Coming in First Place (Between the Teeth Book 1)

by Taylor Fitzpatrick

  “See you in July,” David says, and Jake leans in for one last kiss, pulling away before David’s quite ready to let him go.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The time until July passes slowly, somehow simultaneously busy and boring. David trains hard. He knows exactly what he needs to work on for camp, what they aren’t going to be working on in camp, his weaknesses, and the things he’s good at but could be better, and he makes sure to do all of them. He works hard enough to be exhausted at the end of the day, but not hard enough to get rid of a restlessness that sits within him.

  He and Jake continue to text. It’s something a little less structured than Jake’s game of question and answer, though he still asks plenty of questions, albeit more often about what David did that day than anything more abstract.

  David’s unsure how to respond to some of Jake’s texts, updates about his own day. It seems silly to send a text just to acknowledge that he’s seen Jake’s. But texts like whatre u up to our trainer bagskated us for no gud reason hes evil are a little simpler, because there is an obligation to answer, even if Jake didn’t bother with a question mark.

  That sucks. David responds, because it does — bag skating is meant as a punishment, and David’s frankly curious what Jake and his training group did to bring it on, because it’s rarely utilised otherwise — then, Strength training today.

  nice, Jake replies immediately, and then the texting ceases until the next time Jake gives him a training update, asks how David’s is doing, like he knows that unless there’s a question involved, David never knows quite what to say.

  *

  David gets to Toronto two days early. It’s unnecessary, really — he’s not escaping from Ottawa this time, and Jake isn’t getting in until late the night before camp starts anyway, because it’s apparently a friend’s birthday and he can’t miss it. David doesn’t know why it’s so important, why he’d compromise a good night’s sleep just to go to a party, especially one he’ll have to leave early, but he knows that isn’t the sort of thing he can say aloud.

  David wanders Toronto’s streets. They’re a little more familiar now, though not by much, since he spent the majority of his time in Toronto last year either training or at Jake’s place. He’s staying at the same hotel, and he wonders if he’s going to spend as little time there as he did before. He hopes so, but then, maybe that isn’t doing things right. He doesn’t know.

  Jake isn’t the last person to arrive on the first day of camp, but he’s close, looking sleepy — he didn’t get in until two, according to a text he sent David — and rumpled. He waves at David from across the room, and David feels his cheeks heat when he waves back, feels like people are looking, probably wondering when the rival rookies became friends. Or maybe they aren’t. They’re not rookies anymore, and David doubts the players paid much attention to the overblown media coverage about their supposed rivalry.

  Caldwell and Majors have already selected the teams this year, so no one’s pulling colours out of a hat. The rosters reflect players’ roles and skill levels far better than the arbitrary system they used last year, and David should be satisfied by that. Instead, when Jake is shuffling out with Majors’ group after the rosters are announced, he’s disappointed.

  It makes sense. David and Jake on the same line would be unfair to the other team.

  Jake mouths something at David as he’s leaving. David thinks it’s ‘Sucks’, and finds himself agreeing with that assessment.

  *

  Jake’s car is waiting for him outside the arena at the end of the day, and it feels almost illicit when David climbs into the passenger seat. David knows that’s ridiculous; the fact that they’re on different teams has never stopped them before.

  “Wanna grab some dinner?” Jake asks.

  “Sure,” David says. He’s hoping it isn’t just dinner, but it is. For three days that’s all they do, get dinner at restaurants near Jake’s condo. It’s the same one as last year, David’s gathered, though Jake hasn’t invited him back yet. Still trying to do things right, he supposes.

  The fourth time Jake offers to drive him back to his hotel after dinner, David, frustrated, says, “How long does it take to do things right?”

  “I dunno,” Jake says. “I’m kind of like, winging this right now.”

  “Well,” David says. “Can we wing it at your place?”

  “Just a movie,” Jake says, pointing at him. “We’re just going to chill and watch a movie and then I’m driving you home.”

  “Just a movie,” David agrees, and hopes Jake doesn’t mean it.

