Archive of Our Own

Kip glanced up at the man who walked in, the sounds of the street following at his heels. He was dressed for warmer weather than they were currently experiencing, but the athletic branding caught Kip’s eye – as did the tight muscles on display. The man sauntered up to the bar, shooting a grin across the lacquered top, and hunched forward with a little wriggle.

‘Hey, can I get a menu?’ His tone was affable, and distinctly Canadian. He had yet to break eye contact with Kip.

‘We’ve got specials and offers on the board,’ Kip gestured above his head to the blackboard announcing things like White Girl Wasted, which was a deal for ten shots, and Orgy on the Beach, which was two litres of cocktail in a pitcher with four straws, all in neon chalk. ‘Otherwise, we’ve just moved our menu online, so you can scan the QR code on the bar.’

‘Aw, the death of physical media, right?’ Still leaning halfway over the bar, he dutifully glanced around for an offending code. Kip watched out of the corner of his eye as the guy failed to notice the edges digging into his elbow from the screwed-down QR.

‘It’s a scourge,’ Kip offered back, trying to inject some tip-making energy into his tone at two in the afternoon. Whether he passed or not, the sprightly day-drinker didn’t let on, but apparently gave up his futile search for the menu and instead turned to quizzing Kip directly.

‘Do you do mocktails here? I’m not drinking at the minute, but I don’t want to miss out on a good drink.’ Big eyes glanced up at Kip from beneath his snapback, that cheery smile hitting him with full-frontal dimples.

Kip picked up a glass and started buffing it – both the glass and the towel were bone-dry, but if he kept looking into Mr Canadian-Boy-Next-Door’s wide, wet gaze he was sure to get vertigo. ‘We do – do you have any in mind?’

The man sucked on his teeth, casting about to look at the bottles lining the bar behind Kip; if he was insistent on a mocktail, this was a pretty fruitless endeavour, since Kip had nothing on display below 30%. ‘Do you do Fuzzy Navels here? Oh, what would the mocktail name be? Manscaping? Waxed happy trail? The Beautician? I don’t know.’

Refusing to allow his eyes to follow the skin (indeed hairless, definitely waxed) revealed by the man’s dropped-armhole shirt, half-twisted to almost reveal a nipple, Kip very firmly set down his glass and picked up an equally clean second one to pretend to dry. ‘Remind me what’s in that?’ Kip was not in the mood to ask about fuzzy navels while looking at Mr Muscular’s fuzz-less skin, revealed to a borderline slutty degree.

‘Orange, lemon, peach, and syrup. And ice. And soda. I don’t actually know where the booze comes in.’

‘Right.’ Kip got right on that, shaking the juices and syrup together over ice just to have something to do with his hands. The drink, once he put it together and finished it with a slice of dried orange for garnish, did look pretty good. The man took a long suck of it out of a straw, and sighed gustily.

‘Yum-my.’ He smacked his lips and twiddled with the straw. They sat in silence for a minute. ‘Er, not to make this awkward or anything, but you’re Hunter’s man, right?’

Kip’s shoulders tightened in a newly-minted reflex, beaten into him by a long month of so-called sports journalists. Before he had a chance to reply, the man continued, looking more and more like a professional athlete. ‘His boy? This is the gay bar he said you worked at, and you’re…’

Kyle was out the back, and Scott wasn’t coming around for another two hours, at the end of his shift. He let his eyes drift briefly, longingly, to the abstract clock on the opposite wall. Make that two hours or so. Kip looked over his only company with greater attention, stomach dropping when he found the logo for the Montreal Metros stitched into the man’s cap. The watch on his wrist was a Rolex; his size and musculature, more similar to Scott’s than any mere gym-bro could aspire to; the energy contained along the twitching lines of his arms and hands; all of this became inescapably obvious to Kip as he finally realised the man in front of him was a hockey player. Judging from his team, and the clench in Scott’s jaw when he spoke of them, not one who would be particularly friendly. Kip shot Scott a quick SOS text to see if he could hurry up a bit.

So what was the mocktail all about? Canadian politeness? Some fucked-up hockey machismo posing? Did he lose a bet? Kip accidentally caught his eye again as the man waited for a response. He was still smiling that guileless grin.

‘Yep. I am Scott’s partner. And you are…?’ If he was about to get hate-crimed, however weird the set-up was, he would at least like to know a name to give to Scott. And some of the other Admirals, who had rallied firmly around their captain in the face of their Stanley Cup win.

‘Oh!’ He thrust his hand out over the bar. ‘Hayden Pike, I play for the Metros. In Montréal. In Canada.’ He added, when Kip’s confusion visibly didn’t abate. This was less over the geography, which Kip had already figured out with the colourful logo directly in his line of sight, and more to do with the fact that Hayden Pike, who not only played for the Metros but, if Kip remembered correctly, was one of their starting players, was smiling at him and offering to shake his hand. Half of the Admirals had looked less enthusiastic at greeting him, and that had been when they were buoyed up on adrenaline from their historic win.

‘Okay…’ Kip shook Hayden’s hand, pumping it twice. His palm had been a little cold and wet from the condensation of his drink, but other than that it was a good shake. Taking a deep breath to continue their conversation, Kip realised he had nothing to say, and picked up a third dry glass.

