Chapter Text
There are many things a nineteen-year-old can reasonably be trusted with. A 2018 Honda Civic with a questionable transmission? Sure. A dying succulent rescued from the curb on garbage day, its leaves already browning? Why not. A 1.5-billion-dollar hockey franchise with a fanbase that was still waiting for their first Cup? Obviously.
One thing a nineteen-year-old should never, under any circumstances, be trusted with is the care of a slightly loopy twenty-year-old who has just been given Tramadol for a Grade II AC shoulder sprain.
But somehow, the medical staff entrusted Macklin with a small paper bag of medications, a list of after-care instructions printed in font so small he had to squint, and one Tramadol-enhanced William Charles Patrick Smith, who blinked slowly at the fluorescent lights overhead, tilted his head like a confused golden retriever, and asked with genuine concern if the Sharks were still playing hockey or if they had switched to soccer.
"I hope not." Mack sighed, gingerly taking Will's left arm and making sure his fingers stayed well clear of the injured shoulder, which was already starting to purple beneath the edge of his shirt. "I mean, I'll be fine. It's in my genes. But the rest of you guys? Totally screwed."
Will kept arguing—something about being the best soccer player on the team, about his footwork, about how he'd dominated at BC —but Mack ignored the rambling monologue, steadying him on the walk to the team bus and helping him settle into a window seat near the back where the other guys wouldn't hassle him.
"My head feels heavy. Like, really heavy. Can I put it down here?" Will asked, already nuzzling into Mack's shoulder before waiting for permission, his breath warm through the fabric of Mack's hoodie.
"Is your boy okay, right there?" Toff asked from across the aisle, glancing at Will with the kind of worried frown usually reserved for watching rookies take bad hits.
"Fine... mostly. Right, Will?" Mack asked, turning to the older boy—only to find him already fast asleep, mouth slack, drooling a small wet patch onto the sleeve of Mack's jacket.
Mack would've stopped to sign autographs outside the hotel—there'd been a decent crowd of fans waiting in the cold, phones out, jerseys clutched hopefully—and he kinda felt shitty for not doing it. But letting Will wobble and sway by his side, glassy-eyed and incoherent, would've been way shittier. Even the thought of fans snapping pictures of Will looking like this, of those photos ending up on Twitter or Reddit with captions that weren't kind, made something coil hot and angry in Mack's belly.
Will wouldn't even be hurt if the other team took them seriously. If they saw Mack as a leader—next in line for the C, not just some goofy kid who still got carded at R-rated movies—they'd think twice before slamming Will into the boards like he was a goddamn crash test dummy.
"Oh my god, stop being so emo and help me take off my clothes," Will slurred the moment they stumbled through the hotel room door, flopping onto one of the twin beds with zero grace and wincing when his shoulder made contact with the mattress.
"Be careful," Mack said, reaching over to steady him with a hand on his good arm. "You don't want to make it worse."
"Why are you brooding so loudly? You're giving me a headache," Will added, already half-asleep again, words mushed together like he was talking through a mouthful of cotton.
"That's the Tramadol, dickhead. I'm not brooding." Mack sighed, moving over to help Will take off his pants and shirt, smacking his unsteady hands away before they got tangled in his belt buckle and made Mack's job harder than it needed to be.
"Dr. Lenny said side effects can include headaches, dizziness, tiredness, confusion, mild euphoria, and dry mouth..." Mack recited from memory the list, which was already burned into his brain from reading it three times in the parking lot. "Do you want some water?" He didn't wait for an answer, just cracked open a water bottle from the mini-fridge and waved it in front of Will's face.
"Oh my god, am I high?" Will asked, grabbing the bottle with both hands as it might escape, and taking a huge gulp that dribbled down his chin. "Why am I naked?" He looked down at his boxer briefs—navy blue with little sharks on them, because of course, like he'd never seen them before, completely unaware that Mack had just finished helping him strip down to them.
Mack sighed and reached for the covers to throw them over Will's half-naked body, but the older boy kicked his hand away with surprising accuracy for someone who claimed the room was spinning, sending the blanket to the floor in a heap. Mack bent to grab it again, bracing himself when Will's leg swung out this time.
“Hey!” Mack snapped, lunging to catch Will’s naked thigh before it could swing again, his hand landing on the warm, pale skin that Will always complained about getting sunburned every summer.
Will blinked up at him through half-lidded, drowsy blue eyes that looked almost gray in the dim hotel lighting, flexing his leg against Mack's hand like he was testing whether he could wriggle free. "Don't need a blanket. I'm hot," he slurred, bottom lip jutting out in an honest-to-god pout. "And hey... it wasn't your fault. My head was down. Clean hit. Totally fair."
"I should've been there," Mack muttered, running a hand through his hair, which was still damp with sweat from the game. "He hurt you." It didn't make complete sense, the sentence half-formed and clumsy, but it didn't matter. It was Will—and even high on Tramadol, drowning in painkillers and confusion, he got him.
