Power Play

by Avon Gale

  Misha skated forward and scooped the puck out of the net. “My father bullied everyone he knew. I liked the idea of defending something. Protecting it. I couldn’t do that at home, but I could on the ice.”

  That made Max want to skate over, topple Misha down to the ice, and kiss him. Instead he bumped him with his shoulder. “I wanted to score goals and be a hero.”

  Misha smiled down at him affectionately. “You must have been disappointed to end up a Hab.”

  Max laughed and knocked into him a little harder. “And you had to defend the biggest bunch of thugs in hockey.”

  Misha grinned, showing teeth, and stole the puck.

  Max raced after him, laughing, but there was no way he was going to catch up. Misha had years of a professional career under his belt, compared to Max’s brief stint in the majors, and he easily sent the puck to the back of the net. It didn’t hurt that he was a thousand feet tall and worked out religiously. “I wasn’t really trying to stop you,” Max wheezed.

  “You’re a sore loser,” Misha said, and there was nothing in his voice but warmth, affection, and teasing. It was strange that the one place they should be the most uncomfortable, the one place that should overwhelm them both with memories of the accident, was the one place it all fell away.

  That’s how you win games. It’s just like Misha said at the beginning of the year. The past does not matter, or the future. Don’t think about the next game, or even the next period. Just think about the shot you’re going to take, and that’s all.

  The past was over, and it was time to move on.

  Misha passed the puck to him, and they spent a few moments in easy companionship, not skating as much as moving down the ice like a unit. Like a team. Pity they’d never gotten to play together. But they were there for a reason, and as much fun as it was, there were things that needed to be said.

  Max shot the puck toward the net again to give him a moment to think as he went to retrieve it. “I still don’t see why you’re so disgusted with yourself, but not Drake, who did the same thing. And I mean, your life was in danger, Misha.” He finally understood what Misha had meant when he told Max his father was a butcher.

  “I ran away, Max,” Misha said. “I left my sisters. My mother. With him. And I never once tried to find out if they were all right. I just left.”

  Max sent the puck to him with an easy pass. “Do you think they wanted you to stay there and get killed for being gay?”

  “No. My mother would have given me the money to leave if she could have. Sometimes I think she knew what I was doing to earn it.” Misha caught the puck on his stick and sent it back. He had a good, strong shot—steady and even. “One day my father will die. And then maybe I can look for her. For my sisters.”

  Max was saddened at the necessity of that. But as he well knew, life wasn’t always fair, and sometimes you lost things you didn’t want to lose.

  And sometimes you had to grab on tight to things and never let them go. “Look. I love you. And I think maybe I’m good for you. You laugh sometimes when I’m around. I’m not perfect but I realized after my accident that if I was ever going to be happy again, I had to learn to accept it and move beyond it. And you know what helped me do that? My family, who brought me home and helped me pay the bills I suddenly couldn’t pay. My friends, who told me it wasn’t stupid to want to coach and helped get me started. So maybe you don’t need me to give you space. Or maybe I’m just saying this because I don’t want to give it to you. I dunno.”

  “But I do know that my apartment is fucking cold as... Siberia? The North Pole? Whichever one of those is colder.”

  “For your birthday, I’m buying you an atlas,” Misha said and skated over to him. He put one gloved hand on Max’s shoulder. “I don’t know if I love myself, Max. But I do know that I love you and that you mean it when you say you love me. Maybe I can see myself as that man, the one you love, instead of the one I always see when I look in the mirror.”

  Max stared up at him. “Wow, Misha. That was the cheesiest and most romantic thing anyone’s ever said to me.” But Max was certain his smile was as bright as any flashing light on any goal he’d ever scored. “But go ahead and keep thinking I’m awesome.”

  Misha leaned down to kiss him—a little awkwardly considering their height difference, the ice, and the fact they were both wearing skates.

  “Come home, Max,” said Misha. “And get your clothes out of the washer.”

  Max checked Misha with his shoulder and went down the ice with the puck. Misha kept carefully to the side where Max’s peripheral vision wasn’t damaged.

