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Patrick’s restless.
It’s 8pm on a Tuesday night, the second of a two-day break between games. They don’t have practice tomorrow, just a seven-thirty start time against the Caps. Technically he could be out right now, having some drinks, maybe trying to hook up. It doesn’t really sound appealing, for a couple of reasons.
The first being that he doesn’t really feel like dealing with mass amounts of people at the moment, the second that Jonny wouldn’t be there, and the third…
Well, The Third’s currently puking his guts out upstairs.
And the thing is, Patrick doesn’t regret staying, he doesn’t. When Stan’s cancer came back in January he figured, as much as anyone can without prior experience, that times would be tough. He wasn’t wrong. It’s unbelievably difficult to see someone he cares about struggle through the tests and the anxiety, the chemo and the sickness.
Patrick tries to help with the kids, with being the best on the ice he can be, with the little things. It doesn’t ease the feeling of helplessness that weighs on all of them. There are moments when there’s nothing left to do. There are moments when he just needs a break.
But it’s 8pm on a Tuesday and Patrick doesn’t want to be around people.
He pulls his phone from his pocket. He’s got thirty unanswered messages from various people, some he’ll text back eventually, and others he won’t. There’s a text from Sharpy from earlier that day asking him if he’ll distract Jonny tomorrow for five minutes before warm ups. It’ll be worth it, it reads. Above that is a message from Bur saying: SO WORTH IT. And above that a message from Jonny: Tell those fuckers I’m onto them.
Patrick laughs. He’s almost certain they don’t actually have anything planned. Sometimes they like to fly by the seat of their pants. As Sharpy is often known to do. Sometimes they just like to pretend they’re planning something to fuck with Jonny’s head. It’s mostly innocuous. Sharpy and Bur are too professional to screw around that close to game time and Jonny knows that. He still gets so riled up about it though beforehand.
That’s probably the appeal.
No, that’s definitely the appeal.
Patrick realizes he’s smiling as he pictures it, Jonny pissy and flustered and pretending to not be bothered by it even while everyone in a thirty mile radius can clearly see through him. He rolls his eyes at himself and sets his phone down.
He picks it back up.
Patrick: What are you doing??
Jonny: sleeping
It’s too early for bed, even by Jonny’s sometimes normally strict standards, but after being road roomies for the last five months Patrick’s stopped asking the how’s and why’s for anything Jonathan Toews does. Sometimes he’ll stay up until midnight, fucking around on his phone or watching a movie, other nights he’ll act like Patrick’s fucking pediatrician, listing off factoids and side effects of not getting a healthy eight hours or more of rest on their busy schedule.
He’s an embarrassment to himself, really.
Patrick can’t get enough.
Patrick: Obviously not.
Jonny: ur right I’m talking to you when I could be sleeping.
Patrick: Harsh. You know you feel special when I grace you with a text.
Jonny: what do u want, kaner
Patrick: Is that a question or a statement?
Jonny: fuck u
Patrick: Still not sure if question or statement. Hmm.
Jonny: holy shit. I’m going to bed
Patrick: WAIT
Patrick: Jon wait.
Jonny: what
Patrick: I need waffles.
Jonny: waffles
Patrick: Yes.
Jonny: you need them
Patrick: Yes. Right now. It’s imperative.
Jonny: then leggo my eggo, kaner. Can I go to sleep now???? :/
Patrick: ……never say that to me again. Also no. I need waffles. Now. Real ones.
Patrick: Jonny c'mon.
Patrick: Please.
Jonny: God okay fine. Give me ten minutes
Patrick: NICE. That’s my boy.
Jonny: suck my dick
Patrick: LOL
It’s more like fifteen minutes by the time Jonny pulls up in front of the Bowman’s, but Patrick’s generous enough not to complain.
“Where to?” Jonny asks, grumpy.
He’s got a black toque on and a UND sweatshirt with a pair of gray jersey shorts, because that makes sense in forty-degree weather. Still, he looks soft all over, a little sleep rumpled and smelling of cotton, and it takes Patrick a moment to register his question.
“Uh, waffles.”
“Just waffles? Care to be more specific?”
“Real ones,” he reiterates, because that’s really as far as he thought about it.
“Oh right, how could I forget,” he says dryly.
He messes around with his GPS for a minute before punching in an address and pulling them onto the road.
There’s some country song on the radio that’s overly twangy and annoying so he switches it, surprised when Jonny merely frowns, but doesn’t move to stop him. It makes Patrick…it makes him want a lot of things in that moment: to rib Jonny for his awful taste in music, to call him out on giving in too easily, to brush his thumb over that frown until it disappears.
Stupid things.
He doesn’t do any of them.
Instead he turns up the heat because it’s way too damn cold in this car and shoves his hands inside the front pocket of his hoodie to keep them warm.
