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Troy was late to practice. It’s so dumb — he’s never late to practice, and that’s why his coach had mentioned it (So out of character for Troy), and Dad had been seething in the car all the way home.
It only starts in earnest when they get home. Slamming cupboards, raised voices. His mother is there. There’s an apology in her eyes — a promise that she’ll try to make it up to Troy later with new clothes or extra ice time and assurances that It really is fine, Troy. But she doesn’t say anything now. Can’t say anything now. Troy’s made peace with that — nothing he or his mom can say in these situations ever helps. It’s best to let his dad tire himself out.
“Am I just wasting fucking money? That’s what it feels like, Troy. Like I’m pouring money down the fucking drain when you can’t be fucked getting to the ice on time. Imagine how humiliating that is for me — I’m going in to bat for you, I’m making the connections, getting you into the fucking camps, and your coach tells me you can’t even get to training on time. Does any of this make sense to you? Are you just gonna stand there like an idiot?”
Troy blinks. His tongue feels like it’s tied in a knot. “Sorry,” he says quietly.
“What?”
Troy manages to swallow the lump in his throat. “I’m — I’m sorry.”
Dad laughs. “‘Sorry,’” Dad parrots back in a nasty, mocking voice. Out the corner of his eye, Troy sees Mom wince. “‘Sorry’ doesn’t actually fix anything, does it, Troy?”
Troy nods, “No.”
“What, you’re twelve and you’ve got an attitude? You don’t give a fuck? Jesus, the rehab on your fucking broken leg alone — do you remember that? Do you have any idea how much that cost? You’re careless, Troy. You’re careless, and maybe you need to think about if you’re just fucking around. Are you?”
Troy stares back at his father stupidly.
“I asked a question.”
“I’m — no. No, I want to play juniors. I want to… to get drafted.”
Dad snorts as if this isn’t all they talk about. “Not with how you’ve been playing.”
The world is spinning. Troy has been the best player on every team he’s ever been on. He leads in points. He’s MVP season after season.
Had he really only been five minutes late? Was that all it took?
Dad keeps on for a long time. Longer than usual, but not much longer than usual — about him being late; about him wasting talent and money; about his attitude. And as always, he and his mother are pinned like insects for display — they can’t move, can’t argue, can’t leave. Troy wants to run and hide and breathe and —
At some point, without realising it, Troy stopped breathing. Or, he must have. He’d been glued to the spot for a long time — maybe he laced his sneakers too tight? Or didn’t drink enough at practice? — because he finds himself light-headed and staggers to the ground. His vision darkens for just a few seconds, then he’s blinking himself back into consciousness as his father mutters something in disbelief. Troy hears his name being repeated over and over by his mother — Troy, Troy, Troy, Troy.
Later, she tells him she saw him stop breathing — he must have forgotten to breathe. I’m so sorry, Troy.
Later, this becomes a funny story his father tells his friends — that twelve year old Troy was so shit-scared of a bit of yelling that he fainted; I’m just lucky he didn’t fucking piss himself. (Troy doesn’t know why he would tell people that, but he’s heard grown men laugh at the story, so that’s his answer, maybe.)
“When’s the last time you got your cock wet, Barrett?”
Dallas Kent has just stumbled back in after a night out. Dallas has a pretty regular girl he’s been seeing when they play in Montreal — Shayley. Troy feels kind of sorry for her. She’s a puck bunny, sure, but she’s also eighteen years old and in love with Dallas. She watches all their games, and sends him sweet little messages that have Dallas howling with laughter when he recites them for Troy.
Troy rolls his eyes. “Nah, man, we can’t keep rooming if you’re gonna keep begging me to fuck you.”
As always, this gets a raucous laugh from Dallas. “Y’know, Shayls says she thinks you’re gay.”
