Archive of Our Own

February 2022- North American Collegiate Hockey Coaching Convention in Toronto

"Save me," Bren muttered. "This is worse than the press."

"It is not," Ilya said with an eye roll. "They will trot you on stage, you say your little speech which does not suck, everyone will clap, then you come off again and we can go pretend to care about this pack of idiots."

"I was one of this pack of idiots two and a half years ago," Bren pointed out.

"Yes," Ilya said. "What is your point?"

Bren would've liked to have had Dottie with him for this kind of thing. Not that Ilya wasn't good at being supportive, it was just a very rough kind of support. Suited for the people around him that needed it most like Barrett and Hayes, who took the gruffness for the kindness that it was. The clear exceptions were any people Ilya designated as 'children' (age did not seem to matter to this category), Dottie, and Hollander. They got all his tenderness. As it should be, even if it was always a bit of a mindfuck to see Ilya dote on the six-foot two, muscle-bound, hockey legend that was his very-recently-made fiance.

Usually Bren enjoyed Ilya's sandpaper affection. It kept his own wit from dulling and he could see through it like a pane of glass, so it hardly bothered him.

Today, Bren could have used a gentler touch. Speaking in front of crowds was part of his job and he'd mostly inoculated himself to it. But he had never spoken to his former colleagues, gathered in an enormous mass of potential disapproval like this.

"I'm nervous," Bren said.

"Okay," Ilya frowned. "So?"

"So. I don't want to do this."

"Hm. They have paid you a lot of money to do this," Ilya considered. "But you could give it back to them. I can tell them you have a sudden horrible virus."

"No, it's fine. I know I have to."

Ilya shrugged, briefly unsettling the lines of his very nice suit. He definitely looked better in it than Bren did his and likely had outspent him by an order of magnitude on it. "You do not. We can give them the middle finger and go. But I think you do want to do this. Show them that you were right, this is a way things can be and still win."

"Goddammit," Bren muttered. Because he did want that. It's why he'd said yes in the first place. "You're sure the speech doesn't suck?"

"I read it twice. It is a little boring, but you cannot talk about all the things that would make it interesting, so that is just what it is. It says the things you want to say, at least."

"Wow. What a vote of confidence," Bren said, nailing him with a look. Ilya, unfortunately, was immune to all looks not Hollander-derived.

"It will be good because you are interesting, not the speech. Who cares about the words? The man who delivers them is good and cares. That matters more."

Fuck. Right. Ilya was good at this. Bren was being coached. He didn't even care.

"Mr. Wiebe?" Someone called. "You're almost up."

"Here." Ilya reached out and adjusted Bren's tie, an intensity in his gaze like this was profoundly important. "It will go quick. Over and done. Good luck."

Bren gave him a grateful pat on the shoulder. "Thank you. We're drinking later. On me."

"Excellent," Ilya said with a grin. "Go remind them who the fuck you are."

When Bren stepped out onto the stage, he found the lights as bright as a press room's. That made it much easier. He couldn't see the ocean of faces, dotted with familiar ones here and there. Only the bland darkness he was used to and no one could even blindside him with questions.

"Our last afternoon speaker, Head Coach of the Ottawa Centaurs, Mr. Brandon Wiebe!"

Bren took the podium, he glanced down at the folded sheets of paper, but he knew the speech. He'd gotten good at memorizing P.R. quotes over the last two and a half years.

"Good afternoon," he said, voice reverberating into the darkness, "I feel honored to stand before you. Coaching at a university level was one of the most rewarding things I've ever done. It was there that I realized that coaching isn't just about the sport, but guiding our young people to be the best versions of themselves."

It was close to the impassioned rant he had laid at the feet of the Centaur's GM when his turn had come for his interview. He had had very little hope of landing the job, but he'd wanted to be heard. Sometimes, he wondered if he'd been hired just so someone who gave a shit about the team was somewhere in the leadership because he was pretty sure the GM didn't. The owners liked to come to games and wave. When Bren had almost delivered them the cup last season, they had taken him out for dinner with a sort of bewildered joy and talked about investments more at him than with him.

He didn't say any of that. Instead, he talked about creating a safe and welcoming culture. How prioritizing mental well-being had created a better team with nearly the same players. He praised Ilya, a part he had left out of the paper version so it wouldn't get edited away by the man himself, for his no-nonsense approach and Ryan for his clear-eyed gentle guidance.

The words 'gay', 'queer', 'race' and 'gender' did not enter into it at once. Two weeks on, the video of the proposal was the shot heard around the sports world. If anyone hadn't known before that the Centaurs was the queerest mostly men's team professional sports team in North America, then they certainly did now.

But Bren knew a lot about the places to leave silences. The things people filled in or didn't.

He didn't need to say the quiet part out loud. He just needed to be heard.

Be kind, he begged them, behind serious official wording. Treat them well. Treat yourselves better. For every one of us in this room, how many have left us behind with open wounds that don't heal from all this?

Maybe they heard him. Maybe they didn't. They applauded him at the end. No one booed. That was nice.

Bren left the stage, unclear if he'd done anything at all, except make money and blow hot air.

"You survived," Ilya said.

"Yep."

"Now networking."

"Fuck."

It was actually a bit of a wait. There were some awards to be given out and closing remarks. Only then did they all filter into a waiting vast ballroom with not enough appetizers and a cash bar. They both stuck to soda. Drinking together later would be cathartic, drinking here would be a coping mechanism and Bren didn't use liquor for that.

For a full two minutes they were left alone with their drinks and Bren started to wonder if he'd be rightly overshadowed by the other speakers that had come before him.

"There you are!" Someone with an official lanyard said. "They really should've brought you in properly."

"Who's they?" Bren asked, but it was too late. He, and by extension Ilya, were shepherded closer to the center of the room.

Thus started a line of well meaning people who wanted to shake his hand and tell him that the Centaurs really were in with a chance this year and did he remember meeting them at such and such time and place? Bren agreed that he had to all of them, regardless if he had or not. What was the point of telling someone they weren't memorable?

Beside him, Ilya was given his far share of greetings, but nosy questions died in people's mouths. Without even looking, Bren knew exactly what expression was on his face. The few feckless fools and the true of heart that survived that frozen gauntlet were given icy one word answers that were so heavily accented, Ilya might as well have been speaking Russian. Shutting people down was Ilya's particular art form.

It ended as abruptly as it had begun, the crowd ebbing and flowing around them until they were once more a tiny island.

"Let's get out of here before someone gets stupid," Bren said.

"Coach Wiebe!"

"The universe heard you," Ilya said with a sigh.

"Yes?"

It was a younger guy that approached him and Bren definitely knew that face. He broke into a genuine grin. "Vince!"

"Hi! You remember me!"

"It was only six years ago, son, of course I do," Bren said happily. "Are you coaching now? That's amazing!"

"I graduated and I almost didn't go for it, but uh..I don't know," Vince shifted a little, ducking his chin. "I thought a lot about the things you said and I think I want to be more like you than I want to be like him, you know?"

Bren could only nod, overtaken by that. "Yeah. Wow. Thank you."

"No, coach, thank you. You're Ilya Rozanov?"

"That is what they call me. You are one of Bren's players?"

"One of his washouts, more like," Vince said with a laugh that he wouldn't have been able to manage four years ago. "Couldn't keep my grades up enough to stay on the team. But he always found work for me to do so I could stick around anyway. Congratulations on your engagement! Is that okay to say?"

"Very okay," Ilya said, warmth leeching back into him. "Thank you."

"I actually came over here for a reason! I mean obviously, I wanted to say hello to you. It's great to see you," Vince said quickly. "But my head coach said you guys used to know each other, back in your player days? I think he was looking for you, do you mind if I go get him, let you guys say hi before he goes?"

"Sure, why not?" Bren said, a little more relaxed now. Vince had been one of the kids he worried about, all communication broken off when he graduated. Knowing he was okay made it worth coming here.

