given us a solid lead, but there was still plenty of hockey left to play. Plenty of opportunity for the team to fall apart and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, as Coach often grumbled. I didn’t need to have my own breakdown.
“Oh hey! Look at this!” Andersson’s voice pulled my focus away, and I turned to see him use his stick to scoop a pair of red lace panties off the ice. “You drop something, Kuznetsov?”
“I’ve been looking for those!” Kuznetsov laughed and plucked the panties off the stick. “Your mom left them at my house the other night.”
We all laughed, drowning out Andersson’s “that’s fucked up, man” retort. Kuznetsov tossed the panties at Andersson, landing them on his shoulder. Fans roared, and I looked up to see the Jumbotron capturing the whole thing.
“Nice job.” I high-fived him. “How about a few more of those?”
“Pfft.” Kuznetsov rolled his eyes. “How about you get it into the net for a change?”
“For a change? Fuck you—I’m the only one who scored at all the other night.”
“Uh-huh, and now it’s tonight, and you haven’t scored shit.” He tapped his stick against my skate. “There’s still time!”
As we waited for the hats to be cleared away, I caught my brother’s eye again, and something twisted in my stomach. He’d texted me to congratulate me after my last hat trick, but he had no idea what that night had set into motion. And tonight… Oh God. After this game, I was going to tell him.
Fuck.
I shook myself and broke eye contact with him. I could obsess over this later. For now, I needed to play hockey. Beat his team, then blow his mind.
I can do this.
The hockey part, and the coming out part.
Oh God…
I’d had my usual nerves on the ice tonight, but there was an added layer of jitteriness this time.
Normally, I could fixate on hockey and forget everything else except the pressure of the game. Channel that pressure into playing, bust my ass for my team, then spend half an hour or so pulling myself together after it was over. That was game night for me.
But that wasn’t so easy when the reason for my nerves had been on the ice with me, and it was worse when I couldn’t stop thinking about what I needed to tell him tonight.
My brother and I played against each other several times per season, and we always made a point of visiting when schedules allowed. Sometimes that meant we had time to grab lunch or dinner. Other times it was ten minutes with paper cups of arena coffee before one or both of us had to take off. The league kept players busy as hell when we were off the ice, so we took what we could get.
This time, we’d lucked out—his team was at home and had two days before they were on the road again, and mine wasn’t leaving until tomorrow. So, we’d planned to meet up at his place after tonight’s game. I’d crash in his guest room and meet my team at the airport in the morning.
And though I’d tried not to think about it throughout warm-ups and all three periods, even during Kuznetsov’s hat trick, I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it.
Should I tell him tonight? Am I even going to?
Am I going to come out or chicken out?
C’mon, dude. Focus. Hockey.
I didn’t usually get that queasy nervous feeling when I was meeting up with my brother. Other people, definitely, but Troy wasn’t “other people.”
Thanks to the bomb I was going to drop on him, though, I had that same intensely uncomfortable feeling I had during every single presser after every single game. Like there were microphones and cameras in my face and reporters crowded around me with no sense of comfort zones, and like everything I said was being scrutinized. After this many seasons, I should’ve been used to that—reporters were par for the course. Maybe this was as close to “used to it” as I’d ever get.
But I shouldn’t have felt this way walking into my brother’s house for drinks.
Maybe that told me everything I needed to know about what I wanted to say to him tonight. How he’d react. How he’d predict our parents would react. Fear was one thing. Having that fear confirmed by someone else was the worst.
Oblivious to me, my brother greeted me with a quick hug. As I took off my shoes, he said, “Roseanne and the girls just went