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Facts or opinions which are to pass through the hands of so many, to be misconceived by folly in one, and ignorance in another, can hardly have much truth left.
“You were right,” Hayden called, and let the door slam behind him, the heavy thud reverberating through the foyer before he could catch it.
Jackie poked her head around the corner to glare at him, and he winced. “Sorry,” he said, dropping his keys into the bowl on the hall table with exaggerated care. “How many of them are asleep?”
“All of them,” she said pointedly, “or they were.”
Hayden’s eyes widened, and all other thoughts went out of his head. His children were never all asleep at the same time. The house was so silent he could hear the refrigerator humming.
Jackie laughed (quietly) as he tossed her over his shoulder and tiptoed carefully up the stairs, avoiding the squeaking stair. She even let him go at it doggie-style even though it was harder for her to come that way—he made it up to her by eating her out afterward, which was probably kind of gross but honestly he was pretty into it and nobody knew except the two of them and Jackie was definitely into it, her fingers twisted in his hair, her hips rolling against his mouth.
They were still catching their breath when she said, “What was I right about this time?”
All the post-orgasmic sleepiness left Hayden’s body in an instant, and he sat up, taking half the covers with him. “Oh my God. Shane announced that he’s gay, can you fucking believe it?”
Jackie yawned and took the covers back. “Um, yeah. I told you he probably was.”
“I know, that’s why I said you were right, but…” Hayden shook his head, mystified. “It just…I mean, sure, it explains why we could never set him up with anyone. But he said he was in love with someone, and how is that even possible? Who? When? He’s my best friend, how could I not know?”
“Ah,” Jackie said.
Hayden didn’t like the sound of that Ah, and he decided to ignore it. “I know everything there is to know about that guy, and I can tell you for sure that he has not been going out on dates. He’s not on fucking Grindr or whatever, no way. He’s either playing hockey or thinking about playing hockey. The only people he hangs with are like, you and me and his fucking parents. Shit, do his parents know who this guy is? Cause I don’t have the first fucking clue.”
Jackie tugged at his arm, and he went willingly enough, pillowing his head on her left tit. He kissed her nipple, always slightly distended now from years of breast-feeding, the skin a darker pink-brown than it used to be. He loved it.
“Shane loves you, baby.”
“No,” Hayden said automatically. “It’s not me, I asked.”
Jackie snorted loudly, right in his ear. “Okay, glad you cleared that one up. I meant, you’re his best friend. If he didn’t tell you who it is, he probably has a good reason. He came out to you, that’s a big deal. For someone like Shane, as private as he is? That’s an honor, baby.”
Hayden reached up to thumb at her left nipple, just gently. “Well, thing is, he didn’t just tell me, he came out to the whole team. Right there in the locker room.”
He could tell that this surprised Jackie, and despite everything he was a little pleased about that, since very little did. “Wow. Okay. Go Shane, I guess.”
“Yeah. I mean, yeah, obviously. I’m super proud of him.” And he was. Way more proud than hurt, definitely.
“In that case, maybe just give him a minute?” Jackie combed her fingers through his hair, ran her nails down his spine, scratching gently. “You guys are going to have some time together when you fly to San Francisco next week. I’m sure he’ll talk about it more then, and then once you guys have won the Cup, we’ll have Shane and his boyfriend over for dinner, okay?”
Hayden grinned, pressed a kiss at the hollow of her throat. “We’re gonna win the fucking Cup, baby.”
She tugged his hair, lifted his head up. Her eyes were fierce, absolutely sure. “Fucking right you are.”
They had four days off before they had to fly out to San Francisco, and Hayden spent them in the best way possible: eating Jackie’s awesome food, her even more awesome pussy, and hanging with his kids.
Ruby and Jade were on a friendship bracelet kick—the coffee table had become a minefield of beads and elastic—and so Hayden sat on the floor with them to make one for every member of the team. His fingers were too big for the work, really—he kept fumbling the beads and sending them skittering off the table and onto the rug where Amber would inevitably find them—but Jade was a patient teacher, and Ruby handled quality control with the zeal of a factory foreman. They had to go out to Michaels to get some blue and red beads in bulk, along with more letters because hockey nicknames almost always used S and Y and they’d burned through their supply six bracelets in.
