Work Text:
The locker room swayed like it was floating, barely tethered to the rink below it. Misa sat on the bench, but it felt like the bench was the one sitting on him, pressing him down, gently, insistently, as if to remind him he still had weight. Everything around him shimmered in soft, uneven pulses, the fluorescent lights flickering like they were breathing too fast.
His skates were still on, but they didn’t feel like skates. They felt like roots, tangled and growing into the rubber floor, holding him in place. When he shifted his foot, the room seemed to tilt, the walls stretching like they were made of warm glass.
Warsofsky was speaking, he was almost sure of it, but the words came through as echoes of echoes, more shapes than sounds. They curled above the team’s heads like faint steam, drifting upward before dissolving into the humming lights.
Images from the game surfaced without warning: the puck spinning too slowly, impossibly slowly, like it was moving through honey, the ice widening beneath him into an endless white field, a chorus of crowd noise that felt more like wind than voices. None of it lined up right. None of it felt like it had happened to him.
Misa looked down at his gloved hands. The fabric rippled, shifting between colors he didn’t recognize, as if someone else was choosing what he should see. When he blinked, the gloves were normal again, damp and heavy. He couldn’t tell which version had been real.
A drop of sweat slid down the side of his cheek. For a split second, Misa wondered if he was melting, leaving some small, clear trail behind him.
He tried to breathe, slowly, carefully, as if he might disturb the fragile way the room was holding together. The air smelled like sweat, snow, and something metallic he couldn’t name. He swallowed, and the sound felt distant, like it belonged to someone sitting far across the room.
He told himself he would stand up. Just stand up, but the thought drifted away, thin and translucent, and he stayed exactly where he was, watching the world ripple softly around the edges.
A hand touched his shoulder, light, but it might as well have been a rope thrown into deep water. Misa blinked. The room snapped into focus for half a second and then smeared again at the edges.
“Hey,” a voice said, close enough that he felt it more than heard it. “Take your gear off, man. I’ll give you a ride home.”
Misa turned his head, slowly, like his neck had forgotten the mechanics. It was Sam–helmet off, hair stuck to his forehead, eyes steady in the way nothing in a way nothing else in the room was. Behind him, the lights kept flicking their soft, dreamlike pulse, but Sam didn’t seem to bend or blur with them. He stayed real.
“I can… I can just go with Toff, it’s okay,” Misa murmured. His own voice sounded borrowed, too quiet, like the room was swallowing it.
Sam shook his head immediately. “No. It’s fine. I already told Toff I’ve got you.” He crouched down so they were eye-level. “But you need to move, okay? Start with the pads.” He tapped one gently, grounding and careful.
Misa stared at him, trying to process the request. Move. Right. He could do that. Probably.
When he lifted his hand, it didn’t feel attached to anything. It floated for a moment before settling back onto his knees like it had changed its mind halfway through. His vision shimmered again, the locker room sliding sideways before righting itself.
Sam’s brows pulled together, concern flickering. It was a real concern, sharp and human, cutting through the haze. “Hey. Mikey. Look at me.”
He did, because that was simple, and Sam was the only thing in the room not melting around the edges.
“Good,” Sam said softly. “You don't have to rush. Just don’t shut down on me, okay?”
Misa tried to protest, but the words tangled somewhere between his chest and his mouth. The only thing that came out was a breath that felt too heavy for how quiet it was.
“Yeah,” Sam murmured, nodding like that was exactly the answer he was expecting. “Let me help.”
He reached for the strap of Misa’s shoulder pad, fingers sure and steady. The moment Sam touched the gear, the drifting sensation eased. It wasn’t gone, but quieter, like someone turning down the volume on a dissonant song.
Misa wasn’t sure if he relaxed or if the world did, but for the first time since the final buzzer, he felt something other than the hollow, tilting blur.
He felt the ground. And Sam, still right there. Still Real.
The air outside the rink was colder than it should’ve been. Or maybe Misa just felt it different, like the cold was moving through him instead of around him. The parking lot lights stretched into long pale halos, blurring at the edges as if someone had smeared them with their thumb.
Sam walked beside him, not quite touching, but close enough that Misa felt the shape of him, solid, warm, and real, cutting through the drifting fog in his head.
“Watch the step,” Sam murmured as they reached is car. The words were soft, almost an exhale, but they kept Misa focused enough to climb in without stumbling. The seat dipped under his weight, and the sudden stillness of sitting again made everything tilt for a heartbeat before settling.
Sam slid into the driver’s side, shut the door gently like he didn’t want the noise to startle him.