"He knows you play with eleven years worth of idiots?" Ilya asked wryly as Vince ducked back into the crowd. "I do not remember them all and it was only a few years ago for me."

"I don't care. I can shake hands with some random guy from fifteen years ago to make Vince feel like he did something. I just spent an hour doing it for worse reasons."

"One of your difficult cases?"

"Not difficult," Bren said, taking a sip of his soda. "Complicated, maybe. Decent person, hard life."

"Ah, your favorite," Ilya nodded like that explained everything. Maybe it did.

"I have a type," Bren agreed. "Speaking of, we should start looking at-"

"Here! I told you," Vince broke back through the crowd.

Bren put his game face back on. It shattered almost immediately.

Stepping out from a crowd and walking towards them with purpose was one man Bren could've happily gone another fifteen years without seeing. His face was frustratingly unchanged. Maybe a few more lines here or there. There were threads of silver in his auburn hair, but it was otherwise lush and thick as ever. He still wore it a little long, brushing over his ears to hide that a divot was missing from the top of the left one. His eyes were still the same hazel promise of a good time. The body had shifted some, intense muscle mass giving way to a consciously trim middle age much like Bren's had.

It had been far too long for the fire to still burn, but just seeing him did stir the last dying embers enough to remember the pain.

"Brandon Wiebe," Dusty said, coming to a stop before him. "How the hell are you?"

"It's been a very long day," Bren said, his mouth very dry.

"Hasn't it?" Dusty smiled, the same old winning smile.

"You are Dustin Mackintosh," Ilya said, surprise in every word.

"Nice to know I haven't been forgotten. Especially by someone like you, Rozanov."

"Hard to forget. Three time MVP," one might mistake it for praise, but Bren heard Ilya warming up to the chirp, "I read about it when I was a child."

Some people wouldn't even register that, but Dustin had always been clever. His smile went a little sharp. "And now you're all grown up, is that it?"

"You coach? College? Since when?" Ilya asked, all calm innocence.

"Started five years ago," Dusty said, his eyes locked onto Bren's, shutting Ilya out entirely. "Following in this one's footsteps, actually. I was retired fully, but the years ticked by and I got bored of myself. Then I see a familiar face all over ESPN and I thought, well good enough for him, good enough for me. So here I am and much better for it. You were smart, Rozanov. Retirement is an old man's game, signing up without a gap would've been the better move."

"Yes, very smart," Ilya said as if he wasn't hearing his own words.

"We've gotten to regionals every year since he took over," Vince said with pride.

"That's great," Bren said emptily. "Really something."

"We'll make it to nationals soon. Great year for it. Solid team."

"Bren," Ilya dropped his voice. "Maybe we go now? Early flight."

"They still call you Bren, do they?" Dusty asked lightly, but his eyes searched Bren's, trying to communicate…what? The days when Bren thought he could read him were far, far away.

Bren couldn't look away though. He'd never known how.

"Only my friends," Bren said flatly and Vince frowned. He was picking up on the tension. Shit. They used to be better at this. Then again, back then they'd been masking something else altogether. Back then they weren't strangers. They had, in a way, been on the same team. Instead of whatever this was. Adversaries? Strangers? "But Ilya's right, we're due to head out."

"Let me get your card at least," Dusty urged. "I'd love to reconnect."

There was no polite maneuver out of that and Ilya shifted in a way that said he'd be delighted to find a distinctly impolite way. Which had it's temptations. Instead though, Bren dipped into his pocket and pulled out the black and red card with the Centaurs' logo on it. It would only get Dusty as far as an administrative assistant or an email anyway.

He gave a different card to Vince, the one where he'd written his personal number on it. He always kept one or two, just in case.

"Call me, kid," Bren said. "I want to hear all about how you got here and how it's going, okay?"

"Okay, coach," Vince said with a returned smile. Good. Bren had stuck the recovery.

"Good seeing you again, Dusty," Bren said and offered his hand for a shake like this was all very normal.

"Nice to see you too, Bren," Dusty said and the touch of his palm was nothing special. It was just a handshake.

That was a welcome discovery.

He let Ilya cut them a path through the crowd. Thank fuck it was Ilya and not Dottie. Bren was almost weak in the knees thinking about it now. They made it outside and the gut punching cold was a relief.

"Do you want?" Ilya asked, taking out his pack. "The car will take a few minutes."

"I haven't smoked in twenty years."

"Mm, special circumstances."

Tempting. Very tempting.

"No. Thank you."

Ilya nodded, "You mind if I…"

"Do. I'll inhale the secondhand smoke. That'll be enough."

They both watched the street, silence thick between them. Ilya was waiting on him, Bren knew. He'd accept if he didn't say a word.

The team, Ilya, Dottie. All of them so patient with the things he wouldn't say. Couldn't say. Be honest, Ilya asked of their players and Bren nodded along. Christ.

"It was him. The guy."

The orange point of Ilya's cigarette flared, then tampered down again as he took a long drag. He blew the smoke upward, shielding them in it's transparent plume.

"I thought maybe he was. You do not dislike many people that much."

"I don't dislike him. Up until ten minutes ago, I didn't feel anything about him at all."

"Mm. You did, but those feelings they were asleep. And he woke them up. Cruel."

"I don't think it was on purpose."

"Oh? He sends you an old student that you like to play fetch by accident?" Ilya shook his head. "No, I think it was on purpose. He wants to see you. He has regrets. Middle aged man who had something good and wants to reminisce. Possibly naked."

"Jesus, Ilya," Bren groaned. "You don't know that."

"I can take a very good guess."

"He can enjoy talking to Benny at the front desk about it. Fuck that."

"Will you tell Dottie?"

"Oh yeah," Bren sighed. She'd be pissed off on his behalf, probably. Of the two of them, she was better at grudges these days. "I told her the bare bones of it pretty early on back then. Thought that'd be the end of things with her, but I wanted to start things off truthful."

"So you were always like this," Ilya said almost like he was happy about that. "Of course."

"I wasn't," Bren countered. "I really fucking wasn't."

"Tell me then. About this other Bren. If you want."

The car arrived and Ilya put out his cigarette. Bren considered the offer for the short ride back to the hotel. The bar was quiet and Bren let Ilya order them drinks. No vodka tonight apparently. They got gin and tonics, Bren's preferred situation. They took them to a quiet booth in the corner. Bren raised his glass.

"To our better seasons."

Ilya doffed his glass at that and they both drank.

"And the worse ones," Ilya said, watching him carefully. "They are us too, aren't they?"

"They sure fucking are," Bren said and started talking.

February 1999 - From Santa Fe Coyotes' Arena to the All Stars Game in Tampa

Flexing his hand, Brandon sat alone in the locker room. He always arrived early, started getting changed before anyone else and then got on the ice to warm up alone. The first rush of people into the space was the worst part of the day.

Today would be worse.

Every day was a little worse.

With a sharp inhalation, he forced himself up and to start putting on his gear. He needed to get out on the ice where at least Coach Jameson would likely already be having his first cup of coffee and going over notes.

By the skin of his teeth, Brandon got out before Red and Horton came lumbering in, their voices proceeding them. Jameson was sitting with a clipboard and he gave Brandon a nod.

"Wiebe."

"Morning, coach," he said.

"Remember what we discussed yesterday."

"Yes, coach."

The discussion had been the entire coaching team staring him down in a conference room while ice melted between his fingers. He had stiffly apologized to Horton under their watchful gaze and shaken hands.

His skates hit the ice and at least there, Brandon could breathe. He stretched and sunk into the routine of it all. When everyone else came pouring out onto the ice, they were in a good mood. Brandon was ignored rather than made the center of any kind of intention.

Horton's black eye was spectacular. Very carefully not looking at it, Brandon rode the twist of joy that seeing it gave him. Fuck him. Fuck this whole fucking team. They needed him or he'd be gone already, he was sure. They had failed to replace him as second line center three seasons running.

