Chapter Text
“You better start planning that date!” Brad chirps the night he notches his 80th point of the season, on the way back to the locker room.
“What date?” Patrice asks with alarm. He loves his teammates, but if he’s been set up on yet another blind date, he might take the nearest skate blade and hurl it at someone.
“Our date.” Brad sounds almost hurt that Patrice doesn’t remember. “The one you promised to take me on when I hit hundred points in a season.”
Come again?
“I--”
Oh.
Thinking about it, he did promise Brad that.
Long before Patrice came to think of Brad as a good friend, and on occasion, his hockey soulmate, the word he associated with him the most was ‘unexpected.’ Brad was loud and he was a lot to handle but above and beyond that, for a solid year Patrice had no idea what he would say or do at any given moment. Such as when Brad cornered him after his first NHL call-up and asked, dead serious, whether Patrice would take him out on a date when he got one hundred points.
“I--huh?” Patrice said eloquently.
“It’s a simple question,” Brad replied, a little impatient at having to repeat himself. “When I get a hundred points in a season, will you take me out on a date or no?”
He didn’t even get close to the net in that game, let alone provide an assist, let alone score his first goal. Patrice reminded him of this.
Brad rolled his eyes.
“I’m thinking long-term here bro, never said it was going to be this season.”
He was looking at Patrice with wide, eager eyes, and a boatload of barely contained energy--not unlike a puppy.
Patrice didn’t know what to say or do except to chuckle and tell him he didn’t see why not.
Brad grinned at him with his entire being at that. Somewhere between a training camp and a pre-season friendly he had decided that Patrice was his favorite person on earth and Patrice didn’t know what to do with that either, not yet.
“We have a deal,” Brad said, “you better start planning early though because I am very hard to please.
And with that he sauntered away, whistling a tune, leaving Patrice standing in the hallway and looking after him, quite unsure of what just happened.
That was nine years ago.
Patrice didn’t realize Brad remembers. He definitely didn’t.
And yet here they are, Brad once again excited like a kid who has been let loose in a candy shop and Patrice almost too stunned for words.
“Of course,” Patrice manages to say with a chuckle just as they reach the locker room, “a promise is a promise, granted you actually pull it off this time.”
*
Brad does.
*
Patrice has always had a knack for planning dates. But it’s one thing when it’s a girl you want to impress, and another when it’s your best friend.
For one, Brad is gay and Patrice isn’t. He doesn’t know if a date with a dude is supposed to be different than a date with a girl, if so how, and it’s not like he can ask around.
For two, it is a little bit weird however you look at it. Patrice isn’t into men. Best friends don’t go on dates.
But the hardest part, he finds, is that he almost always kisses his dates at the end unless the date has gone disastrously. Would that be expected of him here? Patrice hasn’t ever thought about kissing Brad, except in the abstract once or twice, and really has no desire to do that with him or with any other man.
He tries to think about it now. His hand on the back of Brad’s neck, Brad’s lips rough--manly--against his own even in a chaste press of lips. The breeze from the harbor cool on their skin.
With a shake of his head, Patrice stops that train of thought and starts googling--best first date ideas for gay men--he will just have to suck it up and get it over with, if that’s what Brad wants. Of every homophobe who hurt Brad in this league, Patrice refuses to be one--not when he can help it.
And honestly? He’s put his mouth in worse places before.
*
Patrice takes his time getting ready. A date is a serious business. He puts on nice jeans, a white form-fitting shirt and a cardigan that he knows is Brad’s favorite. He styles his hair, puts on cologne and checks himself out in the mirror, pleased with the result.
The last piece in the puzzle are the flowers. Patrice ordered them last week, the night Brad notched his hundredth point. Sunflowers. Not heavy like roses or orchids but beautiful in their own way, with an ability to light up any room they are in. Not unlike Brad in that respect, either. Besides, there is that one time when he was coming off of anesthesia, he clasped Brad’s hand in his own and told him with utmost seriousness that Brad was the sun. His sun. Brad had glowed with the praise for a month afterwards.
Brad takes one look at the flowers when he opens the door and gives Patrice his best grin. He looks well put-together too, handsome in a V-neck tee and a blazer, casual but smart.
“Yo, you got me flowers?” he asks happily.
“Only the best for my date,” Patrice replies, which gets him an even wider grin. He wonders whether Brad’s other--real--dates pick him up like this at the door too or if they meet up some place.
