“Water,” Lennon croaks.

“I’ll get it,” I say but can’t fucking move.

He rolls off my side and nudges me. “You’re not moving.”

“Can’t.”

Lennon’s laugh gives me the energy to get out of bed, because after that, I’ll get him anything he wants. He could ask me for a pet unicorn, and I’d go find one.

He leans up on his elbows as I grab a towel from the floor and wrap it around my waist.

“So, I’m guessing that was okay?” Lennon’s tone is unsure.

I run my hand through my hair. “More than okay.” I sense he wants to say something else, but he doesn’t. “Is this about the whole topping thing? Because I don’t care if you never want to top me. At all.”

“Are you sure?”

I climb back on the bed, crawling my way to hover above him. “I think we’ve proved multiple times I don’t need a dick in my ass to get off.”

“And people say romance is dead.”

I pinch Lennon’s side, and he laughs.

“I’m gonna go get you some water now, but I don’t want you to worry about this, okay? Even if you did like to top, I so wouldn’t let you until I get bored of fucking you, and I don’t see that happening any time soon.”

A smile breaks out, and he nods.

After a chaste kiss on his lips, I head downstairs with a spring in my step.

And in perfect timing, the front door opens as I reach the foyer, and suddenly, I’m in one of those nightmares where I come face to face with one of my role models while completely naked. The only thing covering my dick is a towel that’s dangerously hanging low and loose.

I’m pretty sure I’m still covered in cum too.

Great.

I’ve met Matt Jackson before. I’ve spoken to him on the phone, and I’m friends with his little brother. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t intimidate me. He was the first out athlete to play an NFL game.

Noah smirks. “Aww, babe, did you get me a birthday present in the form of a naked hockey player? Because that’s awesome.”

Matt elbows his husband in the stomach and then glares at me. “Where’s Jet?”

Uh-oh.

I stand frozen, unable to form words even if it is to defend myself about not being with Jet. “Umm … not here?”

Matt doesn’t seem convinced, and his scowl deepens.

“I swear!”

“Why are y’all hanging out in the doorway?” Jet’s voice comes from behind Matt and Noah, and then he pushes past them. Thank God. “Whoa.”

“Uh, Lennon?” I call out. “Your roommates are here.”

“And Ollie needs some pants,” Jet yells.

“I don’t think he does,” Noah says. “I like my birthday present wrapped in a towel.”

Footsteps thump down the stairs, and Lennon throws pants at me, and then he pushes Noah. “He’s not your birthday present. I’m not that generous a friend.”

Noah gets him in a headlock. “It’s not like I’d fuck him. I’d just want him to walk around the house practically naked and fetch me things. Like beer.”

“Ooh, I want in on that,” Jet says.

Matt joins in. “Yeah, I’d be down for that.”

“Umm …”

Lennon wrestles free of Noah. “They’re fucking with you. You have your brothers. I have these people.”

Noah puts his hand over his heart. “Aww, did you just call me your brother?” But then he screws up his face. “Makes how we met a little gross.”

I cock my head. “How you met?”

Jet bounces on the balls of his feet. “You don’t know that story? That needs to be rectified immediately.”

“As fun as that sounds, I’m, uh”—I grip my towel tighter—“gonna go get dressed first.”

I head for the stairs, but Noah’s voice makes me pause.

“By the way, welcome to the club.”

“Club?” I turn back.

“The everything’s gay club. Meetings are weekly, and on Wednesdays, we wear pink.”

I laugh and shake my head. “Sorry to disappoint, but I’ve been a card-carrying member since I was fifteen. And I look wicked hot in pink.”

Noah turns to Lennon. “I like him, Beatle.”

As I walk away, Lennon complains, “Don’t call me Beatle.”

Followed by Noah saying, “Okay, Ringo.”

In Lennon’s room, I use my towel to finish cleaning myself up before I throw my clothes back on. By the time I get downstairs again, the guys are in the living room watching SportsCenter, but Lennon isn’t with them.

“Where’s—”

Lennon appears around the corner from the dining room, and he pales as his phone shakes in his hand.

“What’s wrong?” I ask. My mind conjures shit about what the media could’ve already printed about me.

“Guess I don’t have to worry about resigning anymore.”

So, not about me. “They fired you?”

Lennon nods.

“Because of us?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “They don’t know we’re together, but they’re pissed I didn’t tell them I knew about you. Or Soren. Because they’re convinced I knew of that too. You know, with my gaydar superpowers.” He huffs a humorless laugh.

“That’s bullshit,” I say.

He didn’t want to out someone so they let him go even though he’s one of their best reporters?

“Hey, guys,” Matt says, staring at his phone. “Why is Ollie all over the news, being ’shipped with some other hockey player?”

“Huh?” I step forward to the back of the couch and look over his shoulder.

“Caleb Sorensen,” Matt says.

Noah leans in and blocks my view of the phone. “Damn. Need me to beat him up for you, Lennon?”

Lennon’s still looking at his phone, but he looks up at that. “You?”