"Woof, you got him good," Owens said, sliding in beside Brandon.

"He's a fucking asshole," Brandon said conversationally.

"No shit. Are you benched?"

"Nope," Brandon popped the 'p' hard. "They decided I get a one-time pass."

"Dude, you cleaned that rookie's clock six months ago."

"Two time pass," Brandon said.

"Someone in the ranks must love you."

"They don't. What are they going to do? Sub in Lorrey?"

"Good point."

If Brandon had a friend on the team, Owens was it. He was a strange guy with his sword collection, permanent stoner look, and an invisible wife. She was not actually invisible. Brandon had met her. She was a nice enough lady, but she had a hard time leaving the house for reasons Brandon wasn't entirely clear on and the rest of the guys decided that Owens had made her up. They chirped at him about it all the time. Owens just looked through them. He was good at that.

His main advantage as a friend was that he was built like brick shithouse and was happy to stand behind Brandon, apparently zoning out while Brandon laid into someone. It was never clear if Owens agreed with him or had just decided that Brandon was the right person to stand behind in a fight. In either case, Owens very presence tended to deter the other party's worst impulses.

"You two girls going to gossip all morning or are we getting shit done today?" Horton sneered, smacking his blade down inches from Brandon's skates.

Brandon ignored it. He'd promised the coaches to ignore it. Put up with it. Swallow it all down. This is how guys talked. This is how they worked. Even if it had never worked for Brandon.

So, he kept his head down and he got through practice. Lingering on the ice after was just practical even though he was tired. It wasn't like he had anyone waiting on him at home. He could afford to take a few more shots, let the shower clear out in case Horton got any bright ideas.

"Wiebe!" Jameson called for him. "Get over here."

Shit. What now? He'd done what they'd wanted. Maybe they'd bench him after all. Obidently, Brandon presented himself before Jameson.

"Yes, coach?" he asked.

His right hand ached in it's glove. Maybe he actually had cracked a knuckle on Horton's hard skull. Or maybe he'd just been clenched all over so hard for so long that everything fucking hurt.

"Got a call for you this morning. L.A. got hit with food poisoning apparently, half the team is out sick with their heads in the toilet, including all three of the guys that were supposed to got to All Stars. They're doing some Hot vs Cold or something bullshit. So your number is up. You're going to Tampa tomorrow."

"Me?" Brandon asked.

"That's what I said," one of the assistant coaches muttered.

"Shut up," Jameson said mildly. "The goal in the final playoff game last year made an impression. It's an easy enough few days. Keep your head down, don't make us look bad and you might even have a good time."

"Okay, coach. Thank you."

"I didn't have shit all to do with it," Jameson said dryly. "Travel arranged your flight already. Stop by the office and get the info from them before you leave."

"Yes, coach."

Brandon went in slowly and was rewarded with mostly empty showers. The travel department handed off his details without much ceremony. When he went back out into the world, it was to a mild enough day. Santa Fe was not the unrelenting heat that he'd worried it would be when he was first drafted. It had winters, if not as severe as the ones he'd grown up with. Today it was pleasantly brisk without any bite.

Instead of buying a house or something more permanent, Brandon had settled on a rented condo near the practice rink. It had come with the last owner's furniture and Brandon hadn't asked too many questions about that. All of it was fine, pale woods and muted pastels. Owens said it looked like a nursing home. Brandon found it restful.

Getting out his away game suitcase, Brandon started packing.

Him. Twenty-one year old Brandon Wiebe, who had already disappointed early excitement about his career. Who had made one good goal at one tense game. He could call his parents, but it was 50-50 on if that would go well.

His high school friends would appreciate the news, but they'd never been the type of guys who called to shoot the shit. He reached out when he was heading home and wanted to see if anyone would be around to hang with. They called on his birthday and holidays. Fleeting things.

Great. Pinnacle of his career probably and no one gave a shit. He wasn't sure he even gave a shit. All Stars sounded good, but everyone knew it was a dog and pony show. With a sigh, he packed, turning on Green Day to keep him company.

The flight was all right. A first class seat that he would never indulge in for himself, but travel booked as a matter of course. He watched the in-flight movie, registering very little of it. There was a sign with his name on it at baggage claim.

The hotel was big and the color of a ripe peach. Florida was sticky despite the month, the back of Brandon's neck already prickling with sweat as he set down his suitcase in a bland room. Dinner was at seven, it was only four. He changed into his bathing suit and went down to the glittering pool. Might as well take advantage of the perks. There were only a few people lingering by the water, mostly chatting women on lounge chairs.

He put his feet in the water, adjusting to the chill. Before he could slide in, someone said: "Wiebe?"

Looking around in bewilderment, he found a familiar face coming out from the hotel. "Ace!"

"Holy shit!" Ace was beaming as he picked up the pace coming towards him. There was another guy with him, but all of Brandon's attention was on Ace. He got to his feet just in time to be pulled into a rough hug.

It was the best (only) hug that Brandon had had in a year. "I should've known you be here. You had a hell of a season!"

"Thank you, thank you," Ace laughed in his ear, pulling away to study him. "My rookie, all grown up."

"I was grown up when you met me," Brandon said without heat.

"How'd you get here?"

"Last minute replacement. Crazy, right?"

"Nah," Ace said, giving him a little shake before disengaging entirely. "You're damn good, kid. You know I always said so."

"Thanks," Brandon said and he knew he was smiling like an idiot. "Damn, it's really good to see your ugly mug."

"Yours too," Ace said. "You'll sit with us at dinner, right? No one else came from the Coyotes? I would've heard."

"Just me," Brandon confirmed. "Guessing there's a few Admirals though."

"Me and Tick, yeah. Oh! Shit, and Dusty," Ace said, waving at the guy behind him. "Dustin Mackintosh, this is my old rookie from Santa Fe, Brandon Wiebe. You guys have played against each other, I bet."

"Once or twice," Brandon said, sticking out his hand. "But not enough to say hello. Good to meet you."

It was only when Dusty's hand slid into his that Brandon gave him any attention.

And then lost his fucking mind.

Being tall and muscular was a given, of course, but otherwise Dusty's appearance was slightly to the left of everything else expected of a hockey player. His hair was a little too long, his eyes a little too warm, and his clothes a shade too well-fitted. It was in the way he smiled too, warm and with a hint of something wry. As if he knew a joke that he hadn't seen fit to tell.

"What do they actually call you?" Dusty asked, holding on for a second too long, before releasing Brandon's hand. "It can't be 'Wiebe',"

"Something wrong with that?" Brandon challenged.

"Aw, Dusty, you gotta be softer with this one. Wiebe's all hard edges, you'll break your face on him."

"That true?" Dusty asked him, still staring him down. What did he want? Brandon stared right back. There was green and brown in Dusty's eyes, mesmerizing and welcoming.

"Nah, I'm a fucking teddy bear," Brandon said.

"I can't call a grown man 'Wiebe'. Sounds like a cartoon character. Brandon, right?"

"That's what my mother named me."

Dusty's eyes flickered to Brandon's lips. A second. Barely anything. Enough though. Just enough. There had been only a handful of times before, but he knew how men spotted each other across crowded rooms. A few frantic ruts in places no one peered into.

"Bran is awful. You don't look like a cereal," Dusty said. He had a good voice too, deep and resonant, the lingering accent of a good Southern boy around some of his vowels. "Bren, maybe."

"Bren," Ace repeated and for a half-second, Brandon had forgotten he was even there. "I like it. Suits you."

"Nah," Brandon said. "Wiebe does me fine."

But it was already too late. By the time he sat down with them to dinner, Ace was introducing him as Bren and the name had set in stone. A done deal.

In an instant, Bren had been remade.

"Sorry about that," Dusty said with the kind of shit eating grin that said he'd never been sorry about anything a day in his life. "You know how nicknames go."

