Page 30 of The Poster Boy
“I never hated him. He annoys me, that’s all.”
How did we end up talking about Myers anyway? Why would Boone bring him up? Did he know something? I scrutinized his expression and rolled his words over in my head looking for any tell that he’d figured out Myers and I had fucked. But there was no possible way for him to know that.
“Seriously, Jay. Massage therapy is in your future.” Boone moaned a little when I worked my way up his ankle.
Life after hockey was a daunting prospect. It was something every player had to think about eventually. But if luck was on my side, I’d have a few good years left. I doubted I could hit ten more years, but I knew I had a solid five in me. Maybe seven. I lived frugally, investing a lot of my money so I could theoretically never work again once I was out of the league.
I couldn’t see myself being a massage therapist, though. It was likely that Boone was pulling my leg anyway. It could be hard to tell when he was being serious or just seriously annoying.
He let out a groan and pulled his feet back. Putting them on the floor, he stood and stretched. “I’m going to bed.”
He ruffled my hair on the way by. “Don’t stay up too late. You need your beauty sleep.”
“I’m already beautiful.”
“Your attitude needs its beauty sleep then.”
“Fair enough.”
Boone laughed all the way to his room and shut the door.
Without anyone to keep my mind off shit, I automatically thought about Myers again. Fucking asshole had haunted my thoughts since that night in the hotel. I shouldn’t have let him in. Should have let him think I’d been pranking him. But I wasn’t that kind of an asshole.
The only time I wasn’t thinking about Myers, or trying not to think about him, was when I was sleeping. I turned the tv off and headed to the other side of the apartment where my bedroom was. The condo was laid out with abedroom and a bathroom on each side of the unit and the shared living area in between.
The other problem I’d been having ever since the hookup with Myers was that it had reawakened my sex drive. Before, I’d been happy to have a lazy jerk session in the shower or before bed. It wasn’t a big deal that I’d go months without sex. Now, all I could think about was the way Myers felt pressed against me. The way his cock filled my ass, stretched me open. The grip he’d had on my hips and the way I still regretted letting him leave without a round two.
Not like he’d have wanted that. He’d lit out of there before the cum on my leg had a chance to dry. I hadn’t given him a reason to want to stay. Fucking a teammate was a bad idea, regardless of how well he’d sold it to me. He was there. I was there. Once he found out that I hadn’t been joking, he’d zeroed in on me, and I’d been dumb enough, desperate enough, to get into bed with him.
If only he’d have sucked, then I might not crawl into bed every night and reach for my lube. I might not fuck my fist while I thought of him and what it would be like if we’d have taken our time together, rather than fucking and fleeing as fast as possible.
It was what it was, I told myself as I yet again reached for the lube.
The last thing I needed was Marek fucking Myers.
Chapter 15
Marek
To-do lists had never worked for me. The only thing they managed to do was pile up around the house. In my pockets. In my phone. The only thing that worked for me was staying medicated, and then of course there was the panic mode setting where everything that needed to be done ten minutes ago finally kicked my ass into gear.
The fact that Church had dug himself out of his slump and was hot shit right now was the only thing that saved my ass. I’d been a mess in practice all week. Training had been agony. Everywhere I looked, Jay was there, ignoring me as usual. I didn’t expect a marriage proposal or anything, but having him glance my way once or twice would have been nice.
Rejection was a bitch. I hated the way it clawed at me. It wrapped its icy hands around my heart and squeezed until I couldn’t breathe. And that’s when I knew I had to get out of my apartment. The clutter was closing in on me, and I kept meaning to clean up, but I couldn’t get started for some reason.
That’s how I found myself across town at an outdoor rink. It was asphalt instead of ice, but that was fine by me. It didn’t take much to make me happy or to distract me from my wandering thoughts.
A group of local teens were playing when I sauntered up. At first, I was content to lean on the boards and watch the action. It wasn’t that long ago when I was a teenager, but it had been a hell of a long time since I felt any kind of freedom like the kind these kids must be feeling.
The minute I figured out I was gay, I’d known that shit was going to get hard for me. It was a fact of life, especially when you were in a sport. Gay athletes had always existed, but the world at large liked to pretend we didn’t. That’s why being out had been such a big deal. I still hated how it happened, but the bright spot in all the attention was that for every athlete that came out, it paved the way for others to come out and live their truth. That’s the kind of thing I told myself on days like today when everything seemed harder than it had to be. When the weight of my decisions dragged me down. When nothing I did seemed good enough for anyone.
I was deep in mid-pity party when one of the teens stopped dead in his tracks and did a double take. “Hey, holy shit. You’re Marek Myers.”
The game stopped then as everyone swarmed the boards.
“Are you really Marek Myers?”
“Can you sign my shirt?”
