Chapter Twelve #2
“Okay, everyone,” Lunes said, “we’re going to try some five-on-five today.
Grab your sticks, grab some pucks, we’ll warm up.
And remember to be careful with each other.
Pucks hurt when they hit you.” He grinned at the assembled kids, and they grinned back.
“Also, our coach is watching today, so make us look good!”
He handed out sticks, high-fiving each kid as they got on the ice. Most of them immediately skated over to Breezy and high-fived him as well.
Ben scanned the ice looking for Charlie. He must not have left the changing room yet. Goalie pads did take forever to get into.
“They’re pretty good with the kids, huh?” A woman with the bisexual flag dyed into her hair took a seat next to Ben.
“Yeah. Um, I’m Ben. Morris. The coach.” He would be so thankful when he could finally quit this charade. None of the words he’d just said felt right in his mouth.
“Mara. Head administrator at the shelter.”
“Wow.”
She raised a pierced eyebrow at him.
“You seem young for that role, is all.” She couldn’t be more than twenty-five.
“Yeah, well, in some jobs, life experience is more important than work experience.”
Ben nodded in agreement. He looked down at the ice, where the kids did laps or passed one another pucks sloppily. Breezy kept pace with them, offering tips and corrections.
“I didn’t think they’d be good at this,” Ben admitted.
“Me neither. I was like, am I sure this is worth the money? But they offered us a lot of money, so.”
Ben rolled his eyes. Athletes. “Never met a problem they couldn’t throw money at, I guess.”
“Too bad it fixes so many problems.”
“Mm. It would serve them right to find something they couldn’t achieve with cash.”
Mara snorted. “Don’t you earn basically the same?”
Oh, right. “Um, not quite.”
“Uh-huh.”
Desperate for a change of subject, he examined Lunes handing out neon-orange vests to separate out teams. “Mooney—uh, Lunes, I mean—he’s really gotten into this, huh?”
“Diego’s nickname is Mooney?” A look of unholy glee stole across Mara’s face, the universal expression of a person who had found something with which to mock a friend.
“Any chance of you forgetting I said that?”
“Not even a little. Tell me more.”
Ben winced. “I think I’d like to keep the second power play unit intact, thanks.”
“Boo, boring. Please?”
She turned wide, hopeful blue eyes on him, and he almost gave in. But then, the sight of Charlie skating onto the ice with Phil hot on his heels distracted him.
Ben was on his feet in an instant. “Phil, your knee. You can’t—”
“I’m supposed to put pressure on it if I can,” Phil said.
“You haven’t been cleared to skate though. You—”
“Five minutes,” Phil wheedled. “Just five minutes. Come on. Let me see Charlie block his first shot.”
Ben softened. Phil had gotten Charlie interested in sports and had found a group he could take part in easily. He deserved to see him succeed. “If it starts hurting—”
“I’ll get off the ice. Promise.”
Mara watched the exchange with interest. “Charlie’s your nephew, right?”
Ben nodded.
“You’re doing a great thing, taking him in.”
“I’m doing the bare minimum,” Ben said sharply. Down below, Phil had both hands on Charlie’s shoulders, impressing final pointers on him.
Mara shifted in her seat, the thick wool of her coat whispering against his sleeve. “Any one of the other kids down there would kill for the bare minimum. You’re doing great.”
Phil was doing great. How much would Charlie miss out on if Ben stuck to his plan and insisted on moving Charlie out of his house? Would marrying Phil keep him in Charlie’s life, funding things Ben couldn’t afford and offering experiences Ben couldn’t?
Except then, Ben would be married to Phil.
He wanted the best for Charlie, but surely the best included modeling healthy relationships.
Getting married to an ostensibly straight guy so he could get guardianship of his nephew was a bonkers plan, no matter how well said straight guy treated said nephew.
And doing it for the money made Ben feel dirty even though he knew people had been marrying for much worse reasons for hundreds of years.
Could he put up with feeling gross for four years until Charlie graduated high school?
