#
Before the start of his third NHL season, Elliot sort of adopts three newcomers.
They don’t move in with him and Adam, but they follow him around like ducklings during training camp. It’s not that surprising that one of them is Evan Samuels, because he remembers Elliot from when he was visiting Blake a few summers ago. It’s weird at first, to have him around, this kid who looks so much like Blake but couldn’t be any more different if he tried. He talks more, smiles more, and is generally more inclined to share information than Blake has ever been. William Isaksson, their new Swedish kid, seems to start following Evan around, and then Andreas Wagner, their new German kid, joins the New Kid Club as well.
Elliot doesn’t even notice at first, he tries to help them out, finds them places to stay, calls the bank for Andreas, because he’s scared that his English isn’t good enough, helps William with his driver’s license, gives them pointers on how to navigate the city, which places to avoid, where to go for dinner. It’s all stuff that other people did for him when he first came to New York.
He literally went through all of that, minus the language barrier, so it makes sense that he passes on what he knows.
He sits with them during lunch, because he remembers being at a total loss, not knowing where to sit, who to talk to. He’ll leave the pranking and chirping to the other guys. He doesn’t really mind that those three are basically glued to him and look at him wide-eyed when he talks about last season’s playoffs.
They got closer to the Cup than the Ravens have been in the last seven years. They didn’t make it past the first round, but the media called it a miracle. Elliot would have rather called it hard fucking work.
Elliot likes the kids. Probably because he’s a kid, too, barely older than the three of them. Evan is the youngest, Andreas almost a year older than him, and William has already played a season with the Sailors’ farm team out West and got traded to New York during the summer. William talks about Blake MacDonald, the Sailors’ Hockey Jesus, all the time and every time Elliot hears his name he thinks about his Blake, except he’s not really his Blake, not anymore. Evan doesn’t usually mention his brother and Elliot can’t decide if he’s grateful or if it’s driving him nuts.
Evan mostly talks about other players he admires and William joins in, hearts in his eyes, and Elliot can see the beginning of a wonderful friendship there. Andreas often sits next to them and looks lost because William’s English is so good that he almost talks faster than Evan and uses words that Elliot doesn’t know the meaning of, but they usually slow down quickly when they notice that Andreas isn’t following.
Their captain finds Elliot before their first preseason game and gives him a pat on the back. “Good job with the kids, Moo,” Jacob says.
“I was just trying to help,” Elliot says.
“Yeah, that’s what I’m saying,” Jacob replies and hands him a jersey. “Good job with the kids.”
Elliot frowns down at the jersey, because he does have one hanging in his stall, except, when he looks at it, he notices that this one has an A on it. “I…”
“Chris, TJ and I talked about it and we talked to the coaching staff and we agreed that you deserve it,” Jacob says, so thankfully Elliot is saved from the embarrassment of being totally speechless. “So we’ll have three alternates and you guys are gonna rotate. Sound good?”
“Thank you,” Elliot says.
“Put it on, eh?”
Elliot nods and pulls it over his head and the rest of the evening is full of pats on the back and hugs and his three little ducklings are looking at him with stars in their eyes, congratulating him like he signed a 10-million-dollar contract and won the Cup at the same time. They win the game 6-1, and when Elliot falls into bed that night he still has a smile on his face.
He’s almost asleep when his phone buzzes on his nightstand. It’s been buzzing all evening with people congratulating him on that A on his jersey – apparently the news spread quickly. He didn’t even have a chance to tell his parents, they somehow already knew, must have read it on Twitter or maybe his mom was googling his name again. Elliot’s mom follows hockey news like it’s world politics and her life depends on it.
Elliot isn’t sure why he decides to open his eyes and reach out to grab his phone instead of going to sleep and answering that text tomorrow.
When he sees who it’s from his heart betrays him before his brain even has a chance to catch up, fluttering in his chest, ruining the most excellent day he’s been having. It’s a text from Blake – saw you were wearing the A tonight, congrats!
Elliot thanks him and the next time his phone buzzes he doesn’t pick it up again.
#
Blake’s third year in the NHL begins with a blur of a preseason.
He ends up on the same ice as Elliot during the second game, tries not let it throw him off and wins them the game with only one goal sneaking past him. Elliot seems to be distraught because he didn’t get to score on him and Blake almost expects a text after the game, and is only a little disappointed when he doesn’t get one.
They don’t talk during warmups. They don’t talk during the game, not that there’s a lot of time for more than a quick hello. Blake considers going to the visitors’ locker room, but then realizes that he doesn’t have more than a hello in him anyway.
He gets sent back
