Coach lifts one of his scarred eyebrows. “You don’t know if we have what it takes?”
Landon stiffens beside me, like I just poked a bear. I know I didn’t, so I smile at the coach. “You have Conner, and he wants it more than anyone, plus he’s the best Garrison of our generation, so yeah, you’ve got what it takes.”
Coach looks pleasantly surprised by the easy compliment I throw out about Con. I love my cousin. I’ve watched him go through some huge self-confidence droughts, but I always believed in him. “I know Landon, and I will do our best to fit seamlessly into the team.”
“Casco, I’m starting you off on the second line,” Coach says, glancing down at a paper with chicken scratch all over it and what looks like a couple of sketched-out hockey plays. “With Brower and Schmidt. And Garrison, I’ll be starting you on Tuesday. But, well, right now we’ve got a bit of a dilemma.”
“Because you traded for Tyson Michaels, and he was a starter for Vegas.” I finish his thought for him, and he looks relieved he doesn’t have to spell it out.
“He felt he was a starter, yeah. It didn’t look that clear-cut to me, and that Hudson kid outperformed him last season,” Coach says frankly. “I’m not talking smack. I intend to tell him the same thing. I’m not set on the definitive starter. I need you guys to win me over in pre-season.”
“I can do that.”
Our eyes meet, and he gives me a small smile before he stands up. “Let’s go introduce you all to the boys.”
Landon stands after the coach is already halfway to the door. It’s like he forgot he was part of this equation and was just watching us like a Netflix documentary. Coach doesn’t seem to notice, but I give Landon a quick what the fuck stare, and he shoots back an oops shrug.
Coach leads us across the hall, through the gym, and into the locker room, where the guys are in various stages of suiting up for some on-ice practice. Everyone looks up as soon as Coach walks in, and the banter immediately dissipates. I can’t help but notice, as he stands shoulder to shoulder with me, slightly behind the coach, that Landon looks a little bit like a deer in headlights. His blue eyes are wide. His cheeks are a little pinker than usual.
He’s not used to this. He’s never been traded.
I’m instantly flooded with the memories of my very first trade and how awkward and alone and bone-shakingly nervous I felt. I was twenty. I’d only been with my first team for two years. Landon has been with the Quake for ten. I can see how those emotions might be even more amplified. I want to reach out and squeeze his hand, which is entirely inappropriate and probably not what he would want, so instead I speak first after the coach introduces us. “Hey, guys. Happy to be home,” I say. “Landon and I are excited for the season.”
“Bring that Cup juju,” someone calls out, and the room rumbles in agreement.
“And Casco, bring that killer forecheck,” Conner says, and there are more grunts of approval. His gaze moves to me. “And you be the giant ginger wall you’ve been since we were kids.”
“Ah, the Garrison mafia,” someone says, and there are some chuckles, but something about the way it’s said sits weird in my stomach, like a pebble. I scan the room, and the only guy not smiling is Tyson Michaels. For now.
He locks eyes with me for a millisecond before turning his head down to concentrate on tugging on his skate laces. But in that half second, there is no denying the chill in his steely gray eyes. Dude must have already gotten the talk from Coach and knows he’s gonna have to fight me for starter rights. He looks like he’s already started.
Coach goes on about what we’ll be doing on the ice this practice, and then tells Landon and me to suit up. Landon’s spot is right next to Conner, and I’m directly across the rectangular room from him, next to Michaels, of course. They’ve managed to get our name plates up already, which is great. I’ve had teams take weeks to put our plates up, and there’s something really depressing about seeing your name scrawled on masking tape over the last guy’s name while you’re trying to prove yourself on a new team. Landon really wouldn’t need that feeling on top of everything else.
Practice goes smoothly. Everyone, except Tyson Michaels, is friendly and relaxed with us, and it almost feels like we’ve already been here months. It’s a pleasant surprise, except for the Tyson part, but I’ll work on him. I’m used to ruffling feathers. Goalies are notoriously temperamental and competitive. Where forwards are fighting for twelve spots on a team and defensemen are fighting for six, we’re fighting for two. And players may be fighting for their line position, either the first, second, third, or the dreaded fourth line, which sees the least amount of ice time, but goalies who are second don’t see the ice much—if at all.
As the team strips down and heads to the bikes for cool down and then into the showers, Landon disappears for a bit. He reappears just as I’m midway through my shower and steps into the stall beside me. The Riptide practice arena is brand new, and the shower room has pony walls between the shower heads, which isn’t common. We’re usually in one big open room. Landon drops his towel onto the pony wall and reaches for the tap. I let my eyes slide down his smooth, defined chest and abs quickly. Subtly. I still feel guilt for doing it, though, and thankfully, the pony wall keeps my eyes from slipping lower than his belly button. I turn from him, facing outward, and rinse the conditioner from my hair. “Where’d ya go?”
“The team doctor wanted a quick chat,” he says as he dips his head into the water stream and scrubs his face with his left palm. He looks stressed.
“All good?”
He pumps some soap into his hand from the wall dispensers, which, unlike juniors' or high school showers, have fancy soap in them. The Riptide went with something that smells like sandalwood. “Yeah. He went over my latest bloodwork, and he thinks it’s great. Everything is great. He’s in awe that I’m doing so great. Most people don’t bounce back to a professional athlete's level of conditioning after surviving my type of leukemia.”
“So he kinda just wanted to get some one-on-one time with the circus freak?”
Landon’s head snaps up and turns to me, his eye locking with mine. I grin and wink. He blinks and chuffs out a laugh after a long second. “Fuck off, Grady.”
I turn off the water and reach over the pony wall and palm the top of his head, giving him a gentle shove and ruffling his damp hair at the same time. He reaches up and swats my hand away. “Now, now, don’t get pissy. It’s not just the bearded lady that’s a circus freak. The strong man is too.”
“The giant ginger who can somehow contort his overgrown body into positions a gymnast would envy doesn’t get to call me the freak,” Landon quips back.
I grab my towel and wrap it around my waist, letting the first retort that comes to mind fly out of my mouth uncensored. “If you think I’m flexible on the ice, you should see what my body can do off of it.”
Oops.
But Landon doesn’t panic or freeze. He lathers the body wash under his pits, turns to look at me over his shoulder, and blurts out, “Well, flexibility and creativity are probably key in some of the situations you’ve been in.”
I feel my heart trip. He’s talking about the threesome I mentioned. It’s still at the top of his brain. Our eyes meet, and I swear to Christ, something electric shoots between us. I force my feet to move toward the locker room.
