I wondered if he’d felt even a fraction of what I’d felt in that moment, or if I was living in a fantasy world where hockey players could be gay and fall in love with each other.
Afternoon came. One o’clock, then one thirty, then two. Étienne usually got home by noon after practice. Even when he had to stick around for training or treatment, he was rarely this late.
He was avoiding coming home. Avoiding me.
The realization hurt more than it should have.
At two thirty, I heard his Jeep pull up to the curb. The front door opened, and he came in, still in his post-practice sweats, looking exhausted.
“Hey,” he said, not quite meeting my eyes.
“Hey.”
He set his bag down by the door, ran his hand through his hair. “Sorry I’m late. Got caught up with… stuff.”
“It’s fine.”
Silence stretched between us, heavy and awkward. This wasn’t us. We didn’t do awkward silences. We’d always been able to talk about anything.
Except this, apparently.
“You eat lunch?” he asked finally.
“Not yet.”
“I’ll make something.”
He disappeared into the kitchen, and I listened to him moving around. Opening cabinets, running water, the clink of dishes.
Normal sounds. Domestic sounds. The kind of sounds we’d fallen into over weeks of living together.
But nothing felt normal anymore.
He brought out sandwiches twenty minutes later and settled on the other leg of the sectional.
We ate in silence for a few minutes before I couldn’t take it anymore.
“About yesterday?—”
“It’s fine,” he said quickly. Too quickly. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Étienne—”
“I was just trying to help you up, and we got too close. That’s all.” He wasn’t looking at me, his eyes fixed on his plate. “Nothing to make a big deal about.”
The dismissal shouldn’t have stung as much as it did. I’d known he’d pull back, known he’d want to pretend it hadn’t happened.
But hearing him say it—hearing him reduce that moment to nothing—made my gut tighten.
“Right,” I managed. “Yeah. No big deal.”
“Good.” He stood, gathering plates even though we’d barely finished eating. “I’m going to head upstairs. Do some laundry. It’s been piling up and I—yeah.” His eyes stayed fixed on the dishes in his hands, carefully avoiding mine.
The laundry excuse was paper thin, and we both knew it.
But I didn’t call him on it. Just watched him carry theplates to the kitchen, shoulders tight, moving like he couldn’t get away fast enough. “Okay.”
He slid the plates into the dishwasher. “Need anything?”
