“This… looks complicated,” I observed. “I think you might have to help me, at least the first time.”
“Help you in the shower?” Felix asked, sounding genuinely a little stressed at the idea. It made me laugh, as I held up the packaging. He seemed to get what I was implying then, nodding. “Oh yeah, sure.” With that, Felix took the thing from me, flipping it around to look for instructions, just like I had.
He gave a small hum at not finding them there. Ripping the plastic open, out came the wrap itself, but also a small slip of paper that explained how to put it on. “It’s not too complicated,” Felix commented, handing me the paper. “But I’m happy to help you. Do you want to do it here? Like a practice run? A dry practice run!”
I hummed, too. Honestly, I would prefer it if Felix didn’t have to see me actually naked. He wouldn’t look, Felix didn’t see me that way, but I knew that I would blush and feel exposed. My feelings that I was taking advantage of Felix’s hospitality were quite uncomfortable enough for me to deal with without adding more.
“Maybe a dry practice run in the bathroom?” I suggested. “I’ll keep my clothes on and we won’t start the shower, but I think it would be more helpful to practice with the actual shower chair, and having limited space.”
The big, open living room would be a lot easier for me to navigate than the bathroom. On the other hand, there’d be less chance of tripping on a dog, so there were pros and cons!
“Good plan.” Felix nodded. He didn’t offer to help me to the bathroom, which was surprisingly nice. It had taken us a few days of me pointing out that I needed to learn to do things for myself before he had stopped offering. The only thing Felix had made me do was promise that I’d ask if I needed help. Sometimes, it was only that promise that forced me to ask, so he had a point.
It didn’t take us too long to get to the bathroom. Though, obviously, longer because of me. Still, Felix didn’t complain, instead just waiting patiently.
He moved to one side to let me shuffle around on my own. “You’re getting really good at this,” he complimented. I was a little dubious of how true that was, but I supposed I could now get around the house.
“I’m going to have to get used to it, right?” I asked, not really expecting an answer. Christmas still felt like a very, very long way off. Even thinking about what condition my muscles would be in by then made anxiety bubble inside me.
So I pushed it away, giving Felix a small smile. “I’m focusing on one day at a time,” I said, hoping that speaking it aloud could make it true.
Getting myself seated on the shower chair, with my plaster cast sticking outside of the shower cubicle, I held out my hand for the cover. “It’ll be safer if I put it on sitting down.” Otherwise, I might fall over.
“Yeah, that makes sense,” Felix agreed. “I think it’s also better if you do it on your own? I mean, obviously, I’ll help if you need me to, but I think you need to try it on your own first.” Which made sense, especially if I didn’t want to need Felix’s help every time I tried to shower.
Having him here to make sure everything was okay, though, did help. It felt more secure. If something would happen, Felix would make sure I was fine. Giving a dramatic sigh, I shifted to put the cover on.
It wasn’t the easiest thing to do, but thankfully, even with a cast on, I was fairly flexible. “You’re doing great!” Felix encouraged me.
It was so over-the-top that I laughed. “Thanks.” I appreciated that Felix wanted me to feel good, even if it was only about getting a cover on over my cast.
Once I had checked the seal was secure, I sat for a moment, smiling up at Felix. This felt… weirdly companionable. I hadn’t taken a friend into the shower with me since I was a little kid. Though, of course, this was a bit different.
Finally, I leaned forward, trying to work out how to get the cover off again. “I guess I have to be able to get it on and off,” I observed with a giggle. “I don’t want you to have to come to the rescue post-shower!”
Hopefully, it wouldn’t come to that. Now that I’d been on the crutches for a week, I was much better at figuring out how to do things. And while the cast-cover had initially seemed like a challenge, it wasn’t as bad as I had expected it to be. Still, it helped to have Felix there to keep my spirits up.
As much as I hoped not to need his help, I would probably not shower while in the house on my own for the first few times. Just in case!