Hayden took another drink, again through the straw. He smacked his lips, and set the drink down on one of the flimsy cardboard coasters.

‘Look.’ Hayden said, toying with the straw without meeting Kip’s eyes. ‘I have this… friend.’

Ah. Kip had slightly misjudged the situation. It would be one of those conversations.

He was a little rusty, since the last time he’d had to help someone through their sexuality had been in his last year of high school. His communication skills had improved massively since then, no small thanks to Scott and their formerly messy relationship.

‘And, y’know, I think he might be… gay.’ Hayden dipped his head with his emphasis, eyes flickering around the room even though they both knew they were alone. ‘Or, at least, maybe possibly attracted to men.’

Right. Okay, Kip could tease self-awareness out of a hockey player, he could do that. He had been lucky, with Scott, that even though he had been terrified of coming out, and dealing with more than a little internalised homophobia, Kip hadn’t had to help him come to terms with his actual attraction to men. Scott had always been remarkably confident in the sexual aspects of their relationship, even in the early days.

Hayden continued, blurting out his words as though some internal dam had broken. ‘Obviously I don’t want to, I’m not trying to, like, be that guy y’know, the one who just asks all of their questions to that one gay person they know, but Google wasn’t really helping and I figured you have some pretty specific experience, or Hunter does and you’re dating him, so maybe I could maybe pick your brains or something? Uh, please?’ He grimaced.

Kip set down the glass, gearing up to give baby gay Hayden Pike all of his attention. ‘Okay, that’s okay. I don’t mind answering your questions.’ He took on a soothing tone of voice, hoping to be as non-confrontational as he could. ‘Why do you think your friend might be interested in men?’

‘So like – I mean, firstly, he’s never looked at any of his teammates, I can tell you that. In the locker room or anything. That would be crazy unprofessional, he’s not like that.’ There was a desperate surety in his eyes, one Kip was familiar with; this had been one of Scott’s specific fears, that his friends would think he was getting off on them naked in the team showers. For the first time, he was glad someone had come to him as Scott Hunter’s boyfriend – he really felt he could help in this situation.

‘And besides,’ Hayden continued, thumbing the lip of his glass, ‘professionalism aside, they’re a bunch of ugly fucks, mostly. Not that I’m much of a looker – I mean I’m not blessed, but I’m not hideous or anything. Right?’ Hayden cringed, glancing up at Kip. ‘Which is fully beside the point anyway.’

Kip pursed his lips together to quell his smile. ‘You’re good-looking,’ he offered neutrally, letting Hayden drop his gaze with a blush.

‘But the thing is,’ Hayden soldiered on, ‘is that sometimes, sometimes, I think maybe he looks at some men a little differently to how he looks at women.’ He eyed Kip up significantly. ‘A little more, if you get what I’m saying.’

Kip nodded – Hayden was clearly getting into the flow, putting all his thoughts in order, and he didn’t want to interrupt even with a positive reaction.

‘So this one time – this was a while ago, a few years – I, uh, saw this dick pic on his phone.’ That was an interesting muddle of pronouns for an attempt at subtlety, but Kip know better than to call it out. ‘And it was – don’t get me wrong, I know chicks can have dicks. That’s a thing, I’m awoke.’

Are you? Kip thought with wry amusement, fighting to keep his lips from curling at Hayden’s awokeness.

‘So I’m not saying it can’t be heterosexual to have a dick pic on your phone!’ Fascinating, Kip gazed at Hayden, counting his blessings that Scott hadn’t been this far in the closet when they had met. ‘I’m just saying, that’s a lot-’ he held his hands up, a ridiculous distance between the palms- ‘a lot of dick to like as a straight guy, even if it is on a chick.’ Kip eyes up the space and privately decided that, even if it was an exaggeration, that was indeed a lot of dick for a straight guy to like in another person.

Hayden ploughed on, hands remaining in their unrealistic positions. He even pointed his fingers at Kip in emphasis, which felt a little weird.

‘It’s not like, right, it’s not like he hasn’t had sex with women. I just don’t know if he was actually attracted to them? I know about bisexuality and all that, but can you still be gay if you’ve had sex with women?’

Kip took a deep breath. ‘Sexuality is a spectrum, and of course bisexuality is a totally valid identity. But having sex with women doesn’t automatically mean you’re not gay. Your friend, I mean. Compulsive heterosexuality is a thing, is it possible your friend might have felt pressured to, maybe, conform to that image of an ideal man, an ideal athlete, and do all of the heteronormative staples that everyone else does?’ From the gormless look of confused horror on Hayden’s face, Kip needed to dumb himself down a little.

‘Do you think your friend might have had sex with women, maybe had girlfriends even, to fit in by doing what he saw the people around him do? So that no one would think he was gay?’

Hayden jerked back, tears welling up in his eyes. Kip commiserated; this kind of introspection, retroactively recognising the self-effacing behaviours used to mask a vulnerable truth, could be painfully exposing. And they were strangers, despite the links in their lives.

‘Oh my God.’ Hayden croaked, head tilted down to his hands to hide the wetness clinging to his eyelashes. Kip looked down too, and spotted a ring on his finger with a drop in his stomach. ‘I think you’re right. I think I- I think I made it worse.’ He whispered to his wedding band, and Kip winced. The distinctions between the mask of the friend and Hayden himself were slipping, but Kip would have probably tried to be a little more forgiving in his approach to the whole conversation if he’d noticed the marriage earlier.