"Could be worse," Bren said. "Could be 'Dusty' like I've already been forgotten or something."

The grin only got bigger and the rusty laugh that cracked out broke through Bren's shell and made him laugh too.

"You don't fuck around," Dusty said, chucking him on the shoulder.

"I do," Bren said, testing the waters, his voice lowering below the chatter. "Now and then."

"Yeah? Come and tell me about that after dinner, maybe. You know Ace turns in early and I've got all night."

"Maybe I will."

A stolen night, Bren figured. An unexpected bit of excitement and touch. A secret kept because it was mutually-assured destruction.

If only Bren had been smarter or older or if he'd lingered a little longer in the car with the girl from across town that night when he was seventeen. If only, if only, if only.

Instead, he followed Dusty to his room, keeping up casual small talk about their teams. No one was watching. No one thought a thing about it. Just a few players planning a night out or pre-gaming. Nothing to see here. Ace said good night at his door, apparently pleased he'd made some kind of friendship match.

The door closed behind them. The air conditioner was heaving, spreading goosebumps over Bren's skin.

"You're one of those guys with a five o'clock shadow by noon, huh?" Dusty stepped in closer. A plausible distance though. An excusable distance.

"Been that way since I could grow it at all," Bren confirmed, watching him. Unmoving.

They stalemated there and for a breathless, fearful second, Bren wondered if he'd read it all wrong.

"Say no," Dusty murmured.

"I'd rather say yes," Bren said with great relief and took the final step forward.

The kiss was hungry, but their hands were hungrier. Bren had been starving for a long year. There had been a woman, briefly. He'd liked her, she'd stopped liking him. He'd looked for another since it was so much easier to be with a woman. But women had to be a certain something for him. Men, he was less picky about. This man though…even if Bren had been picky he would've say yes.

Dusty's hands on him were reverent, not rough. He laid Bren out and feasted which gave Bren permission to run his hands through the thick mane of his hair and over the broad planes of his shoulders. Dusty pinned Bren's hips to the bed his arm a bar over them as licked and sucked him for whate felt like hours.

"Don't come," Dusty murmured. "I want you to fuck me. Do you do that?"

"Yeah," Bren said though it had only been once before.

They did it face to face. Dusty's eyes were enthralling, the grasp of him around Bren total. Bren might've been doing the fucking, but he felt penetrated anyway. When Bren came it was with Dusty stroking over his face and throat as if he could memorize him with fingertips.

After, Bren expected to get sent on his way, but Dusty wrapped a hand around Bren's wrist and murmured, "Stay awhile. Tell me about yourself."

"Not a lot to know," Bren said.

"Tell me anyway."

"Went to school, played hockey until I decided that was the thing I wanted to do. Worked hard, got picked up and did my time until I got called up. Been in Sante Fe ever since."

"Tidy," Dusty said, and he hadn't let go of Bren's wrist, only switched his grip so his thumb could run circles over the raised lines of Bren's veins. It tingled and it was almost more intimate a touch than any they'd already exchanged. "Parents? Siblings?"

"Parents, yes. Siblings, no. Ace always said that's why I'm such a dick. Never had a brother to beat sense into me," Bren said.

"I've got sisters. They do the same job," Dusty said with a laugh.

"Where are you from?"

"Louisiana. I'd tell you the town name, but it wouldn't mean anything to you."

"Same about where I'm from. Ottawa isn't too far though."

"Canadian. Very exotic."

"Hilarious," Bren said, but he was actually fighting a smile. "What about you?"

"Oh, not too different, I guess. Though I came by hockey a lot harder. Not exactly a popular sport in my neck of the woods. My mother was sick for awhile, went to live with my uncle in Pittsburgh for a year or so. Got the bug there and I was good enough that my parents made it work. And now look at me. On track for MVP."

Bren did look at him. Naked, Dusty was carved from marble that had been dappled in freckles. They spread over his shoulders and down his chest, tiny lilypads of warm brown floating in the milky paleness of his skin. His lightly furred stomach arrowed down to a thatch of almost red pubic hair and his now limp cock. There was beauty in here, in a way Bren rarely got to touch.

"Impressive," Bren said flatly.

That made Dusty laugh again. All of Bren's barbs made him laugh, the longer they talked, the more Bren started to do it on purpose. That rusty lovely laugh and the flash of Dusty's smile delighted him.

They talked long enough for a second round to be plausible. Dusty's hand wrapped around them both while Bren mouthed over Dusty's neck, not daring to bite. Not even wanting to. There was something more tender here than a bite required. Dusty could clearly take a hit, but the way he moaned softly, his tip of his nose brushing over Bren's forehead, made Bren want to be soft.

"Stop me if this is too crazy," Dusty whispered in Bren's ear as they lay sticky and satisfied, shivering a little in the air conditioning, "but I want to do this again. We play you guys in a few weeks, don't we? Can I come over?"

"Yeah," Bren said readily. "After. I'll give you my address. It's a drive though."

"I can afford a cab."

"Okay."

They should separate now. It was getting late, but Dusty kept touching Bren like he couldn't believe he was there. Like they were very long parted lovers.

This was dangerous, Bren decided as he pressed his lips to Dusty's shoulder and tasted that field of dense freckles. He should run. He should listen to his coaches and stop fighting against the unspoken rules that were there to protect him.

"Bren," Dusty said and nothing else. Affixing the label that Bren could never scrape away.

The one that he let stick, if he was honest. A souvenir from All Stars.

February 2022- Room 560, The Garden Inn at Hilton in Toronto

"You could change it at any time." There were two beds in the room and as soon as they'd gotten upstairs, Ilya had claimed one, leaving the lone chair to Bren. He had been listening intently, but apparently this stopped him dead. "I will call you anything."

"I know," Bren said.

"Dottie even calls you this. Why?"

"He started it, everyone else picked it up and then it had nothing to do with him anymore." Taking a sip of his drink, Bren set it behind him. Two was enough for him to feel it these days. He didn't drink much. "Nicknames are nice."

"Wiebe is not so bad," Ilya muttered mutinously.

"You're angrier with him than I am," Bren observed.

"I just found out," Ilya said. "You have known for a long time that he is terrible. It is fresh to me."

"He wasn't terrible. He was scared. So was I."

Blowing a breath out through his nose, Ilya made a disparaging noise. "Fine. So. You hook up. In your house? In hotels?"

"Both. At his place too, in Detroit. He had a hell of an apartment. We'd meet up when we played games against each other, but other times too. Summers. We managed a full week once."

Ilya shook his head. "A week? That is not whatever you told me about. That is not hotels and hookups."

"It was just once."

July 2001- A Cabin in Cobourg, Ontario

"The water is fucking freezing," Bren announced as he stepped back inside, sliding the glass door shut behind him.

"Yeah?" Dusty looked up from his book where he was splayed over the couch. "If only someone could've predicted that and told you not to go swimming."

"I didn't say I didn't like it. Still trying to get through that thing?"

"I will keep trying to prove to Anders that I can finish it," Dusty groaned, flinging it aside. He gave Bren a long look over. "You should go shower."

"You don't want to lick Lake Ontario off my nuts?" Bren asked.

"When you put it that way? No fucking way," Dusty snorted.

But when Bren headed for the bathroom, he could hear footsteps behind him.

The cabin wasn't very big, mostly a bedroom with a kitchenette. It had been built to enjoy the outdoors with the windows facing out to the water and the short dock with it's metal rowboat. This had been Dusty's score, a friend of a friend lending the place to the tune of a few hundred dollars. It was clean, well-stocked and it wasn't Bren's parents' house with it's slow growing poison that sapped into him every time he visited.

Also Dusty was in it. That made it pretty much the best place on earth as far as Bren was concerned.