The car smelled faintly of pine and old coffee. A thin wash of soft music drifted from the speakers, some mellow acoustic thing with warm, rounded guitar notes that seemed to curl into the air instead of moving through it. Sam hummed under his breath, low and tuneful, like muscle memory. The sound was safe, there, not demanding.
Misa stared out the window as the parking lot slowly slipped past. The world didnt look quite real, the streetlamps stretched taller than they should, the shadows too soft, colors running ever so slightly at the edges. He tried to track the motion, but it was like his eyes kept catching on invisible snags.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been silent. It could’ve been a minute. It could’ve been the whole ride.
A soft tap sounded, Sam adjusting something on the console, and then the music lowered even more, barely a whisper now. “You doing okay?” he asked, voice calm but not empty. It carried a thread of steady warmth that cut through the drifting fog.
Misa opened his mouth. Closed it. Finally managed, “I… um. Yeah. I think. Just tired…”
He wasn’t sure if that was the right word. Nothing fit exactly. Everything felt too big or too small.
Sam didn’t push. He just hummed again, the melody gentle, something Misa couldn’t quite place but recognized enough to lean toward. His breathing synced with it without him meaning to.
A moment later, the car hit a small bump, and the world dipped sideways again, as if the ground had shifted under the tires. Misa’s fingers curled tight on his thigh before he even noticed.
And then, warmth.
Sam’s hand, resting lightly on his leg. A quiet, steady point of contact, like anchoring a balloon so it wouldn’t drift off.
“You’re alright,” Sam murmured. “I’m right here. Breathe.”
Misa did. Slowly. The sound of his own inhale didn’t feel so distant this time. The car’s heater hummed. The soft music blended with Sam’s quiet humming. The city lights rolled past like blurred constellations.
By the time Sam pulled into the Toffolis’ driveway, Misa wasn’t sure he’d spoken more than a total of three words. The house lights glowed warm against the dark, but they felt slightly offset, like they existed half a second ahead of everything else.
The front door swung open with a soft creak, and the warm air inside the house drifted in a slow wave, brushing over Misa’s face. It should’ve felt comforting, familiar. Instead, it felt like stepping into a room he'd only visited in a dream, everything the right shape, but slightly out of phase.
Sam stepped in first, his shoulder brushing past Misa’s as he held the door open. “C’mon,” he sighed, guiding him in.
Misa crossed the threshold, but the moment he did, the floor seemed to shift like a shallow tide under his feet. Not enough to knock him over, but just enough to make him doubt the steadiness of anything. His bag felt too heavy. The lights pooled like watercolor bleeding at the edges.
He drifted a few steps farther inside, blinking slowly. The sound of the door shutting behind him echoed down the hallway, stretched and hollow, dissolving into the quiet hum of the house.
The entryway felt narrower than he remembered. His own breath sounded distant, like it had to travel a long way before reaching his ears. Sam set the gear bag down gently, the thud landing strangely muted, as if the sound were wrapped in cotton.
“You’re freezing,” Sam said softly.
Was he? Misa looked down at his hands as if they might tell him. They felt both too cold and too warm at the same time. Wrong. Like borrowed hands he hadn’t grown into yet.
Sam hesitated for half a second, watching him with that same concerned, steady look that had followed him out of the rink. Then he spoke again, voice low and careful. “Go shower, okay? Get warm. Take a minute to breathe.”
The words didn’t feel like an instruction, more like a hand being offered in the dark.
Misa swallowed, throat tight with someone he couldn’t place. His mouth felt slow when he nodded. “Okay.”
Sam gave a small, reassuring tilt of his head. “I’ll be here when you’re done.”
That mattered to him more than anything else in the room.
The hallway felt longer than usual as Misa stepped toward the bathroom, the floorboards dim under the soft light. The house wasn’t silent, exactly; it hummed with small nocturnal sounds, the faint whir of the heater, the distant tick of cooling pipes, but everything was muffled, softened, like listening through a pillow.
He pushed the bathroom door open, letting it fall shut behind him. The soft click felt final, though not threatening, just isolating in a way he wasn’t sure he minded.
He peeled off his clothes slowly, fingers fumbling once or twice as though the fabric didn’t want to let go. The air felt cooler against his skin than he expected, a prickling contrast to the warm steam, which reached out in gentle waves.
When he stepped under the water, the heat hit him like stepping into sunlight after hours in the cold. It soaked into him immediately, overwhelming but soft, washing over his shoulders, crawling down his spine in thick ribbons.
He exhaled, and the sound didn’t even seem to belong to him.
The water drummed against his ears, turning into a kind of white noise that blurred the edges of his thoughts until they felt thin and transparent. The game flickered behind his eyes again, the ice stretching too wide, the puck slithering away like it had its own pulse, the crowd noise swelling and warping until it didn’t sound like people anymore.
