Nothing is going to change, really. Maybe, in a year or two, he can find himself his own apartment, but for now he’ll be Adam’s roommate. Adam almost looked relieved when Elliot asked if he could stay in his room for another year. “For sure,” Adam said, “We kinda need each other to keep each other alive, you know?”
He has a point there, because one of the two of them always remembers that they should maybe buy some food, and it works really well for them. They’re both still alive.
Elliot spends some time in Toronto with his parents after the end of the season, then he goes to Sweden with Adam for Magnus’s wedding. They stay for two weeks and then head back to the city together. Adam has a trainer in New York that he really likes, so Elliot sticks around to train with him and a few of the other guys this summer.
He likes the city. He lets Adam drag him along to baseball games, they try new restaurants, they hang out at the park and elbow each other when they see a dog.
They find their new favorite takeout place that summer, down the street from their apartment. They have the best dumplings in the world and Elliot goes way too often, especially when Adam is out with his girlfriend and Elliot isn’t in the mood to cook.
It’s where he meets Natalie. She’s a college student, pre-law, works in the café across the street a few times a week, and is also weak for dumplings apparently. They start talking while they wait for their orders and then end up eating together at one of the tiny tables by the window instead of taking their food home.
Natalie has never been to a hockey game, but has heard about the Ravens. Her college friend’s dad works for the Comets down in North Carolina. She likes basketball, but isn’t tall enough to play professionally and has a black cat called Vader that lives with her parents and she shows him pictures and he offers to buy her dessert because he doesn’t want to stop talking to her yet.
“I know a place,” she says and they walk five minutes to a bakery that Elliot has never seen before, even though he’s lived here for three years. They get cupcakes and coffee and they talk until the place closes, after they’ve also tried the brownies and the red velvet cake.
Elliot is gonna have to watch it for the rest of the week, but it was worth it.
He walks her to the Subway after and she thanks him and he says, “Can I give you my number?”
He’s new at this, except for the few dates that his teammates set him up on, one disaster after the other, and maybe he should have asked for her number instead, but she only laughs and hands him her phone. Elliot is almost surprised when she doesn’t say no, is pretty sure that he made a complete ass of himself. He talked about hockey way too much, even though she told him that she didn’t know much about it and then he got distracted by two dogs on the way to the Subway while she was talking. When he puts his number in her phone, he gets the numbers mixed up twice, his face going red when he finally hands back the phone after what seemed like an eternity.
Natalie has dimples when she smiles at him. “I’ll call you,” she says.
“Looking forward to it,” Elliot replies.
As he turns to walk back home, he realizes that he actually meant it, that it wasn’t just something he said to be polite, like he usually does. He genuinely wants to spend more time with her, get to know her, hear more about that murderous cat of hers.
Even now that the streets are dipped in a bright orange glow, the summer heat still clinging to the city streets, the air heavy and thick, Elliot feels light.
Chapter Four
Blake gets an invitation to Brammer’s house on Long Island for an end of summer party before they have to report for training camp, so Blake leaves his grandma’s house in Connecticut a few days earlier than planned, kisses her goodbye and pretends that he doesn’t notice all the food she’s sneaking into his bags as he gets ready to go. Evan has already taken off, only spent two weeks at home around the time when Blake had his day with the Cup.
The drive down to Long Island isn’t terrible, so Blake gets to Brammer’s house about an hour earlier than planned, but Brammer waves him off when he apologizes and pulls him into the house, which is already full of people.
Most of them are Knights, some are their girlfriends, some of them Blake has never seen before. When Brammer introduces one of the strangers as Noah Andersson, Blake realizes that he probably does know most of them and doesn’t recognize them without their gear on.
Noah Andersson plays defense for the Brooklyn Mariners. He got drafted the same year as Blake. And Elliot. They weren’t really friends or anything, but as far as Blake knows, no one’s ever uttered a single bad word about Noah. Blake doesn’t particularly like the way he plays, but he doesn’t particularly like the way anyone on an opposing team plays when they’re putting pucks into his net.
“Almost didn’t recognize you
