Day Eight
Day Eight:
On the eighth day of Winterfic, Hazel gave to you, Saint and Luke on the NY Rangers because I’m ridiculous.
Goaltenders had a watchful way about them. Usually on the shyer side, too. They had a routine, they kept quiet. Towel around the neck, head down in the locker room. They were leaders on the team, but they were also separate. Down in their net, they didn’t pile into the goal celebrations. They watched the whole game. Pointed things out that their teammates, focused on the space around them for the most part, didn’t see.
Saint watched the whole game when he was on the ice. And he tried to do the same thing off of it, too. The Game. And life was a game to him—in that way, maybe he was unlike most goaltenders. Not quite loud, but bold. Everything about him begged to be noticed, and appreciated, and he didn’t even have to try.
And Luke was there to do it. He noticed. He would always notice Saint.
He would even notice him, and only him, at the team holiday party, where it was hard to keep one’s attention on just one thing because these parties were rowdy and cheerful. Team parties were always an interesting affair. The vast age range, the different parts of life that different guys were at, made for a confusing room. In part, it was something like an after-school party. Cute kids running around, guys and their wives talking to the other parental figures. In another part, it was a low-level frat party, what one was like at ten PM instead of two AM. In another, it was a video game hang-out to which someone had brought really good food.
Luke wasn’t sure which part he belonged to—other than the kid part. He’d gone to college, but had stayed well clear of the hammering bass parties. He drank on occasion only, and it turned out standing in a dark living room yelling at each other to hear anything was only so fun when you were ten times as sober as anyone else. But it also made him feel funny to sit on a couch and stare at a screen when there was a whole party going on in the background. Some of the Rangers veterans were just standing there, relaxed and free to talk. Panarin, Zibanejad, hell, even Lundqvist was here. But they probably wanted a break from talking about hockey. He knew he should stop thinking of them as Rangers veterans. They were his teammates, had been for three years now, and he’d just signed onto another six.
What did it say about him that his first thought, when offered the contract, was of what they were offering Saint?
Saint had been in New York an entire year less than he had, but sometimes he felt older than even someone like Kreider, who had been on the team the longest. And, at least from Luke’s seat in one of the plush chairs of the rooftop lounge, it didn’t look like Saint was having any trouble figuring out what part of the room he belonged in. He could play the whole game. The whole room, too.
Right then, he was talking with a few of the Russians, holding a glass of whiskey from his fingertips. He looked ten times more relaxed than Luke felt, but then again, Luke knew him. Saint could seem to be anything he put his mind to. Luke knew him, and Luke knew better. No team wanted to go on the holiday break in the way they had. Any NHL team wanted December to be a month of wins, if only so you could go home to your families for a few days while breathing a little easier.
They had done the opposite. They were in a slump, all of them. Turning pucks over, hitting post. Luke couldn’t even count the number of nights he had stayed awake in his bed recently, that rubber-on-medal ping echoing in his ears. The rumors had already begun, the Rangers need fire power, the Rangers need someone who puts pucks in the net, who can give this team a little confidence, make them stop leaving their net minders out to dry. Saint was having the worst run in his career.
Luke knew him. He was anything but relaxed. His mind was on January already, without a doubt, and all the goaltender-typical superstition would be focused on what the new year might bring. He watched Saint listening to the conversation around him, the way he brought his glass up slowly to his lips for a sip. He looked good. Like the conversation and type of party, there was also a wide dress-code, from suits to t-shirts and toques. Saint, of course, straddled them both effortlessly. He wore dark grey, fitted slacks and a black sweater. The necklace he always wore, just a simple chain, glinted at the edges of the collar. He looked tall and strong, despite everything that was happening on the ice.
Despite everything that had been happening between the two of them.
How did he manage it? Even thinking about the fact that he needed two hands now to count the amount of times he’d kissed Sebastian Saint Montague made Luke feel like he needed to sit down. It gave him the same feeling as sending a puck into the net. The hard rush of adrenaline, his heart getting put just a little out of time.
“Cookie?” said a small, high voice, and then there were two tiny hands on his knees. A boy with big brown eyes and a head full of tight, black curls was blinking up at him. It was Will Morgan’s son, Luke realized. Noah.