‘These things can be difficult to come to terms to,’ Kip spoke gently, itching to reach across the division between them and clasp Hayden’s arm in comfort. ‘I know you never meant to hurt anyone like this, and I’m sure your friends and family will understand and support you.’

Essentially a lie: Kip had no idea who Hayden’s family were or what they were like, and if he did indeed have a wife then frankly she did deserve her own emotional processing of being married to a gay man and having her whole life undermined in a moment, but Kip knew better than to get into that. Sometimes people just needed a blanket comfort to lift them out of a spiral.

He must have been right, though, because Hayden laughed weakly and nodded, head still hanging low.

‘He just – he never really enjoyed it, sleeping with women. Like, if you’re attracted to someone, having sex doesn’t feel like a chore, right? We, uh, we talk a lot about sex and stuff,’ Hayden hastily pinned on, twitching a glance up at Kip, who only barely managed to school his impression in time.

‘Right, for sure.’

Right. For sure. If Hayden wanted to pretend that he talked about not enjoying sex with women with another man, probably a teammate, Kip would let that be.

‘Basically, uh, I don’t really know what to do.’ Hayden forced out a laugh, still yet to look back at Kip. ‘So…’

Placing his palms down on the wood, Kip leant over to Hayden, keeping his voice gentle and judgement-free.

‘I think, in this case, the first thing your friend should do is talk. Talk to his partner, maybe a friend he can trust in, possibly someone outside the sport. Communication is key, and the sooner you have a circle you can be truly open with, the better.’

Hayden nodded slowly, still without meeting Kip’s sympathetic eyes. ‘I, uh, I don’t think he really has a partner, anymore. Not one he can talk to. And someone outside the sport is… laughable.’ The cadence of his voice was so sorrowful it made Kip choke back a wave of second-hand grief. ‘But, yeah. Talking, circle of friends you can trust. Yeah. Okay.’ He took a deep breath and let it out in one rustling sigh.

Kip let him sit with that for a minute, then pressed gently on. ‘And going back to your friend being attracted to men, maybe. Have… has he ever acted on it?’

Hayden, who had been drowning his sorrows in fruity mocktail, hummed around the straw in his mouth, a little smirk poking dimples in his cheeks. Pretty obvious answer, that. Hayden apparently was worried that Kip couldn’t read the subtext, however, because he tongued the straw out of his mouth just to add, ‘oh yeah, no he’s, uh, he’s got a hookup.’ As if that wasn’t enough information, he also lifted both hands off the countertop to indicate size, again, nodding serenely.

Kip eyed the space created. Surely some exaggeration, even though it was the same scale as his last display, to flex in a mishmash of queer and hockey culture. Clearing his suddenly dry throat, Kip rallied again. ‘Well, I think it’s good to get some experience, and to really know what you want. And meeting up with people is great, but doing you own, ahem, research has its merits too. The key thing, as with all relationships, is to keep yourself and your partner safe, well-educated, and comfortable.’

‘For sure, for sure. My friend loves a bit of research, I know he kept himself busy over it.’ Hayden actually winked and nudged Kip, who was beginning to get concerned about hockey players’ grasps on basic communication, if these were the lengths they usually went to for a little innuendo. Also, wow was this guy confident, if not in his sexuality, then in his sex.

‘I guess the thing I want advice on is how to support him in the room.’ Hayden eyed Kip meaningfully. Kip felt like he’d just had the thread of the conversation abruptly cut in front of him, and was now completely lost.

‘In the… bedroom?’ he tried, struggling to see the connection between Hayden’s confidence and his request. A flummoxed expression drew Hayden’s brows down.

‘No, in the locker room,’ he hissed, glancing about for eavesdroppers again. ‘I should probably be asking Hunter this, I guess, but do you know how he plans on dealing with it next season? Or how he dealt with it while he was closeted?’

Relieved to have a direction to their chat again, Kip nodded slowly. ‘I know it was hard, for him, for years. There’s a lot of bigotry in hockey, as you obviously know, and he let it fester in him for fear of speaking up and getting accused.’

Although he had just taken on a sad appearance, Hayden perked right back up. ‘I’m not afraid of getting accused of being gay!’ He cried out, delighted.

This seemed pretty perpendicular to the tone of their conversation so far. ‘Okay, that’s nice.’

Hayden touched his fingertips to the table and leaned in. ‘It happened all the time when I was at school. That was right around the time people started figuring out sex, of course, and my parents actually own a sex toy company, it’s pretty big in Canada and the US. It’s expanding into the European market, though! Some of my classmates found out, anyway, so that had to be a whole thing.’ He rolled his eyes. Kip felt psychically assaulted, and spared a single moment to be grateful that Hayden hadn’t namedropped the company in the weirdest flex Kip would have ever been party to.

‘Besides,’ Hayden continued with the blithe lack of filter Kip was quickly becoming acquainted with, ‘it’s not as if I don’t still get accusations. Jack says-’ Kip raised a brow before he could stop himself. ‘Oh yeah, Jack’s my partner. Jack says it’s because I’m comfortable having genuine and tactile male friendships, but the vibe I get from the guys is more that they call me gay because I like sleeping with Shane.’

Kip honestly had no clue what to do with any of that information. He texted Scott to hurry up again.

