Page 27 of Playing His Game
“Yeah, it sucked.” A few months into his rookie season, Jorts had held a shin guard to his chin like a microphone and asked Adam, “When you skate down the straight ice on your gay legs, do you think about all the possible Ls, Gs, Bs, and Ts who made the ice your gay skates are gayly skating on?”Adam had been so caught off guard, he’d laughed, barely noticing the way the rest of the locker room had held their breath, waiting to find out if the joke was acceptable.
“I’m sorry.”
Adam shook his head. “It’s… whatever. The point is, it took a while for me to get them to stop. To focus on hockey.”
“And dating someone publicly is what? Going to remind them that you’re gay?”
Adam huffed and threw his hands up. “I don’t know. I’ve never dated anyone publicly.”
“Wonder why,” Mo muttered just loud enough to be heard. Shit. Adam deserved that.
“Sorry. Just—I’m a little bit…”
“…High-strung?” Mo suggested after a moment. He didn’t even sound judgmental.
Adam wrinkled his nose. “No. Yes. No?”
Mo snorted. Okay, fine, Adam was kind of a mess, and he could see the humor in it.
“The PR team have been keeping me pretty sheltered the past few days, giving the statements time to circulate. I did that one curated post-practice chat about it, you know, asking for privacy and support. But it’s back to regular stuff tomorrow, and I don’t know what I’ll get, but…”
“It’ll probably start up again, in some way.”
“Yeah. Except—” He pressed his lips together between his teeth. Mo waited. “Now I’m the only one who’s a captain. I’m supposed to set an example—not just for the team. For kids who might want to be like me.” People would be watching and waiting and having Opinions about how Adam conducted himself.
Mo tilted his head. “You know you can’t fail at being gay, right? That there’s not one right way to be in a relationship? Like—we’re in Arizona. This is not a liberal hotbed. It’s more like Satan’s frying pan.”
Despite himself, Adam mustered a smile.
“So I get that you’re stuck trying to please a fanbase that’s already predisposed to think all your relationships are bad because you’re gay. But you know that’stheir problem, right?”
Adam’s cheeks heated. He hadn’t expected Mo to cut through his hang-ups so handily. He felt unnervingly seen. “I know that. Buttheydon’t.” He waved at the windshield, in the direction of the city.
“You don’t have to tell me,” Mo said, voice light. “But it’s fine. I get it. Gotta walk before you can sashay. As long as you’re aware that there’s no single gold-standard way to have a relationship, we can play pretend missionary-only heterosexual-except-for-inconvenient-gender couple.”
Adam swallowed back the lump in his throat, ignoring the way those words scraped at him. They were making progress. Instead, he started the car and eased out of the parking lot. “Maybe we could set some boundaries.”
That brought some of the lightness back to Mo’s voice. “We probably should have done that day one. So… no surprise touches.”
“Please.”
“Hand-holding when on dates?”
Adam shrugged. “Can’t promise I won’t jump if I don’t see it coming.”
“Noted. Hm, since your parents insisted on feeding you your Wheaties, your arm around my shoulders makes more sense. No surprises that way.”
Adam rolled his eyes. “I’m a totally average height for a hockey player.”
“That is a very important caveat. By the standards of everyone else, you are too tall for us to flip that script. If I put my arm aroundyou, I’d look ridiculous.”
“You are pocket-sized,” Adam agreed.
Mo squawked. Then he said thoughtfully, “I can avoid making dick jokes easy enough, but anyone who’s ever met me will think I’ve been swapped out for a pod person if I don’t have some flair.”
“Ihavemet you before,” Adam pointed out. He might not know Mo well, but he didn’t need to to knowthat.
“So, pet names.”