  Jake, unfortunately, does, at least mostly. They get distracted from the movie early on. Well, David isn’t even sure what the movie’s title is, let alone what the plot is supposed to be, but right around the first explosion he turns to look at Jake, who’s already looking at him, and somewhere around the third explosion Jake’s body is a warm press pinning him to the couch, one of David’s hands tangled in his too short hair, the other sliding under his shirt.

  Jake pulls away, then, too far for David to follow.

  “Drive you home?” Jake asks.

  “The movie isn’t finished,” David says.

  “I don’t even know what’s happening in it at this point,” Jake says.

  Neither does David, but he doesn’t find that fact particularly relevant.

  “I’ll drive you home,” Jake says firmly, and David scowls out the window the entire drive back to his hotel.

  *

  David finds himself automatically looking for Jake’s car when he walks out of camp the next day, only realises he’s doing it when he’s disappointed not to see it. He wonders if he did something wrong, if it went too far last night, for all that it felt like it didn’t go far enough.

  He’s looking down at his phone, wondering if he should text Jake or just call a cab, when Jake pulls up, and he tucks it away, gets in.

  “The guys were giving me shit for carpooling with the enemy,” Jake says, with a grin that means it isn’t actual shit, just chirping. None of David’s teammates have said anything to him. He doesn’t know if they’ve even noticed. “Want to do dinner at mine?”

  “Okay,” David says, hoping it doesn’t come out sounding too eager, but judging by the grin Jake slants his way, it does.

  It’s just dinner the same as it was just a movie: mostly. For an entire week Jake tears himself away any time hands stray past belts, drives David home, and David's practically shaking he's so frustrated, jerking off in the shower, in bed, once in Jake's bathroom while Jake was in the living room. Jake's mouth was slack, cheeks pink when David came out, obviously aware of what David had been doing, tenting his shorts so obviously David couldn't look away, wanted to touch him, take him out, bury him so deep in David's body he couldn't leave. That night, David took a cab, uncomfortably aware that Jake had probably taken himself out, blood hot, the second David had left.

  The first night David stays, Jake breaks whatever code of — David doesn't know, chivalry? Chastity? Some word Jake probably doesn't even know — and David bites his forearm so hard he bruises himself with Jake's throat tight around him. He tries to get up, after, pull himself together, but Jake's arm is heavy around his body, won't let go. David feels lax, unsprung, and can't put together the energy to get out of bed. They don't even have training the next day. There's no reason to get out of a comfortable bed just to drive across town and slide between cool sheets.

  The second time he has less of an excuse, and the third, and so on, until David thinks he has more clothes at Jake's place than he has in his hotel room, dirty clothes that Jake throws in his hamper and washes with his own, which makes David flush to think about, clean clothes that smell like Jake's detergent. He loses his iPod for a couple days and finds it between the cushions of Jake's couch. He falls asleep with Jake breathing hot against the back of his neck. He's never been happier, and that scares him.

  He is not, however, happy when he wakes up to Jake poking his cheek. He squi
nts past the sunlight filtering through the blinds, too bright. That and the fact that Jake is standing rather than wrapped around him is a sure sign David slept in later than he should have. He had an alarm set, and wonders what happened to it. He suspects Jake.

  “Morning, grumpy,” Jake says.

  “I’m not grumpy,” David says. Not everyone can wake up with a smile the way Jake does. David’s response to mornings is normal, it’s Jake that’s the strange one.

  “Not once I give you this coffee,” Jake says, holding it out, and David eyes him for a moment, considering whether or not he’s ready to face the day yet, before he sits up to accept it.

  “Wanna hit up a park this afternoon?” Jake asks, sitting down beside him and running his fingers through David’s bed-mussed hair. “It’s supposed to be a really nice day.”

  “Sure,” David says, drowsily leaning into Jake’s touch. He shouldn’t, really — it’s an off day. Off days are meant for the aspects of his training that camp doesn’t cover, and time in his own room, which isn’t exactly something he looks forward to, but something he probably needs to do. He spends too much time at Jake’s as it is. Any more and it’s going to be harder, come August, to leave.