Only Owens knew where Bren had gotten to, taking the emergency number with detached interest and a vague 'have a good time, see you in August'. Then Bren had flown to Toronto, rented a car and driven here. Dusty had already arrived and he stood in the doorway, sheltered from the view of the street as Bren rounded into the drive.

They had fallen together right there, the door barely closed behind them and kissed each other senseless on the wood floor. They had fucked on the couch, too drunk on each other to get fully undressed, Dusty's shirt rucked up to his armpits and both their shorts stuck around their knees.

That had been three days ago and the feeling hadn't retreated yet. Bren had imagined that with all the time in the world to satiate themselves, they would slow at some point. Instead, it seemed to only make them more frantic.

Dusty followed him into the shower and pressed him to the tile. He wrapped a hand around Bren's throat, never any pressure in it, not even the threat of it. Here, in the steam and quiet, Bren finally asked, "Why do you do that?"

"Do what?" Dusty murmured.

Bren rested his hand over Dusty's, "Hold me like this?"

"Oh," Dusty hummed in consideration, then whispered, "I like to feel your voice on my fingertips."

It had to be mutual, Bren decided. This awful, beautiful moth that had been born inside his chest, unfurling it's wings over the last two years could not be alone in this world.

"I like that," Bren said.

Dusty kissed him, licking into his mouth.

They did have to eat and meals were oddly more like their regular meetups. In hotels and their homes, they crashed into each other, got each other off and then indulged in each other's company. The slow syrup sex they were having at the cabin was something else altogether.

Neither of them were inventive cooks, but they managed. For lunch they had sandwiches and pickles that Dusty sliced length-wise. Their legs intermingled under the small table and Bren could've lived in that lunch forever.

"I heard you were almost suspended at the end of the season. Again," Dusty said around a mouthful of roast beef.

"Where'd you hear that?" Bren asked mildly.

"Firecracker," Dusty laughed, "what'd you do this time? They traded Horton away so you'd stop clocking him, you know."

"They traded him for Durst and some peace and quiet," Bren countered. "Anyway, it was one of the coaches this time."

"You punched a coach?" Dusty dropped his sandwich to his plate. "Bren. Come on."

"I didn't punch him," Bren said. "I might've suggested that he'd be better off fucking himself with a rusty chainsaw than coaching, but I didn't touch him."

"Jesus Christ," Dusty groaned, "You're impossible. Why?"

"He's been messing with the rookies' heads. Demoralizing them. They're not the best bunch we've ever had, but he was being a fucking bully. I've been trying to balance it out all season, but you know I'm not-"

"Liked? Popular? This is why, you know."

The joy of the meal diminished a little, and Bren set down his food too. "Maybe some things are worth more than being popular. He already did his dirty work on Toby. Kid is only twenty and he's being sent back down. Asshole made him so nervous that he lost all the momentum he'd built up."

"Rookies washout sometimes, Bren. You know that. I know that," Dusty sighed. "You're a good man, but I wish you were better to yourself too."

"What's that mean?" Bren demanded.

"It means you've got a right to a decent career. You're better than you've been playing and it's because your head is in all the wrong places. Trying to fix things for guys who wouldn't spit on you if you were on fire. That's without them even knowing who you really are."

"And who am I really?" He was hissing mad now. He'd never been properly mad at Dusty before. He didn't like it. Dusty was supposed to be peace.

"A guy who fucks guys," Dusty said bluntly. "Same way my team doesn't know who the fuck I am and never will. But if they did…"

Fuck, if they did.

Bren picked at the crust of his bread.

"Some of them wouldn't care."

"Oh?" Dusty pulled a face. "How many, do you think?"

"We can't be the only ones."

"Bren. The guys like us are the worst ones. Haven't you figured that out by now?"

The thought sank like lead in his stomach. He had wondered sometimes. He didn't want to know. He wanted to believe that there were other guys like them out there, living on the fringes of their sport, waiting to be free and not spitting back the pain they felt onto every other guy they met.

"I'm not," Bren said softly.

"I know." Reaching across the table, Dusty cupped his cheek. "Who would know though? When you tell people to be better by trying to beat it into them?"

"What about you?" Bren asked, another question he'd been terrified to broach. He met Dusty's eyes. Stuck there. Locked in. Every time. "What are you like in the locker room? Everyone always tells me how lucky I am you talk to me because you're one of the best. Does that mean how you play or wearing the C?"

"Why not both?" Dusy asked and there was his wry smile. The one that Bren always wanted to taste. "I'm fucking spectacular at both."

The hand fell away, the connection breaking.

"But do you talk like one of them? Or do you stop it?"

"Neither," Dusty said and picked his sandwich back up. "That's what you need to learn. Sometimes the best thing you can do is nothing."

Bren ate mechanically after that. They spent the afternoon out on the dock, Dusty pretending he knew fuck all about fishing while Bren dipped in and out of the lake. The cold water cleared his head and knocked the conversation out of it for awhile.

Before dinner, Dusty bent Bren over the back of the couch and they watched the sunset as Dusty fucked into him so slowly, Bren was a trembling wreck by the end. They ate and talked about other things. Movies they'd seen. Places they would go. They slept in the only bed, pure indulgence. Dusty spooned up behind Bren, kissing the back of his neck again and again until he fell asleep between one kiss and the next.

The moth captured under Bren's ribs shook it's wings frantically. The lax hand on Bren's chest pressed it down. He'd come into this week with a plan, but it was fracturing to dust. He didn't want to disturb the alchemy of their time together.

"I won't punch anyone this season," he promised in their last minutes together on a foggy Friday morning.

"Oh?" Dusty asked, amused and kissed the corner of his mouth. "Is that so?"

"I'll play better hockey. I'll keep to myself. I swear. For you."

It was the closest he had come to what he'd meant to say this week. If Dusty heard the flutter of of paper thin wings beneath the words, he didn't acknowledge them.

"Good boy," he'd said instead with a wink and then let him go, sending him back out to Santa Fe with a last kiss sealed over his lips. "I'll make it worth your while."

February 2022- Room 560, The Garden Inn at Hilton in Toronto

"A week. In a cabin. You make each other promises."

"I know, I know," Bren sighed. "It was right in front of my face. His too, I guess. But it was too hard. You know?"

Ilya's eyes burned into his. "Don't ask stupid questions."

There was a ring on Ilya's finger now, black and gold. It caught the light in strange ways sometimes, a glint against the yellow that died in the inky depths of the black band.

"When did you know you were fucked?"

"Depends on what level. Day one, maybe," Ilya said. "But the way you mean? Mm. 2015, I think. In Shane's apartment. I don't remember the game. I remember my head on his chest, hearing his heartbeat and I had this terrible thought."

"What was that?"

"That it was the sound of my life too," Ilya shook his head slowly as if the thought almost irritated him. "That his heart needed to beat so mine beat. It is more romantic in Russian."

"I hope not. That's already pretty devastating. You should write it down for your vows."

"I'm not saying that in front of people," Ilya said, instantly horrified. "That is for me and him."

"You just told me," Bren pointed out.

"You do not count." Like it was obvious. Maybe it was. Bren smiled at him, despite the bile of old feelings trying to climb out his throat.

"So no Rozanov original poetry at the wedding?"

"Fuck no. I will say the words they have you say. Shane too. My vows to him are mine. Did you and Dottie do this? Write your own?"

"Nah," Bran said. "We did everything small and simple. She didn't want to wear white, I ever tell you that?"

"I have seen the pictures," Ilya said, "and I asked her. Purple is nice on her."

"Gave her mother fits. I loved it. I don't think I would've known what to do with a white wedding."

"I am going to make Shane wear white," Ilya declared with his eyes dancing. "Big lacy dress."

"Uh huh. Please let me know how that conversation goes. Because I will bet ten dollars it ends with you in the dress."

"I will do something very sexy. Low neckline and backless," Ilya said, entirely untroubled by that assessment. "So. Now we have laughed a little and you are thinking of me in a dress. Tell me how it ended."

