“It’s hard,” Blake says.
“I know.”
Blake puts down his takeout container. “Well, I guess you know now.”
Noah’s grin is blinding. He nudges Blake’s ankle with his foot and says, “Guess I do. I’m, like, your gay buddy, Noah.”
Blake shakes his head at him.
“Well,” Noah says, “I guess Elliot knows, too.”
Right, Elliot knows, too.
“I mean,” Noah goes on when Blake doesn’t say anything, “I do suppose he noticed that you had your tongue down his throat and your hands on his ass? Or at least he did that one time I saw you guys together.”
Blake groans and throws a pillow in Noah’s direction. He misses and it slides off the bed.
“How did that even happen?” Noah says. “I mean, I almost didn’t figure out that I was gay, and, like, I never would have figured out that you are gay, so how did you…”
Well, Elliot told him, for starters. And then Blake told him, too. And then nothing happened for a while. And then one night, on the road, Elliot kissed him, in their room, after a game and Blake kissed him back and it was everything. For a month, maybe even two, it was just that, just kisses, and then suddenly it was more, and after that Blake didn’t know how to stop. Not that he had to, because Elliot clearly didn’t want to stop either.
Not until the Draft.
“It just happened,” Blake says.
“Got it, you don’t wanna talk about it.”
“There’s not really a lot to talk about.” Blake shrugs. “We weren’t together or anything. We were a thing… and then we weren’t.”
“He’s literally…” Noah waves in the vague direction of Manhattan.
“I know.”
“But?”
“But… that didn’t happen.”
“Well, his loss, I guess,” Noah says.
Blake doubts that it was that much of a loss for Elliot. He didn’t have any problems walking away from this.
Noah makes a face. “He really broke your fucking heart, huh?”
“No, it wasn’t like that.”
“Yeah, I can hear you saying that, but your face is like… in pain.”
“I’m not in pain,” Blake says gruffly.
He’s not.
“Sure.” Noah rolls onto his side, watching Blake. “Are you still in love with him? It’s okay if you are, I won’t be, like, offended or anything.”
“I wasn’t in love with him,” Blake mutters.
“Okay.”
Blake huffs at him.
“It’s okay to have feelings, you know?” Noah says. “Like, even if they’re… mushy, or whatever.”
“Mushy?”
“You know what I mean.”
“I really don’t.”
“I’m sorry,” Noah says.
Blake shrugs it off.
“No, not about the chirping,” Noah says. “I’m sorry that he hurt you. You’re a good guy and good guys don’t deserve that.”
Blake glares at the ceiling. “Can we talk about something else?”
“Sure,” Noah says. “You think Desjardins is gonna retire?”
Blake can deal with that extreme shift in topic, even though they’re technically talking about Elliot’s team. “I don’t know, he’s kinda young to hang up the skates, but…” Blake shrugs. Desjardins is turning 35 later this year and he obviously doesn’t know him, but they’ve all heard the rumors. That his recovery isn’t going as well as the Ravens were hoping, that he probably won’t ever get back to where he used to be. “They haven’t really said anything about him in a while, so…”
“Yeah, can’t help but wonder what’s going on behind closed doors there,” Noah says. “Sucks. I really liked him as, you know, a person.”
“Evan was scared of him, but, like… just because he grew up watching him and then he was suddenly on the same team as him and apparently he hung around the locker room a lot even when he was on IR.”
Noah laughs. “Wow, okay. I mean, I guess Desjardins is kinda intimidating with the beard and the scowl and everything, but, like, your brother grew up with you, so he should at least be used to the scowling.”
Blake hurls another pillow at him. Misses again.
“You’ll run out of pillows if you keep that up.”
“Ugh,” Blake says and flops down.
Noah considers him for a moment, then he gives him a poke. “Nap?” he asks.
“Yeah, sounds good.”
“Cool if I stay for a bit?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Noah still doesn’t cuddle, but it’s nice not to be alone.
#
“Dumplings?” Elliot asks when he picks up Natalie at the Subway.
She told him not to, said he really didn’t have to about five times, and he does it anyway, because he knows it’ll make her smile and the next season – his fifth, if you can believe it – is just around the corner. He’s not going to have too much time for stuff like this.
“Yay, dumplings,” Natalie says.
He wraps his arm around her and she tells him about what she’s working on for law school, the reading she has to do, and he tries really hard to follow, but some of it goes way over his head. He tries to ask questions, so it doesn’t seem like he completely clocked out and Natalie answers with enthusiasm. It’s the least he can do. She does the same for him when he’s overcome with the need to spew hockey stats for half an hour.
Elliot kisses the top of her head as they walk and she smiles as she talks and it’s all good. He made the right choice when he asked her to move in with him.
It’s not that Adam kicked him out, he just very quietly mentioned that he’s been thinking about asking Lou to move in with him, which was basically Elliot’s cue to vacate the premises. Permanently. Adam helped him move, into an apartment two blocks away, a place that Elliot can afford easily with his contract. Natalie insists on chipping