“Yeah, that sounds like a good plan,” Felix nodded when I told him as much. “Speaking of which, do you want to try now? I’ll go to my room so I can still hear you if you scream or whatever?”
“I’m not going to scream!” Unless I actually did fall over. But the shower chair should make it pretty difficult for me to lose my balance.
After checking I had everything I might need, I agreed to let Felix go. Judging by the shadow I could see under the door, he didn’t go very far. It was weirdly comforting, knowing that he was right there in case I needed him.
It took a lot of the anxiety out of my first proper shower-with-a-broken-leg. I just hoped that all this wasn’t too much of an imposition on Felix. He seemed perfectly happy, and I knew him well enough to spot any signs of irritation. I tried to let his cheerful manner ease away all my worries.
We were just two friends living together for a little while. Best friends, as we’d always been, willing to help one another when necessary.
Chapter Seven
Felix
“But are you sure you’re okay?”
It was our first proper week playing away. Briefly, I had considered just asking not to go, but a) that would suck for the team and b) Jessie would never let me do that for her. So we’d come to an agreement instead. She let me hire someone to come in once a day to make food for her, to make sure she was okay, and I wouldn’t be too overbearing.
Maybe I was still a little overbearing, admittedly. I tried to call Jessie most evenings, just to check in. She had pointed out that I could just text, but this way the dogs got to be involved, too.
Tonight, our fourth day away, Jessie was on the couch in my living room with Edgar draped over her lap. She looked comfortable, which was nice to see. It couldn’t be super easy to be comfortable with a broken leg, I was sure.
Still, Jessie did look more comfortable than me right now. I was sat on a bed at the hotel we were spending tonight in. Sleeping away from home was never my favorite. At least the guys had almost stopped chirping me about needing to call my ‘girlfriend’ every night. It was easy enough to dismiss them when my main priority was making sure Jessie was alright.
Which brought me back to my original question. “Like sure sure?” I repeated.
“Oh my gosh, Felix, yes, I am absolutely positive that I’m fine.” The smile on Jessie’s face made me feel grateful for the technology to video call. Otherwise, I might have thought Jessie was genuinely annoyed at me for asking too often.
Her hand rested on Edgar’s head, not stroking exactly but just reminding him that she was there. He looked even more comfortable than either of us. Clearly, the dogs were loving having someone with them while I was away.
“How are you?” Jessie asked. “It was a close game tonight.”
It had been a close game, Jessie was right. But more than that, it made my stomach turn in an unexpectedly pleasant way. She’d watched it. There was no requirement for Jessie to do so. My hospitality didn’t come with a subclause demanding she watch my games (no matter what some people might assume).
Of course, I did know that Jessie had watched plenty of my games before, too, but by now we’d been friends so long that she didn’t feel like she had to. Almost getting distracted in my own thoughts, I had to shake my head.
“Um, yeah, I’m fine. You’re right, it was close, but we won, so that’s always a good thing.” We hadn’t been as lucky in the game the night before, so I was glad Jessie was asking about this one and not last night’s. “Did you see that goal Alfie scored? That was pretty aw
esome.”
Jessie’s eyes lit up, her head nodding energetically. “Yeah, that was amazing,” she agreed. “He’s really getting better, isn’t he?” It wasn’t as if Alfie had ever been bad. The Pumas wouldn’t have signed him if that were the case. But he’d been young, and new, and both of those things made it harder to predict where a team-mate might be on the ice when you needed them.
Alfie had got to know us all a lot better, and it showed in the way he played.
“How is everyone feeling?” Jessie asked. “A win straight after a loss must be kind of confusing.”
“It’s better than a loss straight after a loss!” I laughed.
Still, I did get Jessie’s point. But this was what hockey was like. You played your best games, whether they ended in losses or wins. Of course, the hope was that they’d all be wins. Some games just clicked better than others. But there wasn’t a comparison I could draw, not one I knew of anyway.