“Okay, fine. I’ll get Matt to do it.”

“Soren’s cool,” Lennon mumbles and goes back to staring at his phone as if wondering if he really got fired.

Matt turns to look at me. “You came out publicly?”

I swallow the lump in my throat. “Yeah.”

“How is your phone not blowing up?” Matt asks.

“Don’t have it on.”

“Ooh, smart.”

As Matt finishes reading the article, the story appears on the TV. Footage from the press conference is played, and it’s weird watching it. It’s like having an out-of-body experience, and the adrenaline that was pumping through me at the time has already faded the memories around the edges. As TV me speaks, I can’t recall saying half the shit I did. I told them about Ash?

I didn’t name him, but he might be pissed.

Oh, fuck. Speaking of pissed, I turned my phone off from the world, but I also just remembered I never got a chance to give my parents a warning.

I take my phone out and go to turn it on when a glass of dark liquid appears in front of me.

“If you’re gonna do that, I might suggest this first,” Jet says.

“Good point.” I throw it back and then hit the button.

I hold my breath as it reboots and notifications start popping up. Missed calls from unknown numbers, my family members, and Ash immediately fill my screen.

Then the messages come.

Ma: I know you’re busy, sweetie, call us when you can. Love you, and so proud. Xx

Dad: Your ma says you should’ve worn a suit but didn’t want to meddle so is making me do it.

I snort at that one. My brothers have sent through their own messages, mostly congratulations and one from Vic being a smartass that says:

Wait, you’re gay!?

I send out a quick group text to let them all know I’ll call them when I can, but I need time for everything to settle first.

Kessler and Petrov and a few other teammates have sent texts of support. There’s one from Bjorn, and I know I shouldn’t open it. I tell myself not to, but my fingers have other ideas.

Bjorn:. So I understand why you’ve been avoiding me since that day in the locker room when I said some hurtful words. Well, one word. I truly am sorry for my stupidity and want you to know I fully support you as a teammate and respect the hell out of you as a friend … if you don’t want to punch me, that is. If you want to punch me, go ahead. Free shot. I’m sorry for being an ignorant prick.

Whether he’s being sincere or not, I don’t know, but at least I know he’s not going to make a problem for me next season. He probably saw what happened to Healy and is saving his ass, but at least he can admit when he’s wrong, or at least pretend so there’s no drama. I decide to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Me: Hey, at least you didn’t fuck my sister. Apology accepted.

Bjorn: LOL! Thanks for being cool about it.

The next one in line is from Ash. I hold my breath as I read over his words.

Ash: I’m stupid to think any of this could’ve been for me, aren’t I? Why him?

I can’t deal with that loaded question right now, so I shoot him a text and apologize for mentioning him at the press conference and tell him we can talk when everything dies down. I can see how he’d assume I did this for Lennon, but it’s not that at all.

Okay, maybe a part of me is excited that I get to have Lennon for real now, but if it weren’t for Soren, I would’ve taken the out today like Lennon asked.

My phone starts ringing in my hand as an unknown call comes through. “And so it begins.”

Instead of answering, I switch my phone off again. If Damon needs me, he can call one of his friends, and if someone from the Dragons needs me, they can call Damon, so there’s no real point torturing me with phone calls I don’t want to deal with.

When I look back up, Lennon’s gone. I didn’t see him slip away while I was distracted.

“Where’d Lennon go?” I ask.

“Drink?” Jet holds up another glass.

“Why are you avoiding answering my question?”

Jets eyes don’t hold their usual spark. “He asked to be left alone for a while and went upstairs.”

Something tells me to respect his wishes, but I go after him anyway.

I bound up the stairs but hesitate outside his room. He just lost his job. He probably wants to be alone to wrap his head around that.

Then why do I get the impression he came up here to get away from me and not everyone else? I don’t have any clue why I think that, but it’s like intuition or some shit.

“Are you okay?” I ask, slipping inside his bedroom and closing the door behind me.

He’s sitting on his bed using his laptop, and he doesn’t look up at me as he grunts his response.

“What are you doing?”

“What do you think I’m doing? I’m emailing everyone I know to see if they’ve got any jobs available.”

Okay, he’s freaking out. “Everything’s going to be okay. You’ll get another job easy.”

Lennon’s fingers stop tapping away, and he glares up at me. “Do you know how many jobs there are for sports journalists out there?”

“Probably about the same amount as there are on the NHL roster,” I point out. “I know about having an unstable job.”

“Then you should know that everything won’t be okay.”

“Weren’t you thinking of quitting anyway?” I ask and immediately know it’s a mistake.

Lennon grits his teeth. “If I quit, I’d have to give two weeks’ notice, and I’d have time to find something else. I would’ve finished out the playoffs and had an opportunity to wrap my head around it. Right now, I’m up shit creek without a paddle.”

“But you’re a great reporter. Any magazine or publication will be lucky to have you.”

“There are a lot of great reporters out there, and media as an industry is practically obsolete.”

