Game six against the Grizzlies was honestly one of the most boring games I’ve played in my whole life. I didn’t know what was going on with them, maybe there had been issues with their flight or something, but they looked like zombies out on the ice. We were beating them six to one and the clock was quickly winding down on the third period. The boys on the bench were laughing and smiling, knowing that if we didn’t royally fuck up in the next three minutes, we would be playing in the championship game.

I squeezed in next to Steve as the Grizzlies called their timeout. My roommate was smiling, but it wasn’t a jubilant smile like the rest of the boys had. He looked like he felt pretty useless, which he kind of was, but I still felt bad about it.

True to my word, I had been spending the bulk of my free time teaching him how to skate and puck handle. Honestly, he wasn’t too bad at it. Given a couple more months of practice he’d probably be about on the same level that our fourth line was at the beginning of the year. I really wanted to give him a moment of recognition for all of his hard work, and for stepping in last minute to be a subject of ridicule like he had. He deserved some crazy story to tell his and Shan’s cute racially ambiguous babies one day, and it didn’t seem like there was going to be any better chance than this one.

“Coach,” I said loudly enough to draw everyone’s attention. “Put Steve in for the last shift.”

Everyone, including Steve, looked at me like I was crazy.

“No way,” said Hawthorne. “He’ll get himself killed.”

“No, he won’t. I’ve been working with him. We’re on home ice and we’re about to go to the championships. Might as well give the crowd a show. It’s not like they’re going to score five goals in one minute.”

Coach still didn’t look convinced. This is where Sal took it upon himself to cup his mouth with his hands and start chanting Steve’s name at the top of his lungs. The rest of us quickly joined in, banging our sticks on the ground in unison. It didn’t take long for the crowd to catch on to what we were doing and pretty soon they were all screaming his name too.

Coach threw his head back and gave us a lofty sigh.

“Fine. Whatever.”

The whistle blew and Steve followed me, Sal, Fish, and Mills onto the ice. The cheering from the crowd above was deafening. I guided Steve into the left-wing position at center and then leaned in to whisper in his ear.

“I’m gonna do everything I can to get you the puck. Keep control of it just the way I showed you in practice and try and get it into the empty net. Do it as fast as you possibly can or else you’re gonna get hit.”

Steve tightened his grip on the handle of his stick and nodded, face set and full of determination. I moved into my own position before the refs could call me for delay of game.

The other team’s center ended up winning the faceoff, but Sal was able to quickly recover. He sent the puck over to me and I scanned the ice to find Steve who was standing still and unopposed next to the Grizzlies’ blueline. I shouldered my way past a defenseman and shot the puck in his direction. It ended up going wide and bouncing off of the boards to his left, but Steve chased it down and got it under control. His arms were shaking and his movements were sloppy, but he was making forward progress nonetheless.

“Faster, Steve!” I shouted, stopping short to hold off the Grizzly behind me. Fish and Mills could only do so much and Sal was way too tiny to defend. If Steve didn’t make the shot soon, he’d miss his golden opportunity.

The screaming crowd started counting down the final ten seconds of the game as Steve made it into shooting range. He pulled back his stick slowly and lightly tapped the puck in. It crossed over the line a second before the clock ran out. The goal lit up and the buzzer sounded. Every single person in the crowd was up on their feet. Steve was standing there in shock as the announcer read out his name and number for the goal. The rest of the team was spilling out onto the ice and heading his way, but I was the first to wrap Steve up in a hug.

“Pretty cool, huh?” I asked.

Steve just grinned wickedly and shook his head. Even though it had been far from a game winner, the guys were more than happy to let Steve bask in the glory of his first, and probably only, goal. We even did the thing where we lifted him over our heads while chanting his name. Soon enough yellow and red confetti came blasting down from the rafters.

This was real. We were heading to the championship game.

After the spectacle and the noise levels had died down a bit, friends and family started joining us out on the ice too, led by a grinning McAvoy. Among this group was Shannon who ran to Steve and nearly toppled him with her embrace.

“That was so freaking cool!” she shouted, giving her boyfriend a kiss. Steve blushed and rested his hands over his waist.

“Yeah, well. No big deal.”

Shannon laughed and disentangled herself long enough to give me a hug too, albeit a lot less forceful one.

“You should go out into the hallway,” she said, pulling away and nodding toward the bench.

Frowning, I turned around. Then I saw that hovering awkwardly in the open space behind where the friends and families had just spilled out was Mark.