  Just like the last time they’d been together on the ice, something ended. But there was something better there to take its place.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Misha stood on the side of the rink and watched his team as they moved smoothly through the day’s drills. Max stood nearby, making notes and occasionally delivering an occasional back pat.

  The Spitfires were winning games, which was a good thing, because it meant there was no new commercial set to “It’s Raining Men.” Neither of them would put it past Belsey.

  Jakob had visited Misha’s house and delivered a stammering apology to Drake for his homophobic comments. Max eavesdropped from the kitchen with absolutely no remorse and gleefully repeated the conversation later to Misha. The team was getting along well both on ice and off, and that was all that mattered.

  Misha was not so sure he was making headway on Max’s insistence that he “love himself.” Misha understood the theory but thought it was a very American, self-help sort of concept that he was not capable of mastering entirely. But he did spend Wednesday evenings at the rink with his new houseguest. And in those evenings, Drake was Isaac and Misha was Misha instead of Coach. At first they simply played hockey and didn’t talk much at all. Misha found it enjoyable to play with such a gifted goalie, and it was difficult to score on him. When he was relaxed, Drake was a formidable obstacle, despite not having the width of shoulders and long legs that some of the others in the league had. He was graceful and confident and he smiled more than he scowled, but it wasn’t until early spring that he started to talk.

  At first it wasn’t much, just a few pieces of information here or there about his life, his family, and how he’d been thrown out of the house at seventeen and had to give up his spot on a development hockey team because he couldn’t pay for it.

  He was from Memphis and was living in Columbia, South Carolina when he heard about the Spitfires’ tryouts. Unlike the NHL or the AHL, there was no draft requirement for the ECHL, and teams could have open tryouts for their rosters. Drake only traded sex for money during the summers when he didn’t have the ECHL housing allowance to pay for rent, and he did so up in Columbia where he’d thought no one would ever recognize him.

  “You’ll stay with me and Coach Ashford this summer and next season,” Misha told him. “Save your housing allowance. Have a savings account. Do not keep your money in a jar in your closet.”

  “Mine’s in a box in my underwear drawer, but okay.” Drake tried once to bring up the money thing, and Misha shut him down by saying he played professional hockey for twenty years and barely spent any money, because, as Coach Ashford was always saying, Misha had a hard time having fun.

  Drake’s stories gradually became darker, underlying the stark realities of living on the streets, and Misha found himself sharing his own memories with someone for the first time.

  Even Max didn’t know the details that Misha shared with Drake, which was something Drake understood. “Coach Ashford always thinks people are good. Like he thinks everyone has a good heart, or good intentions, or whatever.” Drake’s voice went flat. “I don’t know if I’m glad there are people who think that’s true, or pissed off that I know it’s a lie.”

  Drake’s story was nowhere near as horrific as Misha’s, but Misha was beginning to understand that he’d never let himself enjoy the life he’d nearly died trying to have.

&nbs
p; And if anything helped him heal, it was being loved by Max Ashford and knowing that he’d very likely saved Isaac Drake from ending up like him. Drake was cracked around the edges, but not yet so broken that he couldn’t be fixed.

  On the way home from their Wednesday night hockey game, Misha took advantage of the last few moments when they were simply Misha and Isaac to ask a question. “Was it really so obvious... about me and Max?”

  Drake laughed. His feet were propped up on the dash and his arms wrapped loosely around his knees. Before he got out of the car, he always used a spare towel to wipe the footprints off the upholstery. “I was wondering if you were gonna ask me about that. The funny thing is, it wasn’t even me that noticed it. Gaydar fail. Right?”

  Drake sometimes spoke in slang that Misha could not follow. He’d learned to file the expressions away for later and ask Max about them, even if his “What is a lolcat, Max?” reduced Max into fits of such loud laughter that Drake actually came downstairs to make sure they were okay.

  “It was Murphy,” Drake said, grinning. “He was like, wait. They’re doing it. Right? And so obviously everyone looks at me like I’m the expert. Which, since most of the guys are straight, I guess I am.” He paused. “I mean, some of them are curious enough when drunk to make out at a party, especially if there are girls there who are into it. But... anyway.

