“You ready for the weekend?”

“Oh, yeah.” Kevin slammed his gym locker shut and turned to face Matty, beaming at him. He looked like he hadn’t gone to a cabin with buddies… well, ever. “I’m all packed.” He slung his gym bag over his shoulder, and they strolled out of the locker room towards the bus stop for the quick ride down the street.

“Aren’t you an eager beaver?” Matty teased, which made Kevin crack up. He liked making Kevin laugh, though. “I’ll swing by your place to pick you up at like eleven.” He didn’t like driving downtown in Toronto, but going out of the city was fine.

“Eleven? Okay, cool.”

They still hadn’t talked about the damn kisses—any of them. Matty had to catch Kevin alone sometime this weekend. It was gonna be a bit awkward being like “do you wanna kiss me again or were you just fucking with me?”, but it was better than leaving it unspoken and continuing to make out unexpectedly in public.

When they went their separate ways, Matty clapped Kevin’s back and half-hugged him, which was all they seemed to be goddamn doing these days. “See you in a bit.”

“Later, man!”

By the time he got home, Matty had almost stopped thinking of what it would be like to casually kiss Kevin goodbye. He pushed the front door open, trying hard to stop thinking about Kevin’s cute little smile and the way he watched him with bright, attentive eyes when he modeled the exercises the way Glenn wanted them to do them, and…

“Hey, Matty.” From a quick glance at the pile of shoes by the door, everyone else was out, but that was Fisher’s voice. “I made lunch.”

“Sweet, thanks, man. Did you get the meat?”

“I sure did. Did you?”

Matty’s eyes widened as he came around the living room corner. Fisher was grinning broadly. “What the fuck, man?” Matty exclaimed with a laugh, slapping Fisher’s stomach on the way by.

“Ooooh. Sorry,” Fisher snickered. “But you’re ditching us for him a lot lately.” But from the way he said it casually, he didn’t seem to be actually asking the question underneath that. “Have you finally replaced Cam?”

Matty rolled his eyes. There was no replacing Cam, obviously. CJ and Fisher were probably best buds the same way he and Cam had been. But then Cam had to go get himself a heart condition and move to the Maritimes. Sure, he had plenty of buddies around the teams, but there was nothing like having a guy you shared all those midnight wings and six AM practices with.

“Maybe. Glenn was right, he works hard.”

“Good,” Fisher approved and pulled open the fridge to start loading up the cooler with beer while Matty sat at the kitchen table to wolf down the pasta Fisher had made.

Fisher’s first name was Fox, but he hated it so much he’d get aggressive when anyone said it, so they all just knew him by his last name. A lot of people didn’t even know his real first name. It was like that in hockey sometimes—guys got slapped with dumb nicknames, or there was already a Matt or Chris around, so they had to go by Matty or CJ.

It was weird they didn’t have any Kevins around besides this one. Matty knew a few Kevins around his age. None of them had made it up to this level in the last few years, though.

“Speaking of Cam, I wanna go to Fredericton and surprise him later this summer. Since he can’t make it out during bee season,” Matty said.

Fisher laughed. “Bee season.”

“It is,” Matty laughed. “Until, like, fall.”

“Right.” Fisher closed the cooler with a thud and stepped on it to click it shut, then pulled open cupboard doors. “You’re so bereft without him.”

Matty snorted. “Shut up, Mr. I’m gonna cook for CJ’s turn every week instead of making him learn for his damn self.” He brandished his fork at Fisher. “Bereft?” Matty added after a moment. “That’s a fancy word for you.”

Fisher pretended to throw the marshmallow package at Matty’s head and Matty grinned. “Whatever,” Fisher told him. “I meant as a friend. You know what I meant.”

“What, unlike you and CJ?” Matty cleaned his bowl out with bread, then finished that off, too, and downed a few gulps of pop. “When’s the wedding?”

Fisher laughed again, louder this time, and rummaged for their stash of s’mores chocolate bars. “We’ll have a joint wedding with you and new guy. Kevin.”

“Perfect. Cam can be our flower girl.”

Fisher laughed. “What’s his boyfriend’s name? Noah?”

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

“He’ll be the ring bearer, then. Perfect. Now we just need someone who doesn’t suck on piano.”

Matty scrunched up his face in thought as he washed up his lunch dishes. “Or guitar. Drums…?”

“Rock band: wedding edition.”

“Yeah,” Matty laughed, drying off his hands. “Don’t mention it to Kevin ’till I get a chance to propose, though. Might be awkward.” He headed upstairs to pack.