Shane was special, so he got Uncle Shane. Hayden tried giving Rozanov Asshole but he was unsuccessful: Ruby caught him at it and threatened to make it Uncle Ilya which was obviously unacceptable. They settled on Roz, since at least it didn’t use up a Y.
Arthur wanted to help but couldn’t quite manage the fine motor control. He broke Hayden’s heart sometimes—so sweet, so earnest, so mildly puzzled by everything around him. For his sake, the twins agreed to set aside the jewelry-making for an afternoon, and they all trooped to the Science Museum to see if there had been any updates from Penta-Oculus on the search for extraterrestrial life (there never were, but Arthur wanted to visit every day, just in case).
Amber didn’t care what they did, as long as she could put something disgusting in her mouth.
Hayden loved the shit out of his children. They drove him crazy and he was kind of terrible at managing them—he was the one who always forgot snacks, who let them have juice too close to bedtime, who said sure, one more episode four Spongebobs ago—but he would do absolutely anything for them.
Hayden’s relationship with his children wasn’t that different from his relationship with hockey, when you came right down to it.
So it was with a mixture of sorrow and screaming excitement that he kissed his family goodbye at the end of the four days. They all came to see him off at the airport, so Hayden got out of his minivan smelling vaguely of stale goldfish and applesauce.
The team was in high spirits on the plane—JJ had commandeered the music, which was at least preferable to the shitty country music Mitty listened to. Rozanov had given everyone these awful Eurotrash silk shirts, and most of the guys were wearing theirs—but Hayden’s had fucking hamsters on it? Where did he find this shit? Whatever, at least it made a change from Shane’s traditional gifts of Rolexes...oh, yes, there was the box, right there in Hayden’s seat, that familiar dark green with the little crown. Now Hayden would have another Christmas gift for his father-in-law, same as every year.
The time off had been good for him and Shane. He was much more chill now, and Jackie had reminded him that, from all the reading she’d done about it, coming out was never easy, and it should never be taken as a slight or a lack of trust that it hadn’t been done sooner, or differently. Hayden reminded himself of that, told himself that Shane was his brother, and he was there to give him whatever he needed.
So he took out the Tupperware of special vegan cookies Jackie had made specifically for Shane, plus the much larger Tupperware of fucking delicious cookies she’d made for everyone else. He started passing out the friendship bracelets, and managed a smile and a backslap for Rozanov, trying to ignore the way the guy looked genuinely touched, and then he went back to his seat and waited for Shane to come to him.
It would take a bit, he knew. Shane had to make the rounds, check in with everyone. He was spending extra time with Rozanov lately, but that made sense: he was new to the team, plus he and Shane had that crazy mind-meld thing on the ice, where they didn’t even have to look or talk or so much as tap a fucking stick to communicate. They probably talked through all that stuff in advance, like Shane always wanted to do with Hayden, but Hayden couldn’t ever pull off for him because there was planning and then there was executing, and what worked in practice—and what looked clean and obvious on Shane’s careful diagrams—didn’t fucking work when there was a 6’4’’ defenseman barreling down on you with murder in his eyes.
Rozanov could pull it off for him, though. Rozanov could keep up.
And okay, Hayden was a little jealous, but surely that was allowed? It wasn’t easy being best friends with Shane fucking Hollander, Hockey God, when you were just A Pretty Decent Wing. Shane never made a thing of it, never treated Hayden as anything less than an equal, but the fact was he wasn’t. Shane was better than Hayden, but that had always been okay because Shane was better than everybody.
Only now there was Rozanov. Hayden didn’t think he was Shane’s equal either…but he came the closest to it of anyone. And of course Shane liked that in a guy—nothing got Shane’s attention like good fucking hockey did, so it made sense that the two of them were all buddy-buddy now. Those first few weeks Rozanov was on the team had clearly been some of the worst of Shane’s life, but he’d been the bigger man—it’s what made him such an incredible captain—and now the two of them could hang. They could talk about what it was like being faster than anybody else, having a better eye, a better shot, how many sponsorships they each had and what to do with all the free shit people gave them.
So fuck yes Hayden was a little jealous, shit, he was only human. But he was secure in his position as Shane’s best friend. Rozanov was a shiny fellow hockey god, but he was also an Olympic-caliber asshole, and Shane had spent his entire adult life hating him. He’d get bored of talking about how much he hated Reebok soon enough, and he’d make his way to his usual seat by Hayden’s side and he’d treat himself to one of his vegan cookies, and everything would be as it should be.
