He takes a deep breath.
Sometimes he wants to tell his parents about Blake. Or maybe not even about Blake, just that he’s not straight, that he might come home with a guy one day.
Elliot’s phone chimes with another goal notification.
The Knights just scored again.
#
The series against the Grizzlies goes to seven games.
With Games 5 and 6 going into overtime, Blake nearly lies down on the ice when the final buzzer sounds after Game 7.
They won it.
Somehow.
He has no idea how he made it to the end. His teammates come crashing into him, and they take off the net, and Blake ends up with his back against the boards, hands patting his head, everyone shouting.
They’re going to the finals, most of them for the first time in their careers. Charlie is still clinging to him when the other guys start to detach themselves for the handshake line. Charlie plants an unmistakable smooch on the side of Blake’s mask and then grabs him by his catching glove and tugs him along to shake hands with the Grizzlies.
They’ll be facing San Diego in the final round. Nobody thought the Seals would make it this far, a third-seed team that fought its way through two seven-game series and then through a six-game series, hungry, ready for the final round. The media call them dangerous, unstoppable, the secret favorite.
The Knights will have home ice, but home ice means little. The Grizzlies had home ice, too, and now they just lost Game 7 at home.
They shake hands.
The Knights get the Price of Wales trophy and Kells puts his hands all over it and so does everyone else. They take it to the locker room and Brammer loudly suggests that maybe they should lick it. He settles for rubbing his cheek against it, which isn’t much better, but at least they can all go to bed knowing that Bram didn’t slobber all over it.
They go out for drinks after the game and Blake ends up squeezed into a booth with Lehts, Mattie, Kells and Charlie, two pitchers in the middle of the table. Charlie’s head starts to droop before they’ve even managed to finish them, and his head drops onto Blake’s shoulder.
“Aw,” Mattie says and taps the tip of Charlie’s nose.
Charlie jerks upright, looking around frantically, nearly knocking over his cup. “Wha…”
“I think it’s time for bed, eh?” Kells says and reaches over Blake to ruffle Charlie’s hair.
“I’m not tired,” Charlie says, rubbing his eyes.
“Sure,” Blake says and puts his arm around him.
Charlie grins and leans back against him. “Totally awake.”
Blake yawns.
“Kids,” Kells says. “Please don’t fall asleep on me when we play the Seals.”
Mattie cackles.
“We have a couple of days to take a really long nap,” Lehts says.
“Thank fuck,” Charlie mumbles and closes his eyes again.
“Yeah, I think Choo Choo and I are gonna head back to the hotel.”
“Don’t call me Choo Choo,” Charlie says with the most betrayed face. “You were the only person I trusted on this team.”
“Come on,” Blake says, “Charles.”
Charlie sticks out his tongue at him, but quits joking around on the way back to the hotel, hugging Blake tightly before they go their separate ways.
They keep playing.
They’re in the final round, but hockey games are still hockey games. They have to win four of them.
Only four.
“I couldn’t sleep last night,” Charlie mutters when they get on the plane to fly to California for Game 3. They won one and lost one in Newark, so they don’t have an advantage going into this. Ideally, they’ll come home with two more wins. They can’t afford two losses.
Blake holds Charlie’s hand when the plane takes off and they don’t go out that evening. Charlie hangs out in Blake’s room with him and they order room service and watch a movie and they both fall asleep in Blake’s bed before it’s even ten o’clock. Blake wakes up sometime after midnight and nudges Charlie awake. Charlie mumbles an apology, red in the face, and goes back to his own room.
Charlie sits next to him during breakfast the next morning, like he always does, cheeks turning pink when their eyes meet. Blake wants to tell him that it’s okay, that he doesn’t need to be embarrassed, but by the time they get on the ice later that day, Charlie is once again talking to him the way he usually does, so maybe Charlie was scared that Blake would be weird about it.
