15. Epilogue

If someone had asked me last year if I thought this was where my life would be, I would have laughed in their face, then swatted them upside the head ala Moe Howard.

And yes, I would have called anyone who had dared to say that I’d be holding hands with Marcus Newley as we anxiously awaited a video to drop on social media a stooge. Nyuk. Nyuk.

Yet, here we were, at his home, with several of our friends, a nice mixed bag of Comets and Gladiators, drinking soda while nervously eating bowls of snacks.

The tension was off the charts. Ads were streaming in for the upcoming All-Star game and skill competition, another reason those of us who hadn’t been chosen were seated all over the Newley house on a bitterly cold February afternoon. While I would love to say that there was nowhere else I would rather be, a small part of me, that competitive part, was a little envious of the fact that Liam had been chosen over me. I did have more experience. But yeah, his season had been nothing short of stellar. His stats were higher. He’d not lost to the Comets while I had as I’d tried to sort out my shit. So on those merits, and the fact that Liam was one of the best in the league, I mentally tapped my stick and planned to cheer him on as loudly as I could.

“I feel like I ate a box of worms, and not them gummy ones,” Greck said as the countdown to our video neared. It was either going to be a huge success or a massive failure. Both teams’ public relations departments had come together after Marcus and I had had our big sit downs with the teams, the owners, and all of our other teammates right after we ushered in the new year. The teams had not been thrilled and had taken action to ensure that fallout would be minimal. Marcus and I would not face each other on the ice ever again. That seemed fair and reasonable to both of us. Management also asked us to act accordingly, which was a blanket statement given to all the players not to be dumbasses when it came to our behavior on and off the ice. On the whole, it seemed straight players got into more trouble with women than any of the queer players, but I got it. The Gladiators and Comets were just covering their asses. It wasn’t anything specially directed at the men dating men. It was a firm reminder not to be stooges or the eye pokes would be severe. “My cousin Perry…well, actually he’s my seventh cousin removed a few times then transplanted to Kentucky which, you know, seems like an odd place for guy with one eye and a severe dislike of grass to go to but when the U.S. Marshals stick you somewhere you stay there.”

“Darling, uhm, may I ask why, if Perry is in witness protection, why are you aware of his location?” Henri asked as he turned slightly on the sofa to look at his boyfriend seated beside him.

“Oh, sure, well, he called me when he was settled because he forgot to tell his ma, who I seen regular when I was younger, to make sure to send along her biscotti. Now, Mrs. Manetti makes a mean biscotti, I ain’t going to lie, but it ain’t nowhere as good as my mother’s. Anyway, Perry was always a little slow in the mental recognitions. For example, when we was kids he once ate a whole box of worms after his older sister told him they was gummy worms just before they had the gummy sprayed on.” Everyone from Aunt Zada to Goldberry stared at Greck. “They were real worms, not gummy worms, which he said made his guts wiggle. So yeah, that’s how I feel right now.”

Henri smiled, then patted Greck’s scruffy cheek. “I did ask.” The vintner sighed. Everyone else just smiled and nodded. I gripped Marcus’s fingers a bit more tightly as Ooni hustled out of the kitchen with a tray of hors d’oeuvres made of tiny bits of salmon on fancy crackers topped with some sort of cheese dip stuff. The guys cleared his tray off in seconds, only leaving one cracker for Kyleen, who was sitting on my lap with a book about a seagull chick with two daddies.

“The man never runs out of stories, does he?” Marcus whispered in my ear.

“Nope, never. And the really scary thing is that Henri swears they’re all true.”

Marcus raised an eyebrow, then Bean shouted at us to be quiet as it was time. Fossie sat back, adjusted the ice bag on his left knee, and glowered at Crispy and Deandre, who were chatting about the NBA game tomorrow between Philly and Detroit.

I tried to swallow but my mouth was too dry to even make spit. I sure hoped the fans out there got the message from this short little video. We’d all worked so hard, in unison Gladiators and Comets, on our time off, to bring this to fruition. Not a small task when two teams are traveling and in different states, but we all rehearsed our asses off and then filmed it all on one day three weeks ago when our schedules aligned and somehow managed to have a day off at the same time.