None of it felt linear. None of it felt grounded.
He pressed his palm to the tile wall, feeling the slick coolness beneath the layer of heat. Real. Solid. But even that reality pulsed faintly, as if it was breathing with him.
Time slid sideways.
He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, maybe a minute, ten, maybe longer. The steam wrapped him up, the sound of the water filled every space inside him until his own heartbeat felt distant.
Eventually, a thought drifted through a fog.
Sam.
Not as a question. Not even fully as a name. More like a direction. A north star emerging between clouds. The only constant shape in a night that refused to stay still.
He reached for the shower handle and turned it off. The sudden silence echoed, ringing faintly in his ears. Water cascaded down his body in uneven lines, cooling quickly, clinging like it didn't want to fall.
He dried off slowly, still half-floating in a haze. The clothes Sam must’ve set out for him were soft and oversized, the kind of clothes that didn’t ask anything of him. He slipped them on with clumsy movements, tugging the shirt down over still-damp skin.
His legs felt unsteady, but not in a way that worried him. More like they were remembering gravity after drifting too long.
When he opened the bathroom door, a faint draft kissed his face. The house was dim, quiet, familiar. He breathed in, tasting something warm, maybe the scent of Sam’s cologne, maybe just the ghost of the shower steam clinging to him.
He needed something. Or someone. The thought wasn’t sharp, but it was clear enough to follow.
He paddled barefoot down the hallway, each step cushioned by the soft rug. The living room’s warm lamp-glow spilled onto the floor, guiding him like a lighthouse beam.
He rounded the corner.
And there was Sam.
Sitting on the couch, one foot tucked under the other leg, shoulders relaxed, his phone forgotten in his hand. The lamplight softened the angle of his jaw, catching on his eyelashes as he looked up, sensing Misa before hearing him.
“Hey,” Sam said gently, voice steady and warm, as if he’d been saving that tone just for him. “Feel any better?”
Misa didn’t have an answer, but he stepped forward, drawn by something quiet and unshakeable, gravity pulling him toward the only point in the room that felt real.
His knees met the carpet before he’d fully decided to kneel. The movement wasn’t graceful. It wasn’t planned; he just folded.
Sam blinked in surprise, half rising as though to catch him, but Misa had already lowered his head until his forehead rested lightly against the inside of Sam’s thigh. The contact was small, but the world steadied a fraction. The fabric of Sam’s sweatpants was warm and soft beneath his skin.
He exhaled, a long, trembling breath he hadn’t known he’d been holding.
“Oh—hey. Hey, sweetheart.” Sam’s voice went gentle. He eased back onto the couch, moving Misa slowly with him. “It’s okay. You’re okay. I’ve got you."
A moment passed where neither of them moved. Misa wasn’t sure he could. His thoughts felt like drifting ash, too light to catch, too heavy to float.
Then Sam’s hand lifted and touched his hair, tentative at first, as if checking whether the contact helped. When Misa didn’t flinch, Sam let his fingers move slowly, combing through damp strands with a steady, grounding rhythm.
“There you go,” he hummed, voice low and steady. “Just breathe. You’re alright.”
Misa’s shoulders loosened, just slightly. The room’s tilt softened.
Sam continued the slow, smoothing motion, thumb brushing lightly near Misa’s temple in a way that didn’t demand anything, anchoring him. “Rough night,” he said softly. “Anyone would feel wiped after that.”
The words floated, warm and calm, settling into the fog around Misa rather than trying to cut through it.
After a long moment, Sam added, “Warso talked to media after you left the room.”
Misa’s breath stilled.
“He said you were probably the best forward we had tonight.”
The sentence felt unreal, like something spoken from another room, filtered through soft cotton. Misa didn’t lift his head; he wasn’t sure he could, not without the world slipping sideways again. He let out a sound that could only be classified as a whimper.
Sam’s hand kept moving through his hair, steady and patient. “Yeah,” he said quietly, “he’s right. Your assist on Toff’s goal? Beautiful. You played really well.”
Warmth pricked at the edges of Misa’s vision, a kind of pressure, like his body had been holding out against gravity and finally remembered it didn’t have to.
“You don’t have to think about it right now,” Sam went on. “Just stay here with me. Let yourself catch up.”
Misa inhaled slowly, the carpet soft beneath his knees, Sam’s lap warm under his forehead, the hand in his hair a steady, reliable point in the drifting haze.
Misa stayed there for a long moment, forehead resting against Sam’s thigh, the steady motion of fingers in his hair acting like the only anchor he had left. His breathing had evened out without him noticing, loosening from that too-tight place in his chest.
