Page 5 of The Poster Boy
Do you need a Paracetamol?
A what?
Camden
It’s like Tylenol, but British
British Tylenol won’t touch my pain
Brayden
Oh, hey. Heard you’re getting a new player.
Yeah, the news is probably everywhere by now
Connor
Oooh, hockey gossip. Please dish. Who are you getting?
Brayden
Marek Myers. Cute as hell goalie, the poster boy for young gay athletes.
Camden
Wait. I think I heard about that. Wasn’t he outed by some celebrity guy?
Brayden
Yeah. It was a whole thing. But the kid has potential if he keeps his focus.
Seeing Brayden call Myers a kid was hilarious considering there was only a couple years difference in their ages.
“Brooksie Wooksie, put the phone away.” Boone reached for my phone, but I turned to keep it away from him. “You’re supposed to be socializing. It’s good for you.”
“Aw, Boone, leave him alone. We all know Jay has like a ten-minute social battery.” Church shot me a sympathetic smile, but gratitude twinkled in his eyes. Being a goalie was a big mental game. I’d never met a goalie that didn’t put immense pressure on themselves. And sometimes that pressure got to them, which was what Church was going through at the moment. The worse he did, the more pressure he felt, the more his performance suffered. It was a vicious circle.
“Maybe a little healthy competition will get you back on track,” Boone said, nudging a plate of nachos toward Church. “The kid is good, but you’re better.”
“I used to be better.” Church reached for a nacho but stopped when he saw the way Boone was staring him down. “What?”
“Negative self-talk will earn you a titty-twister. I swear I’ll do it.” Apparently the morale puppy had teeth.
“I’d listen to him if I were you. Boone has an iron grip. I still have nightmares from the last titty twister he gave me.”
I cut my gaze over to Boone. “Don’t look so proud of yourself. Smug doesn’t suit you.”
He shrugged. “Everything suits me. I have one of those faces.”
“The kind only a mother could love?”
Church’s quip earned a gasp from Boone, but a smile from me. For now, things were good. But I knew everything would change when Myers hit the ice with us.
Chapter 3
Marek
Ithanked my lucky stars that I wasn’t a rookie and wouldn’t be automatically housed with a seasoned player but allowed to live alone. As it was, the move took me by surprise, and I wasn’t sure how well I was adjusting. The biggest change was that Kelsey wouldn’t be moving with me. She had a job she loved and had settled into her life, which apparently included a girlfriend now. I didn’t want her to give that up for me, not after she’d given up so many other things. She’d more than made room for me in her life when I turned up on her doorstep with my gear bag.