My gut twisted. What was he doing here? Did he just get dragged along as Shannon’s plus one or was he here to see me? He had to be, right? Otherwise he totally would have left by now.

I took a few gliding steps forward and then stopped. This place was absolutely swarming with people. A lot of those people were press and they were probably going to want to talk to me. I chewed on my bottom lip.

As if sensing my distress, our resident hockey dad skated over to me and placed a hand on my shoulder.

“Go talk to him in the changing room,” Sal said. “We’ll handle the press and make sure nobody goes back there for a while.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course. They’re all probably more interested in talking to Steve anyway. You’re old news, superstar.”

I laughed. I felt like giving him a hug, but we’d already done that several times in the five minutes since we’d won the game. I settled for a nod and a quick wave over his shoulder at Tiffany who was standing near Vinny and Phony and beaming at both of us. Then I booked it off of the ice as fast as I could without drawing too much attention to myself.

When I was finally standing in front of Mark it was like he took all of my breath away and just kept on holding it, keeping it all for himself. He was wearing a Dog Chocolate T-shirt and ripped skinny jeans with his signature brown leather jacket. His hair was perfectly messy and longer than it had been the last time I saw him. He had surpassed man bun territory and was slowly transitioning into a full-blown hippie.

“Hey,” I said, though I don’t know how I managed it with no breath. “What are you doing here?”

It was a dumb thing to lead with, sure, but I’m an idiot. We’ve already established that.

Mark took a deep breath and removed his hands from his jacket pockets.

“Shannon was coming to support Steve and I, uh, wanted to thank you for taking care of me on...well, you know the night.”

I shrugged, mildly embarrassed.

“Oh, no problem. I was just returning the favor really. It was the least I could do.”

Mark licked his lips ever so slightly and I could feel that tiny gesture prickle at the base of my spine and turn my stomach inside out. I wanted to touch him so badly, but I didn’t know if I was still allowed to do that. Judging from Mark’s troubled expression, he didn’t seem to know either.

“I, uh...I also wanted to talk to you about some things that I’m pretty sure were said that night. I don’t remember everything, but I think I know enough.”

I sucked in a breath and glanced down the long open hallway. This was a conversation we probably shouldn’t have while we were still in full view of everyone on the ice. I placed the lightest of touches over Mark’s protruding wrist bone and urged him deeper into the bowels of the arena.

“Come on,” I said.

I could feel his eyes on me as he followed behind, taking extra time to assess my pads and skates and the stilted way they made me walk. I led him into the changing room and sat down in my usual spot. He stood in the middle of the room on top of the big Vipers logo where Sal, and occasionally Hawthorne, gave us motivational speeches.

“This is so weird,” Mark said, eyes wide and roaming. I took off my skates while he was looking his fill. Finally, he came and sat down next to me. I wiped a little bit of the lingering sweat from my neck and placed my hands in my lap.

“So…” I said. “How have you been?”

Mark raised his brows and gave a tiny rasping laugh.

“I’ve been better,” he said. Then his mouth flattened into a hard line. “I’m so sorry for anything I said or did while I was drunk. I’m sorry you had to see me like that. And I’m sorry it got so bad that Shan had to drag you into it.”

I shook my head.

“You have absolutely nothing to be sorry for. She didn’t drag me into anything. I was just as worried about you as she was. And for the record, you didn’t do or say anything bad; well, I mean, there were some not so nice things said to Shannon, but I’m one thousand percent sure she’s already forgiven you.”

He took his bottom lip between his teeth and gave a stern nod.

“Well, still. I shouldn’t have done it. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

I put a hand on his knee.

“Everybody makes mistakes. This doesn’t undo any of your hard work or make you a bad person. You don’t need to feel bad about relying on the people who love you sometimes. That’s what we’re here for.”

Mark’s eyes fell closed and he nodded.

“I think I understand about the hockey thing,” he whispered. “I’ve been doing some research and looking into professional players, and at first it seemed like one of the most accepting sports in the world; I had no idea what you were so freaked out about, but then I kept digging and I saw all the fines and wrist slaps for people using slurs and all of these dudes buying their way out of sexual assault charges. I get why someone wouldn’t want to be out in that world. I even get why you’d want to keep your private life completely separate. What I don’t get is how you could love something so much and not tell me. I feel like I got to know you under false pretenses. Like the version of you that I know isn’t the same version everyone else does.”

It was my turn to close my eyes.

“I think you may be right about that,” I said, “but the version you know is just as real, and just as much me as all of the others. Also, he loves you very much. Every version of me does.”