  Jake was right about it being a nice day. It’s hot out, but the good kind of hot, the kind that’s pleasant rather than the kind that makes him sweat through his shirt in five minutes, makes the air thick and smoggy, like most Toronto summer days. That’s probably why he doesn’t make excuses once they get outside, that and the fact that the only place he’s been but the arena or Jake’s apartment this week was a pool, and that was conditioning.

  Jake insists on public transportation, and it’s thankfully quiet midday on a Sunday. David ducks his head down, Jays cap low, and hopes that no one recognises him. No one does, and no one recognises Jake, who has a Lions hat tugged down as well, sitting across the aisle from him on the first streetcar they take, the second, until they’re outside High Park.

  “Why’d we come this far?” David asks, a question that’s been tugging at him since they got onto the subway. There’s no shortage of parks in this city.

  “It’s got a zoo,” Jake says, waggling his eyebrows, like David has any interest in wild animals, and David rolls his eyes. “Tennis courts too.”

  David eyes the bag Jake’s been carrying the whole way. “Is that what’s in there?”

  “Maybe,” Jake says, and when he makes his way further into the park, David follows.

  He seems to settle on a patch of grass, half in the shade, with only a few people in view. It obviously isn’t a tennis court, but David’s not going to bother pointing that out, because Jake will just laugh. “What’re we doing?” he asks, instead.

  Jake opens his bag, pulling out a blanket, then kneeling down and spreading it out. “Sit,” Jake directs, and David does, while Jake goes back into the bag and pulls out sandwiches and bottles of water.

  “It’s kind of a shitty spread compared to last time, but I owed you a proper outside picnic,” Jake says. “We can play tennis after if you want. I brought rackets. You’ll definitely kick my ass, I suck at tennis.”

  David played a lot of tennis growing up. It was the one interest he and his father had in common, and when he was younger, it was one of the only things they did together. They quit playing right around the time David stopped finding his father a worthy opponent, would beat him every time, and David isn’t entirely sure whether that was his choice or his father’s. It doesn’t really matter, he supposes; his father moved out to Alberta not too long after that.

  He looks at the sandwich, wrapped in plastic. No different than the sorts of offerings they get on flights or for catered lunches, turkey and cheese and tomato, plenty of lettuce. He unwraps it slowly.

  “Thank you for the sandwich,” he says.

  “You are so welcome,” Jake says, and David doesn’t even have to look at him to know he’s grinning.

  *

  It’s a little crude to say, but David does, in fact, kick Jake’s ass on the tennis court. Jake wasn’t lying about not being good at tennis. It’s not even a competition; he barely breaks a sweat, though Jake’s panting by the end of the set.

  “Okay, I know I said I suck at tennis, but I didn’t know I sucked this bad,” Jake says, half-laughing. “Either that or you’re way better than you led me to believe.”

  “I just have more practice,” David says. “It’s been a few years, though. I’m a little rusty.”

  “This was rusty?” Jake asks. “Yeah, I’m never playing you again. My poor ego.”

  “You’ve won other things,” David says quietly.

  He regrets saying it as soon as it’s out of his mouth. It’s not like it isn’t true, but it sounds small, petty, out of place on a beautiful day after he’s just trounced Jake and Jake’s accepted the loss with breathless laughter.

  “Wanna go to the zoo?” Jake asks after an awkward pause, and David’s grateful to him for changing the subject, despite his total disinterest in the topic.

  “Not really,” David says. He doesn’t understand why people go to them in the first place. “Rematch?”

  “No way,” Jake says. “Not a chance. You playing me is like the equivalent of Rocket Richard going one on one with a five year old, it’s just cruel.”

  David can’t help but laugh.

  “Let’s get ice cream,” Jake says. “Or no. Popsicles! No! Freezies!”