Hayden leaned back in his seat, stretched his legs into the aisle, and waited.
It’s a long fucking flight from Montreal to San Francisco, six hours, give or take. Normally Hayden tried to sleep—it was why Shane liked sitting by him; Hayden could sleep through anything except a baby crying, and Shane preferred it when people didn’t talk to him. It was an arrangement that had worked beautifully for the better part of a decade. But sleep wasn’t going to be possible; he was way too keyed up, everybody was. He played poker with JJ and Comeau and Biss, mostly to protect the rookie since Hayden was shit at poker—but it turned out Biss didn’t need it. The kid had a face like a choirboy and the instincts of a Vegas pit boss. He fucking cleaned them out.
Shane was still sitting with Rozanov. Hayden could see them from where he sat—Shane in the window seat, turned sideways, with one leg folded underneath him, and Rozanov beside him, one arm slung over the back of Shane’s seat, gesturing with the other. It looked like they were arguing, and Shane hardly ever argued with anybody, mostly because he only ever wanted to talk hockey and when he talked hockey he was always undeniably correct. Maybe Rozanov didn’t get that?
Hayden tossed his cards after a particularly brutal hand—Biss took another forty bucks off him with a pair of sevens, the little shit—and got to his feet, stretching out his back with a groan. He made his way up the aisle to Shane and Rozanov, stepping over Stedlund’s outstretched legs, leaning casually over Tremblay’s seat just behind them to listen in, get a sense of the conversation before joining it.
“No, fuck that,” Shane was saying. “That’s a fucking joke and you know it. No way.”
“Is not a joke,” Rozanov insisted. “I’m being serious.”
“But it makes no sense! It’s going to be hard enough—seriously, everything is already hard enough, and now you want to, what? Make it fucking harder?”
“‘The hard is what makes it great,’” Rozanov said, sounding very wise—except that was from A League of Their Own, and Hayden wasn’t going to let him get away with it.
“You and Tom Hanks actually have a lot in common,” Hayden said, figuring that was his way in.
Shane and Rozanov both looked at him blankly.
“I do not think I have very much in common with America’s Father Figure,” Rozanov said.
“Not Tom Hanks Tom Hanks, his character from the movie. Coach Whatshisname—c’mon, Shane, we watched it together last year.”
Shane squinted at him. “…Jimmy Dugan?”
“What do I have in common with washed-up alcoholic?” Rozanov sounded genuinely curious, and when he put it like that, Hayden really wasn’t sure.
“Uh…you both drink Coke? And he’s an asshole, so…”
Shane rolled his eyes. “Dude, come on. He’s been on the team for months now. Can we just,” he waved a hand between them, “let it go?”
Hayden glared at him, because they had fucking rules about the phrase let it go—along with you’re welcome and anything to do with fruit salad—but also because he couldn’t be expected to turn around ten years of dedicated hatred in a few months. He’d hated Rozanov out of loyalty to Shane, for fuck’s sake—where was the gratitude?
The object of Hayden’s brotherly hatred was smirking at him. “I don’t mind that you think I’m an asshole, Pike,” he said graciously. “It’s understandable—you are jealous.”
Hayden’s mouth dropped open in outrage—never mind that he was, a good teammate would never call him on it, which just brought everything back around full circle, didn’t it, because Rozanov wasn’t a good teammate, he was—all together now—an asshole.
“I’m not jealous,” he sputtered. “I…I made you a fucking bracelet, you shithead.”
Rozanov’s hand went to his wrist. The bracelet was a little tight, and the skin around it was faintly pink, but he hadn’t taken it off. “Your children made me this bracelet. They are wonderful.”
“Actually I made it,” Hayden said, which was mostly true.
“Oh.” Rozanov looked genuinely surprised, and at a bit of a loss. As this was basically unheard of, Hayden thought he might as well bask in it.
“Anyway,” Shane said eventually, to break the silence, “what’s up, man?”
It took Hayden a second to realize Shane was talking to him. “Oh, nothing. I’ve, uh, got some of Jackie’s cookies for you. Vegan, obviously.” He felt even better when Shane’s eyes brightened; it was rare for him to be excited about food.
“Oh, really? I’ll come get some—thanks.” Shane was already unbuckling his seatbelt. “Ilya, will you let me up?”
