I climb into my car and start the engine. That’s when the team slowly starts trickling out of the door I just walked through. One or two at a time. Sometimes a small group of four or five. Because I can’t help myself, I wait until Hugo leaves.
As per usual, he’s walking out with Winslow. Also as per usual, Hugo has a big smile on his face. Even with it not directed at me, it still makes my stomach flutter and my chest tight. My longing for him is truly out of hand. I know that. Yet, here I am.
They don’t break apart as they usually do with Hugo going off with some random girl. There are girls hanging out. There always are. Instead, Hugo follows Winslow to his car. He waves and flirts with the girls, but he doesn’t invite one over this time.
It means nothing. Less than nothing. He owes me nothing. But I feel over the moon when he climbs into Winslow’s carwithouta girl. He’s hanging out with his best friend today. Not fucking some random puck bunny.
Not that I’m judging him. He’s allowed to fuck whoever he wants. Obviously. But the way it makes me nauseous… because I’m totally in love with this man. I’m a cliché gay guy crushing on a straight man. Why? Why do we do this to ourselves? Setting ourselves up for failure and heartbreak.
I watch Winslow pull out of the parking lot. It’s not like I wanted to fall for a man who I barely know, rarely exchange more than a greeting with, and who is fucking straight! But I was simply enchanted by Hugo from the moment I first saw him.
He was the first person outside of management who acknowledged me since I’d started with the Golden Tide franchise. And he’s always so nice to me. Nice to everyone, really. His smile is beautiful. His voice is swoony.
Then if I’m in a place where I’m going to allow myself to be superficial, he’s also gorgeous. I’m not even going to lie and pretend I haven’t noticed how he always wears gray sweatpants and never wears underwear, so what he’s packing is very well on display.
I’m totally a size queen. Like, that’s one of my few criteria when I’m looking to hook up. If I’m going to fuck some stranger, it better be worth it. Otherwise, I can find release all on my own, thank you.
I shift my car into drive and pull out. While I try not to glare at the stupid puck bunnies still lingering about as if there’s anyone else here interested in them, I’m not sure I succeed. Just to be clear—I don’t hate on women. Or anyone. Not even on the hookup culture. I get it. To some extent, I’m part of it.
It’s all just jealousy, knowing that they stand more of a chance with the man I’m totally in love with than I do. It irritates me that they’re likely only interested for superficial reasons. His job, his status, his wealth, his looks. His dick. Bragging rights to having hooked up withtheHugo Bladen.
None of that means anything to me. It’s Hugo himself that I’m enthralled with.
Okay, enough of this. I’m going to drive my hour commute and lock myself up in my pink apartment with Fish Hugo. I’ll log into Creature Community where I have Game Husband Hugo waiting for me in my online pink house within my village of walking, talking animals.
Maybe I’ll convince myself not to text Hugo right away. Maybe I’ll wait until he texts me first. It means he’s thinking of me. That he likes our conversations. Even when they’re just about fish!
Chapter Five
HUGO
Our first gameis against Las Vegas. We have the advantage of being at home, but Vegas is a really good team. And their goalie is crazy.
Which is something I never say out loud. Those are inside thoughts for sure. You can totally hurt someone’s feelings by saying things like that. But if you’ve ever looked into Azure Dayne’s eyes you know what I mean. He’s scary as fuck.
Thankfully, my job is to protect Winny and keep the puck away. While I do head to the other end, I generally remain close to the neutral zone. I try to keep the puck on their end as much as possible and I can do so better by remaining between the two blue lines than when I’m chasing the puck around the opposite goal.
I made the mistake of looking into Azure’s eyes once. Worse was that he met my gaze. It felt like someone walked over my grave and I could feel their footsteps from six feet under.
I’m sure he’s perfectly nice. He and Noah are good friends. Noah only has nice things to say about Azure. Once, I mentioned how I felt when looking at Azure and Noah got very upset. In hindsight, I understand it. I shouldn’t have been making judgements on people I don’t know and haven’t had a conversation with. Azure didn’t deserve my rudeness, even if he wasn’t there to hear it.
Still, I avoid Azure when at all possible. It’s not a consciousthing when getting close makes the hair on the back of your neck stand on end. I can’t help how I feel, but I can definitely keep the thoughts to myself.
As we spill onto the ice to deafening crowd applause, I take a breath of the icy air and smile. This is my peace. Which is ironic because it’s the very opposite of quiet, but it’s definitely a happy place.
I grab a puck on the way by and dribble it around a few laps. I’m not friends with anyone on the Vegas team so I don’t stop to chat like I do some other teams. I pass the puck to Atty, then he passes it to Noah as Miles passes his puck to me. For a few revolutions on the ice, we just pass or shoot into the empty net while our two goalies skate around for a minute.
When Winslow heads for the net, I move off to the side to stretch. On my hands and knees, I spread my legs and bounce my hips down to stretch all my muscles. When I was fifteen, I pulled a groin muscle from not properly stretching.
Let me tell you what. The way my dick and balls sometimes hurt when I moved in the wrong direction and a shock of pain originating from the pulled muscle went down my leg and into my bits? I’m a big advocate for proper stretching. That shit gave me nightmares.
While I stretch, I watch as Winny scuffs up the ice in front of his net. Back and forth. Back and forth. Four passes. Then he gathers the loose snow with his stick like he’s sweeping and moves it around to the side so it’s not in his way.
That’s usually my cue. I've done this position long enough. I can feel the stretch just fine. Now I bring one leg up and keep the other knee on the ice to stretch my groin again. You know, in a different way. Then I swap legs.
Most of my stretching is on my lower half when I get on the ice. I already did some more intense warmups out back before getting into my gear. But I enjoy using the ice too because it also forces me to always engage my core due to the lack of friction. It’s slippery, so to stretchjustfar enough without falling or hurting yourself is key.
When I’m certain I’m not going to hurt my dick—ha!—I get on my knees and use my stick as a balancing mechanism between myhands and twist back and forth to stretch my back a bit more. It’s usually at this point that I look up into the stands.