They hang out in Lehts and Sasha’s room that night, because they have two double beds, nine guys squeezed onto them, watching Star Wars. Lehts is the first one to nod off and Sasha very graciously saves him from having a dick drawn on his face. Brammer turns to Charlie next, because he’s sleeping with his head on Blake’s shoulder again, but all Blake has to do is glare to keep Brammer away.
They play well the next day and leave the Seals’ arena with a win, but return to Newark with the series tied.
Coach tells them to get some rest between games, and Charlie comes home with Blake and they order food and Charlie ends up sleeping on Blake’s couch.
Blake texts Elliot that night until he falls asleep, skirting entirely around the topic of Blake playing for the Cup. He asks Elliot to tell him about Oshawa, so Elliot does, a quick back and forth that calms Blake down like nothing else in the world. He almost wants to call, but it’s late, and he only manages to stay awake for about five more minutes anyway.
In the morning, his phone is still next to him, a few texts from Elliot waiting for him, first a reply to the last text he sent, then I guess you fell asleep, and then, a few minutes later, good night.
Blake replies to apologize for going silent last night and then crawls out of bed to see if the cats have eaten Charlie. They’re next to him, Angus by his feet, Squid next to his chest, both of them asleep, Charlie snoring loudly.
Blake starts making coffee and stares blankly at his depressingly empty fridge. He’s already halfway through a cup of coffee when Charlie shuffles into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes.
“I’m so sorry, Fish, I don’t know why the fuck I keep falling asleep everywhere,” Charlie says.
“No worries. You wanna go out for breakfast? I don’t have any food.”
“Oh. Sure. I’ll…” Charlie nods at the ceiling. “I’ll go take a shower. Meet you downstairs in twenty?”
Blake nods and hands him a coffee. “For the long way upstairs.”
“You’re the best,” Charlie whispers and shuffles away.
#
The Cup is in the building for Game 6.
If the Knights win this game, they– Blake can’t even think about it. He’s jittery before the game and Charlie’s face is white as a sheet.
“I’ve never been this scared of fucking up a game,” Blake whispers.
“You’re not the only player on the team, kid,” Mattie says gruffly.
“Yeah, I could be the one who fucks it all up,” Charlie throws in.
“You’re also not the only player on the team.”
Charlie makes a weird sort of choking sound. “I want to die.”
Blake hums. He can relate.
A hand lands on his back and he can barely feel it through the pads, but Blake has never been so glad to have Mattie next to him.
They have a handful of fans in the building that made the trip from Newark, but they’re undoubtedly deep in enemy territory. It would be nice to win the Cup at home, but if he had a choice, he’d rather get it over with right now. He doesn’t want to play Game 7, he wants to win it today.
When Blake is in the crease, he doesn’t think about it anymore. He doesn’t hear the crowd. He sees his teammates, sees the Seals, sees the puck. That’s it. Just them and the puck, and a save, a save, another save.
The Seals score late in the first and get on the board first.
After that, nothing happens. Well, not nothing. But no goals get scored during the second. Charlie nearly
gets murdered right in front of him, Blake tries to murder a Seal in retaliation and doesn’t even see who the hell he’s grabbing. During the playoffs that sort of shit is legal. They eventually get separated by the refs.
“You okay?” Blake asks.
Charlie nods and skates to the bench, where one of their trainers is already waiting for him with a towel to wipe away the blood on Charlie’s face.
Things don’t get any less rough after that. Blake ends up with a Seal in his net, the puck’s in there somewhere, too, but it’s ruled no goal because the net was off before the puck went in.
They go into the second intermission with the score unchanged. Coach Fitzgerald comes into the room, looks around, and says, “Someone needs to score a goal. I don’t care which one of you does it.”
Blake doesn’t care either. Nobody cares who does it.
It’s Paulie who comes to their rescue halfway through the third, ties up the game for them and all they need after that is one goal.