"You know," Bren said, all the levity gone with a snap.

"I know one line. I do not know the story."

"Who cares? It's old news."

"You told Dottie, you said. How much?"

"You know. A little more than I told you before all this." Not much more. What girlfriend wanted that much detail on the ex, regardless of the form 'ex' had taken?

"Who else did you tell?"

Bren reached for his glass again and finished it off. "No one."

"Yes, this is what I thought. So tell it once. Sometimes, you make it a story and it helps."

"Did it help you?"

"No, because I did not do it. I could not. Until he shows back up like Dread Pirate and chases me through a fucking swamp and makes it a story."

Bren did have to smile at that. Ilya had really taken to their Christmas traditions. He had brought Shane with him this year. Christmas Eve with the Pikes, Christmas morning with the Hollanders and Christmas lunch with Wiebes, including their required re-watch of Bren and Dottie's favorite movie, all of them bundled under blankets and the lights low.

Fortified by that memory, Bren pushed on.

June 2002- Room 294, The Dew Drop Inn, Detroit

Bren lived up to his promise. He played like a demon all season. He wasn't going to win any awards, but it was a career best for him. All it took was keeping his head down. All it took was gritting his teeth and pouring his frustrations into endless practice, additional workouts and carving himself into one of Owens' swords on the ice.

He ignored the pale-faced rookies, who stumbled in after their meetings with the asshole. Ignored the shitty language that was like salt in all his open wounds. Ignored the way the new defense guy talked about his girlfriend.

Bren bore it. He dealt with it. His reward came in dimly lit motel rooms and in the pastel blandness of his apartment. Four times they met up during the season and each time, Dusty acknowledged his efforts with near worship of his body, talking stats like they were diamonds Bren had found in the gutter and brought to him.

Santa Fe made it to the playoffs again. Bren scored a goal in each game until they were unceremoniously knocked out. Then he flew to Detroit to watch Dusty win the cup. He was a nobody in the crowd. Even his best season didn't make him that recognizable. Especially with a baseball cap and his thick playoff beard.

For one beautiful night, Bren let himself pretend that he was a real partner, there to cheer on his man.

He stayed in Detroit long enough for Dusty to make time for him. They met in Bren's hotel room. They shaved off their beards together, making a mess of the counter and sink, They rubbed smoothed cheeks against each other with giddy laughter. Then Bren got down on his knees and treated Dusty like every cup winner should be treated when they were so radiant with the win.

"You were amazing," Bren told him afterwards flat on his back and Dusty pressed along him from shoulder to knee.. "They couldn't have won without you. What's it like?"

"You'll find out some day," Dusty kissed Bren's shoulder. "Anything I tell you will just be my bullshit."

"I want to know anyway. Tell me your bullshit," Bren insisted, running his hands through auburn hair. He could still see Dusty holding the cup aloft, his smile genuine and enormous.

"It was like…" Dusty trailed off. "Don't laugh."

"I won't," Bren promised.

"It was like what going home should feel like, but never does."

Bren leaned in and kissed Dusty's forehead. "Why would I laugh at that? It's beautiful."

"It's ridiculous," Dusty denied, but he closed his eyes, lips curled up at the ends.

"Will you go back to Louisiana this summer?" Bren asked, the question under the question.

"Once all the festivities are over. What are you going to do? See your mother?"

"I guess. I don't know."

"You don't know? It's pretty much here, Bren," Dusty yawned, slid his arm around Bren's waist. "You usually have plans for months."

"I wasn't sure," Bren said and it came out wrong. He'd meant a full sentence, but it stopped there.

He wasn't sure.

But he was.

God, he was sure. He'd been sure for a long time.

"I know with everything, it's gotta be rough, but you should go see her. With the way your father left, it must be rough on her."

"She's having a great time," Bren countered. "She should've left him twenty years ago. She told me she's taking watercolor classes. She got a cat."

"Wow, wild and fun gal, your mother. Hard to believe she made you."

"Because I'm so relaxed? You want me to take up watercolor too?"

"Because you are wild and fun. Knew it the second I met you. All in the eyes," Dusty said, his words tiny tornadoes over Bren's chest. "The way you smiled at me like you wanted to take me down right there by the pool."

"I did," Bren said. "I always want you."

Closer now. Maybe Bren's chest would simply swing open like double doors and left it all fly out. He'd be gone, empty and clean.

"Mm, same," Dusty agreed and levered himself up. "I can't fall asleep here. There's more press tomorrow."

Pushing himself up onto his elbows, Bren watched Dusty pull his pants back on.

"Can we see each other this summer at all?" Bren asked at last and it was a whine in his ears that made him wince.

"Hungry Bren," Dusty teased and leaned down to dot a kiss at the corner of his lips. "August, maybe. I can skim a day or two. Or we could meet somewhere. Vegas, maybe? No one blinks when you say you went to Vegas and that town is big enough to lose us both."

Not the lake house. Not a week. Two days, maybe, if Bren was lucky. Two days in Vegas weren't going to give Bren the needed setting. If he got them at all.

"Dusty," Bren said and wrapped his hand around Dusty's wrist. Held him there without pressure, "I need to tell you something."

"Serious tone," Dusty teased, meeting his gaze, catching Bren up like he always did. "I'm listening."

"I love you."

A hotel was full of noise. There was no silence to their silence. An ice machine down the hall rumbled and shook out fresh cubes, a conversation traveled under the doorway, and the fan in the bathroom rattled on and on.

Dusty's warm eyes left Bren's and then shuttered entirely. He pulled his arm away.

Then he laughed.

It wasn't his rusty good laugh, but a shattered raw sound.

"Don't be fucking stupid," Dusty said when the laugh ended. The words were without inflection. It wasn't angry, just nakedly dismissive. "What we do here isn't love."

"Then what is it?" Bren demanded.

"It's sex," Dusty said. "Who else are we going to fuck?"

"I like women too," Bren said. "It'd be a hell of a lot less complicated to fuck them than you."

"Sure, who doesn't like women," Dusty said, grabbing his shirt and pulling it on. "You care too much about everything all the time, that's your problem. We can just have fun. Not everything is feelings and taking care of people that don't need your fucking help in the first place. Look at the season you had!"

"This isn't about hockey! It's about us," Bren ground out, his throat was closing up. He got to his feet and started getting dressed to because talking about this naked while Dusty was searching for his shoes was awful.

"Us is for couples. We're not an us. We're nothing," Dusty said, sitting back down on the bed to put his sneakers roughly on

"Nothing," Bren repeated, staring helplessly at him, his shirt still hanging from his hand. "I'm nothing to you."

Dusty dropped his hands to the bed. "You're a friend. Something like a friend."

"I love you," Bren said again, and thought better of his shirt. He tossed it to the floor. "You're not my friend. Get the fuck out."

"I'm going," Dusty snorted. "Call me when you calm down. Vegas. August. We'll make it happen. Okay?"

Bren didn't say another word to him. He went to the bathroom and carefully shut the door. Leaning against the sink, he closed his eyes and listened to Dusty pace around for another minute. Probably putting his watch back on. Then he'd grab his wallet and keys which he always took out of his pockets before taking off his pants no matter where he was.

All these useless details Bren had that made up the picture of a man in his head.

The moth had broken through Bren's chest after all. Left behind a ruin of bone and the ash of the fire that had borne it.

The next season, before their first game, Bren 'accidentally' tripped the same assistant coach as he walked by him in the hall. No one could prove anything.

"I thought we were done with this," Jameson sighed.

"No, coach," Bren said lightly. "I was just taking a breather. He's going to take out a third year of rookies in a fucking row. I can't stand it anymore."

"What the fuck are you talking about, Wiebe?"

And Bren told him. To Bren's surprise, the assistant coach was fired three weeks later. They never talked about it again. Jameson still benched him when Bren went for one of his teammates (bragging about intentionally spreading the clap), but he did tacitly approve of Bren running some drills for the rookies himself, especially when the players got better.