Rozanov gave him a disbelieving, almost wounded look. “You will get up for vegan cookies?”
“My wife’s are genuinely good,” Hayden said loyally, though to be honest he’d never tried them. Her egg- and milk-containing cookies were delicious, though, and surely the talent transferred.
But Shane was giving Rozanov an apologetic look. “Yeah, I mean I should probably…” he glanced at Hayden.
Rozanov tipped his head back with a dramatic, full-body groan that for some reason made Shane smile.
“Come on, don’t be a baby.” Shane shoved at his shoulder until eventually Rozanov unfolded himself from his seat and stepped into the aisle. He was fucking pouting, it was bizarre.
“Seriously, what’s the deal with you two?” Hayden asked, once he and Shane were finally in their seats, the Tupperware open between them. The familiar comfort of it—Shane beside him, the hum of the engines, the laughter of the guys—loosened something in Hayden’s chest.
Shane froze, cookie halfway to his mouth. “What do you mean?”
“You’re like, hanging out. It’s weird. I mean, I get you guys probably have stuff you need to talk about—what was that all about earlier, anyway? What was going to make everything so much harder?”
“Oh, that.” Shane laughed, took a bite of his cookie. He chewed it slowly, the way he always did, to make sure he was really enjoying it. “Ilya’s talking about getting a dog.”
This was not at all what Hayden had expected. First of all, it had nothing whatsoever to do with hockey. Second, Rozanov didn’t really seem like a dog sort of person. He was a cat person, if anything, one of those expensive inbred ones that looked like they despised you. “Okay. I mean, the twins have been begging for a Goldendoodle for years now, and I think we’re gonna give in over the summer.”
“Yeah, but…” Shane shook his head, took another bite. “He wants a rescue dog. A rescue puppy. And like, we’re gone all the time, you know? Who’s going to watch a puppy? My parents could help out a little, I guess, but they’re in Ottawa, plus I wouldn’t want to put them through puppy training…”
“Why would your folks help with Ilya Rozanov’s dog?” Hayden was extremely confused.
Shane choked on his cookie. “They wouldn’t. I mean…” he took a big gulp of water, pressed his fist to his sternum “…I’m thinking about getting a dog, and Ilya thinks it should be a puppy. I mean, we might share the dog. Maybe.”
“Why would you share a dog with Ilya Rozanov?” There was a point where confusion became something else, right? Like a distant galaxy of confusion where life was no longer carbon-based but fucking zinc-based or something.
Shane craned his head, and when Hayden followed his gaze, he saw Rozanov’s ankles dangling into the aisle, as he sat crosswise on the seat opposite Mitty and JJ, his ridiculous silk shirt unbuttoned several too many, making them both laugh. “Cause, uh…” he looked back at Hayden, and his mouth tightened. The color climbed his neck again. “Um.”
Hayden waited, but nothing was forthcoming. At last he sighed. “It’s fine, dude.”
Shane’s eyes widened, making him look somewhere between disbelieving and wary. “…It is?”
“Sure.” Hayden reminded himself of what had Jackie told him many, many times, whenever he was feeling insecure: that Shane was his brother, that they loved each other, that Shane valued him for more than just hockey. “I get it—you and Rozanov, I mean. There’s something special about you two, anybody can see that.”
Somehow, that made Shane look even more panicked. “Anybody?”
“Uh, no?” Zinc-based alien lifeforms, that’s what Penta-Oculus was going to tell Arthur about the next time they went to the Science Center. “I mean, just people who really know you, I guess.” Hayden shook his head, tried to get back on track. “And you’ve got to admit, I know you, buddy. I know what you need—and if that’s Rozanov…” he shrugged. “I’m all for it.”
The look of abject relief on Shane’s face made him wonder just how shitty he’d been to Rozanov lately. He’d probably have to do something about that, something more than a three-letter bracelet.
“Hayden, I…” Shit, Shane was actually about to start crying, his mouth trembling, his eyes going glassy. “I can’t tell you how much that means to me. You’re my best friend, you always have been and I just…” he let out a breath, pinched at his eyes. “Fuck. Wow. That’s, uh. It’s quite a load off.”
