Holly stuck her hand out, and they shook on it. “Deal.”
“Mr. Zeiger?”
Robbie tucked the phone between his shoulder and his ear and slammed the garage door closed with his hip, all while juggling the groceries. “Speaking.”
“Hi, Mr. Zeiger. This is Holly Finch withDance Your Ice Off.”
Robbie kicked off his sandals and waddled to the kitchen table to deposit the bags. “Ms. Finch, hi. What can I do for you?” He hoped the schedule hadn’t changed for next week. He’d already done all the meal planning and bought the groceries and—
“—an accident, and isn’t available to skate as your partner.”
Wait, shit, was he getting fired because his pairs partner got hurt? Sawyer would be devastated. “Okay,” he said slowly. “So…?”
“The thing is, we have another skater available to pair you with. But I wanted to call and check with you to see if you’d be okay with that first, since I’d be putting you with our choreographer, Finn.”
Huh. “Oh,” Robbie said.
He took a minute to work through how he felt about that.
Robbie never came out publicly while he was playing, although some of his former teammates knew he was bi. He’d never dated a man, though he’d had sex with a few. He was old, he liked women too, and it had never seemed worth the hassle.
Now that he was retired and increasingly solo-raising a queer kid, his priorities had shifted. He didn’t have to come out just to be a guy’s partner on a dumb reality show. But if he changed his mind about being on the show because of that, what kind of example was he setting for Sawyer? Plus he’d be letting his charity down.
“I mean, sorry. I spaced out for a second there. Yeah, that’s fine.” He paused. “Do I, like, need to come in and meet this guy?” He and Stef had already met once last month, to ensure they’d get along.
“That would be ideal, but filming starts in two days and Finn’s schedule is busy. I don’t suppose you’re free later this afternoon?”
Robbie groaned. “Sorry—my afternoon is fully booked, appointments for my kid that can’t be rescheduled.” He had a check-in scheduled at Sawyer’s school to go over his progress and integration, and then, because of course it worked out that way, they were off to the orthodontist to find out how much more the kid’s smile was going to cost. “What about tomorrow?”
Ms. Finch grunted down the line.
“So, I guess we’re meeting the day after?”
“Meeting the first day of filming is not ideal, but needs must, I guess.”
She checked that Robbie had received his instructions for filming and when and where to show up, then wished him a good day and hung up.
So he was going to be one half of a same-sex ice-dancing duo on national television. Somehow he didn’t think that this was the unlearning of toxic masculinity and subversion of gender roles that Sawyer had in mind when he signed Robbie up for this nonsense. He wanted Robbie to “be himself,” but specifically the version of himself he’d been on his not-so-anonymous Twitter account a decade ago. It had been a friends-and-family handle originally, but after a while, as Robbie interacted with teammates and opponents and forgot to protect his anonymity, the fans discovered it. Robbie had accidentally cultivated a persona prone to sass, silliness, and teasing of other players that walked up to the line of flirtation and winked at it.
Even though he was mostly joking, it had felt a little transgressive. Sawyer would’ve said “there’s lots to unpack there,” because Sawyer was a little asshole who never let Robbie keep things in their neat little boxes.
Anyway. Ice dancing with a man was a whole other level. It would piss off conservatives, which basically made it an automatic win.
Robbie shook his head, pocketed his phone, and put away the groceries. He had things to do and places to be.
At the school, Robbie talked with Sawyer’s teachers and the counsellor about how he was settling in. Under the advice of his therapist, he had changed schools for a fresh start and to be with his best friend, Imogen. Thank God Robbie had been able to file most of that paperwork and the school didn’t ask for court orders for Robbie to list himself as a secondary contact. Ithad been a busy year for everyone, and the staff worked hard to support Sawyer and look out for him. They’d even scrubbed his deadname from the records before Robbie could figure out how to file the paperwork for a legal name change.
So Robbie happily went to the school for meetings as often as the counsellor wanted.
With supremely ironic timing, Vince texted Robbie while he sat in his car in the school parking lot, waiting for Sawyer.
Can you take the kid this weekend?
Robbie blinked at his phone. At this point, Sawyer was all but living with him full-time. It was safer to assume he’d be at Robbie’s on the weekend than at his dad’s.
He’s here most weekends. Robbie knew Vince was absent lately, but he was pretty sure Vince knew that.
Right right but just… have him sleep over?