‘So they… the guys know? That you sleep with Shane? Hollander?’ Kip asked again, just to double check, and cast a surreptitious look outside, to where a conveniently-placed bus stop had the man in question plastered up the side of it, shining abs on prominent display.

‘Oh yeah, they didn’t have a problem with it so much when we were rookies, since that’s just what you do, but now that we’re both veterans, and Shane’s captain, the old-school guys think we should have left off by now.’ Hayden tossed a what-can-you-do shrug in Kip’s direction, then turned to wave cheerily at the door. ‘Hey Hunter! What’s good, man?’

Scott stood in the open door, panting slightly, with his phone clutched in one hand. He was still dressed in the same business suit he had left the flat in that morning, and so had probably caught the subway from his meeting with Underarmour directly to the Kingfisher, instead of stopping off at home. Kip felt a flutter of love and gratitude for his boyfriend, but also slightly regretted pulling him in to deal with whatever the fuck was going on with Hayden Pike with no warning.

‘Pike. What? Hey Kip. What?’ Scott let himself behind the bar, eyes not leaving the unlikely interloper even when he kissed Kip in greeting. Hayden also did not drop eye contact – nor did his smile waver.

‘Aw, Hunter. I was hoping I would catch you! I was just talking to your boy here about being a gay hockey player.’

Scott abruptly looked more confused. Then a slow comprehension dripped down his face. Which was interesting, because he had never mentioned anything to Kip. ‘This is about you and Hollander, isn’t it.’

A gusty sigh accompanied Hayden’s drooping expression. ‘I should’ve known you’d know. You guys have got that gaydar, right?’

Scott nodded slowly. ‘I think it’s an open secret in the league, Pike.’ To which Kip felt more annoyed – he could have done with this kind of context half an hour ago!

Hayden sucked his teeth. ‘I dunno, he’s slept with enough women over the years to dodge suspicion.’

Kip shook his head. ‘Who has? Your friend?’ He asked, incredulous. Surely Hayden could drop the charade by now?

In the same moment, Scott snorted and muttered under his breath. ‘I think that’s half the problem, bud.’

Hayden reared back. ‘Yeah, my friend Shane,’ he addressed Kip first, rolling his eyes in a frankly unfair expectation, ‘and what do you mean, part of the problem? Sleeping with women has got to be one of the least gay things a guy can do.’

Kip swapped a glance with Scott, all three of them now more confused than ever. Scott broke the ice first. ‘The problem that Hollander is sleeping with you and your wife?’

Kip choked on a gasp. Then he remembered Hayden’s maudlin look at his wedding ring, and leapt in before Hayden had a chance to answer. ‘Hayden doesn’t have a wife,’ he hissed to Scott, ‘he’s got a partner, now, called Jack.’ Of course! Hayden must have been left by his wife for this Shane guy, and now he’s experimenting with his sexuality and discovering things about himself!

Unfortunately, Kip’s discretion didn’t work. Now both men were staring at him in varying states of alarmed confusion.

‘Jack is my wife? Jack, Jacks, Jackie?’ Hayden answered. Then the amusement fled again. ‘And Shane is not sleeping with me and my wife. What the fuck?’

‘So he’s… just sleeping with you?’ Kip tried again, trying to straighten out the lines of conversation in his head.

Hayden took a deep breath and placed both palms down on the table to lean right over it. ‘I am not sleeping with Shane. I am not,’ he said quite firmly, holding uncomfortable eye contact with both of them, somehow, ‘sleeping with anyone except my wife, Jackie.’

Kip wanted to scream. ‘You just – you just – told me that you like sleeping with Shane.’

Scott’s neck cracked with how he whipped around to stare, gobsmacked, at Hayden, who rolled his eyes again. ‘Oh my God, I share a room with him on roadies.’

‘Even though he’s a captain?’ Scott sounded mortified, which – okay, Kip could maybe see where the wires had gotten crossed in his earlier conversation with Hayden.

‘And like, sometimes a bed, but the guys don’t know about that anyway.’ Hayden stressed, talking over Scott.

Kip took a deep, deep breath, closing his eyes and squeezing them tight. ‘Okay! Okay. Let me just ask: have you, Hayden, ever had a sexual relationship with Shane? Yes or no.’

Hayden narrowed his eyes. ‘What counts as sex?’ He answered, instead of yes or no.

‘Why do you share a bed with Hollander?’ Scott breathed, exhausted.

‘Babe. Not right now.’ Kip said sternly, placing a placatory hand on Scott’s arm. ‘Hayden, answer the question. Yes or no.’

Hayden thought in silence for an uncomfortably long time. ‘Hmmm, no.’ He decided, at last. ‘As long as sex means both direct contact and mutual orgasms.’

‘Okay, I’ll take it. For now.’ Kip told himself firmly, shelving the broad range of decidedly homosexual activities Hayden could have, and probably had, engaged in with Shane Hollander without breaking those two rules.

Hayden, of apparently no brain-to-mouth-filter fame, explained anyway. ‘We’ve definitely jerked off in the same room together a few times, but c’mon, this is the NHL. Who hasn’t? And sometimes, when I’m sleeping with Shane – in the same bed as him, oh my God – I’ll have a wet dream and wake up cuddling him. But that’s just normal for me anyway.’ He sighed deeply when he saw Kip’s and Scott’s disbelieving stares, obviously missing the cause in its entirety. ‘That’s not weird!’