Will yawned, stretching his uninjured arm above his head until his spine cracked, and shifted gingerly onto his left side, making room on the narrow bed for Mack. "A hockey player gets hurt, and an umbrella gets wet. It's part of the job, right? You can't be everywhere on the ice at every minute. There are child labor laws, after all," he joked, the corner of his mouth twitching into something that almost resembled his usual grin.
Mack huffed out a laugh despite himself, sliding onto the small hotel bed beside Will, the mattress dipping under their combined weight. "Wotherspoon's a little bitch. He wouldn't even drop the gloves. Definitely not gonna count as my first fight on NHL Fights Tracker."
"Don't worry. You'll lose that cherry soon enough. Even if I have to get injured ten more times so you can get into ten more fights defending my honor." Will laughed, a sound that came out breathy and rough, a faint blush creeping across his cheeks—from the meds or the conversation, Mack couldn't tell—as he handed Mack back the empty water bottle. Their hands brushed during the exchange, and instead of pulling away, their fingers lingered, then tangled together, calluses catching on calluses.
"Thanks for that, by the way. For sticking up for me like that. Even though it was dumb, and it could've cost us the game."
Mack only half-listened, his gaze fixed on their interlocked fingers, on the way Will's thumb slowly stroked across his knuckles in a rhythm that might've been unconscious but felt deliberate. "Worth it," he muttered, voice quiet but steady, the two words holding more weight than he meant them to.
Will tugged at Mack's hand, pulling him down onto the bed beside him with gentle insistence. Mack followed carefully, hyper-aware of every shift and angle, making sure not to jostle Will's injured arm as he settled next to him on the narrow mattress. They ended up lying face-to-face, turned toward each other in the small space, close enough that Mack could count the faint freckles scattered across Will's nose. Will was in nothing but his boxer briefs, skin pale and smooth in the lamplight except where bruises were already blooming dark across his shoulder blade, and Mack might have forgotten how to breathe.
"Do you remember what you said to me during training camp?" Will asked, eyes half-closed, his words slow and lazy and honeyed from the Tramadol. Mack knew he shouldn't answer. Knew he should just pull the covers over Will's half-naked body and retreat to his own bed across the room like a responsible caretaker.
But the thing is, the main reason a nineteen-year-old should never be trusted with the care of a twenty-year-old is that the nineteen-year-old is Macklin Celebrini—and the twenty-year-old is Will Smith.
Mack had been in love with Will for no less than six years—his first crush, and the one that had never gone away. It had started the first time he’d faced Will in a game, and he couldn’t stop thinking about him even after the final whistle. There was something about the way Will moved on the ice, confident and fast, that stuck in Mack’s head long after the game ended. Over the years, that crush quietly turned into something deeper. And just a few months ago, at training camp in some forgettable hotel room that looked a lot like this one, Mack had finally confessed. Since then, everything had been… a little awkward.
They were still Mack and Will. They still did everything together—people-watching while sipping coffee that was far too sweet, letting Will talk him into romcoms as long as there weren’t any scary parts (sorry, but Red Eye is definitely not a romcom), or just letting Will drive him to the rink each day, quietly enjoying being next to each other.
But now there was this underlying tension, a quiet understanding that hummed between them in locker rooms and on the bench: Mack loved Will. Will didn’t—at least, not that way.
"I remember what I said," Mack said, forcing himself to keep his voice steady, refusing to confess his love for Will a second time, refusing to give voice to the want that lived in his chest like a second heartbeat.
"Do you remember what I said?" Will asked, his left arm drifting up—moving slow and uncoordinated—and swiping the stupid beanie off Mack's head, the one Mack had forgotten he was still wearing, his hair spilling out messy and flattened.
"Yep," Mack whispered, careful not to relive the ten seconds of rejection that had felt like an eternity, the way Will had looked at him with something like pity and said he was flattered, but he didn't feel the same way.
Silence stretched between them, thick and charged, the only sound the hum of the heating unit and their breathing. Will's hand trembled slightly in the air, fingers flexing like he was fighting against the medication pulling him under, before steadying with visible effort. Then his fingers threaded into Mack's hair, calluses from stick grips and weight bars rasping gently against his scalp, twisting just enough to send a shiver racing down Mack's spine.
"I lied," Will breathed, the confession low and raw and cracking at the edges, his grip tightening as he drew Mack closer. Inches vanished; Mack could feel the heat radiating from Will's bare chest like standing too close to a fire, the faint salt of his skin mingling with the clean scent of soap and the chemical sweetness of pain meds. Will's breath ghosted warm across Mack's cheek, a teasing prelude that made his stomach flip, before his lips grazed Mack's—soft at first, tentative, testing, then pressing with a dry urgency that parted them both.
Mack's eyes drifted shut, his body locking in place like every muscle had forgotten how to move, as Will's mouth claimed his: a fleeting sweep of tongue that tasted like want, the graze of teeth nipping at his lower lip hard enough to sting, the kiss deepening into something wet and insistent and messy, laced with the subtle taste of the freaking minty gum Will incessantly chewed. Heat bloomed where their lips met, spreading through Mack's chest, Will's free hand curling loosely around the back of Mack's neck to hold him there, thumb pressing against his pulse point.