  “So Murph was like, ‘Don’t you guys notice that they’re always showing up together and leaving at the same time?’” Drake grinned. “But... uh, we all thought Coach Ashford was gay”—even in the safe confines of their Wednesday games and the car rides that were a part of that, Drake never referred to Max by anything other than Coach Ashford—“but no one believed it about you. Which is dumb, ’cause I’ve sucked a lot of dick and there’s really no way you can tell who’s into it. But I mean, Coach Ashford was always.... He watches you a lot. And smiles.” Drake made a face. “It’s kind of gross and sappy.”

  Misha was horrified to feel his face flush. “Max does smile a lot. Yes.”

  “It’s weird. I thought at first he was just trying too hard to make everyone like him, but then I realized he’s just like that. And everyone does like him,” Drake assured him. “But it’s hard to believe Coach Ashford... like, he’s that hot and a good guy? And bisexual? So a fucking unicorn, then.”

  Misha blinked. Drake’s slang, combined with that Southern twang, occasionally made him hard to understand. “A... did you say unicorn?”

  Drake nodded. “Yeah. Like, hot bisexuals are supposed to be a myth. Like unicorns. But I really don’t think Coach Ashford... I mean, I bet he’s more gay than he thinks he is.”

  The conversation should probably stop, but Misha was—maybe not fascinated, but something close to it. “You think Coach Ashford is not really bisexual?”

  “No. I just.... Okay. So, I’m not saying there’s no bisexual dudes. God no. Remember that game we had in Bakersfield a few weeks ago? I know a few of the guys on that team, and we went out after the game. Anyway, I was trying to explain this whole thing, but I guess I wasn’t doing a very good job and I made it sound like I said there was no such thing as bisexuals. And one of the guys, his fiancée was there and, like, yelled at me for ten minutes and called the Jacksonville Sea Storm’s goalie’s boyfriend to give me a lecture about bisexual erasure? I don’t know. It was weird. But I’m just saying that sometimes people think being gay means you won’t ever find girls attractive. And that’s not true. I think girls are attractive sometimes. Like, okay. That girl in Bakersfield—I think her name was Zoe—she was totally hot. I just thought her fiancé was way hotter.”

  The difference between Misha and Drake, Misha realized, was that Drake had been stigmatized for being gay, had been disowned and thrown out because of it, but he never internalized it and thought his attraction to men was something to be ashamed of.

  Neither had Max, come to think of it. Despite being “new to being bi,” as he liked to put it, Max had no internalized sense of guilt or shame about it. And as uncomfortable as it was to admit, Misha had to admit he did.

  Granted, Max and Drake did not live in a country where being gay was illegal—but neither did Misha. Not anymore. And that meant it was long past time that he stopped being ashamed. Maybe that’s why Max had suggested Misha and Drake have these Wednesday-night hockey sessions. Max was smarter than anyone—especially Belsey—gave him credit for.

  Misha parked the car in the driveway behind Max’s Jeep and switched off the engine. He thought carefully of how to phrase what he wanted to say. “I want you to know that it is... good for me. To hear you talk the way you do.”

  “About how I think your boyfriend is hot?”

  Misha smiled briefly at that. “In a sense. Yes. You speak of being gay like it is....” He waved a hand. “I’m not sure how to say it.”

  “Like I’m a normal twentysomething dude talking about sex?” Drake gave the kind of sigh favored by weary millennials. “It is normal, Misha. That’s the thing. When my parents threw me out, they said I could stay at home if I went to some intensive “get rid of the gay” therapy camp or some shit.” Drake rolled his eyes. “I considered it, but only ’cause I thought maybe there’d be a bunch of cute, repressed gay guys there. Then I realized that going there would be like admitting I thought it was wrong. I mean, I’m not saying that’s true for the other people there, since I didn’t go so I never met them. But I wasn’t going to let anyone take that away from me.”

  Misha thought about that. “I prayed for it to go away. To any saint who might listen, that’s what I asked for. And I thought when it didn’t that they did not answer.”

