With one last rep, Phil smirked to himself.
He’d been feeling old, what with the injury and the divorce.Washed-up, undesirable.It was nice to know someone still thought he wasn’t.
He wiped down the machine and closed out with some stretches in the free weight area, taking his time so Vanderbilt didn’t think he’d chased Phil off.He didn’t bother showering—the locker room showers didn’t have a chair for him.He hadn’t been on the ice anyway, so he wasn’t covered in the musty smell of ice-wet hockey gear, just regular post-workout sweat.Instead, he followed the long corridor down to Ben’s office.
Rapping on the door with two fingers, he leaned inside before getting an answer.Ben sat slumped in his massive desk chair, head leaned back and eyes closed.Was he getting enough sleep?The man had to be under enormous stress.Not only was all of hockey media waiting for him to perform some sort ofTed Lassomiracle on the Sea Lions—which he, for reasons Phil would hopefully know someday, didn’t want to attempt—now he had Charlie.
Speaking of which.
“We should get home.”
Ben looked up at him.“You look obscene.”
Phil raised his eyebrows.“Really?You see how many sweaty guys in gym shorts every day?”
“Yeah, well, not all of them…” Ben pursed his lips as if actively trying to keep the words inside.
Phil leaned against the doorframe, interested in the end of the sentence.Sadly, Ben shook his head, picked up his phone and keys, and stalked past him.His arm brushed Phil’s chest as he went, and Phil raised a hand to stop him right there.The breadth of Ben’s shoulders kept them both trapped in the doorway for a suspended second.They were so close together Ben could easily lean in and kiss Phil again.With the doorframe there to hold him up, Phil wouldn’t need his crutches.He could let Ben take whatever he wanted, let Ben touch the bare skin of his legs and run his hands up under Phil’s sweated-through workout shirt—
But Ben pulled himself away and kept walking, back ramrod straight.
Of course.
He didn’t want to touch Phil like this, sweat-soaked and gross.
He didn’t want to touch Phil at all.He’d just gotten confused last night by Phil being nice in a way he clearly hadn’t experienced enough in his life.
Which was fine.Phil’s life had enough complications at the moment.
They found Charlie exactly where they’d left him.He claimed not to be hungry for lunch, which was no surprise after the amount of chips he’d consumed, but Phil conned him into eating something healthy by setting out a plate of carrot and cucumber sticks while he heated up some leftovers for Ben and himself.No one could resist a crudité.
On the car ride home, Phil had read out his lawyer’s email, so Ben would know what he was getting himself into.
Now, over lunch, Ben asked Charlie, “Do you want me to apply for legal guardianship of you?”
Charlie looked up from slathering his carrot stick in ranch dressing.“Why are you asking me?”
Meeting his eyes steadily, Ben said, “Last night, you mentioned being an emancipated minor.If that’s what you want, I can help you.I’d prefer if you’d let me apply for legal guardianship, but it’s your decision.”
“What will I have to do?”
“Huh?”
“If you’re my guardian.What will I have to do?”
Phil looked to Ben, taken aback.Ben winced, but he seemed to know precisely what Charlie meant.
“Go to school.Try your best to do well at it if you want a shot at college.”
“That’s it?”Charlie eyed him suspiciously.
Hesitantly, Ben added, “This isn’t a must, but I want to take you to a doctor and maybe a psychologist.”
Instantly, Charlie drew in on himself.“They tried at home.They wanted to send me to some closed ward.It’s not gonna fix me.”
Phil looked down at his chicken and pasta.He felt nauseous.In between googling legal guardianship, he’d looked up what it meant to be transgender this morning.The number of times he’d seen the contact info for the suicide prevention hotline during his research made him want to never let Charlie out of his sight.
“I mean a real psychologist, not a Mormon one,” Ben said.“One who can get you prescriptions for hormones if you want.”