And then he fucking hugged Hayden. This had happened a grand total of six times previously, and Hayden could name every single one: the time they won the Cup, the day after the twins were born, the other time they won the Cup, the day Arthur was born, the day Hayden had asked Shane to be Arthur’s godfather, and one time three years ago when Shane was really drunk and sad about something he wouldn’t explain.
It was an awkward hug, obviously, with an armrest and a container of vegan cookies crushed between them, but Hayden did his best, throwing his arms around his friend and squeezing tight. “I love you, man.”
Shane choked into his neck. “I love you, too.”
Shit. Now Hayden was going to start crying. He blinked up at the ceiling, inhaled through his nose. It was pre-finals emotions, that’s what it was, they made everybody fucking crazy. The whole team was an exposed nerve right now. “It’s gonna be great, dude. I promise.”
Shane took a deep, wet breath against Hayden’s neck, shuddering a little, but when he sat back, he was smiling, the real one that made him look nineteen years old, and he just looked so fucking happy. Hayden couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Shane look like that. “Yeah. I know it is.” He let out a breath, his shoulders settling. “It’s going to be amazing.”
“Fucking right it is.”
Shane settled down after that, pulling out his iPad and sketching out plays as usual—as usual, Hayden listened, added his thoughts if he had any, promised he’d do his best to execute, both of them knowing his best would be about seventy percent of what Shane drew up. They chatted about the kids, about Arthur in particular, and Amber, and Jackie’s Pilates studio/juice bar/kava bar—“The fuck is kava?” Shane asked, which was a question Hayden himself had once asked and now could confidently answer with, “It’s a fucking tea, dude, it chills you out, you should try it,” knowing that Shane absolutely never would. Chilling out was antithetical to who Shane was as a person.
They landed at SFO with only a slight bump, and Hayden waited patiently for the seat belt sign to ding off before getting up because that’s what you did when you were Shane Hollander’s best friend. As they walked down the stairs and into the damp Northern California air, Shane gave Hayden another hug, fucking unprecedented, and said, “So you’re cool to switch rooms, obviously.”
Hayden was going to have to call Jackie; he was used to Shane being weird, had built his entire adult friendship around Shane’s particular brand of intense, private, slightly baffling quirkiness—but this was beyond the fucking pale. Still, he said, “Yeah, of course, obviously,” because what the hell else was he supposed to say?
Shane gave him a look of such warmth and gratitude that Hayden felt his throat tighten again, and then he was gone, striding ahead to catch up with Rozanov, who was waiting for him at the gate, leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets.
Hayden ended up sharing with JJ. And to be honest? It was fucking great. He could play music, for one thing—within ten minutes JJ had his speaker set up on the nightstand and they were arguing about playlists—and JJ liked to talk, for another. Hayden wasn’t used to silence—well, he was, because he was Shane’s best friend and had roomed with him on the road for a decade—but when he wasn’t with Shane, he was surrounded by his kids or his guys or both, and he liked that, he liked the chaos and the constant stimulation.
So maybe it would be okay, after all. Sure, he was a tiny bit hurt that Shane wanted to room with Rozanov instead, but the hell with it, right? Shane loved him, he’d said so, he’d given two—two!—hugs to prove it.
Hayden tried calling Jackie to get her read on the whole thing, only to remember that it was the middle of the night her time. He texted her instead.
-Shane’s gone Cup-crazy. He’s hugging people. But he loved your cookies because you’re the best! Love you baby!
They won both fucking games. The second went into overtime, but still—they won both fucking games.
Everyone was on fire—Mitty was a beast, it was like he’d swelled in size, taking up the entire net. JJ was a monster, clearing the crease with hits that rattled the glass. And Hayden was skating like he never had before, his legs burning but his brain quiet, locked into that rare headspace where the game slowed down around him. They all were playing hockey the way it was meant to be played, fast and aggressive and smart, keeping their line changes crisp and their checks hard but clean.
And Shane and Rozanov? They were like nothing Hayden had ever seen—like nothing anyone had ever seen. Everyone was talking about it—the commentators were tripping over themselves talking about how historical it was. Theriault wasn’t an idiot; he put them on the same line almost all the time, switching them off between center and wing, even though it didn’t really matter which position they played as long as they were on the ice together. Shane had always loved playing, and had clearly loved playing with Rozanov earlier in the playoffs, but now he was fucking gleeful, lit up inside, and Rozanov was exactly the same. He was still an asshole, still gave San Francisco every reason to hate him, but he played like he was flying, like every single point made him feel more alive. They didn’t even seem to get fucking tired.