Brad places the flowers in a vase by the windows overlooking the harbor with care, smiling and chattering all the while, clearly floored at the gesture. Do his other dates bring him flowers too? He knows for a fact the last guy he dated didn’t, not once, the asshole. Patrice should have punched him like he considered doing at the time, while he had the chance.
“Ready?”
“Oh baby,” Brad grins--it would be a smirk if it was twenty percent less happy--“I have been ready for a decade.”
*
He takes Brad to his favorite restaurant in the North End.
Mike, the owner, greets them at the entrance, smiling at them both, tells them to follow him as he leads the way up the stairs.
He gave Patrice a quizzical look when Patrice first told him he needed the table for a date, and an even more quizzical one when Patrice explained who his date was going to be. But then Patrice explained their deal and how he ended up where he is, and Mike laughed, in that booming voice of his, understanding glinting in his eyes. He is a good man.
Once they are seated--well, it’s strange to see his table like that. With a single flower in a small glass vase next to the ever present candle, and with a person--with Brad across from him.
Brad seems to find it strange too, though for a different reason.
“Dude, I’ve been to this restaurant at least a dozen times, but I didn’t even realize this table existed,” he says, astonishment high in his voice.
Patrice’s table is by the back wall, shrouded in shadows and lit only by a small candle--hidden in plain sight even as the restaurant is bustling with patrons around them.
“That’s kind of the point. I didn’t want people to--” Patrice stops at the look that crosses Brad’s face before he can say something disastrous. Something like I didn’t want people to get the wrong idea.
“I wanted to take you somewhere special,” he says instead, “Ever since I inherited this table it’s been where I come to clear my head, alone, and I wanted you to be the first person I brought here with me.”
Brad doesn’t even attempt to hide his surprise at that--and pleasure if Patrice reads it correctly. He leans in and narrows his eyes, a picture of pure focus.
“What do you mean inherited?”
Patrice laughs. Because here is a story.
When he was concussed, back in 2007, his teammates all tried to show support in their own way. They cooked for him to the best of their ability, which was not much, came over to hang out with him, even when that meant sitting in a dim room and talking in soft voices, and told him he would be back. Zee pulled him from the deep wells of self-pity more than once. Tim for his part--Tim who didn’t like any of them and didn’t like much in general--gave him a call one day and said they were going out for dinner. It wasn’t a question.
“Wait,” Brad interrupts, his eyes quite wide now. “Tim as in--Tim Thomas? You are shitting me.”
“I assure you that I am not shitting you. The one and only.”
Brad nods, more interested now than ever.
He had been just as surprised, and too stunned to say no. Thinking of, that seems to be a pattern in Patrice’s life.
So Tim had brought Patrice here--just the once and using the back entrance and through the kitchens--led the way to a table so out of the way it was hiding in plain sight. It was a quiet dinner; Patrice never figured out what to talk to Tim about, and Tim didn’t care much for talking to people in general. Midway through it he did look at Patrice though, and said, ‘you are strong, kid, and fuck that concussion in the ass if it thinks it can stop you.’ It had been...oddly touching.
“Then, when he was leaving Boston, he handed me this card right, with the phone number of the restaurant's owner scribbled on it and said ‘the table is all yours kid. I will let you know if I need it back.’”
Brad shakes his head. “That is wild, man,” he says, a sentiment with which Patrice wholeheartedly agrees.
Now, all Patrice has to do if he wants the table is to call half an hour in advance and it will be ready for him, no questions asked.
He pictures Tim’s face if he knew Patrice was using his table for a date--and not with someone with nice boobs and a curvy ass. With a man. With Brad.
He would probably spit in Patrice’s face, never mind promises and that their ‘date’ isn’t even real.
“Funny as that story is, can we not talk about Tim Thomas on our date?” Brad asks. Patrice might be imagining the hint of unease in his voice. He used to be so cautious around Tim. You couldn’t tell if you didn’t know Brad--outwardly he was still everyone’s favorite pest--but Patrice would notice the tension in his shoulders, the way he held himself a little tighter.
Patrice didn’t know, of course, back then.
“Of course, yeah.” He hasn’t realized his hand has balled into a fist where it’s resting on his thigh now. He uncurls it and rubs his fingers on his jeans. “What should we talk about?”