Over the years, I had tried to learn more about dancing for Jessie but, still, she was far better at knowing hockey than I could ever be with dance. “It’s not confusing,” I shook my head. “It just reminds us that we need to play better more, you know? The team’s doing alright, Luke’s been captaining the shit out of us, so we’re doing well.”
Jessie nodded. We’d talked before about how dance and hockey were different that way. Jessie didn’t really have a captain. Not one who danced alongside her. The closest was her choreographer or her director, but those were specific roles, more like being a coach than a captain.
“Well, I assume that’s good,” she teased. “Not too long now. How are you enjoying hotel life?”
The groan I gave in response was dramatic and made Jessie laugh. It felt rewarding, even when her voice was broken up by the crackle of the video call. Making Jessie laugh had always been one of my favorite things. Knowing her for as long as I had, it never ceased to make me smile back.
“I mean, does anyone really love it? I miss my bed. I miss my dogs. I miss you,” I shrugged. “But I’m sharing a room with Chase and his snoring almost sounds the same as Damson’s.” That, too, made Jessie laugh, so I grinned.
As if on cue, I heard Damson’s snoring through the phone. It really was strangely similar to the same nasal sound that Chase made.
“The dogs miss you, too,” Jessie assured me. “I’m not a very convincing Felix-impersonator. And not just because I can’t take them running.” I’d hired someone to walk the dogs, since Jessie couldn’t do it with her leg still in plaster.
After a moment’s hesitation, Jessie carried on. “It’s weird being here without you. Not because of my leg. I don’t think I’ve ever been here on my own for this long. I keep expecting you to come around the corner or to drop a bottle of water on my pillow because you don’t think I’m hydrating.”
I squinted at the screen, like it was somehow going to reveal to me whether Jessie was hydrating enough now. She said that I only thought that, but since living together, I’d definitely noticed that she didn’t drink enough water. Given, that might have also been because her mobility was limited but my arriving with water bottles was helpful. In my opinion, anyway.
“And are you?” I asked, deciding that the tiny phone screen wasn’t going to tell me if she looked dehydrated. “Hydrating enough,” I clarified. The question did make me feel a little bit like a parent so I frowned. “I know you’re an adult and can look after yourself.” Kind of, most of the time. When she didn’t have a broken leg, anyway.
Giving a small shrug, I threw an apologetic look at the screen. “I just worry.”
“I drink plenty,” Jessie answered, which didn’t really tell me anything. She said that on days when she had definitely had less to drink than I had. As if she could read my mind, Jessie raised an eyebrow. “You’re much bigger than me. You need more water.”
Whether that was true or not, drinking more water couldn’t hurt. “I’ll get myself another drink after this call,” Jessie promised. “Though that will mean I have to move Edgar.”
Hearing his name, Edgar’s ears shifted, but he didn’t actually lift his head. “What about you, are you getting enough sleep, or is Chase’s snoring keeping you up?”
The question made me snort. “That’s actually one benefit of Damson’s snoring, I can sleep through it pretty easily,” I told her truthfully. Yeah, Chase snoring wasn’t ideal, but it actually bothered me a lot less than I imagined it might bother other guys. Still, there were worse snorers on the team, plenty of guys with a history of broken noses, after all.
“I’m getting okay sleep,” I answered the first part of her question. “Hotel sleeping is no one’s favorite, but the beds are fine. It’s definitely different than being at home, but it’s just part of the job, you know?” And Jessie probably did know, actually, because sometimes she went on tour with her dance group.
She nodded. “Yeah. And getting to play hockey for a living makes up for a lot of the hotel sleeping, right?” Her voice sounded wistful. It must have been so hard for her not to be dancing. Since she’d joined the cheerleading squad in high school, Jessie had danced practically every day.
But before I could offer her any sympathy, Jessie had moved on. “You get back on Friday, right?” she asked. “Shall we do something fun over the weekend?”
“Got a game on Saturday evening,” I reminded her. “But yes, Sunday we can do something? What sort of something did you have in mind?” It wasn’t exactly like we could go places. It used to be that we’d go hiking and stuff like that, but Jessie could hardly hike with a broken leg.