“Lennon—”

“Fuck, do you really not understand this? Imagine if what you did tonight cost you your career. Hasn’t that been your fear all along? We’ve been so worried about what coming out will do to your career, we didn’t even think about mine.”

“Wait, now you’re blaming me for this? Are you saying if you knew you’d be fired, you would’ve said something to your editor sooner?” I don’t mean to raise my voice, but I think I’m subconsciously meeting his tone.

“No, but maybe … shit, I dunno, maybe I would’ve distanced myself? Not gotten involved in”—he waves his hand between us—“whatever delusion we’re under.”

“Delusion?”

“Even before I lost my job, this was never going to work. I was going to go back to Chicago, and—”

“Noah and Matt make the New York–Chicago thing work.”

“They can move around together. We don’t have that luxury.”

“Then maybe losing your job wasn’t a bad thing, because now you can stay here.” I would love it if that happened.

“And if my next job is in Atlanta? Or Seattle? Or—”

“New York,” I suggest. “Don’t write us off because you don’t know what’s going to happen.”

Lennon shakes his head. “I can’t help thinking if this was you in my position that you would hold a little resentment over us, but you’re telling me to stay calm.”

“I think you’re prematurely freaking out. You’ve got time to find another job, and if money’s an issue, I could always—”

“No. I’m not taking money from you.”

“It’d be a loan or whatever. I’m just saying there’s no need to panic yet.”

Lennon sighs. “I need some time to wrap my head around this and put some feelers out there so I don’t feel completely helpless right now. Can you … can you just let me do my thing and we’ll talk later?”

I want to keep arguing, because I have no doubt he’ll be grabbed by any sporting magazine looking to hire, but then it occurs to me that no one might be hiring, and if I was staring down the end of my hockey career, I’d be high-strung too.

Still, I don’t want to leave him. I want to stay in this room and prove to him we’re not a delusion. What we have is real whether he’s ready to see that or not.

If he’s not ready, and I push, I’m gonna lose him. If I keep telling him it’ll be fine when he doesn’t believe it, I’ll lose him.

He’s right that if this had happened the other way around and I lost my career tonight, I’d be inconsolable and would most likely take it out on anyone and everyone who tried to rationalize it to me.

And that’s why I know I have to give him space, even if I don’t like it.

I turn on my heel, and head downstairs.

“God, again?” I complain as Soren and I come up on the screen again as soon as I sit down. “Don’t they have like other shit to report on?”

“You’ll get used to it,” Matt says. “At least y’all got each other. I’m still waiting for someone else in football to say somethin’.”

Jet feeds me another drink, and when I down that one, he runs off to get me another.

Matt and Noah talk about shit like nothing’s wrong, but they can all obviously sense the tension after Lennon’s and my fight.

He called us a delusion. Like he has no faith in us ever working out. That it’d be impossible to have a relationship with me. And as much as I keep telling myself he doesn’t truly believe that—it was said in the heat of the moment and in the middle of a freak out—I can’t help running worst-case scenarios in my head.

What if he really can’t forgive that I’m partially responsible for him losing his job? What if he decides being in the limelight isn’t worth it? What if he thinks I’m not worth it.

Ash realized I wasn’t worth waiting for. Maybe Lennon will realize I’m too much effort. Especially if being with me will interfere with his career.

I figure when he calms down he’ll come to find me, but he still hasn’t, and it’s getting late.

“You know, you could always take my seat,” Jet says from where he sits across from me.

“Huh?”

“Well, with how many times you’re turning your head to watch the stairs, I’d say it’d be safer to prevent injury.”

Matt stares at me, concern etched in his scrunched brow. “How was he when you went up there?”

“I’m surprised you didn’t hear him yelling at me.”

All three of them suddenly lose eye contact with me.

“You did hear.”

“It’ll be fine,” Noah says. “Matt and I made long distance work.”

Jet coughs and splutters. “For a few weeks when you were all mopey and broken up. Then you moved for him.”

“Long distance isn’t even the issue right now,” I say. “He’s ready to throw us away because of a possible job that could possibly be in another city. He’s lashing out at me because it’s my personal shit that cost him his job. And the more I think about it, the more I think he has a right to be upset. I just don’t wanna lose him over it.”

“Maybe he needs some space,” Noah says. “Time to clear his head.”

“And what if when his head clears, it tells him to walk away?” I ask, but it’s more to myself than the others. “We’ll be over before we’ve even really started.”

“Then maybe it’ll be better that way.” Noah shrugs. “Because once you’re in, you’re all in, and then it’s so much harder when you have to walk away.”

I stand quickly, because I need to fix this, but I come to the conclusion Jet’s been feeding me doubles as my legs wobble more than after a grueling skate. But I’m not belligerent drunk or angry drunk. I’m just sad drunk.

Sad because the same night I come out to everyone, the rest of my world crumbles.

Sad because we should be celebrating, and instead, I’m worrying about the future and what it could possibly hold for Lennon and me.