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Jonathan Toews was living the dream.
He had everything he could possibly ask for: a Stanley Cup, a Gold medal from the Olympics, a lake named after him, and being able to share the honor of being one of the youngest Captains in the league with one of the best in the league, Sidney Crosby. He had everything he had ever wanted.
Well, everything except Patrick Kane.
Jonny had been in love with his bright eyed, curly haired best friend for so long that he no longer remembered what it felt like to not be in love with him.
Unfortunately for him, though, his best friend was very, very straight. Johnny was very aware of this. It’s not like he hadn’t noticed the constant flow of puck bunnies that flitted through Kane’s bedroom with their high heels and short skirts. He’d even had a few short-term girlfriends, all of whom Johnny had hated simply because none of them had shown the interest in Kaner that he had deserved. They all came out with him, drank with him, slept with him, and got bored after a few weeks. Each one was worse than the next. They had no interest in getting to know Kaner, only his lifestyle and his money. His latest breakup had been with a short brunette girl named Lily. She hadn’t even liked hockey. She went out with him and ignored him in favor of flirting with bartenders and even some of his teammates. Kaner had looked particularly crushed after he saw her trying to give her number to Stahlberg. Jonny had no idea what he even saw in her.
So, the point was, Jonny loved Patrick, and Patrick loved girls. Johnny had accepted that fact a long time ago.
Which is why Johnny’s brain almost short-circuited when Patrick kissed him one night.
~
Jonny and Patrick were hanging in Johnny’s living room after a particularly brutal game against the Red Wings. The Hawks had managed to scrape out with a win, but it was a close game, much closer than Johnny was comfortable with. He hadn’t played very well; his game had been shaky because of his worry for Patrick after his friend had been taken to the boards in a particularly brutal (and unnecessary) hit by Kronwall early in the third period. Pat went down and was shaky getting up after a few seconds of stillness. Pat had insisted that he was perfectly fine, but that was hard for Jon to believe when Pat hadn’t come back from where the trainer’s had taken him to look him over until after the game was over. Jon had gone to ask the trainers about Pat’s condition, and they had reassured him that he was fine, but he might experience a bit of pain from the major bruising that commonly comes along with being Kronwalled.
Which is how Jonny ended up sitting next to Kaner on his couch about an hour earlier. He had invited Pat over with a thinly veiled excuse of wanting a rematch in Mario Kart, but realistically, he had just wanted to make sure Pat wasn’t feeling any discomfort after being wrecked in the game.
They were lazily chirping each other while they played, sipping beers and being over-competitive, as usual. Eventually, they were running their cars off of Rainbow Road more than they were staying on it, so they decided to put the controllers aside and focus on their drinks.
Pat was edging towards tipsy, as was Jonny, so it wasn’t a surprise when he started talking about his ex-girlfriend and how unhappy he was with how their relationship had turned out. He slouched further into the couch and Jonny as he prattled on about how much he missed Lily and just wanted someone to hug him and make him feel good.
Maybe Pat was much drunker than Jon had thought.
Jon bit his tongue to keep himself from saying everything he wanted to: how much he loved Pat, how he’d be so much better for him than the girls he attempted to date, how he knew Pat better than everyone. Instead, he let Pat lean on his shoulder and sniffle.
Pat eventually ran out of things to say and fell quiet, his breathing the only sound in the room.
After a few minutes passed, Pat’s breathing had seemed to slow down and he had been quiet enough that Jon assumed he was asleep. When he looked down to check, he saw Patrick looking back at him through half-lidded eyes. They stared at each other for a moment, before Pat tilted his chin up slightly and softly pressed to lips to Jonny’s.
Jon sat in shock for so long that Kaner pulled away to look at him. He must have seen something on Jon’s face that Jon himself didn’t know was there, because he leaned in again to slot their lips together more firmly than before.
Jon’s mind raced with thoughts. Maybe Kaner isn’t as straight as I thought. Maybe he… No. Kaner is straight. Kaner is drunk and lonely and he isn’t going to remember this in the morning.
Jon pulled away from Patrick reluctantly. He didn’t want to, but he didn’t want to continue with something that would hurt too much when Pat regretted it in the morning.
He decided the best thing to do was to just put Kaner to bed and hope he wouldn’t remember their kiss enough to resent Jon for it. He led Pat to his guestroom and made sure he had everything before leaving him to it.
Jon went to his own room and tried not to think about the kiss. He started missing it as soon as he ended, and he knew that thinking about it would just make it harder for him to move on, knowing that it would never happen again.
He got into his bed and finally made his mind be quiet enough for him to fall asleep, dreaming about Patrick’s lips on his.
~
Patrick woke up disoriented with a throbbing in his temple. He looked around, trying to figure out where he was, when he remembered: He was at Jonny’s.
He had kissed Jonny.
He had kissed Jonny and Jonny had pulled away.
God damn it.
Patrick had always promised himself that he would only kiss Jonny when he was sober, and couldn’t blame it on being unaware of himself.
He had to talk to Jonny.
Patrick walked into the kitchen, planning to tell Jonny that he was sorry that he had kissed him while drunk, but that it didn’t mean any less to him.
Jonny was standing with his back to Pat, messing around with the coffee maker. He didn’t seem to have heard Pat come in.
“Good morning,” Patrick greeted Jonny’s back.
Jon turned around with a mug of black coffee in his hand, the way he pretended to like it, even though Pat knew he secretly loved a ton of sugar in it. “Uh, hey, Kaner,” Jonny muttered into his coffee cup.
So, okay, Jonny was always a little slow in the morning. Maybe Patrick should wait until he was fully awake to talk to him about his feelings. He didn’t want Jon to be grumpy when he confessed. “What are we doing today,” he asked instead.