“You got it, man,” Fisher called out after him.

Matty tried hard not to admit to himself that his heart was thudding at the thought. He’d had a dozen conversations like this over the last few years. Bromances were dime-a-dozen here.

It was completely fucking normal.

His glow of nervous excitement about this guy he barely knew yet, he’d locked lips with maybe three times?

That really wasn’t.

* * *

“Hey, Kev!” Matty rolled down the window as he pulled up in front of Kevin’s building. “You want backseat or front?”

“Hey!” Fisher protested. He’d already claimed dibs on the front seat. “I’m shotgun.”

Kevin laughed. “That’s fine. I can take backseat.”

Chris slid over into the middle, next to CJ, leaving room for Kevin in the third seat. Poor Jasmine was sprawled across CJ’s lap, but she didn’t mind. “We won’t even make you go in the middle.”

“O ho ho,” CJ loudly laughed. He was quickly joined by the other guys, even Matty and Kevin.

Matty pretended he didn’t see the flush on Kevin’s cheeks as he opened the back to throw his bag in, then came around the side.

Then, Matty double-checked that the door light was off and everyone was belted in and they were off to the races.

“How’s it going?” CJ asked, leaning forward to see Kevin around Chris.

“Not bad,” Kevin told them. “Just talked to my parents on the phone. They’re missing me already.”

“Oof. Wait for the season,” Fisher winced.

Kevin chuckled. “Everyone keeps saying that.”

“It’s pretty hard,” Matty chimed in, glancing to Kevin in the rearview mirror. “But it’s not that bad, as long as you’re emailing or sending videos or whatever. Time zones are really the worst part. Especially being three hours away—four for you—when that happens.”

Kevin nodded. “Can’t wait for prospect camp, though. They start off with medicals, right?”

The rest of the car was eager to tell Kevin all about what to expect, from the medical to drills and expectations. Matty stayed quiet to focus on getting them out of downtown and onto the 400 north to Georgian Bay.

By the time the Toronto skyline fell around them into massive subdivisions, then housing co-ops, then flat fields and the long, straight stretch north, they were discussing pizza places.

“No, you’re crazy,” Kevin scoffed. “That’s the worst delivery I’ve had yet.”

“Which place did you call? You never call the downtown one.”

“Oh, shit,” Kevin exclaimed. “Really? All franchises are supposed to be the same. That’s the point of a franchise.”

“Yeah, well, they aren’t,” CJ laughed. “You’ll learn real fast.”

Matty smiled to himself, staying out of the conversation for now. It was just nice to hear Kevin getting along fine with the rest of them already.

Not that he’d expected any less. Kevin was easy to get along with, and so were the rest of his buddies.

The lake closed in on the left before long, peeking through gaps in trees. Matty kept a close eye out for their exit, then the dirt road they had to follow down to the dock.

The owner had left the keys for the boat and the house in a steel lockbox. Matty punched in the code and grabbed the keys, then went to pick up his own bag from the back while the guys grabbed theirs, plus the coolers and supplies. He’d had his boating license for years, so the owners were happy to let them have it without a lesson as long as they paid a deposit.

“It’s not that far away, really,” CJ was marveling. It had only been a couple hours’ drive from Toronto, and the time had flown by.

“No, this is super-close. I wish my parents were this close,” Matty laughed.

“Me too,” Kevin said, which made Matty feel instantly guilty. At least he could drive out to see his own family over the weekend if he had a really bad week. Kevin brushed it off by grinning across the lake, though. “Holy shit, we got great weather.”

It was supposed to be clear all weekend, with maybe some cloudy patches one evening, but no rain. That was fine by Matty.

“Yeah,” Chris cheered. “C’mon, someone, grab the other end of this.”

Between them, they carted their stuff down to the boat, got it started, and piled in. They tried to stay more or less balanced, keeping about half of them on each side of the boat. Kevin seemed like he had good sea legs, but CJ stayed sitting down firmly as Matty gradually pushed the throttle.

It didn’t have a strong engine, but it was good enough to get them over the water towards the dock and the blue-sided lake house looming into view beyond.

Matty relaxed as he approached the dock at a careful putter, steering into it until someone could hop ashore and moor the boat.

The cabin looked beautiful even from the outside, they had lots of food, and they had a whole weekend to themselves. As long as he didn’t kiss Kevin in front of everyone, it was gonna be just fine.