Chapter Thirteen #2
Chris watched him go fondly. He was amazed Jayden had sat still for so long. He’d have to visit more often.
“Are you doing okay?” Mara asked in the sudden absence of teenagers.
“Of course. I mean, things are awkward. I’m sure Mooney’s told you all about it.”
“Diego told me about the team, yeah, but how are you?”
“I don’t understand.”
Mara reached out and patted his hand. “I mean, you had a rough night on Halloween, and you’ve been having a rough time in general, huh?”
“Oh. I mean, it’s much worse for Howie, and I don’t know if Tom’s talked to Dmitriyev yet, and—”
Her hand migrated to his shoulder and shook him a little bit.
“Dude. You are allowed to be pissed. They put you in a shitty position. It might not have been on purpose, but it was rude of Jax to assume you would tell him Howie’s secrets because he’s older and smarter, and it was kind of immature of Howie to blame you and storm out. ”
Chris could count on one hand the number of times someone had told him he’d been right. It felt strange, vindicating and hollow all at once. Being right didn’t mean much when one of his best friends hadn’t talked to him in days.
“I think it just played out badly. You know, Howie walking in when everyone was in the middle of explaining things to Hayes. He must have thought they left him out on purpose.”
“They did,” Mara pointed out. “Like, it’s one thing for Jax and Tom to be cool with the team figuring them out when it’s theoretical, but to have it actually happen with Hayes of all people?
And then the Russian thing coming up in the middle of everything?
I bet they got cold feet. And, I mean, I love Howie, and to be honest, I figured he wasn’t straight, but he’s also impulsive.
What if he runs his mouth to the media by accident or something? ”
“He wouldn’t.” Chris had utter confidence in his friend.
Howie might be impulsive, he might be young, he might not be done figuring himself out, but he knew what was at stake for hockey players.
His recent statements online proved it. He wanted to make the world better, safer for everyone.
Chris’s heart hurt at the thought of Howie believing Chris hadn’t seen that about him, had kept things from him out of a lack of trust.
“God, you’re such a nice person,” Mara marveled. “It’s no wonder you ended up being the gay whisperer of your team.”
“I’m the what?”
“Diego’s words.” Mara rolled her eyes. “He wanted to know why no one had come out to him. I love the man, don’t get me wrong, but he has the straightest, jockiest energy of any of you.”
The weight her words took off his chest was as surprising as it was welcome. “And I don’t?”
Her eyes went wide. “Um. Do you not…want to?”
Chris buried his face in his hands. “Mara, I’m so confused.”
“Ooh.”
He looked up to find her smiling widely.
“Okay,” she said, “I am great at this talk. You wanna come to the kitchen and have some tea where no one can hear us?”
“The kids…”
Mara put two fingers in her mouth and whistled. “Sammy, Emily, you’re in charge!”
Two of the taller teens shot her a thumbs-up from the other end of the table, where they were supervising what looked like middle school geography homework.
In the kitchen, Mara put water in the kettle to boil.
She got out a tin and opened it, spreading the smell of Christmas through the room.
Then she poured a carefully heaped spoonful into a little metal egg with holes before putting it in a cup and pouring hot water over the whole thing.
Chris, who up until now had assumed tea came exclusively in bags, watched in amazement.
“That smells so good.”
“I know, right? Trader Joe’s does this almond spice stuff, and it is game-changing. I keep it around for sexuality crises.”
Chris laughed nervously. “I guess you get a lot of those around here.”
“Eh.” She tilted her head to the side. “Less than you’d think. Most everyone here got through the sexuality part of it and is in a regular crisis.”
The tea smelled so good, and her smile was so kind. Chris dared to joke, “So I’m special?”
“The most special. You wanna tell me what’s been going on with you?”
Cradling the warm mug in his hand, Chris started from the beginning: his string of failed attempts at dating, how little he’d always enjoyed sex, Luca’s offer of coaching, how different things felt with him, and now his own unforeseen reactions.
“Can it be that easy?” he asked. “Can I have been secretly gay all along?”
Mara propped her elbow on the kitchen table, pillowing her chin in one hand. She’d nodded along and made listening noises and asked a few questions. (Especially about the mafia, which pleased Chris. No one ever took that part seriously enough.) “I don’t know,” she said. “Does it feel right to you?”
Chris shrugged. “Not really? I’ve never looked at a guy before and felt…anything like what I’m feeling now.”