Brad is thoughtful for a moment--what do you talk about on a pretend date with your best friend?--then he leans back in his chair, and says with his usual charm,
“Tell me whatever story you tell your dates to make yourself appear personable and endearing.”
Patrice frowns.
“I’m not sure what that means.”
Brad tips his chair forward again and leans in so that his elbows are on the table. He looks at Patrice and his eyes are sharp. Brad gets distracted a lot on his own but once he has honed in on something, it’s very hard for someone else to take his attention away from it.
“Oh come on, you know exactly what I mean. It’s a harmless instance where you fucked up-- you tell it to make yourself look human and silly without raising any real alarm bells or giving away anything important. You go on too many dates not to have one.”
Patrice half-scoffs in protest. He does not go on ‘too many dates.’ And half of those dates, he would like to remind Brad, have been blind dates set up by friends and teammates who were concerned for why he hasn’t settled down yet with a pretty wife and 2.5 angelic kids.
Patrice opens his mouth but before he can say anything Mike tears through their bubble with a basket of bread in one hand and wine on the other.
“Some bread and wine for our beautiful couple,” he says with a jovial grin, keeping his voice just low enough that it won’t carry to the other tables.
Brad shoots him a quick, alarmed look--he knows?--but settles down at the Patrice’s reassuring nod.
Patrice returns Mike’s smile but raises his hand just as Mike is starting to pour out the wine.
“We can’t,” he says apologetically, “not with the playoffs.”
“Yes,” Mike says, nodding, “yes you can.” He winks as he reaches out for Patrice’s glass around his hand. “You know I would never do anything to hurt our playoff chances and that’s why I won’t give you more than one glass each even if you ask me to. Treat your date right.”
Patrice stops himself from sighing and continues to smile politely instead.
“You should treat me right,” Brad says with a satisfied smirk as he takes a sip of his wine. Honestly, alcohol doesn’t sound like such a bad idea at the moment. Patrice doesn’t remember the last time he thought this much about what you are and aren’t supposed to do on a date while he was on an actual date, and it’s a little bewildering. Then again, last time he was out and about it wasn’t with his best friend.
“Going back to your story--”
Patrice rolls his eyes and sighs. Since denial seems to be futile with Brad, he briefly considers making something up, but Brad knows him too well to let him get away with a blatant lie. He thinks back to all his little misdeeds and other times he screwed up to see if he can find something else. There is the time Brad dared them to finish an entire bottle of vodka in one sitting because ‘someone had insulted his honor.’ There is the time Brandon came up to him and asked if they could kiss, just once, when he was a rookie and he had to enlist Brad’s help to turn him down but also make sure he had someone he could talk to. There is the time he agreed going sledding with the guys on a sketchy hill, the idea spearheaded by Brad and Torey, and it ended in a disastrous puppy pile at the bottom.
And then there is his actual go-to story, because of course Patrice has a story. They say he is a saint, and they praise him for being humble but Patrice has never been humble enough not to recognize that there isn’t a heart he can’t steal with a little bit of an effort and a stubble.
Brad must be good at it too, if he knows that’s exactly what you want to tell your date to make them like you. Briefly he imagines Brad sitting across from a handsome, effeminate guy in a restaurant not unlike this one and making him laugh with a retelling of some insignificant foolishness from his past, maybe nudging the guy’s foot suggestively with his own under the table. Patrice doesn’t like that thought--he isn’t proud of it but it has always made him...uneasy to think about Brad with other men.
Brad pumps his fist in the air when Patrice nods.
“I knew it,” he says, “now dish.”
Patrice decides to go with the routine he would use with any (real, female) date. Today is embarrassing enough as is; it will be worse if he starts butchering and editing things on the go now.
“So,” he says, with a smile that unlike the other fifty times he told this story, is genuinely self-conscious now. “You should know that I am terrible around housework. I was too busy with hockey growing up to pick it up and I’m I guess messy in general.”
“That’s bold, telling a first date you are useless as husband material. I like that.” Brad grins. “Then again, maybe that’s why you are still single.”
“Oh shut up,” Patrice says, “I am opening up my heart here. So anyway--”
There was this one time, when a good friend of his was sick and trusted Patrice with his laundry. Snow storm meant all dry cleaners around them were closed and his friend just needed some clean clothes. And Patrice--well, he didn’t realize you can’t wash bright colored clothes with the whites.
Not until he took a bunch of pinkish shirts out of the washing machine that did not used to be that color when he threw them in there anyway.