“Hey, bud,” Luke said. “Cookie?”
Noah grinned. “Cookie!”
“Not without asking your dad, little guy.” Luke put his soda down, and rose, swinging Noah into the air with him and making him shriek and laugh.
Luke had never thought he liked kids, but he supposed this one was okay. Noah pointed in the direction of his father like an explorer at the bow of a boat.
“Daddy!” Noah shouted once Luke got a little closer.
Will Morgan looked up from where he and his wife were talking to the Trochecks. Luke supposed he had officially crossed over into the after-school drinks section of the room.
“Hi, honey,” Will grinned. “Oh, look who you found.”
“Luke,” Noah said earnestly.
“He came looking for cookie support,” Luke said. “Just wanted to check with you guys first.”
Will’s wife, Ray, laughed. “What the heck, sure, it’s Christmas. He’s gonna crash so hard later.”
Luke looked at Noah, arching a brow. “Affirmative.”
Noah patted his cheek. “What?”
“Cookie,” Luke said very seriously and Noah gave another shriek that made Luke wince and crack a smile.
Maybe it was the kid’s table. Maybe that’s where he belonged, Luke thought as he watched Noah and some of the other kids munch happily as they handed him crayons to scribble with. Draw puck, draw puck! Thank God the little Trocheck girl hadn’t asked for something more complicated, but he liked that he could make all these little guys so happy just by drawing a blue dot where they pointed to. It was easier than talking to anyone. Luke was shy, and he knew it, and, sure, the other guys knew it, but that didn’t help. He’d been told he didn’t have the nicest resting face, and that it made the shyness get mistaken for disinterest. These kids didn’t seem to care, though. They seemed to like him just fine.
“I didn’t know we had invited a band of artists to the party,” said a voice from just behind him, and Luke felt the back of his neck heat.
“Saint!” came a chorus of replies, some of the kids actually bouncing up and down as they beamed up at him.
And of course they all loved Saint. Adored him, it looked like. Just of course they did.
It didn’t mean Luke was prepared for it when Saint crouched beside him, pressing them together from shoulder to hip, and picked up a crayon. “All right, all right, settle yourselves. What should I draw, then?”
He received a very wide array of choices. Dinosaur! The Earth! My grandma’s couch! Goalie mask!
“My mask, then,” Saint said. Luke watched Saint draw an outline of his mask—pretty well, if Luke was anyone to judge. “What should I have on my mask next season?”
Another wide array of options. Dinosaur! Chicken nuggets! The moon! And Saint drew each suggestion. A little T-Rex, brown blobs of chicken nuggets—no, from McDonald’s! cried a kid, to which Saint very seriously replied, They don’t sponsor us, kiddo. The yellow crescent moon took up one side, along with a tree of broccoli with a great red X over it, and, for some reason, the words watering can, which perhaps someone had only just learned.
“Luke!” cried Noah.
“Yeah?” Luke said.
“No, Luke goes on the mask.”
“Luke?” Saint said, and then, for the first time since crouching down, turned to look at him. It brought them closer, Saint’s honey-brown eyes right there, his full parted lips. “Oh, hi there, Tweedle.”
“Hi,” Luke said softly. Again—he was better at talking to kids, it seemed.
It only lasted a moment before the kids were demanding their attention again, pushing the blue crayon back into Saint’s hand. Across the forehead of the mask, Saint neatly wrote out the letters of his name. L-U-K-E. Luke laughed when he made the kids spell it out, pointing to each letter as if they were in class. They were only too happy to prove to him that they could, though. It was sweet.
“And what should we do with it?” Saint asked. “We can’t just leave it like that, can we?”
The little Trocheck girl leaned forward. “Big heart!”
Saint picked up a red crayon and pointed it at her. “Good choice.”
Luke flushed, didn’t even notice the way he was biting his lip as he watched Saint take the small crayon and, oh-so carefully, trace out the two arches of a lopsided heart around Luke’s name. Like he was some sort of crush of his, and he was doodling in a high school notebook.