There’s something sick between Troy Barrett and Dallas Kent. Always has been — since they were rookies, and even still at twenty-one. Dallas pokes at the idea of Troy being gay — makes jokes, writes slurs and draws cocks on him when Troy passes out after a big night with the guys. Troy, in turn, tries to joke about it — as if it’s ridiculous, and not his living, waking nightmare that Dallas finds out about him.
“Shayley says I’m gay?” Troy snorts.
“Mhmm. Reckons that’s why you’re not interested in any of her friends.”
“Doesn’t think that maybe not everyone’s into sluts with chipped nails and clown lips with white trash names like Shayley?”
Dallas grins wide. “I’m not gonna fucking marry her, Barrett. Sheesh.”
Troy closes his eyes and sees sweet Shayley with her false lashes and low-cut shirts and hearts in her eyes for Dallas. He feels even more miserable for being such an asshole about her, even behind her back. Dallas does that enough for both of them.
“Y’know, you can just tell me,” Dallas says with mock sincerity. “We won’t be able to room anymore — but I’m sure some of the guys won’t mind head from pretty boy Troy when we’re on the road. Got pretty sweet lips yourself, Barrett.”
Troy feels a wave of nausea roll through him. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Why did Dallas have to do this? It’s way, way too far — but he usually only says this shit when they’re alone, so Troy can’t tell if this is something other guys find funny. Does Dallas actually suspect he’s gay? He must. But if he really suspected, why would he keep Troy around?
Troy takes a breath and holds it. He wishes he could run away — but there’s nowhere to run. Not from Dallas. Not from himself. He remembers to release the breath.
“Fuck off,” Troy manages weakly.
Dallas rolls his eyes. “That’s all you got?”
“If I was gay, I don’t think I’d get with the ugliest guy on the team,” Troy mutters.
Dallas grins a little. “Really never thought about it?”
Troy has thought about it. He tries not to think about it. Troy’s pretty touch starved, these days. Part of the irony in him being vile about Shayley and calling her a slut is that Troy is fairly sure he would cuddle up to the fucking equipment guy at this point, if someone would just hold him for a night and keep his secrets. So Troy’s thought from time to time about Dallas’s big, capable hands tangled in his hair, or on his throat, or spanning the width of his chest. Troy’s desperate.
He wants to run, but he says, “You and Shayley have a lot in common — you’re both trashy blondes I have no interest in fucking, who mostly just think about your dick. You’re perfect for each other — I could never come between you.”
Dallas flashes a grin — and Troy still can’t tell exactly what Dallas knows or suspects, but Troy seems to have danced well enough that Dallas rewards him by letting it go for the rest of the night.
Troy and Adrian never talk about coming out. Not in any real way. Adrian considers he will come out ‘later’ — though Troy isn’t quite sure when ‘later’ is meant to be. It could be when Adrian is at the top of his game, when he can pick and choose roles without so much fear of being typecast or blacklisted. It might be when he’s fading into obscurity, when no one cares who he is or who he fucks. They talk from time to time about out queer people in the entertainment industry as if one day Adrian will be one of them.
They never talk about Troy coming out as a possibility.
“When do NHL players usually retire? Thirty?” Adrian asks. They’ve drained a bottle of red in Adrian’s LA apartment. Adrian flicked through channels until he found a black and white movie he occasionally mouths the words to, but neither is watching intently.
Troy shrugs. “Some. Sooner with an injury. Later, maybe, if you’re good and not too injury prone.” Troy hesitates. “I could come to LA, when I retire.”
Adrian laughs at him — that beautiful, melodic laugh of his. Troy feels his face get hot. “Troy — don’t you hockey players all just want designer cabins by lakes or McMansions in the mountains?”
“I like the beach too.” He swallows, then, “You’re in LA, most of the time. I mean, you’re kind of blowing up right now with the super hero stuff. You’ll be in LA all the time when we’re thirty.”
Adrian laughs again. “And you’re still going to be sneaking into my LA apartment in a ball cap and sunglasses in six years’ time?”
Why does this feel so humiliating?
“A house, Adrian. I’d buy one, probably.”
