Page 44 of Game Misconduct

Jesus, this was a strange fucking year.

Mike didn’t have the heart to wake him, so he cleaned him up as best he could without disturbing him, then went to the little table to take the whiskey and dump it out. That was when he saw two things that made him pause. One, an orange prescription bottle, for oxycodone acetaminophen, which he knew was Percocet. Two, Danny’s phone, and saw the little banner alerts pop up.Celi.Whatever she had to say she was saying in quick succession.

Are you going to come home for the holidays?

Mom and Dad are asking. You still haven’t called.

Mike stared at the phone, stared at Danny, and wondered what would happen if he stayed the night. But he definitely couldn’t do that. He frowned at the phone and the medication and the drink, and finally settled for pouring the whiskey down the sink. He couldn’t do anything about the pills.

It was concerning. It wasn’t his business to be concerned.

He got dressed and he left. He looked over his shoulder one last time before he closed the door, at Danny in the bed, and he tried not to think too much about anything.

Danny woke up alone to the sound of his alarm, which didn’t surprise him at all but still felt kind of like a disappointment. The first thing he noticed was that Mike had made an attempt to clean him up, which was not what he’d expected. It was a surprisingly sweet gesture for Mike.

He limped his way in the bathroom to survey the damage, which was extensive and almost comical. Mike had left absolutely no doubt about what Danny had been doing. There were mouth-shaped hickeys, dark and splotchy, all over his body. The imprints of Mike’s fingers on his wrists and hips. It was ostentatious, childish almost, and he was definitely too old to be going around looking like he’d been mauled by an overexcited werewolf. But he couldn’t say no when Mike actually gave in and asked for things, desperately, like he was going to die if he couldn’t.

He was sore in places he wasn’t often sore these days. That was good. He was sore in places he was usually sore, and that wasn’t. The play-fighting on the floor had done a number on his knees, even if in the end it was more than worth it. He was going to have to take a couple of pills if he wanted to get through the game.

He looked at the bruises in the bathroom mirror, then at his face. He still looked exhausted but he felt—better. The glass he’d used earlier was on the side of the sink, empty, but he couldn’t tell if Mike had finished it off or poured it out. The team was leaving for another road game, anyway, so it wasn’t like he could have drunk it anyway.

As he was waiting at the airport, he saw that Mike had snapped him a picture of his mouth, chin, and neck. It was hard to see under the black-and-gray ink, but the skin under the tattoos was purple and bruised.from you, Mike had captioned it, and Danny could see the quirk of his lips. Not the usual smirk: something wry and inviting. Danny smiled to himself, stupid and fond, and took a screenshot.

lmao, Mike said immediately, and Danny responded,shut up.

Artyomov looked over and said, “Got girl, Garcia?”

Danny composed himself, forced the smile down, and shrugged. “Something like that.”

“If y’all make ayour momjoke at me, I’m gonna throw down,” Gears mumbled, his face buried in a steaming-hot cup of coffee. “It’s too damn early for that.”

Danny patted him on the shoulder, sympathetically, because there were definitely going to beyour momjokes in the future now that he’d said something. Showing weakness in front of hockey players was asking for trouble.

Distracted, Danny glanced back down at his phone and thought about what he wanted to say to Mike, but somehow, any words he could think of seemed inadequate. Instead, he said,this was good, see you next game?and let the rest of it speak for itself.

He dozed on the plane to Tampa, very much feeling how late he’d stayed up and what he’d done, knees and back screaming at him, but it wouldn’t matter. With medicated numbness he’d be able to get through the game physically, anyway. Mentally...well. He was distracted but maybe not surprisingly in a better mood than he’d been in for a while. Particularly because when they landed, he saw that Mike had written back,fuck yeah.

The contented mood didn’t last all that long. There was no hiding what Mike had done to him, and when they were dressing for the game and Danny was completely naked, Gears noticed.

He let out a whoop that was half scream of horror and half howling laughter. “Oh my god, Garcia, what thehell.”

Danny looked down at his torso, and back up at Gears, and grinned a little sheepishly. He could only shrug: there was no explanation or excuse he could give that would sound convincing. It could only ever be what it was.

Gears was still staring at him like this was a revelation, both impressed and terrified. The rest of the team was staring too, or snickering, or both. It was a locker room: you saw everything. And it wasn’t like no one had ever come in with scratches on their back before, or even hickeys on their necks or other places, but this was...well, it was Mike. So it went without saying that it was a lot. Danny got it. It was embarrassing, and everyone knew, and that was probably exactly what Mike had been going for.

Gears was saying, “Seriously, man, you’re like a monk, youneverbring a girl around, but you’re like...oh my god, your chest? Yourass? What thehell.”

“Gears, when you’re old enough to date, one day in the distant future, you’ll, uh, learn, maybe.”

“I’m twenty years old!” Gears insisted, “I’m twenty, I’ve dated girls before, and that’s—that’s fuckedup, man, holy shit.”

“Why you look at his ass?” Artyomov demanded.

“Well, it’s right there! And it’s—dude!Lookat it!”

Across the locker room, Landry watched him with narrowed eyes. He was hockey-handsome, with the kind of small-town Canadian face that Danny had gotten so used to seeing in the league. He was usually grinning, but he wasn’t smiling now. He watched Danny like something that hadn’t made sense was adding up. Danny met his eyes across the circle and held his gaze. It was a dare:go on, you want to say something to me?

But Landry didn’t have the courage to say it, or maybe he just had the sense not to screw things up irreparably for both of them. He looked away first, and Danny went back to dressing for the game, although he’d filed it away in the back of his head. Not only could Landry not really be trusted, but he had probably guessed. And it was anyone’s best guess what he would do with that information.

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