“Very nice,” Saint said, and then signed his name on the paper with his actual signature, making Luke snort. Saint just smiled and rose with an exaggerated groan to make the kids laugh—although Luke swore he heard one of his knees pop. “All right, I’m stealing Luke away now.” Saint kicked at Luke’s butt to get him to stand up, too. He threw an arm around Luke’s shoulders and fixed the kids with a mocking glare. “No following us, we’re going to eat the grossest cookies you’ve ever seen.”
They left the confused chorus of ews behind, and Luke laughed as Saint pushed him towards the balcony doors that lead to the rest of the roof. Saint slid the door open, all fogged up from the cold outside, the heat inside, then closed it again behind them. Luke looked back and found that the party was nothing but blurry silhouettes, and hints at light.
“Pretty nice piece those kids have,” Luke said. “Signed it and everything.”
“Thought they should have something to start them off in life,” Saint said. “You know, in case their daddy’s whole NHL thing doesn’t work out.”
Luke just smiled and walked to the railing, leaning on it and looking out over New York City’s lights. A siren wailed below them, and the wind was surprisingly gentle for being so far up. Luke was barely even cold.
“It was a good idea, though.” A moment later, Saint was leaning beside him. “Instead of my number on the front of my mask, I’m going to switch it to just your name in a big, red heart. What do you think?”
“I think you’ll get some shit for it.”
Luke wasn’t sure why he said it. He’d meant it as shit from the guys, jokes and chirps. But it came out closer to what he supposed the words had made them both think of. Each other. And nine whole times they had kissed. Luke stared out at the city, its lights blurring together as his mind went elsewhere, to Saint’s mouth, to Saint’s hands pushing up and under his shirt, to both of them looking at each other afterwards, trying to figure out what this was.
“I don’t care about any of that,” Saint said from beside him. “Do you?”
Luke pressed his lips together. Saint was made to be noticed. To be adored, like those kids in there. Like the entire city of New York, when they chanted his name in MSG. Saint, Saint, Saint. Luke had a shyness that most people thought was just rude arrogance. Saint was perfection, while the internet often speculated as to whether Luke even knew how to smile.
“Black’s done it,” Saint said. “With Lupin. They’re okay. And the world’s a whole lot harder on Black than it ever will be on either of us.”
That was true. People hated Black just because he was good, then hated him when he was bad, too. God, what must that be like?
“Okay, you can’t do this with me,” Saint said, gesturing around them. “You know this. Stop it.”
Luke looked over at him, confused, and Saint smiled and turned to face him, too. He gave his head a slow shake, eyebrows raised.
“You’re not going quiet on me. Answer my question. I’m done not talking about this. It’s been about a year now if kissing you, and, personally, I really like it. I’m not saying I want to drop a press conference, but I’m not going to stop myself from wanting to be with you just because someone might give me shit for it.”
Luke liked this. This forceful, no-nonsense side of Saint. It was good for him. For the most part, Luke was bad at sorting out meaning when people talked circles around themselves. Saint didn’t do that. Saint knew what he wanted, he read the whole game, the whole ice, the whole room, and life, and he said it that way.
Luke decided to give it a try. As long as it was just Saint here, as long as it was just the two of them, he could deal with his heart pounding and his breath trying to run away from the sheer honesty of it all.
“You think I don’t like kissing you?” he asked.
“Oh, you love kissing me,” Saint said. “Like doing a few other things to me, too, that I won’t name with children so close and present.”
Luke smirked. “Yeah.”
“I’m just saying maybe you’d like being those things with me.” Saint swallowed, and Luke saw the nerves then. The little cracks, the toll that this season had taken. “And only me.”
Luke bit his lip again. “Mhm.”
“And maybe not be so quiet about it. With me.”
“Okay,” Luke said, heart roaring happily in his ears now. “I’d like that.”
“Little louder, Luke,” Saint leaned in and whispered. “Just for me.”
Luke was shy, and quiet, and unsure most of the time of how anything was going to end. But Saint was asking, and Luke wanted nothing more than to give them both what they wanted. He reached out a brushed a thumb over Saint’s bottom lip before steadying his jaw so he could kiss him. He lingered in it, pulling away as slow as ever.
“I want only you,” Luke said, and for once Saint was the speechless one. Saint only smiled and kissed him again.