Page 62 of Home Ice Advantage

“You okay?”

“No. Of course not. He’s my best friend, Eric. He’s been my best friend since I was eighteen years old.” Ryan let Eric slip an arm around his shoulders. Leaned into the embrace. “He wanted some space.”

Eric could feel the future stretching out like carnival taffy, pulled so thin it was about to snap. There were a number of ways this could go and none of them made him feel particularly confident. It was kind of insane, he thought, to realize how much whatever happened next meant to him. How much he didn’t want Ryan to say what Eric thought he might say. “What doyouwant?”

“I don’t know. I guess I need some space, too. To process this. It’s just...he’s always been the one thing in my life I could trust to be there, always. And now...”

The thought coalesced in his head. Thinking about it ached, like he’d been slammed into the boards without being able to tense up for it first. But even if it hurt, there were certain things that were the right thing to do. Before he could stop himself, Eric was saying, “You know. If you’re in love with him, then I’d understand if you wanted to stop doing this, if you wanted to—”

Ryan’s head whipped up to stare at him. “No! I don’t want to stop doing this. I mean, shit, I don’t know what I’m doing. I love Murph, I’ve always loved Murph. I don’t think...maybe I was in love with him once, and I probably never realized it. But I’m here for a reason, Eric. I know we haven’t fucking talked about anything we’re doing and that’s fine. We don’t have to. But I don’t want to throw this away.”

The invisible weight on his shoulders lifted and Eric exhaled. “Okay. Well. I’m...shit, I’m no good with fucking words like this. I’m sorry, buddy. This can’t be easy.”

“It’s a little better now,” Ryan said. “Can we—can you kiss me?”

Eric kissed him. He didn’t want to think about the relief behind it, the desperation. It was enough, for now, that they were here.

Chapter Eleven

February

Murph’s visit at the end of January had really fucked Ryan up, he realized later. It was funny: the divorce with Shannon hadn’t affected him nearly so much. They hadn’t spoken in the months since the final divorce hearing, and he barely even thought about her. He went a week without talking to Murph, and it felt like the world as he knew it had ended.

He wasn’t his usual self at the numerous charity events the coaching staff had to attend, he wasn’t charming the season-ticket holders in the same way. He wasn’t as sharp on the bench, and he wasn’t as intense in practices. Eric and Petey were able to cover for him, to a certain extent, but once February rolled around Ryan realized that he really had to get it the fuck together. He couldn’t let his personal life affect his work life that way: if he did, he would never be able to do the job the way he needed to do it, especially because his father was lurking at the edges of the team, like a scavenger biting at his ankles and waiting to steal the scraps of garbage.

“Who are you texting?” Eric asked, his voice a sleepy mumble, as he rolled over and pressed his face against Ryan’s ribs.

“My fucking dad. Guess who wants free tickets for him and Chelsea and my brothers?”

Eric’s eyes opened fully, and he propped himself up on his elbow. His expression was measured, searching. Even without his glasses, he always had a kind of raven-like air when he looked at you that way, like some kind of big, overgrown bird with prey in its sights. “You know that Conroy will just give you the tickets if you ask for them.”

“That’s the thing. I don’t want to ask him. My family is...you give an inch, they take a mile, and then some. If I give him the tickets he’s just going to keep asking.”

“So just say no, then.”

Ryan didn’t laugh, but the noise that escaped was a sort of pained chuckle that was close enough. “Iamsaying no. Mark Sullivan never accepts no as an answer. That was the first lesson he taught me as a boy.”

Eric flopped back down in the bed and closed his eyes. Ryan fought the sudden and inexplicable urge to run his fingers through Eric’s unruly hair, which had grown a little longer as the season went on. Eric said, “I’ll tell him to fuck off for you. Gladly.”

“Ha. Mental image is nice, but man, would that backfire. Then I’d never hear the end of it about someone else fighting my battles. No. Sorry to keep you awake. This is just something I need to handle on my own.”

“It’s fine, mon pitchounet.” Eric’s muffled voice drifted off, and he was asleep again.

Ryan looked at his phone again. Dad had said,It’s the least you can do considering all of the shit I’ve done for you over the years.He sighed and rubbed his hand over his eyes. He really had to just put all of it into the background, concentrate solely on the team, which was in another losing skid. He locked his phone and lay back down in the bed, turned over on his side to look down at Eric. In his sleep, he did look younger, more peaceful, in a way that he never did on the ice. And he just let Ryan see him like that without even thinking about it anymore.

Ryan closed his eyes, although it took him a long time to sleep.

They lost on Valentine’s Day, and even Ryan could tell that the season was really starting to wear on Williams. He might have been the team’s number-one center, but he was still young, and going against top lines that had learned to game-plan for him every night for twenty minutes was starting to wear on him. It was the kind of night when everyone blew their defensive responsibilities, when they went down 3-0 in the first and Davey had to come in cold in the second to relieve the starter.

In the locker room after, Ryan made sure to go over to talk to Williams, let him know that it wasn’t his fault. “We’re expecting a lot out of you, Willy, and you’ve more than risen to the challenge. You know a night like this doesn’t change that.”

“I should be better,” Williams said, raising one eyebrow. Like it was a challenge to pep-talk him into accepting this.

“We can all be better. We’re going to work on it. But that’s what it comes down to, in the end. You can only work on the things you can control. The roster is what it is, and you’re a load-bearing beam, buddy. It’s not fair to you, but that’s what it is.”

Williams exhaled. Around them, the rest of the team was still noisy and chaotic, stripping out of wet gear, checking to see who’d lost the most money on the board, chirping each other. Williams never participated in the worst of it. He wasn’t that kind of a kid.

He looked back up at Ryan, his dark eyes shrewd. “They’re going to blame me.”