That’s so weird, Kip insisted, but in his head so Hayden wouldn’t go into any details about how normal it was for him and Shane.

‘Okay. And have you ever had sex with a man who’s not Shane? Or Jack.’ Kip tipped on just to be completely sure, but Hayden only leered.

‘Hell yeah I have! Loads of times.’ There was that bro-y, jock-y energy lighting up Hayden’s face again. About gay sex. Kip felt a headache start to poke around behind his eyes.

Scott looked distraught. ‘What the fuck are you talking about, Pike? Can you just- just fucking- make sense?! You’ve had sex with a man.’

Hayden nodded.

‘But you haven’t had sex with Shane Hollander?’

Hayden peered at Scott, who had started to tug at his hair. ‘That’s right.’

‘You have had sex with a man who isn’t Shane Hollander.’

Hayden glanced awkwardly to Kip, whose head was pounding in earnest now. ‘You seem to be struggling with this, Hunter. You’re aware that Shane isn’t the only man on the planet, right? It is possible to have sex with a man that isn’t Shane.’

Scott’s face, already a less-than-fetching shade of red, started to twitch. ‘But why would you have sex with a man who isn’t Shane Hollander?’ He insisted.

Hayden’s brows flicked up, and he side-eyed Kip with a badly-disguised expression of delight. Kip couldn’t move his eyes or neck without pain, so he turned his whole body in his boyfriend’s direction.

To his credit, Scott realised his mistake almost right away, and floundered. ‘Not me! Him! Pike – Kip, you have no idea, you have no idea. They’re so fucking- they- how are you two not fucking?!’

‘Why are you so insistent about this? Do you want Shane and me to be fucking?’

Which raised a good point. Scott was being weirdly fixated on the idea of Hayden and Shane having sex. Without even telling Kip all the context as to why.

‘You- you- you-!’ Scott’s eyes boggled at Hayden’s unflapped demeanour. ‘You went on your honeymoon with him!’ He declared, and Kip rolled his eyes to shooting pains. Obviously this was just harmful co-dependency rumours from homophobic hockey players who saw Hayden and Shane share a room – because they were good friends, beds aside – and decided that male friendship was gay.

‘Only for a week!’ Scoffed Hayden, and Kip. Kip wanted to sit down. ‘And how did you know that, anyway?’

‘You and your wife posted your honeymoon photos to Instagram for your anniversary last year. Hollander was there.’ Scott’s voice cracked on Shane’s name.

‘Aw, fuck’s sake. He was only with us the week we went and stayed near Banff National Park. He was nearby, we were doing lots of hiking, which I knew he’d enjoy, so Jackie and I invited him up for the week! How does that make people think we’re fucking?’ Hayden clearly saw this as a reasonable argument, but Kip was siding with Scott on this one.

‘Kip.’ Scott said, very seriously, turning away from Hayden entirely. ‘Kip, look at these.’

He pulled out his phone and opened Instagram, pulling up Hayden’s profile and opening up the pinned post. It was a carousel of twenty pictures. Scott flicked through the first twelve too quickly for Kip to discern, but when he slowed down, Kip saw what he was losing his mind over.

The first was a photo of two people embracing on a gravel driveway, mountains rising behind them. One was a blonde woman wearing athleisure wear, probably Jackie, and the other, facing the camera, was Shane Hollander.

Scott swiped along. Kip saw a selfie of the three with a glittering lake in the background, a photo of Hayden and Jackie holding hands as they walked up a trail from behind, an almost identical photo of Hayden and Shane doing the same, a photo of Shane and Jackie bent over Shane’s cupped hands, something feathery poking out above his fingers.

All very cute and fairly normal, except that these were Hayden’s public honeymoon photos on his public Instagram account.

But then, Scott drummed up the final three images.

The first was very sweet. Shane was smiling at the camera, an awkward but charming close-lipped affair, relaxing on a soft, red-brown sofa with a gorgeous sunset in the background through wall-to-wall windows. In his lap, he was running his fingers through Jackie’s hair, who was fast asleep stretched out along the length of the couch. One of her hands was curled up by her chest, and the other was draped over Shane’s knee, and her head was nestled on his thigh and up against his stomach where he sat, gently reclined to accommodate her.

Kip squinted at Hayden. Did we clarify that Shane and Jackie are definitely not having sex either? He tried to recall, but the wrinkles of the earlier conversation were still rubbing his brain raw.

The next photo was even more damning. Jackie lay on her front on a sunbed, blue skies all around her. She was grinning directly at the camera, chin propped up on her folded arms, and sunglasses pushed up onto her head. Shirtless, Shane Hollander leaned over her, his own sunglasses resting in his hair. Both of his hands were on her back, fingertips creeping over her shoulders – where there were no skimpy little bikini strings to be found – and he was very shirtless. A bottle of sunscreen in the foreground provided at least a little bit of plausible deniability, but, and Kip could not stress this enough, there was not a stitch of clothing to be found in the entire image, and Shane Hollander was very, very shirtless.

Kip swallowed.

Hayden scoffed loudly. ‘Oh, not this again. I told you, sometimes Shane and I sleep in the same bed, it’s normal for us!’

