Page 45 of Over the Line

Liam sipped his drink. “Nuts? In what way?”

“They…” I thought about it. “Basically, they staffed as lean as humanly possible, piled shitloads of work on everyone, and then complained that we all had to work tons of overtime just to keep up.” I tsked and shook my head. “When they decided to make managers salary only with no overtime… I bailed.”

“Like they wouldn’t let you work overtime?” he asked. “Or they wouldn’t pay you?”

I laughed bitterly. “Oh, they couldn’t stop us from working it. We had to work it, or the place would’ve imploded. They just couldn’t understand why morale took a dive and people started jumping ship when they stopped paying for it.”

“Dicks,” he muttered.

“Right?” I took a drink. “Eh, corporate bullshit. What can you do?”

“Change companies, apparently?”

“Well, yes. And this place isn’t perfect. It’s got some issues, but compared to the last place? I’ll stay.” I paused. “Especially since the other place went under during the pandemic.”

Liam whistled. “Wow. Bullet dodged!”

“Seriously. And hey, the place I’m at now has an office in Pittsburgh, so…” I raised my glass in a mock toast.

To my surprise, Liam leaned across the cushion and clinked his glass against mine. “I’ll drink to that.” Something sparkled in his eyes, and I didn’t dare let myself read anything into it. He was probably just being polite.

You’re an idiot, Garrett.

He took another drink and put his glass on the coaster, then adjusted the icepack against his hip. “So. You want to watch a game?”

“Sure. Yeah. I’m always down to watch hockey.”

“Perfect. Okay, so tonight’s options…” He picked up his remote and brought up a menu of streaming games. “Ottawa at Edmonton, Boston at Denver, San Jose at Philly.” He pursed his lips. “San Jose and Philly will probably be the most entertaining.”

“Yeah? They don’t like each other?”

“Eh, there isn’t much of a rivalry, but both teams have a ton of offense and virtually no defense. I predict a lot of goals on both sides.”

I grinned. “Sounds like an exciting game.”

“Unless they both decide to unfuck their defense tonight and make a liar out of me.” He selected the game on the screen. “Guess we’ll find out.”

They did not prove him wrong. Both teams did in fact have incredible offense, but their defense was about as effective as a wet paper towel. It made for a lot of action, though. A “high-event game,” as Chris often said. By halfway through the second period, the score was 6-5 in favor of San Jose. Philly had pulled their goalie after he allowed four in the first period, but the backup immediately let in two. He was holding his own now, though, which had given his team time to score enough to make it a one-goal game.

It was definitely not a boring game.

But even more entertaining than the hockey was the commentary. Like, seriously… did these guys hear themselves?

“Fox feeds Downey, Downey rims it around to Larsson, who takes it right to the backdoor of Sarkkinen⁠—”

Liam and I both burst out laughing. I damn near tumbled off the couch, and he was wheezing.

“They have to hear themselves,” I said, wiping my eyes. “There’s no way they don’t.”

“I don’t know, man.” Liam was still far from composed. “I’ve done interviews with one of the commentators, and he’s…” He shook his head. “Nice guy, don’t get me wrong, but he has no idea what some of that shit sounds like.”

“Oh my God.”

“They need a gay man in the booth.” He tipped his glass toward the screen. “At least then he can be like ‘yo, guys, that sounds all kinds of wrong.’”

I snickered. “I feel like anyone who took that job would just feed them even dirtier things to say.”

Liam pursed his lips and seemed to give it serious consideration, and his expression was far too attractive for my circulatory system to handle. “You’re not wrong. I’d be terrible for that job.”