Page 79 of Goaltender Interference

Unfortunately, he didn’t know what to tellanyof the women.

This happened sometimes when he was dealing with social situations where he didn’t have a script. He’d freeze up and choke, and either start rambling on about something unrelated or shut down completely. It had been easier at the team night because he’d had Matt there as a safety net, and he’d had alcoholto make it a little easier to turn his brain off, but he didn’t have either of those things right now.

The thing about all of this was: however well-meaning they were, Aiden could barely think of anything to say to any of them. Could barely string together coherent sentences. He could feel the sweat soaking through the thin underlayer he had thrown on beneath the jersey, the kind of cold chill that went deeper than the skin.

The thought of spending forty-one nights a year like this made him want to gouge out his own eyes. Even by the end of one night, he had to excuse himself to go into the bathroom, wet his hands with cold water and slap himself in the face several times. The sharp sensation helped jolt him out of the panic, but it didn’t help him feel any better, really. A guy finishing up at the urinal looked at him oddly and Aiden beat an even hastier retreat.

How was he going to do this? In Montreal or anywhere else. It would be exactly like this anywhere. Rows of arena seats full of perfectly nice women who were going out of their way to include him, to make him feel welcome, even though the situation was undoubtedly pretty fucking unusual for all of them. Rows of arena seats full of perfectly nice women he had nothing to talk to about. He wondered whether any of them would be willing to listen to him do the things he normally did when he was panicking, which was either recite a little mantra to himself, or talk about goaltending technique. Aino, at least, would probably be amenable to it.

He exhaled. That was a problem for future Aiden. Right now, he had to get through the rest of the game.

By the time the clock had ticked down and the horn sounded for the end of the period, the Royal had eked out a win. The players went through the little routine that they always did for home wins: after the line to bonk Fournier on the helmet andgive him a hug, they circled back to center ice, skating in slow circles with their sticks raised in a salute to the crowd. Matt faced the section of the arena where the WAGs were sitting and waved one hand. Aiden watched Matt on the Jumbotron as he skated toward the tunnel, looking up at the upper levels again. Maybe for Aiden. Maybe it was a coincidence.

It shouldn’t matter, but it did.

Matt felt unexpectedly emotional about the whole evening—the chat, the conversation with Reed—even after the win. He’d looked up into the stands, knowing he wouldn’t be able to see Aiden in such a crowd with the lights shining in his eyes, looking for him anyway. He wondered what Aiden would say if Matt told him he’d said yes.

But then he had to worry about changing and showering and media. He didn’t have time to think about how he felt about it. He didn’t have time to think about how Aiden felt about it. He hoped he didn’t mind too much. Matt would have to tell him that it was okay to mute it if he wanted to. That it was just for organizational and logistical purposes.

But it wasn’t. It was Matt telling the team what Aiden was to him.

“How was it?” Matt asked, when he got home later that night. For the last few years, he’d always been exhausted after games, eager to fall into bed. It was different now that he had Aiden in his life again, curled up against his side. He still felt exhausted, but his body was insistent about the fact that it wasn’t ready to sleep yet, that it wanted other things first.

Aiden looked up from under his eyelashes at him. It was the look that had really done him in, fifteen years ago. They werejust such pretty eyelashes, thick and dark and a little curled. It was absurd, really, that Aiden looked like that still.

Aiden said, “I don’t think I ever want to do that again.”

“Sorry. I had hoped you wouldn’t be uncomfortable. Were they okay?”

“They were all friendly. It’s fine. It was fine. I’m just so fucking awkward, Matt. Just not cut out to be a WAG, I guess.”

Matt slipped his hand beneath the waistband of Aiden’s boxer briefs. It was cheating, kind of, to do that. “I dunno, it’s pretty nice coming home to you here. You do all of the WAG stuff already, except the socializing.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Aiden muttered, but he was already getting hard in Matt’s hand, teeth digging into his lower lip as he trembled with the force of trying not to push his hips up into Matt’s grip.

“Can I fuckyou?”

“Yes—okay—fuck, Matt, JesusChrist—” Aiden’s voice broke on the last word, jumping up an octave. It was funny: Matt hadn’t done anything except stroke his dry, calloused hand up the length of Aiden’s cock and he was already falling apart under Matt’s hands and the weight of Matt’s body, rolled half on top of him.

“I think about you all of the time when I’m playing,” Matt said. Their mouths were so close together, not quite a kiss. Close enough that Matt could feel the words vibrating against Aiden’s lips.

“What do you think about?” Aiden asked, a little breathless. He had his hands in Matt’s hair, running them through it even though Matt kept things pretty short during the season. His mouth was hanging open, a little dumb, a sigh escaping when Matt took his hand away.

“You, waiting for me at home.” He spat in his hand and took Aiden in his grip again. “Sometimes I think about you waiting for me naked in bed at home.”

“I did that for you already, basically,” Aiden said, a little arch. His light brown eyes were intent on Matt’s face when Matt pulled away, crinkled a bit at the edges in a smile. It made Matt feel a little crazy, knowing that Aiden rarely met anyone’s eyes directly, but always looked athimlike that.

It was like Matt could get glimpses of the way he’d used to be, before everything went sideways, before they vanished again. Mostly just in bed. Maybe that was all he needed to know: if things weren’t going well out of it, he could just use his body to let Aiden know how much he meant to Matt. “It’s never enough,” Matt said. “Take these off.”

He helped Aiden squirm and kick the underwear away, even though it was difficult, because Matt didn’t want to move and Aiden didn’t seem to want him to, either. He still had one hand gripping Matt’s hair, like if he would let go, Matt might get up and vanish, too. As if he could ever fucking do that. Aiden was painfully hard in his hand now, even harder when he moved his free hand to Aiden’s throat. He didn’t grip or press, just let it rest there, watched Aiden struggling not to push himself up into that, too.

It was objectively kind of insane, how easy Aiden was.

“What else do you think about?” Aiden blinked rapidly, like he couldn’t control it, couldn’t focus on anything and was desperately trying to anyway. Matt moved his hand again so he could touch Aiden’s eyelashes with one hand, feel the feathery movement against his skin. Aiden didn’t flinch away, just lay still under Matt’s fingers, gentle against his eyelids, his cheekbone, the line of his jaw.

“Just—you. Everything about you. The way your voice cracks when you’re turned on. Your pretty eyelashes, the smell of your hair, the way you taste—”

Aiden tilted his head up, his stupid needy little way of asking for a kiss without having to say it. Matt couldn’t help but give him what he wanted, remembering as he leaned down and drowned in Aiden’s mouth all of the other times he’d kissed Aiden like this, hundreds of thousands of kisses over the years they’d been together. He still felt as insane, doing it, as he’d done the first time, like he couldn’t believe this was his life, that it was happening to him.

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