  “Maybe their answer was that there was nothing you needed to get rid of.” Drake laid a very careful hand on Misha’s shoulder, which was the first time Misha could think of that Drake had touched him. “Since we’re sharing shit, I wanted to thank you. For coming to find me when I ran away.” He lowered his head, and his voice was heavy and choked with tears. “That’s never.... My parents just let me go, and I can’t tell you what it means to me that you didn’t. So, thanks.”

  Misha very carefully put his hand on Drake’s shoulder and squeezed. Then he dropped it without comment. He wasn’t as good with words as Max, but in this case, he didn’t think there was anything that needed to be said.

  Later Misha watched as Max went through his usual routine before bed, which amounted to plugging a few gadgets into chargers and making sure he had something to wear the next day. Misha usually read, but instead he unabashedly watched Max, who’d stripped down to his boxer-briefs. He caught Misha looking and gave him that wry, playful smile Misha liked so much. “What?”

  Misha spoke before he could change his mind. “You remind me very much of the first man I kissed. A boy, really. We were only fifteen.”

  “I remind you of a fifteen year old boy?” Max gave him an affronted look. “Someone was going to get laid tonight, but now they’re not. Eww. And here, you wouldn’t even play the ‘who is hot on other teams’ game.”

  “It’s an abuse of authority, and you didn’t want to play who was hot. I believe your exact words were ‘Who would you suck off in a shower after a game—’”

  “Misha, you have got to lighten up and live a little. Stare at other hot guys. Just don’t suck any of them off in the shower that aren’t me.” Max blushed in that way of his, where only the tips of his ears turned red. “We were talking about you and the first boy you kissed and how I reminded you of him and how I was wrong to think that sounded creepy even though it totally did.”

  “He had nice eyes. Like you. Expressive. And cheekbones. Very nice cheekbones. But he was very joyful. Like you are. Even about... about this thing we do.”

  “Coach hockey?”

  “Fuck,” Misha clarified.

  “Who’s not joyful about fucking?”

  Just me, apparently. “Max, come here,” Misha said, exasperated and amused, and Max padded over to the bed, climbed on top of him, and straddled him. Misha
took Max’s face between his hands before Max could lean down and kiss him. “I wasn’t. Not for a long time. Since the boy with the nice cheekbones. But I am now.”

  “Damn right you are,” Max murmured, wriggling on his lap, but his smile drove all the darkness out of Misha’s mind and cleared the thunderclouds of his memories until nothing was left but sunlight. “I’m a catch, Samarin.”

  “You’re something,” Misha agreed, and kissed Max to keep him from saying anything else. “Max?”

  “Yeah?”

  Misha bit him gently on the mouth. “Fuck me.”

  Max went still in his lap. “Really?”

  “Yes. If you want.” Misha moved back a little to look at him. Max was usually very happy to bottom, and if he wasn’t in the mood, there were other things. He was always in the mood to get fingered, though, and he liked that more than anyone Misha had ever been with. Talk about joyful.

  He put his face between Max’s neck and shoulder. “When I—I only let them if it was a lot. Of money,” he clarified. Misha concentrated on how good Max felt—on his scent—and kept the gathering clouds of his memories at bay.

  “Oh,” Max said quietly, running a hand down Misha’s back. “Well, I’m kind of broke, but I’ll make you eggs in the morning. Some toast.”

  “You burn the toast. Every time.”

  “I still think your toaster is broken.”

  “If you wouldn’t try to make the toast and brush your teeth and do ten things at the same time—”

  “Misha,” Max said, and Misha would never, ever get tired of hearing the way Max said his name. “Do you want this? Like, really want it? Or is it another one of those things where you’re trying to love yourself? Because that’s cool and all, and I really want to fuck you, but I’m only doing it if you want it.”

  “Max,” Misha interrupted, and he would never get tired of saying Max’s name either. He put a finger over Max’s mouth, which was swollen a bit from all the kissing and biting. “I want it. I want you. I want to feel you inside of me and I want to see how it makes you feel.”