We’d spent a lot of time at home, though. Maybe there was something outside-y that we could do. “Go for a drive?” I offered. “I don’t want you to get cabin fever,” I joked. Except that was also kind of not a joke. Being trapped indoors for weeks was going to get pretty awful pretty quickly.
Jessie’s smile warmed me from the inside. “So thoughtful,” she teased. “But yeah, that sounds really nice. I was going to do some research and see what there was to do for people who aren’t so mobile.”
It didn’t surprise me that Jessie would’ve wanted to research. “I’m sure there are things that we can drive to,” she added. “I’ll look into it. I don’t exactly have much else to do right now.”
Despite the truth of that, Jessie was clearly trying not to get too negative. “I thought I might invite Dana over. That would be okay, wouldn’t it?”
My first instinct was to say that of course, it was fine, that Jessie hardly needed to ask. It was true, but I also understood why she was asking. Still, while it was my house, Jessie lived there now, too, so it was hers as well. Even if temporarily.
“It would be okay,” I replied. “Thanks for asking, but yeah, you can have your friends over. I guess just let me know if you don’t want me there or whatever, I can always go out with the dogs.” I did want Jessie to feel like it was her home, too.
The strangeness of that wish washed over me and I had to look away from the camera, in case she could pick it up.
“You don’t have to be out with the dogs,” Jessie assured me. “It’s a big house, if we want to gossip we’ll find a room you’re not in!” A smile tugged at the corner of my lips. It was nice how Jessie and I worked around one another.
“Anyway, is Dana the one who’s friends with her ex or the one who’s having a thing with one of the male dancers?” I asked, not always being the best at remembering the names of the people I heard gossip about.
“Dana’s friends with her ex. Or trying to be, anyway. I’ll have to ask her how it’s going.”
It was easy to let the conversation carry on from there. Jessie talked a little more about the gossip from her dance studio; she was still getting updates by text from most of her friends.
Then, when Edgar tired of draping himself over Jessie’s lap, I urged her to go get that drink she had promised me she’d have. We said our goodbyes, leaving me to stretch out on the bed and try to get comfortable on the hotel’s unfam
iliar mattress. It would be good to get home again!
JULY 10TH, 2007
“Felix, we can’t just demand that Jessie’s parents let her celebrate her birthday with you.” My dad frowned and I gave yet another sigh.
Last year had sucked because Jessie’s family had taken her on a trip for her birthday, which meant we couldn’t spend our birthday together. So this year, I was very determined to change that. My birthday parties were often at a skating rink but this year I was making an exception.
There was a bit of the zoo dedicated for events, so I’d asked my parents to let me have my birthday party there. Sure, no problem, my mom had said. But apparently, now it was a problem!
“The problem isn’t you having the party there, Felix,” mom argued. “It’s not even that we would mind Jessie having her party there, too! We just can’t promise you that her parents will agree.”
Which, okay, I did get but…
“We will ask,” Mom promised. I grinned.
Jessie and I had already talked about this. We figured if the parents were in charge of organizing it between them, then we stood a better chance. Besides, it was going to be cheaper than a trip away, right? And who didn’t want to have a birthday party at a zoo!
“Thanks, mom!” I beamed and my dad shook his head.
“And if they say no?” he asked.
“Well, then I don’t want to have a birthday at the zoo,” I decided.
Mom frowned, coming closer so she could give my shoulder a squeeze.
“Honey, are you sure you want to base your decision about where to have your birthday on what Jessie might want?”
Dad nodded. “Your mom’s right,” he agreed. “If you don’t want to have your party at the zoo, you don’t have to!”
“No, obviously I don’t have to,” I agreed. “But like... I like having my birthday parties at the rink, it’s cool because I get to skate with all my friends. But I’ve done that always! And Jessie’s friends aren’t really into skating.” Her brother would love it, but that hardly counted. I wouldn’t base my decisions on what Harley liked.
Friend Locked (Salt Lake Pumas) Page 6