When Sam finally spoke again, his voice was gentle. “Hey… let’s get you off the floor, yeah? Couch’ll be easier on your knees.”
Misa didn’t respond verbally, but Sam waited anyway, giving him a few seconds to decide whether he could move. Eventually, Misa shifted just enough that Sam understood it as agreement.
“Alright,” Sam hummed. He slid a hand to the back of Misa’s neck, guiding without pulling, supporting without rushing him. “Take your time.”
Misa rose slowly, the room tilting for a split second before leveling out. Sam kept a steadying hand on him as he swung both his legs onto the couch, his back against the armrest, before softly pulling Misa down on top of his body. Misa went happily, shifting until he was positioned between Sam’s legs, head buried in his chest, sinking into him like he was absorbing some part of his weight he hadn’t realized he was carrying.
Sam’s hair found his hair again automatically, brushing through the damp strands, slower this time, more intentional. “There you go,” he said quietly. “Just settle in.”
Silence stretched between them, comfortable and warm, filled with the soft hum of the lamp and the almost-silent sounds of the house at night. Misa felt himself drifting, this time more tired than frightening, like earlier. More like the edges of things softened just enough for him to breathe around them.
After a little while, Sam spoke again, voice low. “You scared yourself tonight, huh?”
Misa blinked at that. The words weren’t accusing, fitting in a way nothing else had tonight. He nodded, barely.
“Yeah,” Sam said, acknowledging the motion with a soft breath. “Make sense. You pushed hard out there. Harder than you think.”
Misa swallowed, the sound small. “Didn’t feel like enough.”
Sam huffed a quiet exhale, not quite a laugh, more like disbelief that anyone could see it that way. “I disagree.”
Misa’s eyes flickered up.
Sam continued, thumb brushing lightly behind Misa’s ear in a grounding circle. “I think you played really well. You did good. You always do good.”
The words felt heavy and unreal, but gently. Like they didn’t need to be believed right now, they just needed to exist.
“Thank you,” Misa let out a shaky breath. “Did Toff and Cat come home yet?”
“Yeah,” Sam said simply. “You took a while in the shower.”
The quiet settled again, but now it felt warmer and less hollow. Misa buried his head back into Sam’s chest without thinking.
Misa wasn’t sure how long he had lain on Sam. Time had gone loose again, stretched in warm, slow waves.
Eventually, Sam shifted slightly, brushing a hand once more through Misa’s hair before letting it rest against his upper back. “Hey,” he whispered, voice low, “I think we should get you to bed.”
Misa didn’t move at first. The idea of standing felt impossible, like his body was made of something heavier than muscle and bone. The idea of leaving this quiet, steady safety landed somewhere deep in his chest.
He swallowed, voice small but clear enough. “Will you stay?”
Sam’s response was immediate. “Of course.” He cupped the side of Misa’s arm, steady and warm, his thumb brushing lightly once as if to reassure him. “Come on, I’ve got you.”
Misa nodded, the movement small and slow. Sam stood first, then offered a hand. Misa’s legs wobbled, and Sam shifted closer, one hand hovering near his back, ready to catch him if he tipped.
They moved down the hallway together, Sam guiding him gently, their steps muffled by the soft rug. Misa’s breaths came easier now, slower, but everything still felt fragile, like he was made of thin glass and the world around him was just a little too bright, a little too loud.
When they reached Misa’s room, Sam nudged the door open with his shoulder. The warm lamplight spilled across the blankets, and Misa felt his body sink toward the sight like a magnet being pulled home.
“Go ahead,” Sam nudged him. “Get in. I’ll be right back with some water.”
Misa crawled onto the bed, limbs heavy in a way that wasn’t quite exhausting, but more like his body had finally decided it could let go. He slid under the blankets, pulling them to his chin. The fabric felt soft, warm, grounding. He let his eyes flutter half-shut, the room tilting just slightly before settling again.
He heard Sam’s footsteps return, the quiet clink of a glass set gently on the nightstand.
Then the mattress dipped as Sam got into the bed next to him.
“Hey,” Sam said gently. “Lift your head a sec.”
Misa did, barely. Sam slipped his arm under his head, adjusting until Misa was flush against him.
“There you go. Better?”
Misa nodded, eyes slipping closed.
Sam nuzzled his nose into Misa’s hair, pulling him impossibly closer. “I’m right here.”
Misa’s breath steadied, chest rising and falling in slow, even waves. The fog in his mind didn’t vanish, but it softened, fading to the edges where it couldn’t swallow him whole. Misa felt his body unclench all the way for the first time since the game ended, sinking fully into the mattress, the blankets, and the quiet presence beside him.