Pride and Pucks and Prejudice - 18. Chapter 18

Noah

We beat Cleveland five-two. It wasn't our prettiest game of the season, but it might have been our most satisfying.

They'd spent most of January sitting on top of the division. Now we were two games clear.

The dressing room afterwards was loud in the relaxed way that followed a good win. No shouting. No music loud enough to shake the walls. Just easy conversation. The sort that came when everyone knew we'd earned the result.

Ben declared this worthy of "civilized beverages." Nobody believed anything involving Ben would remain civilized for long. Even so, about an hour later most of us found ourselves in O'Malley's, the little brewery a few blocks from the arena that had quietly become the team's unofficial gathering place. The owner had stopped pretending not to recognize us weeks ago. A section near the back had somehow become ours.

Coach Hayes appeared long enough to raise one glass. "Good work." We answered with a chorus of thanks. He took one sip, looked around the room. Decided we were capable of supervising ourselves, then disappeared before Ben could persuade him to join the darts tournament.

"A wise man," Jackson observed.

"The wisest."

---

The evening settled into an easy rhythm. Burgers arrived. Someone ordered wings. Aleksander insisted he could beat anyone at darts. Five minutes later he demonstrated conclusively that he could not.

Ben celebrated every missed throw as though it were a personal achievement.

"This board is defective."

"You missed by three feet," Eddie pointed out.

"It moved."

"It did not."

"It absolutely did."

"You hit the jukebox."

"It was tactical."

"No."

"It was."

Jackson leaned slightly towards me. "I don't think he understands how darts work."

"I don't think he understands how most things work."

"Fair."

Aleksander's next throw somehow landed in another lane entirely.

The bartender applauded politely.

---

Ben eventually climbed onto his chair.

Glass in hand. "Speech."

A chorus of groans answered him. He ignored them.

"To first place." He lifted his pint. "To Coach Hayes pretending not to like us."

Hayes, already halfway to the door, raised two fingers without looking back.

"To Eddie."

Eddie looked suspicious. "What about me?"

"For somehow surviving adulthood."

"I've done very well."

"You've done... adequately."

Laughter rippled around the table.

Ben finally raised his glass again. "And to another two points."

"Cheers."

Glasses clinked.

Beer disappeared.

Conversation broke apart into smaller groups.

---

I found myself standing near the bar talking with Rick from equipment about skate sharpening. At some point Jackson wandered over.

Neither of us acknowledged it. The conversation drifted naturally. Rick eventually disappeared after somebody asked him about replacement sticks.

Jackson stayed.

We talked with Melissa for a while about the children's hospital visit scheduled before Christmas. Then Eddie wandered over carrying another basket of fries. Ben joined us. Aleksander appeared shortly afterwards, still blaming defective dartboards.

People drifted in. People drifted away. Nobody stayed in one place for very long.

Except, apparently... Us.

I hadn't noticed until Ben frowned thoughtfully. He looked from Jackson to me. Then back again.

"You know..."

"What?" Jackson asked.

"You two keep standing next to each other."

Both of us looked down.

Our shoulders were almost touching.

Jackson shrugged. "It's loud."

I nodded. "It is."

Ben considered that. Reasonable enough.

"So move."

Jackson blinked. "Why?"

"I don't know."

Ben waved vaguely around the room. "Social diversity."

"We've been talking to everyone."

"We have," I agreed.

Ben looked at Eddie. "Am I imagining this?"

Eddie took a thoughtful sip of his beer. "No."

Aleksander wandered over just in time to hear the last sentence. "No what?"

Ben pointed at us. "They're magnetized."

Aleksander looked at Jackson. Then at me. Then at the six inches separating our shoulders.

"Huh."

Jackson frowned. "What?"

"You do keep ending up together."

"We're literally talking to all of you."

"Correct," Ben said.

"But you're doing it from the exact same place."

I looked around.

They had a point.

We had spoken to almost everyone on the team over the last hour.

Neither of us had moved more than a couple of feet.

Jackson looked equally puzzled. "It's coincidence."

"I'm sure it is," Ben said.

His tone suggested the opposite.

Eddie nodded solemnly. "Complete coincidence."

"Absolutely."

Aleksander scratched his chin. "Remarkable coincidence."

Jackson looked at me.

"They're weird."

"They've always been weird."

"True."

Ben sighed theatrically. "You know what's really impressive?"

"What?"

"You genuinely have no idea."

"No idea about what?" I asked.

He smiled into his beer. "Nothing."

That should probably have worried me.

Instead I reached for another handful of fries.

The conversation drifted somewhere else.

A few minutes later Jackson asked whether Dallas or Los Angeles had better Mexican food.

Naturally he was wrong.

We spent the next ten minutes proving it.

Neither of us noticed that, without thinking about it, we'd drifted another step closer together. Ben, Eddie and Aleksander noticed.

None of them said a word.

They simply exchanged the sort of long-suffering look usually reserved for particularly obvious problems that somehow remained invisible to the people involved.

Someone eventually asked Ben about the worst date he'd ever been on.

He looked almost offended. "You'll have to narrow it down."

"You've got more than one?" Eddie asked.

"I've had a rich and varied romantic history."

"You got stood up by a girl named Ashley because you accidentally took her father to dinner."

"That happened once."

"You paid."

"He looked hungry."

Laughter rolled around the table.