“And since then,” he concludes with a dreamy smile he knows gets right to the hearts of his dates, “I know how to do laundry.”
“And people say I’m the dumb one.”
All his other dates anyway. The ones who aren’t the friend whose clothes Patrice messed up. Good thing he isn’t trying to steal Brad’s heart for real.
Brad’s face was really something to behold as he fished out a now-pink pair of boxers out of the hamper, though. He looked up at Patrice and asked why his clothes changed color, drawling, eyelids drooping thanks to flu medicine--sick enough that if Patrice told him a fairy came and transformed them while he was sleeping he would take it as a reasonable explanation. He was significantly less happy once he got back on his feet and asked where he could find his favorite (previously white, now pink) shirt.
Brad scoffs at him.
“Also I can’t believe you messed up my favorite shirt and have been using that grim occasion to get into ladies’ panties ever since. Where is the respect bro?”
“It was a few clothes!” Patrice exclaims with practiced outrage. They have had this argument more time than either of them can count now, even if the date part is new. “You can afford to buy yourself a new shirt, or hundred.”
Brad whined so much Patrice even offered to buy him new clothes but he didn’t follow through with it when Backes overheard the conversation and said, great, let them call you daddy for a while instead, as he walked by.
He wondered what it would be like if he did though, on a couple of occasions--Brad trying on new clothes, no doubt adding some outrageous items just to get a laugh out of it, Patrice footing the bill.
Brad nudges Patrice’s leg with his foot under the table.
“You know, I kept the shirt.”
A smile is playing on his lips that Patrice can’t quite read. Patrice was so sure he tossed it in the bin the moment he got better and kicked Patrice out of his apartment.
“Why?”
Brad shrugs. “I like looking at it from time to time to remind myself you suck.”
“I don’t suck!” Patrice protests. So maybe he feels a little guilty for the mess he made, to this date. But that’s the harshest thing he’s heard Brad say about or to him in a long while. Maybe you do get used to the constant praise and love.
“No, that you definitely don’t.” Brad laughs.
If it falls a little flat Patrice doesn’t mention it.
“What story do you tell to get in your dates’ pants?”
Brad’s eyes glint with mischief. This is his moment to shine.
“So,” he says, “if you don’t know, you should know that I’m a pretty affectionate guy.”
He is looking straight at Patrice, smiling as he speaks like he is about to let him in on some great juicy secret, and man, he is good at it. Patrice can totally see how easy it must be for his dates to fall for him. Patrice shifts in his seat. Cuts Brad off.
“Who in Boston doesn’t know you are an affectionate guy at this point? You literally licked two people last year. On camera.”
Brad shrugs. “A lot of gay men aren’t into hockey. Too much ‘toxic masculinity’ and ‘homophobia’ in the league to make it worth their while. Though if I just want sex I definitely talk about my tongue and the places it’s been.”
Patrice can hear the air quotes and there is a resignation to it--‘something keeps hurting you over and over again and you accept it as normal at some point’ Brad said once with the same voice as he is using now. They were both drunk. Patrice wanted to take the mostly empty bottle in his hand and smash it against the wall.
“Anyway back to the story--But one thing I learned the hard way around is you do not snuggle hockey guys at night. One time on the road, back when I still had a roommate, I slipped into the guy’s bed at night--you can say I was more than a little drunk--and I got a black eye for my efforts. I was trying to be snuggle up to the guy, but then he woke up, turned around and punched me in the face. Which is his loss really because I make an excellent big spoon.”
Brad does this thing where for all his on ice hugs and chest bumps and the arm he always has slung around someone or other when he is awake, he will hug himself and lean away from anyone near him if he is falling asleep in some place public--on the bus, on the place, on Patrice’s couch.
“Who was it?”
Patrice can’t quite hear his own voice for the blood rushing in his ears.
Brad’s smile falters. He purses his mouth.
“It was back in Providence. No one we played with in a long time.”
There was this one time when they were flying back to Boston and Brad had the worst flu he has had in years. Fever, vomiting--the whole deal. He’d played through it too, which made it even worse and he needed IV fluids and something stronger to bring down his temperature. But it was a short flight back home and the medical staff decided it could wait until they got back to Boston. So he sat next to Patrice on the plane--or rather Patrice took Torey’s usual seat without asking and sat next to him--and his head fell on Patrice’s shoulder before the plane even took off. His skin was clammy and he was already asleep.