Scott gripped the phone, his knuckles turning white. ‘I haven’t shown him that one, yet.’ He warned darkly, and with a flourish, scrolled to the final photo.

Kip felt his mouth physically drop open, but he couldn’t even blame his face.

Jackie took up most of the image, in what was clearly a selfie. She was beaming at the camera, a bit of sunburn high on her cheeks, and was making one half of a heart with her free hand. Over her shoulder was the bed, in which her newlywed husband lay sprawled out on top of a naked Shane Hollander.

Kip clutched the phone, bringing it up to his face in sheer disbelief. Not quite naked, he acknowledged, spying a hint of a Calvin Klein waistband from around the edge of Hayden’s – actually quite impressive – ass. Hayden himself was either definitely naked or wearing some Speedo/thong style underwear, because where the corner of a sheet covered him there was extremely little left for interpretation. One of his hands was down by his side, in suspicious proximity to the aforementioned waistband, and the other was up next to his face, cupping one of Shane’s tits.

From all the way up at the head of the bed, Shane smiled gently at the camera, his free hand making the other half of Jackie’s heart. Which was so cute. But-

‘How are you not fucking?!’ Kip demanded, zooming in on the cradled pec. ‘Also, why would you post this online?’

Hayden tossed his hands up. ‘I asked the lady at the desk if they had extra rooms when I invited Shane up! It’s not my fault they never actually made one up for him! I wasn’t going to make him sleep on the couch, was I?’

No, not after you had your athletic threesome on it, Kip snidely thought, with just enough foresight not to say it out loud. He felt quite like he deserved a treat for his tact this afternoon.

‘Can we go back to the part where you said you’ve had sex with lots of other men who aren’t Hollander, please.’ Scott tersely demanded.

Hayden, somehow still affable even after the state of his afternoon so far, nodded happily. ‘I mean, it wasn’t lots of men. It was more like, lots of sex with one man. Does that still count as lots of gay sex? Or is it because it was only with one guy over like two weeks, I’m still entry-level?’

Scott sucked his lips into his mouth and turned watery eyes on Kip, begging him to take up the mantle of the conversation.

Unfortunately, Kip still felt as though if he opened his mouth he would scream, or accuse Hayden of being in the world’s most obvious and definite throuple with his wife and Shane Hollander, so he just gestured impatiently at Hayden.

‘The summer before me and Jackie got married, we went on a big Europe trip, and we stopped in Paris for a couple of weeks, and. Well. When in Paris, am I right?’ He flashed a grin. ‘Wait! Do you guys know what I mean about going to Paris? Like, with a girl? Because you’re gay?’ He looked quite distressed, so Kip waved him hurriedly on, not quite up to trusting his voice yet and desperate to avoid Hayden Pike explaining the concept of double penetration to him and his boyfriend. Fucking hell.

‘Anyway, we met this guy on the first night. He was pretty good looking, and we hooked up. It was pretty great, so we just invited him to stay for the rest of the holiday and, what can I say? We ran out of positions pretty quickly, so I just thought: what if this dude fucked me while I was fucking Jack?’ He shrugged. Scott’s under-eye started to twitch.

‘And that was pretty great too. The prostate, am I right?’

Hayden actually held up his fist for a fist bump. Scott, with a deeply-ingrained jock-ness, reciprocated purely on instinct, nothing in his face to suggest he was aware of what his arm was doing.

‘So, yeah. I think I covered everything: blowjob, handjob, up the ass, between the thighs, cheeks, tits, a sneaky little footjob in there, surprisingly fun, spit-roasting, double penetration – Jackie went out and bought a toy – facial, plugs, beads, had a good time with a vibrator… yeah! Unless I’m missing something? If I am, I’ve probably covered it with Jack, but I don’t know if it counts as gay? Like, with a strap? Is there anything a woman with a strap can’t do?’

What a philosophical question. Kip prayed, more desperately than he had prayed before his finals, that Hayden would stop listing sex acts.

‘I guess jizz, obviously. But I mean apart from that. Is there anything?’

Scott, who had been introduced to at least three new things in Hayden’s little monologue, shook his head, a hollow expression in his eyes.

‘Nice!’ Hayden pumped his fist with an unmistakeably proud grin on his face.

‘Sorr-’ Kip’s voice cracked. He tried again. ‘Sorry. How about we get back to the topic at hand? You wanted help with a gay friend?’ It was no use. His voice was still as hoarse as if he had been cheering through back-to-back Admirals playoff games. Against Toronto.

‘Right. So as you know, Shane’s gay-’

Scott threw his hands up and dragged them back down his face. ‘Shane Hollander is gay?!’ He exclaimed. Kip narrowed his eyes at his boyfriend. If you say and you haven’t had sex with him one more time…

‘You and Hollander both fuck men and you haven’t fucked each other?’ Scott demanded. Kip closed his eyes, overwhelmed tears brimming under his eyelids.

Hayden pouted. ‘Hey, come on, that’s not fair. I’m not going to sleep with anyone without my wife, and Shane’s not interested in women. How could we have fucked?’ He sounded extremely disappointed about that state of affairs. Kip let his hand drift to Scott’s knee under the counter and squeezed, sharply. He did not want a single more digression into Hayden’s sex life. At this point, he felt more intimately acquainted with Hayden than he did with Scott.