Charlie is the one who gets credit for it, but it’s not a pretty goal. The puck bounces off at least three people, including the Seals’ goalie, before it falls into the net. Blake has his eyes on the board, watching the replay. There’s not a single goalie in the world who would have managed that save. It’s an unlucky bounce, but they’ll take it.
The Seals pull their goalie, and Paulie gets the empty netter, and they still have thirty-two seconds on the clock, but it’s starting to sink in now, that they’re close, that the Cup is in the building and that they’ll hold it in their hands.
Thirty-two seconds.
They run down faster than Blake would have imagined.
He doesn’t even remember hearing the final horn. It’s like when they won the Eastern Conference Finals, except he’s pretty sure that Charlie is actually crying when he hugs him this time. He’s pretty sure that Kells is crying, too. Blake hugs every guy he can get to, but mostly he wants to find Mattie.
He’s at the very outside of their large and sweaty huddle, but the boys let him through and Mattie puts a baseball hat on Blake that says that they’re Stanley Cup Champions. He hugs Mattie until Mattie tells him that he needs to let go, because the Seals are waiting for handshakes.
There are a bunch of Knights fans down by the glass now and when they’re done shaking hands, Blake skates over to them to throw himself against the glass. Quickly, because then the Cup is coming out and Kells is skating over to take it from Joe Watson. It goes from Kells to Mattie, from Mattie to Paulie, from Paulie to Juice, and then Juice is skating over to Blake.
He takes it for a spin and then hands it over to Charlie, because he was the one who scored the game winner.
They’ve let everyone’s families on the ice now, too, and Blake finds Evan with Mattie’s family and Evan pulls him into a crushing hug. Neither of them says that they wish their grandma was here, that they wish their parents could see this. All Evan says in the end is, “I won’t fucking touch it.”
Blake laughs, barely has time to hug Mattie’s kids before he’s pulled away for an interview. That’s how his night is going. Photos, interviews, more photos, then the locker room, and the Cup, champagne getting poured everywhere.
Evan told him he wouldn’t come out to celebrate with them, because he’s insanely jealous and he has to be on a flight to Hartford at nine the next morning because he’s helping out at a hockey camp back home.
The team takes the party to a club and Blake wonders how he’s supposed to remember winning the Cup when he’s handed drink after drink. He gets talked into dancing and he dances and he hugs everyone who’s close enough to hug and then someone hands him another drink, and after that he needs to sit down. He eventually escapes to the bathroom, where the music is nothing more than a dull throb and he has a second to breathe. It smells terrible. He’s overcome with a strange sense of déjà vu, but doesn’t pause to figure out why.
He hides in a stall and gets his phone out of his pocket, his brain hurting from seeing all the missed calls and texts, and finds Elliot’s number. It’s early morning in Toronto, not that Blake realizes that when he hits call.
Elliot picks up, voice sleepy when he says, “Hey, Stanley Cup champion Blake Samuels.”
“That’s what you’ve saved in your phone?”
“Not yet, but I’ll take care of that in a couple of hours when I’m actually awake.”
“Sorry,” Blake says.
“No, you’re not.”
“I’m not,” Blake confirms. “I miss you.”
“Blake.”
“I do.”
“I know. But you’re only telling me that because you’re drunk.”
“Still true.”
Elliot sighs. “I miss you, too.”
“When are you coming back to New York?”
“I don’t know. I… I’m doing the same camp in Toronto that I always do.”
“But it’s not starting yet.
“No, not yet.”
“So when are you coming back to New York?”
“Can we talk about this when you’re not drunk? Because you just won the Cup. And this is… I’m not even awake.”
“Okay,” Blake says, because Elliot has a point and it is okay. “I miss you,” he adds, to make sure Elliot understood him the first time.
“Yeah, I heard you.”
“You said you miss me, too.”
“Yeah, I said that.”
Blake hums, because he was going to say something else, but now he can’t remember. “I’ll call you.”
“Okay.”
“Tomorrow.”
“Whenever you have time.”
“Yeah. Tomorrow.”
“Blake.”