Jon replied more to the floor than to Patrick. “Uh, I was just – I don’t know. I was gonna go grocery shopping. Maybe.”
“Oh, good, man, we can totally get the good cereal instead of the boring healthy shit you like. I’ll just shower before we go!”
Pat started to walk off to get in the shower when he heard Jon’s voice from behind him saying, quietly, “That’s okay, Kaner, I think I’m good to go by myself.” Pat slowly turned around to look at his friend, who still wouldn’t make eye contact with him. Maybe Jon was… upset at him? Could he… could he be upset about the kissing? Maybe Patrick had read him wrong. Maybe –
Maybe Jon didn’t want him.
Patrick’s stomach dropped at the thought. He had wanted Jon as long as he could remember, and he thought maybe his best friend felt the same way. But… maybe he was wrong.
Maybe it was a good thing that he could blame it on the alcohol. He’d rather pass it off as a drunken mistake than lose his best friend for having feelings for him. He can hide it if he needs to.
“Look, Jon, about yesterday…” He paused at Jon’s flinch. “I was really drunk. I don’t know why I kissed you. So – sorry. About it. Just… let’s forget about it. Yeah.”
~
Jonny listened to Patrick apologize for his drunken mistake and felt his hopes fall, even though he had known all along that it didn’t mean anything to his friend. He looked at his friend’s sheepish face for the first time that morning and knew that he had to get over this thing he had for Patrick because nothing was ever going to come out of it and he was going to spend his life miserable and pining for something that he was never going to have.
So Jonny did the only thing he could do, and said, “Consider it forgotten.” Because it didn’t matter that he had been in love with Pat practically since they met; their friendship was too important to Jon to ruin it because of his feelings for Pat.
~
Pat knew he had imagined the brief look of disappointment on Jon’s face. Looking at Jon’s face at all was painful right now, knowing that Jon would only ever accept what had happened as a mistake. Pat knew he had to get out of Jon’s house before he told Jon that, no, it really hadn’t been a mistake and that Pat wants him more than anything.
“So, I’m just. Gonna go. Yeah. See ya at practice.”
And with that, Pat left the apartment, along with any hope he had of getting what he wanted.
~
The next day at practice, things were awkward. Where there was usually loud chirping between Jon and Pat, there was radio silence. Where there used to be playful checking and rough housing, there was careful avoidance.
To a normal person, this would look like two teammates individually focused on practice.
To someone who knew Kaner and Tazer, this looked like the world was about to end because things like this just didn’t happen. Ever.
So naturally, Patrick Sharp had to intervene.
He deftly pulled Jon into the equipment storage closet as he was walking down the hallway, unsuspecting.
Jon managed to let out a startled yelp before the door clicked shut.
“So, any interest in telling me what’s going on between you and Peeks?”
Jon turned to find the source of the voice. “There’s nothing going on. We’re fine.”
“Bullshit, Jonny, I’m not stupid. This isn’t how you two act. So either you tell me, or I’ll talk to Patrick. I don’t want to have to upset him, Jon, do you want that?”
“Just. Don’t talk to Pat. He has no reason to be upset, ok? None. He’s the one that wanted to forget about it, anyway.”
“…Forget about what?”
Jon froze. “Um.”
Patrick sighed. “Jon, I want to help you. Let me help you fix whatever you did.”
Jon replied reluctantly, looking more at the floor than his friend. “Well… We were hanging out last night after the game and… well, we were drinking, and Pat kissed me, and it was just a drunken mistake, and he wants to forget it, because he was drunk, and I told him it was forgotten, but I can’t forget it, Sharpy. I can’t.”
That… wasn’t what Sharpy was expecting. At all. “Jon, don’t tell me you’re a homophobe, please. He’s your best friend. This doesn’t change anything; he’s still the same person. I swear to God, if you hurt him – “
“A homophobe? Sharpy, what the hell?! Wouldn’t that make me kind of a hypocrite?”
“What.”
“Pat, I can’t forget about it because kissing Kaner is something I’ve wanted for years, ok, and when it finally happened, it was because he was drunk and it didn’t mean anything to him at all. I just. I love him, okay? And he doesn’t feel the same at all. Now that I’ve had what I’ve thought about for years, even as a mistake, I can’t just go back to the way it was before.”
Jon was unaware that they had an audience until he heard a strangled choking noise coming from behind him.
Sharpy’s eyes were wide, and looking over Jon’s shoulder at something behind him. “I’m just gonna…. Uh…,” Sharpy stuttered out, as he exited the room.
Jon still hadn’t turned around.
Of course Patrick had heard him. That was just Jon’s luck. He didn’t want to turn around and see what was definitely going to be a look of complete disgust on Kaner’s face. He couldn’t deal with that. He hoped maybe Kaner would just walk out of the room, and leave Jon to deal with himself.
But then Jon felt a hand on his shoulder, pulling him around, and found himself looking into the wide eyes of Patrick Kane.
“I – Pat, I can explain. I - ” Jon didn’t get a chance to say anything else, because in an instant, his lips were colliding with Patrick’s. He inhaled sharply, shocked, couldn’t believe that it was happening.
Pat pulled back and looked at him.
“We’re both incredibly stupid,” he breathed out.
“I’m sorry, what?
“It’s just… we’ve both been feeling the same thing for such a long time, and neither of us did anything about it. We could have been making out forever ago!”
“I – I thought you were straight. Like, really straight.”
“Well, I thought I was too, and then I met you. I think you’re the exception, Jon.”
“So… what does this mean,” Jon whispered.
“It means that we’re going to go home and make out.”
“Pat.”
“Okay fine. We’re going to go home and talk about where we want to go with this.”
“Okay, yeah.”
“But, Jonny?”
“Yes, Pat?”
“Can there be making out?”
“Yeah, Pat. Whatever you want.”