Just stay still, Mack thought, the plea echoing in his mind like a lifeline he was clinging to. It won't be on me if I let this happen. I'm not pushing; I'm just... here. Passive. The moment hummed fragile and electric, like the buzz in the air before a power play shifts and everything snaps into focus.
And God, didn't he deserve this? A sliver of what he'd craved through the grind of practices, the sting of that rejection that still made his chest tight when he thought about it, the months of stolen glances across the locker room and swallowed words that stuck in his throat. He'd poured everything into this—his game, his heart, his quiet devotion that everyone seemed to see except Will. After all the ache, the wanting, the watching Will flirt with girls at bars and wondering if he'd ever look at Mack that way, maybe he could claim this one spark of joy, let it flicker without guilt.
A low moan escaped Mack into the kiss, vibrating against Will's lips, and that sound seemed to ignite something in Will. His fingers fumbled at the buttons of Mack's shirt, popping them open one by one with shaky determination, the fabric parting to reveal the taut planes of Mack's chest, still flushed and damp from the day's tension. Will's palm slid inside the open shirt, warm and rough with calluses, splaying across bare skin—fingers tracing the ridge of a collarbone, thumb brushing over a nipple and making Mack gasp.
Will pushed himself up on his good arm with more coordination than he'd shown all night, using his weight to press Mack back against the mattress. Mack went willingly, his breath coming in short, sharp bursts as Will's mouth left his lips to trail wet, open-mouthed kisses down his jaw, his neck, the hollow of his throat. Each press of lips sent heat pooling low in Mack's belly, his hands finding their way into Will's hair, fingers tangling in the soft strands.
"God, Mack," Will breathed against his collarbone, the words muffled and slurred but unmistakable. His hand slid lower, palm dragging down Mack's stomach, fingers tracing the line of muscle until they reached his belt. Will worked the buckle open with fumbling determination, then the button of Mack's jeans, the sound of the zipper loud in the quiet room.
Mack's hips lifted involuntarily when Will's hand slipped inside, when those calloused fingers wrapped around him through the thin fabric of his boxers. A strangled sound escaped his throat, half-gasp, half-moan, and Will made an answering noise low in his chest—something pleased and wanting.
"Want to," Will murmured, already shifting down Mack's body, his mouth pressing kisses to Mack's chest, his ribs, the skin just above his waistband. "Wanted to for so long."
Mack's brain was short-circuiting, pleasure and want warring with the growing unease coiling in his gut. Will's fingers hooked into the waistband of both his jeans and boxers, starting to tug them down, and Mack lifted his hips again to help before he could think better of it. The cool air hit his skin, and then Will's breath, warm and close, and—
No.
The clarity hit like a bucket of ice water. Will was high. Will was barely coherent. Will's movements were uncoordinated and clumsy in a way that had nothing to do with desire and everything to do with the Tramadol flooding his system.
"Will, stop," Mack said, his voice rough and strained. His hands found Will's shoulders—carefully avoiding the injured one—and he pulled him back up, even as every nerve in his body screamed at him not to.
Will blinked up at him slowly, his pupils blown wide and unfocused, lips red and wet, tongue darting out to wet them further before asking, "Why'd you stop?"
Mack sighed, the sound heavy with everything he wasn't saying, and touched his forehead to Will's, close enough to feel the heat of Will's skin and the flutter of his eyelashes. "'Cause you're high as a kite and you probably won't even remember this in the morning, but I will."
Will scrunched up his face like he was trying to compute what Mack was saying, brow furrowing in concentration, before sagely nodding as Mack had just explained a complex breakout play. "But if I don't remember, then you gotta promise to remind me, okay? Cause I really liked kissing you." His eyes were already drifting shut again, but he forced them open, searching Mack's face with drowsy earnestness. "Promise?"
Mack nodded, waiting for Will to close his eyes, his breath evening out as he fell into a deep sleep. Mack let himself stay there for a few beats, memorizing every freckle and mole and tiny scar on Will's face—the one by his eyebrow from a high stick in juniors, the constellation of marks across his nose—lingering in his warmth, knowing that come morning he'd pretend that none of this ever happened. He knew that Will didn't actually love him like he loved Will. The dirty mix of exhaustion and drugs drove Will to say things that weren't true or real. He knew if he brought it up in the morning, he'd just be rejected again. Maybe even worse. Maybe with Will thinking that he took advantage of him while he was like that.
No.
Everything that happened this night would stay with Mack and Mack alone. He'd carry it like he carried everything else—the weight of expectations, the pressure of being the franchise's golden boy, the careful architecture of wanting something he couldn't have. Just another secret tucked away in the machinery of his heart, willful and deliberate, a machination of his own making. He'd protect Will from this, even if it meant protecting him from the truth.