“Maybe the day after tomorrow.”
“That’s probably more realistic,” Elliot says.
“Are you smiling?” Blake asks.
“Maybe.”
“Knew it.”
“Drink some water.”
“Wow,” Blake says. “Wow.”
“That was probably good advice.”
“Yeah, not my fault you didn’t take it.”
Elliot laughs. It’s Blake’s favorite sound.
“You should go back to sleep,” Blake says. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”
“You’re still not sorry,” Elliot mumbles, “but that’s okay. Have fun, eh?”
“Yeah,” Blake says, and, “Sleep well,” and then he hangs up.
“Fish, did you hide in the bathroom to call your… whoever that was?”
Blake opens the door of his bathroom stall and finds Paulie by the sinks, drying his hands. Right. There are other people in the world. He’s not the only one. He tries to remember if he said Elliot’s name. He doesn’t think he did.
“It’s okay,” Paulie says. “Why’s your… whoever… not here?”
“Because,” Blake says, and leaves it at that, because Paulie is one of the guys who’s been around for a while, got drafted two years before Blake, and he’s one of those guys who has probably realized that Blake has never brought a girlfriend to any of their team events and who stopped asking at some point.
Paulie gives him a hug for some reason.
Blake returns to the rest of the team, most of which look like they’re about ready to go to bed. He’s tired, too, and if he sat down right now, he’d probably fall asleep immediately.
“Okay,” Kells shouts over the music, “I’m taking Bram. Blake, you don’t look as wasted as some of these idiots, can you grab Choo Choo?”
Blake grabs Charlie, nearly falling over with him when Charlie leans against him.
He’s not sure how they make it back to the hotel and he’s even less sure how he manages to drag Charlie all the way to his room, Charlie giggling as he tries to get his wallet out of his pocket.
“There, there…” Charlie says and holds up the wallet, triumphant.
“Okay, here, let me…”
Blake swipes the card for him and ushers Charlie inside, catching him by
the arm before he can trip over a pair of sneakers by the door.
“Whoops,” Charlie says and stumbles against Blake. “Sorry. I’m not that drunk, I swear.”
“Right,” Blake says.
Charlie grins at him, eyes fixed on Blake’s face, dipping down to his lips, then back up again. Charlie’s eyes are the deepest, darkest brown, warm and soft. Kind. He’s definitely staring right now, in a way that you usually wouldn’t stare at a teammate, but the rules don’t apply when you’re wasted because you just won the Cup. Since Blake is marginally less wasted, he knows that something’s up here, but his brain is too slow to figure it out.
He’s too slow when Charlie leans in and kisses him. Blake kisses him back, only for a split-second, before he gently pushes Charlie away.
“Time for bed,” Blake says and nudges Charlie over to his bed.
“I…”
“It’s okay.”
“Blake.”
“It’s okay,” Blake says again and decides that Charlie is not too drunk to figure out how to put his own ass in his bed and maybe even take off some of his clothes. He quickly bids him a good night and gets the hell out of his room.
Blake’s own room is three doors down and he has just opened the door when a handful of his teammates come tumbling out of the elevator, laughing, shushing each other as they loudly sneak down the hallway.
Blake grins at them and Sasha waves at him, nearly tripping over his own feet.
They’re all going to be close to death on the flight home in the morning.
#
They fly home and Charlie sits next to Kells on the plane, so Blake hovers next to Mattie until Mattie offers him the empty seat next to him. There’s food on the flight that Blake considers, since he does need to eat something at some point, but his stomach seems to be unsure if it wants him to eat food ever again.
He eventually goes to sleep. It’s a long flight and he’s exhausted. He doesn’t have to worry about anyone drawing dicks on his face, because the rest of the team is fucking exhausted, too. Everyone’s hungover and Bram looks a little green in the face, like he’s about to throw up all over the plane. Brammer’s never been this quiet in his life. Kells seems concerned, shooting glances his way until he passes out.
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