Four years might pass quickly in the grand scheme of life. But then there would be college, and Phil had enough money to pay for that as well. Worst-case scenario, Ben was looking down the barrel of an eight-year marriage to a man who wanted to take care of him but didn’t love him.
“Aw, Phil is in coach mode,” Mara said next to him.
Phil crouched, the thighs Ben had put his mouth all over straining against his jeans as he demonstrated proper goalie posture to Charlie.
He winced as he skated off the ice, and the kids’ game of five-on-five started up.
Ben wondered whether Phil would let him draw a bath tonight. His knee must be sore.
Ben was so screwed.
On the way home—on the return journey to Phil’s house, not home—Charlie chattered a mile a minute.
He’d blocked ten shots. He’d also let in eleven, but for his first time as a goalie, Phil assured him those were decent stats.
He talked about the game, which was far more civilized than what Ben saw on the ice on a thrice-weekly basis.
No one had been slashed or cross-checked, and while a few of the older teens did experiment with shouldering one another into the boards, no one had left the ice with visible bruises.
Phil blamed their hesitance on being on skates for the first time; Ben figured they were just better people than most professional hockey players.
“Hey now,” Phil said with a pout.
Ben wanted to kiss the pout off his face.
He made chicken teriyaki for dinner and scrubbed the pans and the plates and the counters viciously afterward.
Phil and Charlie retreated to the living room to catch the last period of the Eastern Conference games, leaving him to it.
Unfortunately, while cleaning usually calmed Ben’s brain, today it made his thoughts race in more and more hectic circles.
This wasn’t helped by Trout texting him at quarter past seven to let Ben know “his guy” would be at the team’s New Year’s Eve shindig, and he would make the introductions then.
By the time Ben decided he couldn’t find anything else to occupy his hands in the kitchen, Charlie had already gone upstairs. Should Ben have instituted some sort of “say goodnight before you vanish” rule? He had no idea what the whole legal guardian thing entailed.
Maybe Ms. Rodriguez had gotten it right. Maybe Ben ought to give up now—call her and tell her the truth about his living situation and his job situation and his Phil situation.
“Bet you he’s lying in bed staring at his phone.
We’re going to have to reconsider letting him use it all the time,” Phil said from the couch, leg propped up and ESPN on.
“I did some research, and apparently, some people have dedicated media time for their kids. Like, he gets an hour in the evening with his phone, and then we take it away.”
He couldn’t call her. Charlie deserved to have Phil in his life, even if Ben didn’t.
He had to call her before he talked himself into marrying Phil.
“Huh,” Ben said, “I’m kind of relieved he’s making friends so fast, though, and you need a phone for that nowadays. Anyway, he seems a little old for us to take away his stuff randomly.”
Phil tilted his head to the side. “Maybe. But he could see all sorts of shit online. We could at least put some filters on the Wi-Fi so he can’t access the really messed-up stuff.”
Raising a doubtful eyebrow, Ben asked, “Do you know how to do that?”
“I would hire someone, obviously.”
“Obviously.” Ben leaned onto the back of the couch, chin hovering over Phil’s shoulder while the game recap showed the New York Liberties losing 1–3 to the Montreal Wyverne. “What about when we want to use the internet for messed-up shit?”
“I think you can enter a password to get around the filters? I don’t know this stuff. I’m old.”
“Hey.” Ben poked him in the shoulder. “If you’re old, what am I?”
“Geriatric.”
“Thanks. You’re serious about the phone thing?”
Phil sighed and tilted his head up to look at Ben.
“Yeah. I mean, we don’t have to be super strict about it, and we should definitely talk to him about it before we do anything.
But I don’t want him to get sucked into anything too brain-rotting.
Mooney and Breezy were making TikTok videos with the kids in the locker room, and honestly, if I could delete that app from the universe, I would. ”
He really was old. A wave of fondness overtook Ben. “Hey,” he said. “How’s your knee tonight?”
Phil made a face. “You want me to admit you were right, and I shouldn’t have gotten on skates?”
“No. I wanna know if I can draw you a hot bath. Maybe some Epsom salts.”
“Oh.” Phil’s face smoothed out into a smile. “That would be great, actually.”