  “They’re just one hundred percent sugar,” David says, but he doesn’t protest any further when Jake drags him to the nearest convenience store, because while he probably didn’t work off enough calories to deserve an ice cream bar — Jake really wasn’t much of an opponent — it’s hot, his shirt sticking to his spine, and ice cream sounds nice.

  “I totally knew you’d be getting that,” Jake says while David opts for a vanilla ice cream bar dipped in chocolate.

  “It’s good,” David says, while he tries to decide whether it’s a chirp or not. Probably. He knows people use vanilla as an insult.

  “I know,” Jake says, but buys a gigantic freezie instead, a foot long and violently blue, that turns into liquid before he’s done. He tips it back and drinks it, what must be a pure blast of sugar, and laughs when he sees the face David’s making, sticks his tongue out. It’s blue, which is disgusting and ridiculous. He’s ridiculous. David shouldn’t want to kiss him.

  “No zoo?” Jake asks.

  David shakes his head.

  “Come back to mine?” Jake asks.

  David hasn’t seen his own hotel room in days, hasn’t done more than sleep and shower there in — he can’t even remember. He really should go back to the hotel.

  “Okay,” David says, and follows Jake home.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  “Pick a movie, any movie,” Jake says.

  “You know I don’t care,” David says.

  “Please,” Jake says. “Just once, pick the movie.”

  “I’m fine with whatever you want to watch,” David says.

  “David Chapman,” Jake says. David thinks he’s trying to sound stern, but he isn’t very good at it. “I’m begging you here: pick a movie.”

  Jake’s phone rings practically on cue, which gives David more time to decide. Not that it’s likely to help: he’s sure he’d be capable of picking a movie if he was invested in watching any of them, but he isn’t.

  “Give me a sec?” Jake says, holding it up, and David nods, scrolling through the movie options as Jake disappears into his room.

  It’s probably his parents. Jake’s on the phone with his family a lot. It wasn’t something David noticed last year, but then, David wasn’t spending all his time at Jake’s last year, just the evenings. Presumably he spent just as much time talking to them then, just did it when David wasn’t around, and, admittedly, David’s around him most of the time now.

  Jake’s always talked about being close to his family, but it was one thing for David to acknowledge that was probably true, another th
ing to see it in practice, how often he talks to them, how often he talks about them. It seems excessive, but then, David talks to his agent more often than his parents — significantly more often than his parents — so he probably isn’t the best judge.

  Jake doesn’t come out of his room for a while, long enough that David starts to wonder how much he could possibly have to say. He was on the phone with his father yesterday, one of his sisters too, David can’t remember which one. Jake can’t have much to report: he’s just going to camp every day, spending the rest of his time with David, and David’s sure they don’t talk about that. They may not be ‘just buddies’ as he thought last year, but it’s certainly not the sort of thing Jake’s going to be telling his family about.

  David has scrolled through the same movie options at least half a dozen times before Jake comes out of his room.

  “Your parents?” David guesses.

  “Allie,” Jake says. His eldest sister. David thinks she was the sister he was talking to yesterday, though he isn’t positive.

  Jake sits down beside David, blows out a breath. “Did you pick a movie?” he asks, eyes on the TV.

  “Is something wrong?” David asks.

  “No,” Jake says, but the smile he gives David is weak enough to have him concerned.

  “Are you sure?” David presses.

  “It’s cool,” Jake says. “We were just talking about like, I dunno. It’s all good.”

  “Okay,” David asks. “Is she okay?”

  “She’s fine,” Jake asks. “Curious about what’s got me — she’s good.”

  David chews on his lip, watches Jake staring at the blank TV like there’s something riveting on the screen.

  “You don’t talk about me, do you?” David asks.

  “No,” Jake says, which is a relief, then, “I really want to, though.”

  David doesn’t know what to say.

  “Like,” Jake says. “I feel like every time I talk to any of them there’s this big part of my life I’m not telling them, you know? Like I’m hiding something I don’t want to hide. And it kind of sucks, because usually I tell them pretty much everything. I feel like I’m lying to them.”