It wasn't Bren's best season. He drank too much on his free nights until he started to worry himself and started taking long walks instead.

They played in Detroit and Bren's tricky knee was mysteriously bothering him. He'd never faked being hurt before. Probably why it worked at all. He stayed home.

Detroit came to play them and Bren refused to make eye contact with anyone in a red jersey. After the game, he went home and stayed in his bedroom, pretending not to hear the knocking on the door. A half hour later, his phone rang. Dusty must've made it to his hotel. Bren let his answering machine pick it up.

I guess you're out with your team. Good for you. It was a good win. I'll see you in six weeks.

Good for him.

Bren didn't cry. It wasn't in his nature. Or maybe it had been once and through the grinding teeth of the 80s, he'd had the tears pressed out of him. Instead, he burned. He ached. He went for a punishingly long walk.

He loved and he loved and replayed the stupid voice message dozens of times before forcing himself to erase it.

It happened again at their last game, Dusty trying to catch his attention the whole time.

"What?" Bren finally asked him as Dusty cornered him in the parking lot before Bren could get on the bus. "People are watching."

"You played well tonight, that's all. If you wanted to come over, raise a glass over it-"

"Like friends do," Bren said flatly. "Or like we did?"

"We're friends, aren't we?" Dusty asked and if there was hurt in his face, Bren didn't have any room in himself for it. He had enough hurt of his own.

"No," Bren said, "we're not."

He put his back to him and walked onto the bus. He sat down next to Owens, who gave him a weirdly tuned in look.

"Wiebe," Owens said seriously, "you should come over for dinner when we get back. I just got this totally sick katana I want to show you."

"Okay," Bren said with a tired smile. "Cool."

"And," a shoulder checked hard against his, "maybe bring that rookie along. The one you're nice to all the time. I like him."

"I like him too. Cindy is okay with that?"

"She likes who you like," Owens said with a nod, apparently pleased with that result and promptly zoned out again.

Bren left his mother to her watercolors and cats that summer. He stayed in Santa Fe and had dinner once a week at Owens' place. He went to the library and discovered audio books which he liked a lot better than sitting and reading.

Dusty called at the end of August.

Telling you, Bren, Vegas! Just give me a call, we don't need to book anything. We can wing it!

He deleted that voice message after the third go around.

After some debate, he bought himself a cellphone. Everyone seemed to have one now and he liked the brick in his pocket. He liked texting too, the careful short communications that shot out around the world. Ace apparently loved it and freshly retired he had nothing, but time, so they wrote each other like micro-dosing a penpal.

Bren had a good season. Dusty followed him to hotel rooms and called his name in parking lots. Bren didn't open the door and he didn't answer.

They lost out on the playoffs and Bren, at last, flew home to see his mother. His friends from high school threw a birthday party for someone Bren didn't know and he went reluctantly.

"Hi, you're Brandon, right?" A woman with short hair and incredible biceps approached him right when he was thinking of leaving. She had bright blue eyes and her lipstick was purple.

"Yeah, that's me. Bren, these days."

"That's new," she said.

"I'm sorry," he said and studied her face. "You seem familiar, but…"

"Dottie," she said with only a small tick of upset around her mouth. "It was a long time ago."

"You're the brick wall!" He recalled. "You harassed me harder than most guys who are paid to stop me."

"I don't know about that," she said, but the little cue of sadness swept away and she was beaming at him. "You remember."

"We talked all night. Hard to forget. I'm sorry I didn't call, I-"

"Don't worry about it," she said, waving it away. "We were kids. I've been watching you play though. You're good."

"I'm all right." He couldn't stop smiling at her. "What have you been up to?"

The details of their last conversation eluded him, but she didn't seem to recall the things he'd shared either. That was all right, they were both happy to recount it all again. They talked until people started to leave and then she said as easy as anything, "I just got a new place. Want to see it?"

Six months later, after careful planning, Dottie flew out to see one of his home games. Only to find him benched at the last minute. Afterwards, they met up and he apologized in the parking lot, embarrassment burning through him.

"Wait, I'm not clear on this," Dottie said, taking his hand. "They benched you for arguing with them?"

"Uh, I called our captain a toothless inbred dickhole, I think," Bren admitted, practically under his breath. "I don't know. I was pissed."

"What'd he do to you?"

"He's been ragging on one of the guys without a lot of English. Fucking with him. I couldn't take it anymore."

"Oh," Dottie said. "Bren, why are you apologizing for that?"

"You came all the way here and I wasn't even on the ice because I couldn't keep my temper."

She pulled him into a hug. He went.

"I love you," she told him.

"I love you too," he said without hesitation.

There was no moth or raging fire. Bren loved Dottie like trees loved each other, roots entwining, growing together. Nourishing each other.

They played Detroit a week after Dottie had to go back home.

"Bren, c'mon," Dusty said though the apartment door. "I know you can hold a grudge, but aren't you lonely?"

Bren sat down on the other side of the door. "I'm not," he said and he had no idea if it was loud enough for Dusty to hear.

"Jesus, Bren," a thump. Hand or forehead or something hitting the door quietly. "You know how it is."

Bren did. He rubbed the heel of his hand over his chest. "Go away, Dusty."

"All right, fine," Dusty said. In reply? On his own? "I'll see you soon."

Dottie job hunted in Santa Fe, flying down for two weeks over the summer for interviews. Bren loved her interview suit, all practical skirt and blazer, silky nylons. He didn't love the nude lipstick, but he understood the need for disguise better than anyone. They got engaged when she got a good offer and she moved into his faded pastel apartment and started shifting the color palette.

Bren wasn't even home the last time Dusty showed up.

"I think I gave him a shock," Dottie said with grim satisfaction. "But he was polite about it. Said he was sorry for bothering me. I think he hoped I didn't know who he was, so I let him think I didn't."

"Dottie-"

"It's all right," she said and kissed him once, gently. "He'll leave you alone now."

Dusty did exit his life after that. Only another face to play against. At least in person anyway. Memories would crop up at odd moments. A longing too when Bren was on the road and at his loneliest. Once randomly, it grabbed him so hard that Bren had put his hand to his own throat, a phantom of what he missed.

"It's funny," the guy at the airport bar said. He'd spotted Bren having this moment and ordered him a drink. For a horrifying moment, Bren worried it was a come on, but the guy reeked of Midwestern niceties and he made only the appropriate kind of straight-guy eye contact. "Airports will do it to you every time."

"What do you mean?" Bren asked, clinging to his glass.

"I travel a lot, and it's go, go, go, but sometimes you gotta just stop dead in an airport because you're stuck until the flight comes and then your head fills up, right?"

"Yeah," Bren allowed. "Sometimes. You a salesman or something?"

"Nah," the guy laughed. "I coach college football. You look like a guy that plays something if I had to take a guess."

"Hockey," Bren confirmed.

The guy raised his glass in acknowledgement. "You on your way to a game?"

"Going home after exhibition match," Bren said. "Preseason thing, couldn't get on the team charter."

"I'm on a layover then home too," the guy grinned.

They chatted aimlessly. Or it seemed aimless at the time. Bren took his number because he'd been so friendly. No harm in knowing more people.

"Hey," Ted said as Bren got to his feet to make his flight. "If you're ever thinking of shifting gears, you can't go wrong with coaching."

"Sure," Bren said with a laugh. "Who would take me?"

"You never know."

Three years later, they'd start texting a lot. Bren had needed the advice, his first shaky start with a team and two kids already depending on his salary making him endlessly nervous. Just then though, Bren got up and Ted stood and said, "Hey, not to be weird, but do you need a hug?"

"That is weird," Bren said, but he hugged Ted anyway.

It was his first hug from another man in a long time. It did him a lot of good.