“Cold?” Jonny asks, smirking like there’s something amusing about Patrick being perpetually chilly, or himself a human-sized walking furnace.
“Well, it’s winter.”
“It’s basically spring.”
“It’s basically me freezing my nuts off here so get a move on, Tazer,” he snaps back.
“Pipe down, we’ll be there in ten,” Jonny huffs, brow furrowed.
He pretends he’s exasperated by Patrick a lot of the time, like it makes him come off casual and indifferent, relaxed. But then he’ll do things like flip the heat to max and step on the gas pedal as if Patrick can’t see exactly what’s happening. Maybe he thinks Patrick doesn’t notice. Maybe he thinks he’s being super nonchalant and chill. Maybe he’s wrong and Patrick catches all of that shit because he has eyeballs in his head and he pays more attention than people give him credit for.
They come upon some traffic, a rusted out Monte Carlo pulling in front of them and then slowly down to a snails pace. Typical.
“Would you fucking go!” Jonny growls, tone polite even though his words aren’t. “No, don’t stop. Get in the other lane. The other goddamn lane!!”
Patrick fits his hand over Jonny’s thigh before he can think better of it. It’s meant to be a tap, or maybe more of a pat, but he ends up squeezing softly at the solid muscle underneath, enjoying the way Jonny settles beneath his touch almost immediately. He can’t lie, he relishes it, those ways in which Jonny will quietly unbend for him more than anyone else.
Patrick could kiss him. It’s not a thing they really do, or well, it’s a not thing they do unless orgasms are involved though.
He thinks of Jonny’s grouchy text from earlier and smiles.
“I am, ya know. I’m gonna suck you off so good later.”
Jonny coughs, jerking the wheel. “You uh, you don’t have to.”
Patrick squeezes his thigh again, spreads his fingers wide. “Shut up. You earned it.”
“Oh,” Jonny nods. “Well, okay.”
Even though they’ve been doing this for months now, even though they’ll say the dirtiest shit to each other during the heat of the moment, outside of the bedroom Jonny still gets flustered talking about sex at the weirdest times. Like now, his gaze is shifted away, the tips of his ears a bright red. Jonny’s cheeks and forehead are a little ruddy too. He reaches out and presses the back of his hand to Jonny’s velvet hot skin, feels the warmth melting into his own.
Patrick bites at his bottom lip to stop from grinning.
“You okay there, bud? You seem a little worked up.”
“You wish,” Jonny scoffs, which totally means he is, and Patrick’s smile widens. He turns his hand over and palms the edge of Jonny’s jaw, drawing his thumb down across the barest hint of stubble and over a mole he remembers licking four nights ago. Jonny’s skin always seems like it’s a sun kissed gold, even now, with winter just behind them.
“I do,” he admits since there’s no point in denying it, not when it’s true and not when it gives him this, Jonny shivering under his touch as Patrick grazes the sensitive spot on Jonny’s neck above his shoulder.
He can’t be blamed for staring at it the rest of the way to the restaurant.
*
The booth they’re seated at isn’t exactly the most discreet, but it’s quiet for a weeknight. There’s not many people around and those that are don’t seem to care about who he and Jonny are or what they’re doing. Which is both nice, and Patrick’s not too prideful to admit, a little disappointing.
Someday everyone in Chicago will know his name, their names. Maybe not this season, or the next, or even the one after that, but eventually they will. He’s almost too impatient for it at times, he knows. People are quick to tell him how long it could take, rebuilding the Hawks, creating a bigger fanbase, winning. It could take half his career, it could take his whole career. Not that a he really believes that, but that’s what people say.
But honestly, people can fuck off.
When he looks at Jonny he just…he knows. He knows deep in his gut that they’re going to be great.
He also knows Jonny’s not seriously ordering some fruit right now. He did not drive Patrick all the way here to eat some damn fruit.
“Are you for real?” he asks, after the waiter leaves.
Jonny takes a sip of water. “I never said I wanted waffles.”
“Clearly. Because fun is a foreign concept to you.”
Jonny makes an unimpressed face.
“A water and a fruit bowl? You eat like my grandpa ordering from the senior citizen menu. Should I get your membership to AARP ready?”
“I’m good, Kaner. But thanks. My stomach has just been giving me problems again.”
Patrick pauses. Now that he’s looking at Jonny, really looking at him, under the harsh fluorescent lighting, and not the dark cab of his car, he can see how what he might have partially taken for a blush are blotchy spots of a flush.
“Why didn’t you say? I would’ve let you rest, you idiot.”
Jonny rolls his shoulders, stretches his neck to the side for a beat. Then he shrugs.
“Well, because you said you wanted some waffles.”
Patrick sucks in a breath.
It’s been a long day. A long few months, maybe. Where the highs have felt like something out of dreams he had as a kid and the lows…he wasn’t altogether prepared for those.