‘And you want our help with supporting Shane.’ Kip steered again.

Hayden sighed gustily. ‘I just want him to know that I know and love him.’ Not enough separation between those two statements, buddy. Kip clamped his mouth shut. ‘But I don’t know how to let him know he can trust me if he doesn’t already know, which means he’s not telling me for some other reason, and I don’t want to force him into a corner if that’s the case.’

Kip nodded slowly, clawing for a solution that would get Hayden out of his hair so he could lie down with a cold, wet towel over his forehead, topping-and-tailing with Scott so that they could rub each others’ feet at the same time.

‘Why don’t you call him. Right now. Say you’re here with us, and we’ve invited you both to the Kingfisher your next game in New York. See how he reacts to that.’

Hayden lit up, muttering Kip’s instructions under his breath as he pulled up Shane’s contact on his phone.

‘Okay, here we go.’

Hayden dialled the number. It rang four times before the call was picked up, and Hayden slammed the phone to his ear, a besotted smile on his face. Kip didn’t turn to look at Scott. They were so close to the end, and then they could book it and, after a long and relaxing decompress, Kip could politely inquire as to why Scott had never told him about any of this.

‘Hey, buddy! How’s the quiet life treating you?’

With Hayden’s attention diverted, Kip focussed on his meditative breathing.

‘Ah, they’re all doing great, thanks for asking. The kids are with my parents, and Jackie’s taking Baby to see her sister in New York. Yeah, no, of course man!’

In, two, three, four.

‘He’s just talking to his mom on the other line,’ Hayden stage-whispered.

Out, two, three, four.

‘Yeah, Yuna’s a gem. Hey, listen. I don’t want to keep you too long, I know you’ve got your yoga to get on with. I just wanted to ask you something, real quick.’ Hayden was going off-script. Not Kip’s problem. Kip was breathing in, two, three, four.

‘Nah, of course man!’ Hayden tilted his head, a thoughtful expression attempting to cross his face. He sucked his lips, making kissing sounds down the line. God did Kip ever not want to understand a relationship less than Hayden’s and Shane’s. Surely, even apparently without the sex, this could be classified as a situationship? Out, two, three, four.

‘Oh yeah, nothing major, just wondered if you managed to catch that new documentary the Discovery Channel did, on one hundred and fifty years of hockey? They even snuck your name in the end there, remember that trick shot you pulled against McPhearson in your rookie season? When you got him five-hole somehow even though you were covered by two D-men and you managed to fool everyone into thinking you’d passed to me, but you managed to actually pass it to your own blades and then you kicked it back onto the toe of your stick and whipped it flat across the rink an inch above the ice? Fucking criminal, man. Disgusting. You’re a beautician. Which reminds me, I saw a highlight reel of your ten best dick tricks-’

In, two, three, four. Out, two, three, four. Was Kip hyperventilating? Was Kip hypo-ventilating? He didn’t know.

‘-and I gotta say, I think they did your one against Boston last year dirty, that’s definitely top-three material. I mean, when you back-shotted it from the face-off dot, holy fuck!’

In, two, three, four. Hayden laughed. ‘Sorry, I meant back-handed. Nasty as!’

Out, two, three, four.

‘But they did get number one right, I have to say. Shane Hollander’s sexiest dick trick: Boston, October 2013. 4-3. Even Rozanov couldn’t get one over on you! They way you let them sweat for it, and then just lifted it up glove-side, easy as you like. Fifteen seconds before the final buzzer. You’re an artist, Shane. A maestro. You know what they said, in that documentary? Shane Hollander, redefining the sport of hockey. That’s all you; you’re a legend. And you’re not done yet!’ Hayden crowed, smug as though he was talking of himself.

‘Okay, no, no. I’ll let you go. But hey, when you get a moment, check out that documentary? And I tell you what, I’ll text you that dick trick compilation tonight! Enjoy it! Okay, love you, bye.’

Kip was simply too zen to care about whatever Hayden said. He had achieved a new level of serenity through measured breathing and indiscriminate filtering out of whatever came from Hayden’s mouth.

Hayden hung up with a delighted wriggle. ‘He’s okay with me knowing he’s gay!’ He clapped his hands together, grin stretching to his ears and dimpling his cheeks.

Huh. Maybe Kip was a little too zoned out of Hayden’s conversation, because he had no idea where that had come from.

He didn’t fall into the trap of asking Hayden to explain, though. ‘That’s so amazing! Yay.’ He spoke firmly, the golden promise of the end of Kip’s shift shining over Hayden’s shoulder in the form of the big art-deco wall clock.

Scott was currently enjoying the off-season though, so he lumbered head-first into the trap.

‘Genuinely how the fuck did you come to that conclusion then, Pike?’ Scott was so emotionally overwrought that he didn’t even sound confused, or the slightest bit curious. Instead, all that remained in his voice was a heavy fatalism, marching along with its hands tied.

Hayden let his eyes rest shut as he nodded proudly. ‘My boy was getting head on the line.’

What if I just walked out, right now. Kip eyed the clock ravenously; it had neither a second hand nor numbers, but he was almost sure the minute hand actually looked further from the three o’clock position than it had been the last time he stared at it.

Perhaps the only option left was a conversational brick to the head. Kip lifted his chin assertively. ‘Hayden, I do not want to know how you know that.’

