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“Leave him alone, Larkin. Cole’s hair is his whole brand. Without it…” he tsks and shakes his head again. “I’m afraid to think what he is without it.”
Cole points at Camden. “First of al, rude. Second of all, I have range.”
“Bold words from a man whose hairline is currently in hostage negotiations with his forehead,” I shoot back, pulling my hoodie off.
Cole turns to face me, running a hand through his perfectly styled blond hair. “You’re just jealous because your hair does whatever it wants. Mine has discipline.”
Easton walks past, already taped up and heading for the ice, but he pauses just long enough to say, “Don’t tell me you’re fighting about his hair.”
“This is very important, Cap,” I inform him. “Cole’s identity is at stake.”
“Get him on the ice,” he says to no one in particular, and keeps walking.
Camden suddenly clears his throat in that dramatic way he does before he tells one of his stories.
The whole room shifts a little. Even Kai glances up from whatever he’s reading. Camden settles onto the bench across from me, his gear creaking as he leans forward. He’s got that look in his eye that promises the inadvertent audience a good time.
“Did I ever tell you about the guy who used to play here? Three years ago. Good player. Solid guy. Everyone liked him.”
The whole room goes quiet, but I’m doing the math in my head. Jensen, I know, had been around three yeas ago, but he had washed out with a knee injury and never made it back to active roster.
Of course, Miller was the center back who had the unfortunate habit of showing up to team dinners with…
“Which guy?” Jordan asks.
“Doesn’t matter his name.” Camden shakes his head slowly, getting into the moment. “What matters is what happened to him.”
Cole has finally abandoned his hair crisis, turning to face Camden with genuine curiosity. Even Easton, who was halfway through the tunnel has stopped. I can tell by the way he’s looking at Camden that he has heard this story before. He knows what comes next.
“Guy got involved with someone on the staff’s family side,” Camden says, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “Didn’t think anyone would notice.”
He glances around the circle, his eyes lingering on each one of us before he adds, “It was the marketing assistant at the time, right? Sarah, the one with the ponytail who used to handle all the jersey launches? Total nightmare for the PR department, you know. Anyway, word is he started meeting her for those early morning coffee runs at the shop on the corner.”
“Nooo, that’s wrong,” Theo interjects, looking from Camden to Kai and then me. “It was Dutch’s niece. The one who interned for the social team last summer.”
Jordan snorts, tossing a roll of tape at Cole’s stall. “No, you idiot, it was the daughter of Brennan’s best friend. She’d been coming to his training sessions for a bit.”
“Hey! It doesn’t matter, all right?” Camden says, attempting to bring back our attention. “You simply can’t keep secrets in a building like this,” he gestures at the walls of the locker room and makes a ‘listening’ sign. Or at least, that’s what I think it is. “The walls have ears, my friend. And eyes.”
“Someone saw them in the lobby, or maybe it was an accidental text to the wrong group chat, I get it mixed up. Anyway, getting involved with a Brennan family connection is trespassing, plain and simple.” He slams a fist into an open palm to drive home the message.
“And Brennan? He doesn’t hold grudges. He just changes the roster. Three weeks later, the guy was playing in the ECHL, and the marketing office had a new vacancy. It was so clean and noiseless, it makes you wonder if it ever really happened at all.”
“But it did happen,” Camden taps his chest over his heart, his expression mock-solemn. “Or I am a tomato going to turn into a pumpkin at midnight.”
“You’re a tomato, anyway!” Jordan laughs, lobbing his size eleven Jordans at Camden who promptly dodges the missile.
Dmitri looks up from his phone for the first time. I’d just about forgotten he was in the room. He takes a slow, deliberate look around the room, then lands on me.
“This is a warning story,” he says.
Camden waves him off dismissively. “It’s just a story.”
“It’s a warning story being told to Wyatt specifically.”
The room goes very still. I can feel every pair of eyes land on me. Jordan. Cole. Easton. Theo. Even Camden looks a little caught out.
The silence stretches for one second. Two. Three. I don’t say anything. I just keep staring at my skate lace like it’s the most fascinating thing I’ve ever seen. I’m aware of my heartbeat in my throat.