Adrian pauses — as if they’ve strayed too far from the script in his mind and he needs to improvise.
“You’re such a romantic,” Adrian teases.
“You flew up to Toronto for Christmas,” Troy mutters. “For me.”
I said I loved you. You said it back.
“Retired Troy Barrett will have a house by the beach in LA for me. Or maybe Malibu?” Adrian muses, perfect white teeth flashing in a sharp smile. He waits for Troy to answer.
“Wherever.”
“Nice enough house to make up for the CTE and dad bod?”
Troy feels as if he’s been struck. He sucks in a breath and shudders it out. He wants to leave. He needs to put his head together — figure out why he feels hollow and awful and ashamed. Troy just told Adrian that he wanted to share a home with him — that he saw them together and domestic and whatever in six years’ time, and Adrian isn’t pleased. He’s whatever the fuck this is — barbed, playful, evasive. Troy feels like there’s no air. Is it the wine? Wine gets to Troy’s head. Maybe it’s gotten to Adrian too.
He wants to run, but they hardly see each other. And after whatever the fuck this is, if Troy behaves, Adrian will still hold him and touch him and let Troy have him. Troy will say he loves Adrian (love drunk, and maybe actually drunk), and Adrian will say it back (he does, in bed). But he won’t if they fight. And he can't have any of it if he leaves.
“Dad bods are in,” Troy says. “I’ve been thinking of bulking.”
Adrian wrinkles his nose. They devolve into a more natural banter, and eventually Troy feels himself relax again.
Adrian might not want Troy in six years, but he wants him now. He loves him now. Troy makes the most of now. As they fall into bed, he supposes he's glad that he couldn’t run, really.
Troy runs from Harris Drover. That’s its own sort of humiliating. Troy is a grown man. Troy is meant to be a role model (which, okay, he hasn’t been up until… well, maybe now-ish). He shouldn’t be running from anything, let alone from an objectively warm and kind person.
But Harris lets him run.
Harris lets Troy come to his office and soak in his calm and pet the team dog, and when it gets too hard, Harris lets him run away. And he lets him come back and do it all again, and again, and again.
“Y’know, you’re probably the only person I’ve ever met who literally runs away from their problems,” Harris says with a grin from behind his PC. Carly Rae Jepsen plays softly from a small speaker on Harris's desk. Troy sips a coffee in the chair opposite him.
“Sometimes I need space to figure stuff out,” Troy admits. “I’m sorry, though.” Then, “You let me.”
“Do I?” Harris asks, then chuckles. “I mean, sure. I guess.”
“Like, you’ll let me leave and come back.”
Harris looks puzzled. “What else would I do?”
Troy blinks back at him. He doesn’t know that there’s a way to tell Harris that for all it seems to be his go to move in Ottawa, Troy has always been trapped. He’s never had space to breathe and think or run. There was no give in any of his past relationships — Dad, Dallas, Adrian. He was always facing them, and he was always losing.
“I don’t worry that you’ll…”
Get mad at me. Scream at me. Punish me. Leave me. It’s too much to tell the cute social media guy who’s way too sweet for him. It’s too much to reveal to the guy he’s kind of crushing on. It’s too much.
Troy feels it then — that urge to run. He looks up at Harris guiltily and Harris throws his head back and laughs.
“Got places to be again?” Harris asks knowingly without any real edge to the words.
“Yeah,” Troy says, “I should… Stretch. My calves. They’re tight.”
Troy gets to his feet and scrambles to the door. But he looks back at Harris’s bemused face and shoots him a small smile. “Thanks.”
Harris rolls his eyes and gestures at his empty coffee cup, “Just keep ‘em coming, Barrett.”
Something dances under Troy’s skin, and he nods stupidly. “Yeah. Sure.”
On the other side of the door, Troy takes a deep breath and lets it go, and there’s a spring in his step as he runs away, knowing Harris will let him slink back in with a hot cup of coffee the next day.