Page 14 of Unlovable Player

I head back to my apartment and order a huge pizza for myself before flipping through the sport’s channels I had installed the day I moved in. I stream the highlights of the game on ESPN+ and rewind my goal and watch it a few more times while I shovel peperoni pizza into my mouth. The third time, I pause on Austin’s face as he looks up on his breakaway and realizes he’s screwed. The camera doesn’t show his reaction when he realizes I’m his only option, but I can imagine how he felt, knowing he had no choice but to pass the puck to me. Give me the glory. I imagine he’d rather give it to anyone else on the planet but me.

In that moment, before he sees me, I can imagine the pure adrenaline in his eyes, and can just about make out a blush of exertion on his cheeks. Now I know what his messy hair looks like out of his helmet and game day product, I can appreciate that too.

I rewind a couple of seconds and watch Austin’s breakaway again, pausing on his face when the camera zooms in on him after the goal. Remembering the first thought that came to mind when I saw him practicing alone. The similarities between a good hockey sweat and a post-sex glow. My cock twitches in response and I press the heel of my hand against my crotch as I stare at the face on the screen. But then I remember where he probably is right now. Celebrating with the team, without me. And why I left Yale in disgrace, and, fuck that.

I turn the game off and the PS5 on, distracting myself until I’m too tired to keep my eyes open.

I wakeup on the couch still in my post-game clothes. The screen is paused on the loading screen ofFarming Simulator, the alarm on my phone buzzing in my ear.

If I’m late to practise, Captain Donoghue will never let me forget it, so I spray some deodorant and leave the apartment in the clothes I fell asleep in.

It looks like the whole team is already there by the time I arrive. Captain gives me the side-eye as I throw my bag into my cubby and start changing into a fresh jersey.I might be crazy, but does that side-eye hold slightly less ire today?

Once we get out onto the ice, I’m less concerned about what individual teammates think of me and I’m just anxious to get out there and blend into the team.

Coach instructs us to grab a puck and focus on some skills he thinks need work before our game against UConn later. After working on some individual drills, practising cutting back with the puck and focusing on speed and possession, Coach splits us up into groups of three. I expect him to put me in the fourth line with the freshmen and the benchwarmers, but he teams me up with Donoghue and Gray. I’m not the only one who’s placed with linemates they don’t usually play with, but Coach assures us it’s just a practise drill.

“It doesn’t matter who you’re with,” he says. “We all need to work as a team. We’ll switch it out after a few goes through.”

Coach puts some cones down on center ice and has us get into position while the skills coach demonstrates what he wants us to do.

I listen to the instructions, but I’m looking at Donoghue. The cage on his helmet barely hides the annoyance on his face, but behind that, I think I see something else. He’s focusing like his life depends on this drill. Like if he gets one thing wrong, the world is going to fall apart.

Coach blows his whistle and we snap into action.

Pass, drop, hold…I do as Coach instructed, Captain passing me the puck while I skate around the cones. Of course he drops the puck perfectly onto my stick every time, and I find myself eager to get it back to him with just as much precision. Am I really trying to impress this guy? I think it’ll take more than a few perfect passes in practise to do that.

We transition into our three-way pass drills, and by the time practise is over, I’m exhausted and sweaty as hell. It doesn’t help that I didn’t have time to shower this morning.

I head into the showers as fast as I can, stripping before most of the other guys can even get their pads off.

“Why are you so desperate to get your clothes off Yale?” It’s the guy who’s place I took in the first line today - regardless of what Coach said.

“Why you looking Hayes?” I ask.

A few of the guys whoop and someone slaps Hayes on the back.

“That’s enough.” Donoghue doesn’t raise his voice exactly, like Coach, he doesn’t have to. It carries and the guys pay attention. “We don’t need that shit in this locker room.”

“Sorry Captain.” Hayes is a little younger than Donoghue, but I don’t think it’s only the age difference that makes him defer to his captain so absolutely.

I only realize I forgot my body wash when I look for it in my wash bag in the shower.

“Fuck.”

“What?” Donoghue has a hint of impatience, a little lingering hardness he seems to save only for me, but he’s the captain, and it’s his duty to make sure I didn’t break a toe or something.

"Nothing, just forgot my body wash."

"Here.”

He holds a bottle ofNivea for Menout to me and I take it before he changes his mind. As soon as I pop the top, a smell wafts out that would make my dick twitch if I wasn’t standing in a shower room full of guys who can barely stand me. All of them just waiting to catch me popping a boner over them.

I wash quickly and hand the body wash back to Donoghue before rushing out of the showers. That smell was him. Whenever I checked him into the boards in a game against Yale. When he tossed me a practise jersey that first day. His skin, his…fuck. Stop it.

The gameagainst UConn is a shit show in the first period. UConn’s captain has been on his A-game from the opening puck drop. They break through five minutes in, but Olivetti blocks the opposing captain’s shot and Donoghue collects the puck to convert the ensuing breakaway bid. He’s denied a goal by UConn’s defense and takes a pretty nasty, but legal, check into the boards. He looks dazed as he skates back out to center ice for the next face-off, and when Coach tells me to take it, I think steam is going to start coming out of his ears.

I win the face-off, because I’m a boss at being a sneaky dickhead about it and no one ever knows which way I’m going to go. That, and I signaled to Gray beforehand, so he was ready behind me to collect the puck when I charged UConn’s captain a half a second before it dropped.

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