A brick to the head was old hat for Hayden Pike. ‘He came on the call, right at the end. And it was a wet blowie. Noisy. I’m talking mouth open, throat open, drool everywhere wet.’ He snickered, still nodding appreciatively.

Scott gripped Kip’s wrist and squeezed rhythmically. Kip let his hand serve as a stress ball – he was doing the same to the towel he was strangling out of view.

‘He doesn’t sound like that when he’s getting sucked off by a girl.’ Hayden added, completely unnecessarily and without prompting. ‘I could tell he was fully enjoying that.’ Tears sprung to his eyes, but judging from the dopey beam on his face, not the rational tears of someone who had just been spontaneously and non-consensually exposed to their friend’s sex life.

‘I’m just—’ Hayden sniffed, fingering the rim of his empty glass and looking gayer than Scott had managed while actively sucking Kip’s dick— ‘I’m just so glad he knows he can include me in his gay sex. I’ll always help Shane cum.’ He declared. Kip’s vision had tunnelled, and he truly didn’t know if there was anyone around to hear whatever the actual fuck Hayden was saying about the guy he definitely isn’t having sex with.

That last proclamation proved too much for Scott. He slammed his unoccupied fist down onto the bar top. ‘Kip. And I. Have to go now. Goodbye, Pike.’ Scott strode very intentionally towards the closed end of the bar, spun on his heel with militant precision, and swept back along the space, broad shoulders ushering Kip along in their gravity.

‘Oh, where are you off to? I should head out now, maybe we’re going in the same direction?’ Hayden threatened, and Kip pressed down on Scott’s toes to warn him of the danger.

‘You’re going to meet up with your wife? Where did you say she was?’ Scott’s handling of the delicate situation was clumsy, but not so clumsy that Hayden noticed it at all.

‘Yup! She’s introducing Amber – that’s our new daughter – to her cousins. Amber’s cousins, that is. Two, five, eight, ten.’ An incomprehensible series of numbers, but Kip brushed past them immediately, not letting them snag on his mind for even a moment. The only thing he wanted to know was: ‘Charlie lives in Park Hyatt, by Central Park. Do you know it?’

Kip was about to retort that no, obviously he wouldn’t know some random private residence, when the name registered. ‘Charlie lives in Park Hyatt? The hotel?’ Wait a second, Kip didn't care.

Hayden nodded and held open the door for Scott and Kip. Scott skirted through with as much distance between him and Hayden as he could physically manage. Kip couldn’t shake the idea that Scott was like a kid on the playground, or maybe a Republican, trying to avoid catching the gay. Which was deeply ironic, but Kip was also a little worried that whatever was wrong with Hayden was contagious.

Scott tried to assert that they were going in the exact opposite direction to Hayden, and so must depart from his company expeditiously. ‘Kip and I are not going in that direction. We are going… to the 9/11 memorial.’

Kip winced, but now that Scott had put the idea in his head, he couldn’t think of anything else in that direction. ‘Mmhmm. I go after every shift.’ Well, Hayden had been resolutely immune to sarcasm, bullshit, and pretty much every other social cue throughout their entire, bizarre encounter, so Kip might as well take the plunge and solidify their excuse. ‘It’s very important to me. Spiritually.’

Perplexed, but well-meaning, Hayden patted Kip on the shoulder. Now I’ve caught the gay, Kip realised deliriously, Scott won’t want to touch me now. ‘It’s important to have things important to you. Kip, take care man.’ Hayden stared soulfully into Kip’s eyes for around four seconds too long, before switching to assault Scott with those wet, absurdly not-having-sex-with-Shane-Hollander eyes. ‘You too Hunter. See you on the ice!’

Before Scott had a chance of fleeing the brutal attack, Hayden shook his hand energetically, and took off down the road.

‘When he said he had sex with a man and it was pretty great…’ Scott trailed off, unable to actually pose the question.

‘I don’t think we need to talk about that.’ Kip decided for the both of them. ‘I’ve had enough of helping Hayden Pike through sexualities.’

They both stared anxiously at the man’s retreating back, frozen with baited breath for him to vanish from their sight and render them out of danger.

Slowly, without looking, Kip reached across and intertwined his fingers with Scott’s. They were trembling. Kip took his final deep breath and let it all out in a sigh that lifted pigeons into flight around them.

‘How are you feeling, babe?’ Kip asked, so gently, knowing that although he was feeling queasy from his encounter with Hayden, Scott would be feeling so tenfold.

His boyfriend snivelled pathetically.

‘Can we go get a smoothie?’ He choked out, eyes unfocussed and lips pouting. ‘Somewhere south of here? I just need to-’

Kip swiftly faced Scott, clutching his other hand up to his chest. ‘I know, babe. I know. Come on.’

‘I just,’ Scott started, stumbling his way down the street, ‘I can’t believe he told us all that stuff?’

Kip nodded. He, too, was gobsmacked at the utter disregard Hayden had shown the concept of oversharing. And he was all for sharing details. With his friends. But he’d never had a deluge of information quite like that before. From a stranger. I cannot believe I met that man for the first time today, thought Kip, whose exhaustion and trauma-bond rivalled calamity survivors’ psyches.

‘And!’ Scott continued to cry, voice wobbling with mental and emotional over-exertion. ‘I cannot believe he’s not fucking Shane Hollander!’