Although that clearly wasn’t true, since Shane and Rozanov fell asleep on the flight back, even though the plane was thumping with Mitty’s shitty fucking Toby Keith. Hayden glanced across the aisle and saw Rozanov slumping down so his head was on Shane’s shoulder, his mouth open with a line of drool coming out, darkening Shane’s sweatshirt. Hayden shook his head, sort of pitying the guy—Shane would be so grossed out when he woke up.
He caught up with them both after they’d all cleared Customs, slung an arm around each of their shoulders. Shane, predictably, stiffened, while Rozanov gave him a look like he’d gone crazy.
“Hey,” Hayden said, trying to sound light. “You, uh, you getting together with your folks, Shane?”
Shane’s answering smile looked a little nervous. “Um, yeah. They’re coming over tonight, actually.”
“Yuna and David,” Rozanov recited.
“Awesome, they’ve got to be psyched.” Mama Hollander was probably losing her ever-loving shit—a four-time Cup-winner, birthed right from her very loins. Maybe Ruby or Jade would go pro one day…
Shane winced. “I don’t know about that. It’s, uh, it’s complicated.”
“No way, dude,” Hayden said confidently. “You and Rozanov, together? Fucking unbeatable.”
Rozanov cleared his throat, shifting a little. “That’s, uh. Very nice of you, Pike.”
He sounded surprised, and no wonder—Hayden hadn’t really been very nice to him, well, ever. He sighed, squared his shoulders, told himself to hoist his balls: Rozanov was an asshole, but he was their asshole. Plus, he was Shane’s friend. “Hey, uh, Roz, got a sec?”
Rozanov eyed him warily but nodded; after a minute Shane strode on ahead, leaving them to it. They walked together in silence, their footsteps echoing in the mostly empty corridor past the baggage carousels, while Hayden tried to puzzle through what he wanted to say, until Rozanov paused at the elevator going up to the parking garage, his eyebrows raised.
Hayden flushed. “Right, okay. Sorry. I just…I guess what I wanted to say is…” he stopped, took a breath, and Rozanov let out a long-suffering sigh.
“Pike, I have things to do…”
“I know! Fuck!” He dropped his bag on the concrete floor, scrubbed at his head. He really needed some sleep. “I think I owe you an apology. I haven’t been, um, as welcoming as I probably should have. You’re a great addition to this team, for all of us, but…you know, for Shane especially. I’ve never seen him like this before, and it’s, you know, the two of you are really something.”
There was a long pause, during which Rozanov narrowed his eyes at Hayden—not judgmental, more like he was studying him. “I thought you were going to threaten to break my legs if I hurt him.”
Hayden forced out a laugh. “What? No.” He thought about it, then added, “I mean, I will. If you do. I just figured it went without saying.”
Rozanov nodded, reached up to squeeze Hayden’s shoulder, his grip firm and warm. “You are okay, Pike. Go home, get some rest. Tomorrow you will score some goals, yes?”
“Fucking right,” Hayden said, and knocked his head against Rozanov’s. It only hurt a little.
Hayden did score, thank you very much—in fact he scored twice.
The first one came midway through the second period, when the game was still knotted at one and the crowd was getting restless, that low anxious hum that meant they needed something to believe in. Shane won the faceoff clean, sweeping it back to the point, and the puck moved around the zone in quick, sharp passes—Roz to Hayden, back to Shane—until Shane found Hayden cutting across the slot. It wasn't a pretty goal, Hayden had a defender draped over his back and barely got his stick on the ice in time, redirecting the pass through a tangle of legs and pads. The goalie never saw it. The lamp lit and Hayden didn't even know it had gone in for a half-second until Shane crashed into him, grabbing his jersey, yelling something lost in the roar. The bench erupted. Comeau was banging his stick on the boards so hard Hayden could hear it from center ice.
The second was the kind of goal you dreamed about as a kid.