Ben sighed dramatically. "Fine."

He set his beer down.

"I was nineteen. Playing junior. Thought I'd impress this girl by taking her skating."

"So far, so good," Jackson said.

"It was going beautifully." Ben paused. "Until I discovered she'd neglected to mention she was a figure skater."

Aleksander winced. "Oh..."

"Oh, indeed."
---

Not to be outdone, Eddie leaned forward.

"That reminds me."

"It shouldn't," Ben muttered.

"It absolutely does."

Eddie adopted the expression of a man preparing to deliver important historical testimony.

"Junior playoffs." He pointed at himself. "Our goalie lets in one bad goal."

"So?"

"He blamed the left goalpost."

"The... post."

"Said it'd been leaning all game."

Ben blinked. "...Leaning."

"He argued with it."

"For how long?"

"Longer than you'd think."

Aleksander frowned. "How long is longer than I'd think?"

"The referee eventually gave him a misconduct."

"For arguing with the goalpost?"

"For refusing to stop arguing with the goalpost."

The laughter started again.

Eddie wasn't finished. "The best part?"

"There was a best part?"

"He skated over after the game..." Eddie jabbed a finger toward an imaginary net. "...and apologized."

Silence.

Ben stared.

"You cannot be serious."

"I swear on my goalie pads."

"What did the goalpost say?"

"It accepted."

That finally broke Jackson.

Not the quiet smile I'd seen after a clever joke.

Not the amused little huff he usually gave Ben's nonsense.

Real laughter. His head tipped back. His eyes squeezed shut. One hand covered his face while the other thumped the table. He laughed so hard he had to catch his breath.

For a moment every trace of the composed, disciplined winger disappeared.

No careful answers. No practiced professionalism. No reserve.

Just... Jackson.

I'd seen him score overtime winners. I'd seen him flatten defensemen who outweighed him. I'd watched him face television cameras after bad losses as though nothing could rattle him. I'd watched him carry pressure most players would have folded under. I wasn't sure I'd ever actually seen him laugh.

Not like this.

Time seemed to slow. I found myself watching him. Really watching him. The way the corners of his eyes crinkled. The way his whole face changed.

He looked... Jackson caught me looking.

His laughter faded into a grin. "What?"

I realized I hadn't answered immediately. "...Nothing."

"You sure?"

"Mm."

He shrugged and turned back as Ben insisted the goalpost had almost certainly been at fault.

Everyone else kept talking. I didn't hear much of it. I took a slow drink of my beer. I looked away. Took another drink. Tried to remember what Ben had been saying.

Couldn't.

Somewhere between one heartbeat and the next, an entirely unhelpful thought popped into my head. I'd forgotten how handsome he was.

I stared into my glass.

That... was unfortunate.

-------------

The roads were almost empty by the time I left the brewery. A light dusting of snow had started again, soft flakes drifting through the headlights as I drove home.

The radio played quietly. I wasn't listening. My mind kept wandering back to the evening. Not Ben's increasingly implausible dating history. Not Eddie's story about the goalie who'd argued with a goalpost.

Jackson laughing.

It replayed itself with irritating clarity. Head tipped back and eyes crinkled. Laughing so hard he could barely breathe.

I adjusted the heater. Maybe that was all it was. Jackson had relaxed. That made sense. He'd settled into the team. We'd all become more comfortable around one another.

Maybe I'd simply never seen him laugh like that before because...

Because... I frowned at the road ahead.

No.

There had to be another explanation.

The traffic light at Broad Street turned red. I rolled to a stop.

Without thinking, I smiled.

Not at anything outside the windscreen.

At the memory.

I caught myself.

The smile disappeared.

Oh.

Silence settled inside the car.

Then another thought arrived.

Oh no.

The light stayed stubbornly red.

My grip tightened on the steering wheel.

No.

Absolutely not.

I began, with increasing desperation, assembling evidence for the defense.

We'd spent more time together because we were linemates.

That was normal.

The coffee.

Convenient.

The hospital visit.

Public relations.

The airport.

Delayed flight.

Minnesota.

He'd invited a teammate to dinner.

Perfectly reasonable.

Practice.

We were building chemistry.

The music.

Coincidence.

Waiting after games...

I blinked.

I'd started waiting for him after games.

Not consciously.

I'd simply found myself lingering if he was still with the trainers.

Looking for him before boarding buses.

Looking for him in restaurants.

Looking for him when we walked into meeting rooms.

Knowing where he'd be on the ice before I'd even looked.

Knowing where he'd be off it, too.

Every perfectly reasonable explanation I'd confidently accepted over the past months suddenly looked... considerable less reasonable.

The traffic light turned green. The driver behind me gave a polite tap of the horn. Well, polite for a Philadelphia driver. I drove on.

---

My apartment was quiet when I let myself in. I tossed my keys into the bowl by the door and dropped my jacket over the back of a chair.

The silence felt unusually loud.

I stood in the kitchen for a long moment without switching on another light.

Jackson laughing.

It appeared again.

Completely uninvited.

I closed my eyes.

"This is ridiculous," I muttered to the empty apartment.

The apartment, unhelpfully, offered no alternative theory.

I leaned both hands against the kitchen counter.

This was a problem.

A very large problem.

Because if I was right...

I stopped.

Exhaled slowly.

...Ben was going to be absolutely unbearable.

And, much, much worse, he was going to be right.