"Hey," Dottie greeted him when he walked in the door. A house now, the apartment a memory. His son was in her arms and Bren embraced them both. Who needed a cup? This was what coming home should feel like.

February 2022- Room 560, The Garden Inn at Hilton in Toronto

"A cup would still be good," Ilya said. "I like them."

"Oh shut up," Bren laughed, tipsy and dizzy with memory.

The jackal grin that Ilya only got when he was a few too many in the bag was splattered over his face.

"He is a pushy bastard. But you are a stone wall. So, you ignore him and he will go away again," Ilya determined. "That is all that needs to happen, yes?"

"Pretty much," Bren agreed. "I wish I had the energy to hate him, but what's the point? I loved him. He didn't love me back. It happens."

"It does," Ilya said, fishing an ice cube out of his emptied glass and crunching on it.

"Don't say it like that," Bren grimaced.

"Like what?"

"Like you know something. That works on the boys, it's not working on me."

"I am finishing my drink," Ilya rolled his eyes. "So suspicious all the time. It's bad for you."

"Says the most paranoid person I know."

"Yes, exactly. Take it from me."

They both went quiet for a minute, Bren trying to gather his scattered thoughts while Ilya was apparently determined to eat all his ice. Maybe they were both a little more drunk than anticipated.

"Thank you," Bren said.

"Yes, you are welcome," Ilya said. "For whatever. But also, shut up."

"How much gin did you have?"

Ilya considered that very deeply. "Too much, I think. We should get a greasy breakfast in the morning. Before the flight. Then sleeping. Maybe Shane will not notice I am hung over if I have slept and eaten."

"How likely is that?" Bren asked with a grin.

Ilya snorted. "Low, but hope is important, you always tell me."

"I always tell you that?"

"Maybe not in words, but yes." Abandoning his drink, Ilya pushed up to his feet, wandered towards the door and then stopped. "Shane believes in fate."

"Does he?" Bren asked, trying to follow that line of logic. "Do you?"

"No," Ilya said. "But sometimes, I think, it believes in us. Unfortunately. Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

Their rooms were right next to each other, and he heard Ilya's door open and close. Then his voice. Ilya didn't talk to himself, so it must be a phone call to Hollander before bed. Good idea. Bren texted Dottie and she called, sleepy-voiced and pleased to hear from him. He caught her up in a few sentences and she made the angry noises he knew she would. Then they talked about other things. It was only a chance run in with someone so far in their past as to be a watercolor himself. Barely an impression on the page.

Mostly, after a few days, Bren forgot it had happened at all.

March 2022- Head Coach's Office in the Centaurs' Arena in Ottawa

"And then we had to catch the rest of the chickens," Harris said, throwing up his hands. "Troy was so sweet about it, but maybe he was miserable. I don't know."

"Why are you doing date night at your parent's house?" Ilya asked, wiping his fingers on the last of the tiny paper napkins.

"Good question," Bren said.

"I like being there," Harris subsided. "Do you think Troy hates it being there?"

"Are you there with him?" Bren asked.

"I- yeah?" Harris frowned. "Of course?"

"Then he does not hate it," Ilya said, "If you are smiling at him, that man's head is empty as a drained coconut."

"Hey!" Harris protested. "He's very smart."

"No one's saying he isn't," Bren assured him. "It's only specific scenarios where he gets a little cloudy."

"Specifically if he thinks you will pay attention to him," Ilya said as if that needed clarification. Maybe it did.

Harris pulled a face. "I pay attention to him all the time. Especially at the orchard because it's peaceful."

"So? Then he is happy to have chased chickens with you and you are worried over nothing."

Bren pointed at Ilya instead of trying to talk around his last bite of grilled chicken.

"Hm," Harris studied them both.

"Mail call!" An intern, called from the door. "Can I just hand it all out here? Harris, do you want yours?"

"Yes, thanks, probably all garbage anyway."

There was a stack for each of them and Harris took his away with him to his office. Ilya put his feet up on the chair Harris had abandoned to open his.

It was peaceful, going through junk mail.

At the bottom though was a handwritten envelope. Bemused, Bren opened it carefully and pulled out a few pages of folded legal pad paper.

Dear Bren,

It began. So someone that knew him well. Turning around the last page, he saw,

Still a little bit yours,

Dusty

Bren glanced up, but Ilya was absorbed in his phone already, mail forgotten in his lap. He started reading again from the top.

Dear Bren,

I tried the front office, but you have a very protective staff. I tried typing this up as an email, but it didn't feel right.

I'm sorry about the conference. You've been on my mind a lot the last few years and now your face is inescapable. The Great Rebuild of Ottawa. It's amazing. I always knew you could be amazing. I guess I just didn't have the vision to see how. Anyway, I'm sorry that I ambushed you. I wanted to see you and talk to you and I let that overcome my better judgment.

Vince doesn't know. I told him we'd had a falling out a long time ago and he accepted that. He's a great coach. You did right by him and you should be proud of that.

There's a lot of things I want to say to you. I don't know if you'd hear any of them or how far you'll get in this letter so let me get the most important thing out front.

You were never nothing. I loved you. From the beginning. I don't think I ever loved anyone like that before I met you. But I was terrified. You weren't supposed to love me back. You were supposed to be the one that kept us safe from all of it by caring less than I did.

I didn't know what to do with all that back then. I said the worst things. I know I made you uncomfortable by not giving up. I'm sorry for that too. I couldn't accept that it had slipped away from us that easily.

I wanted to rent the lake house again. I wanted that week back. But even if I had convinced you and we'd gone, it likely would've gone down the same road again. I know that now. Because I did do it all over again. Another player from another team two years later. It ended worse. Much worse. You were always a better man than I gave you credit for.

Retiring was a nightmare, but it gave me a lot of time to think. I'm out now, for the most part, except at work, but even there it's an open secret. My husband, Michael, is a wonderful guy. He's a civil rights attorney. I think you two would like each other.

You always said you liked women too, so I hope that's true and your marriage is a happy one. She was nice to me when she didn't have to be, certainly. The kids are cute. I never had any, but I'm an uncle a few times over now. It's good to have that in your life.

If you ever want to talk, call me. If not, I understand. I just wanted you to know.

Still yours a little,

Dusty

The pages were light, but Bren put them down like they were heavy enough to break the desk.

"Feelings letter," Ilya said without looking up from his phone.

"Yeah," Bren agreed.

"From Mackintosh." It wasn't even a question.

"How do you do that?"

"Bren, please. You do not have dozens of big feelings people. There is him and Dottie and she is not writing you a letter at work."

"He said he loved me. Who cares? After all this time?"

That made Ilya put his phone down and pin him with a look. "It matters."

"This isn't like you and Hollander."

"I know," Ilya scoffed. "Hollander is much better at stupid gestures than this."

"He really is," Bren said sliding the pages further away from him. "Dusty never knew when to quit."

"But now you know."

"Now I know. Can you toss those in the recycling for me?"

"I am your errand boy now? Fetch and carry?" Ilya complained even as he scooped up the pages and neatly tore them in half, adding them to his own pile of junk.

"It does say assistant in your job title."

"I will have this changed next contract. Associate, maybe. I like that one."

Swinging his feet back down to the floor, Ilya gave him a long accessing look. "I'm fine."

"Yes," Ilya determined. "You are. Good. See you in fifteen."

It was good to know. To have been loved once. What it meant now was a little peace of mind, but it would have meant the world then. Sometimes, it was too late.

Bren: I love you.

Dottie: I love you too. Everything okay?

Bren: Pretty much. Mostly I just wanted to say it and I'll tell you the rest later. Do you want me to pick up Melissa from choir practice? I think we'll get out of here on time.

Dottie: Yes! That would be great, then I don't have to rush dinner.

Bren: Okay, sounds good. Got to go do my job apparently.

Dottie: Oh no, not that. Go do the job you love and then get our kid. I'll see you at six.

Bren: ❤️