And then they hit turbulence. Brad jolted awake with a start. He tore himself away and looked at Patrice with alarm, eyes wide, and started to apologize. ‘I’m sorry,’ he stammered, in between shallow, panicked breaths. I--you know I didn’t mean to-- I’m sorry I’m--. It took Patrice a while to calm him down and get him to settle on his chest again, this time with his arm wrapped around Brad’s shoulders, whispering to Brad’s ear that he was fine and he was safe and it would be alright, over and over again, until long after Brad fell back asleep.
“Christ.”
It was about twenty hours before Patrice messed up his clothes. He thought Brad had a nightmare.
Brad shrugs. The earlier mischief is now gone from his voice.
“It wasn’t like it was really his fault. No one wants strange men crawling into bed with them.”
Patrice remembers what it felt like to hold Brad--too warm and smelling of sweat, but his head was such a welcome weight on Patrice’s chest--how good it felt when Brad settled down. As if as long as he stayed in Patrice’s arms, Patrice could keep him from harm. He would be safe.
“Did he apologize?”
Another shrug.
“He didn’t tell anyone.”
Patrice wants to smash his wine glass against the wall. He wants to find this bastard and knock him out with a punch or two.
“This isn’t-- it isn’t okay.”
“No,” Brad replies, not breaking eye contact, “but it is what it is.”
Patrice opens his mouth to say--he doesn’t know what he will say. He wants Brad to be angry. This is the funny anecdote Brad tells on his first dates.
Mike interrupts them when he appears with food. He sets a plate of pasta with lemon chicken in front of Patrice and pasta with veal and broccoli in front of Brad, telling them to enjoy.
“I--” Brad says, frowning at the menus Mike is taking away, “did we even order food?”
Thinking about it, no they did not.
Mike tells them that no offense, but they both only order only the one dish every time they visit, with a smile bordering on smug. “If today is the day you want to change it up,” he says, “I will be happy to make you something else.”
Patrice looks at his food, then at Brad, and lastly at Mike. He is pretty sure he ordered something else that one time about a year ago. And then immediately wished he ordered his regular dish instead. Since when has he become this predictable?
By the looks of it Brad is going through the same thought process, and Mike takes it as his answer. He offers them a wide grin, a quick bow with a flourish, and disappears.
All this time. At movie nights when Patrice could feel his eyes getting heavy and wanted to slide towards Brad. When he was the one falling asleep on the road and a shoulder--Brad’s shoulder--looked like an excellent pillow. He refrained because he thought Brad didn’t like it.
Patrice stares at his own food. He has suddenly lost all his appetite, but Brad clearly wants to move on, and it won’t do to ruin their date any more than they already have by refusing to eat. He takes a bite.
All this time.
Brad kicks him in the shin, hard enough to make Patrice wince.
“You don’t get to sulk on our date,” he says. “I worked way too hard for this. Eat your food and be entertaining.”
Patrice laughs a little at that against his will. Brad did wait almost a decade for this and earned it with his sweat and blood.
“It’s incredible, isn’t it,” he replies solemnly, swallowing down the mess of feelings swirling in his chest to visit them--well, never. “We have the best first line in the NHL here for this date.” He points at Brad with his fork. “You--” points at himself “--me, and,” points at the food “--pasta.”
Brad hurls a bread roll at him at that. It’s a close catch--almost goes past Patrice’s shoulder and hits the patron one table over in the head--but at the very least Brad is grinning again.
“I hate you,” he says.
“Do you tell that to all of your first dates?”
Brad stabs a piece of meat with his fork.
“Only the ones who deserve it.”
*
Their date is kind of nice after that. Well, it is for a while, anyway. They talk about the new season of Game of Thrones, their plans for the rest of the summer, carefully skirting around any thoughts on when their summer will start. Brad invites him to come to Halifax and give hunting a try for what must be the hundredth time and Patrice tells him for the hundredth time he will think about it, knowing that he won’t. He cried when he watched Bambi as a kid and Bambi’s mom was shot. He himself can’t be the one who orphans sweet fawns.
“Come to Quebec,” he counters, waving his fork at Brad, “we will go fishing.”
Patrice has a summer house by a small lake, away from the hustle and bustle of the city, complete with a small dock. He likes spending time there in the summer, likes its peace, the way time seems to slow down.
Brad makes a face. “Fishing is boring. I would be bored to death.”