I offered him my open palm and he immediately threaded his fingers through mine.

“I’m sorry for lying to you.” I said.

Mark gave my hand a squeeze.

“Yeah, well. I probably could have handled it better. I should have given you the chance to explain and all that crap. Do me a favor though and never lie to me again, unless I’m getting fat. You can lie to me about that.”

“Deal.”

Mark leaned into me and rested his head against my waist.

“I missed you so much,” he breathed.

I wrapped my arm around his shoulder and held him tight.

“I missed you too.”

After a few perfect serene moments I started lazily playing with strands of Mark’s hair.

“So... where are we?” I asked, “because I really, really want to kiss you right now, but I also don’t want to fuck this reconciliation up by overstepping, and I—”

The last part of my sentence died on my lips as Mark kissed me. It was rough and desperate and full of all the emotions that had been welling up between us in the last couple of months. My back was digging into the side of my cubby, but I couldn't bring myself to care. It felt like every inch of my body had been suddenly and abruptly awoken from hibernation, and now I got to bask in the beautiful glow of sunshine.

I was starting to get hard, and I’m pretty sure Mark was too because when he pulled back the first thing he said was, “You have no idea how badly I want to fuck you in your hockey uniform.”

I laughed and wrapped my arms around his neck.

“Well, I happen to know for a fact that my dorm room is currently empty and I think my roommate will be occupied for a while.”

We grinned mischievously.

“Are you going to get in trouble for sneaking away?”

I shrugged.

“Probably, but what are they gonna do? Fire me?”

I slipped on tennis shoes and kept all of the rest of my gear. Then I poked my head out into the hallway to make sure the coast was still clear.

“Come on,” I whispered. “I know of a secret exit near the equipment room.”

“Won’t it be locked?”

“Yes, but I have a key.”

Mark rolled his eyes.

“Of course you do.”

Back on campus, Mark and I somehow made it all the way from the parking garage to my residence hall without touching, but as soon as we were safe within the confines of my room, all bets were off. His hands were on my face and my mouth was on his and my heart was beating so hard and fast that I could actually hear it.

Mark kissed me into the side of my bed and I fell back onto it with pleasure. He held himself over me and ran his fingertips over the top of my jersey.

“What’s under here?” he wondered aloud.

I sat up enough to tug it off, revealing my grimy sweat soaked pads and my plain white T-shirt underneath. Mark poked at them carefully and then frowned.

“Is all that really necessary?”

“It is if you don’t wanna break a rib or damage your internal organs.”

“Noted.”

He rolled off of me and placed his hand on my upper thigh, dangerously close to where I wanted it. Let’s just say that I had never been more aware of my athletic cup than I was right now. I told him so, I couldn’t not. Mark’s pupils expanded and he pulled off his shirt before undressing me from the waist down. It took some time for him to figure out how to unclip my socks and shin pads, but soon enough I was free and on display.

Mark sucked in a shaky breath and took me into his mouth. My head lolled back and I stuck my fist in my mouth to keep from crying out. Unlike last time we did this here, there were people next door and all up and down the hall. They would hear every last sound. Although, to be fair, they’d probably just assume it was Steve and Shannon back at it again.

Right before I was about to burst, Mark pulled off of me. He stood up and peeled off his jeans quickly and clumsily. Then he rummaged around in my desk until he found the bottle of lube I had invested in after our first time. This time he barely spent any time preparing me. He knew I could take it, which gave me a weird secret thrill.

Mark fucked me on my back with my legs thrown up around his shoulders and one hand tugging on the collar of my shoulder pads. It was undisputedly the hottest thing I’d ever seen.

“Gonna cum,” I whispered.

Mark continued fucking me and caught my cum in his hand so that it wouldn’t get on my gear. Less than a second later he was cumming too, thrusting into me so forcefully it was making the bed rock. Afterward he slumped down on top of me and buried his head in my chest plate. I could feel his stomach moving rapidly against mine as he fought to regain control of his breathing. We could have laid there forever, basking in the glow of being back together, but of course, the universe had other ideas.

I heard the rattling of the doorjamb after it was already too late to do anything about it. Mark tensed up and I did my best to hide his exposed ass cheeks as Steve walked in.

Steve immediately dropped the bag he was carrying and covered his eyes with both of his hands.

“Jesus H. Christ, you guys!”

Steve turned to leave and despite my mortification I couldn’t help but laugh. This was irony at its finest. I threw a pillow at him on his way out.

“Now you know how I feel!”