He definitely wasn’t prepared for Jonny.
And dammit, now Patrick’s eyes are prickling.
He wipes at his face surreptitiously as the waiter delivers their food, asking if they need anything else. Jonny smiles, and kindly declines before placing a raspberry into his mouth.
He chews on it carefully, like he’s afraid it might betray him too. His hat’s pushed back, a bit askew on his head, and the skin below his eyes are puffy.
He’s a hot mess.
“You should marry me,“ Patrick declares.
“What?” Jonny splutters.
“You’re gonna be a great husband one day. So you should probably be mine, is all I’m saying.”
“And why’s that?” Jonny asks, startled and eyes wide, but his mouth is edging into a gorgeous crooked smile.
Patrick cuts into his strawberry covered waffles, because they absolutely look glorious, and takes a huge bite.
"Beuzz ’m gna b a mmaler a mmurrd lif.”
“Excuse me?”
“Because,“ he says, finishing his bite. "I’m gonna be a baller at married life.”
“You’ve got whip cream on your face,“ Jonny laughs. "Also, I’m pretty sure you still don’t even do your own laundry.”
“Shut up. I can do laundry. And mow the lawn. And grill a great steak. Annnnd you still haven’t said yes yet, which is rude, by the way.”
He wipes his mouth and wads up the napkin to chuck at Jonny’s face.
“I’m thinking,” Jonny says, batting at the next napkin wad. “Quit it.”
“I’m waiting, Toews. I don’t got all day.”
“I’m gonna need a list all of your credentials first. I need to know what I’m working with.”
He picks up a blueberry and rolls it between his thumb and forefinger. Patrick steals it before he can eat it and pops it in his own mouth with a wink.
“You know aaaaaalllll my credentials already, baby. So come on, let’s hear it.
“Alright.”
“Alright?”
“Yeah, okay. I will,” Jonny nods, firm. “But we’re retiring in Canada.”
Patrick groans. “Ughhh, nevermind.”
“Too late. You already asked.”
He makes a compelling argument, but…
“We’re staying in Chicago and that’s the end of that,” Patrick states.
“For how long?” Jonny asks.
“Forever,” he says easily, because they aren’t going anywhere. This is their city. Patrick can feel it. He knows Jonny can feel it too by the way he’s beaming back at him stupidly.
And that’s how they end up smiling like morons at each other when Patrick’s text alert goes off. It’s Sharpy.
Don’t forget about tomorrow, it reads, and Patrick snorts.
Jonny automatically looks suspicious.
"Who was that?”
“Um,” he says lamely.
Jonny squints at him and reaches for the phone. When Patrick pulls it to his chest he leans over and tries to grab at it again, which causes him to scramble back. And Patrick’s not proud to admit it, but he shoves the phone down the front of his pants. He knows Jonny’s too well behaved to go digging in his pants. Well, in public at least.
So it’s probably a good distraction when their check suddenly arrives.
*
It’s late enough by the time Jonny pulls back up in front of the Bowman’s house, his belly pleasantly full and the rest of him more at ease, that he thinks he can probably drift off once he gets in bed. Jonny’s been talking about the game tomorrow, plays he wants to run, ways he figures Patrick can out puck handle Ovechkin. It’s a lot like the conversations they’ll have in their hotel rooms on the road. It’s become familiar at this point, soothing.
Patrick kisses him.
It’s clumsy and ungraceful and unplanned. He only catches the right half of Jonny’s mouth, half open as he is forming words, and Patrick sprawled across the divider to reach him. It’s not at all what he meant to do, but as he pulls away Jonny turns and presses back. Their mouths slot together before their arms find purchase, which involves a hand in Patrick’s hair and a fist curled in Jonny’s shirt. It’s inelegant but so good, especially when Jonny’s tongue licks at the seam of Patrick’s lips and then slips inside.
He tastes tangy and sweet and he’s kissing Patrick like it’s the only thing he knows how to do, the only thing he wants to do.
When they part Patrick’s buzzing all over, skin a tingly kind of warm as he tries to catch his breath.
“You’re gettin’ pretty good at that, Jonathan.”
“Back at ya,” Jonny says, eyes bright and pleased.
Patrick wishes they didn’t have to end the night here. Especially after he made Jonny that promise.
But.
It’s late. They have a game tomorrow and Jonny needs his rest. They both do. Plus, there’ll be time for everything else over the weekend.
He hops out of the car and comes around to the driver’s side window, waits for Jonny to roll it down.
He leans in and kisses Jonny again, quick and soft. “Thanks,” he says, and hopes Jonny gets how much he means that.
“Of course,” Jonny smiles, soft and private.
He walks to the front door and turns, giving Jonny a dorky wave as he takes off down the road. Patrick watches him go.
One day, he thinks.
One day he and Jonny are going to take this city by storm. And they’re going to do it together.