San Francisco had pulled their goalie with ninety seconds left, desperate and swarming, and for a terrible stretch it felt like the ice was tilting the wrong way—bodies everywhere, shots coming from every angle. Hayden blocked one with his shin and his whole leg went numb. Then Rozanov—who had no goddamn business being that calm with six attackers bearing down—picked off an errant pass at their own blue line, cool as anything, like he was collecting his mail. He didn't rush it. He let San Francisco commit, waited until Hayden was the only one who'd kept up with the breakout, and then threaded a pass through two defenders that had no right to get through, tape to tape, the puck arriving on Hayden's stick like it had been summoned there. Empty net. Hayden buried it and the building shook.
The horn sounded four seconds later and Hayden threw his gloves in the air. Rozanov was the first to reach him, smacked him on the helmet, hard enough to rattle his teeth.
"Good hands, Pike," he said, and the bastard actually sounded like he meant it.
There was no champagne in the locker room, not with one fucking game standing between the Metros and the Cup. Theriault gave a terse speech, talked about discipline and how hard they’d all worked for this, how a four-game shut out was how they did it in fucking Montreal, boys, so go home, kiss your wags, and show up tomorrow ready to bring it home. He clapped Shane on the shoulder on his way out, gave Rozanov a curt nod that, from Theriault, was basically a declaration of eternal love.
Shane’s speech wasn’t that different: “I’m so fucking proud of you guys, of myself, of all of us. The way we’re playing…” he shook his head, a little misty-eyed, his throat working. “It’s something most people only dream about.”
“It’s cause of you, Capitaine!” JJ hollered.
“Yeah, you and Roz, baby—you are motherfucking gods out there!” That was Mitty, his eyes bright and a little crazed.
Shane grinned, wild and fierce, and across the room Rozanov smiled back at him like he was looking at something holy. “We are lucky to have him with us.”
“I,” Rozanov said roughly, “am lucky to be here with you.”
Everyone hugged after that, hell, most of the guys were openly weeping. Comeau and Drapeau were wrapped around each other in the corner, swaying slightly. It was just too much adrenaline and emotion, so much that Hayden found himself with his arms wrapped around Roz’s naked chest on their way into the showers, skin against skin. He was solid and furnace-warm, his back slick with sweat, and Hayden pressed his face between his shoulder blades. “Fuck, man.”
Rozanov patted his arm. “I know.”
Hayden pulled back, laughing, swiping at his eyes. Around them, the showers were already running, steam billowing out. He ducked his head under the spray, blew bubbles in the water streaming down his face.
“Hey Holly, is your guy going to come out on the ice tomorrow?”
There was a chorus of “Shut the fuck up Biss, what the hell is wrong with you?” “They don’t have jinxes where you come from?”
“Sorry, sorry!” The kid sounded panicked. “I didn’t mean, I just…we still haven’t met him!”
Hayden reached out, clapped him on the shoulder. “It’s all good, dude. And don’t worry, Shane will introduce him when he’s ready.” The words were easy to say: Jackie had been repeating them all week.
Shane shot him a grateful look, and Hayden puffed out his chest a little.
“But you know, if we win—” Mitty glowered at Biss. “You should totally make out with him, pull a fucking Scott Hunter.”
Shane’s skin was already red from the hot water, but Hayden could still tell he was blushing. “I…I don’t know.” He glanced around the room, looked away again. “We’ve talked about it, but he’s not…he’s not out, and…”
“He should be,” Rozanov said abruptly from the other side of the room, his voice echoing off the tile. “He should kiss you in front of the whole world.”
Shane scowled at him. “It’s complicated for him. I don’t want him to rush into anything.”
“Rush.” Rozanov sounded mocking. “This fucking guy, he does not rush, he—”
“Come on, man,” Hayden said, “that’s not cool. Nobody should be pushed into coming out before they’re ready. You don’t know shit about Shane’s boyfriend.”
Rozanov stared at him. “What the fuck, Pike,” he said flatly.
“I’m serious! People can have all kinds of reasons for not wanting to come out. Maybe his family’s not cool with it, maybe he’s just not fucking ready. That’s his call, not yours.” Hayden jabbed a finger in Rozanov’s direction, feeling like a fucking ally, baby. “You don’t get to decide that for someone else just because you think it’d make a good highlight reel.”
He spun around to grin at Shane, found him looking even more confused than Rozanov did. “Right?” he prompted.
Shane glanced at Rozanov, who spread his hands, shrugging. “Uh, right. That’s right, Hayd. Yeah. Thanks.”
