“As you always do.” He chuckles as we say our goodbyes and hang up.
That was totally unexpected but made my day.
I holdup the mini mic. “Game day fit. Talk me through it.” Fish stops, adjusts his collar for the camera, and gives that grin. “New season, new look.” He starts listing everything he’s wearing by the brand he’s working for.
“Looking good, Big Fish!” Billie calls out from behind me. The girls erupt with laughter.
Fish stills. “What did she just call me?”
I watch his face, the confusion, the flicker of something underneath, and I think about yesterday, about the Reddit stuff, about the way his voice changed when he said he hated it. About a man who told me his most intimate moments are rated by strangers on the internet, and how it makes him feel like he’s not a real person.
“Ignore them, come with me,” I say, grabbing his arm and pulling him down the corridor away from the girls.
“What’s going on?” he asks, letting me drag him. “Why did she call me that? What’s a Big Fish?”
I stop when we’re far enough away that no one can hear us. “You’re Big Fish,” I tell him as I pull out my phone, find thecampaign photo of him in gray sweats, and hand it to him. “The athleisure photos from your campaign went live this morning.”
He looks at the screen, takes a second to process, and then his ears go red. It’s the same red from when I told him I’d read his Reddit reviews. It crawls up his neck.
“Um, well, that’s unfortunate.”
“It’s impressive.” The words slip out before I realize what I’ve said.
He tilts his head. “Is it now?”
Now it’s my turn to flush bright red. “I … um …”
He reaches out and slides a strand of hair behind my ear. “I like that my dick has made you flustered.” Shit. I look up into those strikingly blue eyes and feel goosebumps rise across my skin. “Thank you for telling me,” he says, switching gears on me.
“I had to.”
“Is it bad?” he asks quietly.
“The public reaction is good. I mean, between women and gay men racking up the views, it’s another viral sensation. The brand will be happy with the outcome.” I cringe telling him that.
“At my expense,” he says, barely a whisper.
“I’m so sorry.”
“You have nothing to apologize for.” The next thing I know, he cups my face, his thumb grazing my cheek, and then slowly sliding down my lips. I feel every touch of his skin against mine. My lips part on their own, those blue eyes locked on me. My body is ready to combust as I swallow hard. “Friends,” he says more to himself as he drops his hand. “Don’t worry about me, Lettie, I’ve got this.” And with that, he strides away from me.
What just happened?I stand in the corridor for a full minute after he disappears. My fingers touch my lips where his thumb was. What was that? That wasn’t banter. That wasn’t friendly. That was something else, and my body is still vibrating fromit. Friends. He said friends to himself, like it was a reminder. I shake it off and head back to the girls.
The game starts,and something is off. I notice it in the first period from my spot in the tunnel. Fish is half a second slow on every play. Not enough for a casual fan to catch, but enough for someone who has filmed his every shift for weeks. He’s missing reads. His passes are slightly behind his linemates. He overshoots a one-timer he would normally bury without thinking.
“Fish is quiet tonight. You think all the Big Fish stuff has got to him?” Marlowe says beside me.
“Probably,” I say. Right now, his body is on display on every phone in this arena. Every fan in this building with a phone has probably seen the gray sweatpants by now, and he knows it. He’s skating in front of eighteen thousand people who’ve all seen the outline of his cock and are calling him Big Fish, and he has to pretend that it doesn’t bother him because that’s what he does. He buries it. Plays the part. But the burial takes energy, and that energy isn’t going to the game. Evan gives him a look from the bench that could freeze water. Fish shakes his head like he’s trying to reset. Coach is pacing, arms folded. Pierre says something to him during a line change, Fish nods, but I can tell he’s not hearing it.
The second period is worse. He gets caught out of position twice, turns the puck over in the neutral zone, and Bouch covers for him on a play that should have been routine. Someone in the crowd yells, “Big Fish!” and even from the tunnel, I see his jaw tighten. This is what it costs him. The bravado, the playingit cool, and “The camera doesn’t lie” jokes. This is the price, and nobody sees it except maybe Evan, and now me.
In the third period, he finds something, maybe frustration, maybe pride. He wins a board battle, throws a hit that sends the other player into the glass, and sets up Bouch for a one-timer that hits the post. Close but not quite. The effort is there, but the precision isn’t, and for a guy whose whole game is built on precision, it’s noticeable. He’s in the corner battling for the puck late in the third when it happens. The hit comes from behind. Blindside. The sound is sickening, that heavy crack of body against boards, vibrates through the glass and into my chest. Fish goes down, and he doesn’t get up immediately.
My phone drops to my side.Get up.I internally scream. The ref blows the whistle, and the players converge. Pierre shoves the guy who hit him. Evan drops his gloves and starts punching. Felix is in someone’s face. But I’m not watching any of them.Get up. Please get up.My heart is in my throat, my knuckles are white around my phone. This is my friend who ate Frosted Flakes for breakfast and told me about a girl who broke his heart, and then put his thumb on my lips two hours ago, making my body come alive. It shouldn’t feel like this.
But it does.
He sits up slowly, and shakes his head. Grabbing the boards, he pulls himself upright. The crowd cheers, he waves, then skates to the bench. The trainer leans over him and checks his eyes.