“All right. Come on, old man. I’ll help you up the stairs.”
Strictly speaking, Phil didn’t need help with the stairs anymore and hadn’t since Ben had put the rope up. Since he used his crutches less and less now, Phil could manage even better.
But Phil said, “Sure.”
So, Ben got the pleasure of wrapping his arm around Phil’s waist, the heavy pressure of Phil’s arm over his own shoulders, and the heated line of their sides pressed together.
For a defenseman, Phil ranged more on the tall and slender side, at least in comparison to Hayes and Breezy.
Ben liked that he could take on some of Phil’s weight, support him in this physical way.
Especially when ever since he’d moved in, Phil had been supporting Ben as a coach and as an uncle to Charlie.
Doing this, helping Phil, meant a return to form.
Ben only lived in his house to provide physical assistance, and it was good to remember that.
The pale, rust-colored carpet in Phil’s bedroom felt plush under Ben’s socked feet as he led Phil through the room to the en suite.
They stopped at the hamper for Phil to take off his shirt, his pants, and his socks, leaving him once again in nothing but loose boxers.
Ben had seen it all before, had touched it, had licked it even, but he still couldn’t keep his eyes away from the swell of Phil’s dick or the firm muscles of his thighs.
“You know,” Phil said conversationally, “you should probably take off your clothes too. Might get wet.”
“In a minute.”
Ben got Phil situated in the bathroom, sitting on the closed toilet lid, and turned on the water in the enormous bathtub.
He spared a guilty thought for the Bay Area’s perennially low water supply and let it fill as he sprinkled some Epsom salts in.
As they dissolved, the bathroom filled with sharp, eucalyptus-scented steam.
The humidity made Ben’s shirt cling to his skin, so he ducked into his room and pulled off his clothes, leaving his briefs on.
He didn’t look down at himself as he returned to the bathroom and locked the door.
Phil was toned, and even sitting down, his stomach looked good.
Ben, already stocky by nature, found that as he aged, it had become harder to keep the weight off.
He didn’t mind; he felt comfortable in his own body.
But his stomach and thighs jiggled much more than Phil’s, and he didn’t want to think about how he contrasted with the professional athletes Phil regularly saw naked.
A few inches of water now filled the palatial tub, so he helped Phil to his feet and led him over to the edge, keeping firm eye contact on Phil’s shoulder.
“You’ve seen it all before,” Phil pointed out, his voice deep and rich with amusement.
With such explicit permission, Ben couldn’t stop himself from looking, first at Phil’s face, at the crow’s feet around his eyes when he smiled, and then down the swell of Phil’s pecs, the planes of his stomach (just as flat and toned as remembered) and finally, to the apex of his magnificent thighs, where his dick rested, a little plumper than it would normally be.
Ben swallowed heavily.
Phil stepped into the tub, holding on to Ben with one hand and the stainless-steel rail by the side of the tub with the other. He lowered himself into the water with a gratified sigh. “Oh, that feels good.”
Phil was not the only one having trouble staying soft.
“So were you serious this morning?” Ben asked, desperate to change the subject.
“Yes, I do want to marry you if it helps you keep Charlie.”
“Good to know,” Ben said weakly. “But I meant about retiring.”
“Oh.” Phil sighed and stretched, sinking just a little deeper into the water. “Yeah. Yeah, I think so.”
“You love hockey.”
Phil smiled up at him. Ben gripped the edge of the tub.
His knees felt a little weak. “I do. But hockey doesn’t love me back.
It never has, and when I was younger and healthier, I could put up with it.
But now…I’m never going to be hurting for money.
Haggling out another deal for a year or two or getting sent halfway across the continent if the Sea Lions won’t keep me…
it’s not worth it. If I keep going, I’ll only break my body more. ”
“Phil…”
“What?”
“It’s my fault.”
Silence thrummed heavily through the bathroom, thick and heavy in the air as the steam from the bath, while Phil processed the statement.
“What do you mean?”
“Your knee, you having to retire, the team being the mess it is…everything. I’m not really a hockey coach.”