“Uh-huh. And you say a switch flipped when you two banged?”
Sipping his tea, Chris considered. “Not right away. I mean, the first time was good, too, but it didn’t get me all confused. I liked how much he liked it, but I wasn’t…the way I am now. I don’t know. I guess I wanted to do it again to make him happy. He does so much for me, you know?”
“No, what does he do?”
So, he told her about their excursions to Pike Place Market, the architectural boat tour in Chicago, the ribs in St. Louis, and the delicious, if not authentic—according to Luca—pizza in New York. Then, while he was at it, he told her about the suits and the Berkeley cheese.
“Aw,” she said when he finished. “What a great roommate.”
Chris nodded so fast his neck twinged. “Right! But for some reason, now when people say he’s my roommate, and even when I say so, it makes me feel…I don’t know, gross and sad.”
“Because you have a crush on him and want to be more than roommates.”
He stared at her. “I do?”
She frowned, cocking her head to the side. “You said you were feeling sexy stuff about him, right?”
“No, I mean…this is how a crush feels? Like I would do anything to make sure he keeps living with me? Like he’s the best person I’ve ever met in my entire life? Like I want to lick him all over, including the not-sexy places?”
Mara, who had just taken a sip of her own tea, snorted it all over the table. “Well, yeah, dude.”
“Oh my God,” Chris said. “Oh my God.”
“What?”
It figured he would be stupid about crushes too. “Is there a word for a guy who’s never had a crush in his life until he’s twenty-three and then falls head over heels for his best friend?”
All of a sudden, Mara’s expression cleared. “Yes! There is!”
“Wait, seriously?”
“Yeah.” She beamed at him. “There totally is, Chris, you’re a genius.”
“Really?”
“Wait right here.” She got up and left the kitchen, leaving him alone with his tea and the sudden wild hope he wasn’t broken.
Chris got home from the shelter late, too late for a pregame nap, much less a long, involved conversation with Luca.
He kept the pamphlet from Mara safe in his jacket pocket and decided later would be soon enough.
He had so much to work through in his scrambled brain anyway. Rushing it wouldn’t help.
Of course, then he found out Luca had picked up his suits from Leonora’s shop and was in the middle of cleaning out the dishwasher. He’d rolled up his sleeves to do it, revealing the corded, ropy strength of his forearms.
“You are my favorite person on the entire planet,” Chris said, because it was true, and he didn’t have to feel weird about it anymore.
Luca scoffed.
Chris wasn’t kidding, not even a little bit, but Luca didn’t do big declarations. Chris would have to find a different way to go about things.
“Hey, do you want to go out to eat with my family again when we’re in Montreal?” he asked. “We could do a roommate date after if you want, but I can’t not see them.”
Startled, Luca paused in sorting the silverware. “You are not staying the night with them?”
Chris thought about squeezing into his creaky old twin bed at his parents’ house and listening to them squabble over breakfast. Then, he thought about standing on the deck of a boat with Luca, taking in the sparkling night sky together. “Nah. I’d rather spend time with you.”
A rare smile blossomed across Luca’s face, though he tried to hide it in the silverware drawer.
Chris’s heart beat double-time, and he let himself enjoy the sensation.
“Ready to break the losing streak tonight?”
“It has been two games; it is not a streak. Besides, we already decimated Chicago once.”
Chris offered his fist to bump. But before Luca could return the gesture, he reconsidered and pulled Luca into a hug instead, and then they had to get changed into their suits.
He decided to go with the black suit for tonight. The gray one seemed classier, somehow, and he wanted to save it for when he met up with his family.
Wearing a suit had never been so comfortable.
The waistband on the pants fit just right, and there was no weird bulge around his dick; the shirt, a bright fuchsia, didn’t billow out anywhere leaving a gap in the buttons, and the jacket wasn’t too tight across his shoulders or too short at his wrists.
He’d been watching YouTube videos in preparation for this moment ever since Luca had taken him to see Leonora.
So, he knew how to tie the skinny black tie so that the even skinnier part stayed hidden, and he knew to close only one button on the jacket.
Although, Chris thought it was kind of stupid to bother putting a second button on the jacket in the first place if you weren’t supposed to use it.
Examining himself in the mirror on his closet, he couldn’t deny he looked…good.
It didn’t make his face any different than it always had been, but in well-fitting clothes, Chris looked big and strong, and his features matched his body. He wasn’t a different guy or anything, but maybe he had graduated from being a potato to being a French fry.