“I think I’m going to puke,” I confessed as the video began. A few quick clips of Marcus and me in net, then the “fight” we’d had a few months back were all spliced into a rapid montage that flowed into me and Marcus, in street clothes, facing each other in a dark rink. We stood at center ice, shapes around us in the shadows, one bright light shining down on us as we faced off. I threw Marcus a worried look. He gave my fingers a squeeze while Kyleen clapped in time to the music that jumped up in your face out of nowhere.

On the screen, Marcus and I began belting “Wannabe” by the Spice Girls as our teammates—Bean, Fossie, DJ, Greck, Ooni, Liam, and Crispy—all skated around us, fists raised in full gear. After telling each other what the other wanted, the guys around us magically lost their hockey gear, and the fists, and appeared in funky 80s clothes. Greck, because why not Greck, had gone to great lengths to find a chartreuse tank top and paired it with black checkered pants in homage of one of the original member’s outfits. He had gone full girl power, and it was effing glorious. The other dudes were all in bright 80s guys clothes. Lots of acid washed high waisted jeans, denim vests, and studded boots or sneakers. A few had windbreakers on, all in bold colors, with bandanas tied around their heads. The wigs they all wore…well, aside from Greck, who was living his best life as a girl group diva, were mullets. Yeah, it was a look for sure.

While Marcus and I did our best not to slaughter the song—lip syncing was out as the singers were all female—the guys moving around us were putting on all the moves. Not saying they were good moves, but they were working the hell out of them. It was obvious that none of us were singers or dancers, but we were passionate.

Everyone in the room was hooting at the video as it played out, the end having both teams shaking hands while Marcus and I shared a fast but loving hug. The ice glowed with rainbows and team logos, and then it was over.

I stared at the TV as the stream from San Diego slid back to the upcoming game. Everyone else, aside from Kyleen, who was singing to herself as she looked at the happy seagull family going on a picnic at the seashore, picked up their phones to check their respective teams’ feeds.

Marcus and I had decided we would not be looking for likes or comments. People could accept us, our love, and our message about friendship or they could jump into Seneca Lake. If our family, friends, and teams were behind us, that was all any person required. Strangers who hated weren’t even on our radar.

Ooni sat down beside me, gave me a fresh cup of coffee, and passed a cookie—one that he had baked from scratch which was OMG and someone needed to marry this man stat—and said something in Finnish that pulled all the eyes from all the phones.

“What was that?” Fossie asked, easing up to shift his ice bag around a bit.

“I said that even the most perfectly prepared clafouti will collapse if you check it too often,” the tall man in the white apron stated.

“Amen,” Aunt Zada piped up. “Who cares what the toxic fools think? You kids would do well to remember that all the likes in the world don’t mean diddly-doodles. You boys just focus on hockey, each other, your friends, and your families. All the rest can go peddle their funny papers.”

“Amen,” I whispered even though I had no clue what a clafouti was, stole a kiss from Marcus, and then shared a heart-shaped cookie with my best girl Kyleen. She gave me the last bite—it had very little frosting as most of it was on her fingers, but hey I was in season anyway—then patted my face with fingers coated with pink icing as she led my eyes to hers.

“Basky, what is a funny paper?” Kyleen asked, which made me smile because I had no clue what a funny paper was either.

“I don’t know,” I whispered to her, her tiny fingers resting on my cheekbones.

She crawled over me to kneel on her father’s strong thighs. “Daddy, what is a funny paper and can we get some? I like funny things. Like Greck.” She pointed right at my teammate. Greck howled in laughter which spread through our little band of puck pushers and one by one, phones were placed face down on tables.

“I kind of love these guys,” I whispered to Marcus. He pecked my cheek, his gaze soft and tender. “I kind of love you too.”

“Ouch. Just kind of?” he asked, ignoring his daughter and the pink frosting fingerprints on his shirt. He only had eyes for me. It made me feel like the most important thing on the planet.

I chuckled and left him hanging. For now. Once the house was quiet and we were under the covers in his big, firm bed, I’d show him just how much I adored him.

Even if he did think Kirk was a better captain than Picard.