He has invited Brad at least a hundred times too. The thing with summer is—it’s good. It’s a well earned rest after the hectic schedule of the season, and what keeps Patrice sane and coming back for more. But it’s also long and as nice as it is to catch up with family and friends—well, he wonders sometimes where he and Brad would be if they didn’t have—this. If they weren’t forced by external circumstance to live in the same city for the majority of the year, play side by side. Summer gets lonely sometimes, even when he is with people he loves.
He waggles his eyebrows, speaks before his mind can catch up to it.
“I can think of ways to keep you entertained.”
Brad makes a sound between a snort, a laugh, and a welp. The last one probably because he almost choked on his food. Patrice passes him some water.
“Is that a promise?” Brad asks, when he can talk again, wiping a tear from his eye.
You say things like that on a date. As a friend, there are many ways to keep someone entertained. Patrice is not blushing.
“Guess you’ll never find out, since fishing is so boring.”
*
When they are done with food, Mike comes back with coffee and dessert. A decaf cappuccino for Patrice, a latte for Brad, and two chocolate macarons.
Brad foregoes his usual jibes about Patrice’s dismal caffeine tolerance to raise his eyebrows at the dessert.
“For one, we are really not supposed to be eating sweets right now. For two, I know for a fact this place doesn’t serve macarons.”
Patrice smiles, a little smug at his achievement.
“They don’t serve macarons to patrons who aren’t me. They serve me whatever I ask for. As it turns out, there are perks to being the city’s sweetheart.”
“Humble much?” Brad takes a sip from his coffee which gives him a temporary foam mustache. “Also, that’s such bullshit man. Half the city has no idea who you are. You are not Tom Brady.”
He licks the foam away. Patrice doesn’t track his tongue as it travels across his upper lip. He eyes the macaron sitting square in the middle of its small plate. “But seriously though—am I on a date with the Mr. Responsible, Patrice Bergeron, or—Jake?”
“It’s only one macaron, bitch,” Patrice says with a smile, having waited for this moment. “Man up and eat it.”
Those were the exact words Brad used, a couple of years ago now. Patrice was injured, ordered to rest for at least a couple of weeks, with only PT and no gym, and looking to miss significant time. He’d grown a beard; he was miserable and intent on making anyone who came in contact with him just as miserable as well. So Brad had showed up one day, and dragged him out despite his protests, to a coffeeshop. Almost slammed the decaf cappuccino and the macaron in front of him, told him to snap out of it. It’s only one macaron, bitch. Man up and eat it. Just because you can’t play doesn’t mean we don’t need you. Because fuck, Bergy, we need you.
Patrice had snapped out of it.
He thought the memory would be a nice touch to the end of their date.
Brad eyes him now, before his gaze flicks back onto the table. Patrice wonders if he imagines the expression that crosses his face.
“Right,” he says with a smile that falls a little flat, “suppose one macaron can’t hurt much.”
Patrice frowns, with the unease of every person who has a sneaking suspicion they did something wrong but have no idea what.
“I—”
“Drink your ‘coffee’ dude,” Brad shoots back, stabbing the air with his tea spoon, “it’s going to get cold.”
*
Brad is—again, to someone who doesn’t know him, he is his jovial, friendly self for the rest of their time at the restaurant and on the walk back. But Patrice knows him. He buries his hands deep in the pockets of his jacket against the cold that has fallen with the evening. A subdued Brad is an odd thing. Hordes of tourists prowling the streets feel quiet without Brad’s endless energy at his side. Patrice thinks back to Brad’s story, to macarons, to that day in the tunnel when Brad cornered and drew this promise out of him, thoughts swirling in his head without direction even as they keep talking about this and that.
They stop in front of Brad’s apartment building.
Brad raises a hand to touch Patrice’s arm.
“Thank you for this,” he says, his smile inscrutable if still fond. “I had a great time.”
This is it. The end of their date.
Patrice sucks in a breath.
“Should we uh—should we kiss?”
Brad looks at him for a second through narrowed eyes. Tells him, flatly, that they are in public. Turns on his heels and disappears inside before Patrice can say anything else.
Patrice walks to his car, climbs inside, closes the door. Slams the steering wheel. Hard.
Through the closed window he can hear birds singing in the bushes to his left. There is a knot in his throat he can’t swallow past, a tightness in his chest he can’t breathe through. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.