An awkward silence settled over the showers, broken only by the hiss of water and someone’s tentative cough. Hayden finished up, scrubbing, feeling like he’d fucked up but couldn’t figure out how.
Mitty, bless his beautiful, disgusting heart, broke the tension by releasing the loudest, most rancid fart Hayden had ever had the misfortune of inhaling. It was caught by the steam and held, and the guys cleared out fast, swearing at him.
Hayden toweled off and got dressed, wincing at the bruise blooming purple across his shin from the blocked shot. He thumbed open Jackie’s text:
-Baby you were INCREDIBLE. I’m so fucking proud of you. Come home so I can put you to bed.
He grinned, typed back on my way.
Shane Hollander was kissing Ilya Rozanov at center ice.
At first, Hayden didn’t even notice. He was far more interested in skating over to Mitty with everyone else, in throwing his helmet on the ice and his gloves in the air, in screaming and crying because they’d won the fucking Cup—the horn still reverberating in his chest, confetti falling from the rafters in blue and red spirals. Hayden’s throat was raw, his eyes were burning, he couldn’t feel his legs, and he felt like he could fly.
He didn’t think anyone else had noticed, either—on the team, that is, because obviously everybody else noticed, the crowd was going crazy (mostly about how they’d won? Hayden hoped so) and somewhere above them the announcers were going crazy but none of it really filtered in through the blood pounding in his skull until finally Mitty said, “Oh holy shit. They really did it.”
Hayden still didn’t have any idea what he was talking about, but he spun around to take a look and…okay. Wow.
He knew, logically, that Shane had sex. But it had never seemed really real, and even once Shane came out Hayden figured he probably did, like, handjobs or whatever the gay version of missionary was, in bed with the lights off and some soft jazz playing or something.
Watching him now, with his tongue down Roz’s throat and his legs around his waist, Rozanov’s hands under his thighs, it was starting to seem like maybe that wasn’t quite accurate.
“Are they…gonna start fucking?” Comeau asked in a hushed voice.
“We should probably…”
“Yeah. I mean, there are kids here.”
Mitty shrugged, shook his head, sent sweat flying everywhere. “Whatever, it’s hockey. They’ve seen worse.” He tilted his head, watching them avidly. “Roz has got great technique.”
“Gross, dude.”
“I’m not talking about tongue—although yeah, that too, probably—but Cap’s not a small guy, and that’s a solid hold. Lower back support and everything.”
The officials were bringing the Cup on the ice. Hayden could see the silver gleaming under the lights, but Shane and Roz still weren’t stopping. Hayden skated over to accept it, raised it overhead, feeling the world flashing in and out of reality. He passed it to JJ, to Mitty, on and on down the line, and then his kids were on the ice, Ruby and Jade barreling into him, sending him spinning. Arthur was crying, overwhelmed in his noise-cancelling headphones but still so proud of his dad, and Hayden scooped him up and held him close. He kissed the tip of his head, closed his eyes, felt the warm, solid weight of his son in his arms, better than any heavy piece of silver could ever be.
And then Jackie was there, Amber squirming in her arms, and they trapped her between them, and Hayden kissed his beautiful, amazing wife, the love of his life.
He thought again about Shane kissing Rozanov, wondered if they’d stopped by now. He pulled back, laughing, keeping one arm around Jackie and the other around Arthur. “Can you believe that shit?”
“You bet I can, baby,” she said fiercely, gripping the front of his jersey, her eyes bright and wet. “I knew you could do it.”
“No, I mean…” he jerked his head over, saw that yes, they had come up for air, and were playing tug-of-war with the Cup, laughing, Yuna and David looking mystified but happy. “Who could have seen that coming?”
Jackie’s eyes widened, and for a horrible second he thought she was going to say something like, Um, everyone? And he was going to feel like a dumbass again, as usual, who had never really understood his best friend, the guy he loved most in the whole world—and who apparently loved Ilya Rozanov of all fucking people, which made no sense except, now that Hayden really thought about it, sort of did.
But instead his wife shook her head, pulled him in close for a deep kiss, the sort of kiss they usually only got to have while Moana was playing in the background.
“Nobody,” she said, laughing. “It’s the craziest thing that’s ever happened.”
“Fucking right,” he said fervently, and then he had Amber on his shoulders and his wife in his arms and his other children were around somewhere, and he thought, I’m the luckiest motherfucker in the whole world.