Page 54 of Dangle

“You little fuck!” he yelled, his shocked face fighting off the smile and laughter.

His hands moved, but I clocked it too late. His fingers dug into my ribs, tickling me until I writhed in his lap and fell to the floor between the sofa and coffee table, pulling him with me. We wrestled, pushing the coffee table further and further away as we rolled around, switching who was on top, both of us doing our best to keep the other from terrorizing our ribs while laughing like a pair of hyenas.

“Stop. Fuck. I’ve not pissed this morning!” I yelled.

He laughed in my face. “Poor baby.”

“Slone, I mean it. I’m gonna fucking piss on you.”

He didn’t tickle me again, but he smiled down at me as he rubbed my nose with his. “Maybe I like golden showers.”

“Ew. Gross.”

Tears sprang to my eyes with relief when he sat back on his haunches and removed his massive frame from my bladder. I scrambled to my feet, bent and kissed his still-smiling face before racing for the bathroom. The morning raced through my head while I relieved myself and washed my hands. Then I glimpsed two things that stabbed at me.

One, the lounge clothes laid out on the counter with a new toothbrush and deodorant sitting next to them. I pushed the way those borrowed items made me feel because the other thing didn’t just stab at me; it twisted the knife before plunging it in a second time.

The weapon: the smile on my face. I never smiled like that. Or not never, but fucking close. The wide-mouthed grin that stretched my face and crinkled my eyes once belonged to someone else, like everything that made me me.

I may be just another Donald Malachek, but I didn’t look like them. I looked like another champion. Another Olympian. Another hockey player. I remembered him somewhat. He loved skating and the game the way I loved skating and the game. He was good. Excellent, but unlike the Malacheks, Victor Petrov was larger than life and always happy. A big, beautiful man whose face was rarely without a smile.

Tears burned trails down my face, and memories rolled through my head. I missed him. He made all the training fun. He never made it feel like a chore. We laughed at our mistakes until we got them right. But all that went away when he died. He suffered an aneurysm while skating. The doctors said he was dead before he hit the ice. The funeral took place during my first week of Junior hockey, and my father refused to let me miss the start of training camp.

Unable to walk out of the bathroom, I turned on the shower so the water could warm. Hopefully, the ragged mess look I sported would disappear after a scalding hot shower. I needed itto anyway. No way could the hot as fuck kinky bastard I wanted to throw me down and rail me into next week see me like this.

The shower rained over me, beating the hangover soreness from my muscles. Palms pressed against the tiles, head hung between my arms, I stood there, letting the water cascade over me while also letting the emotions warring inside me have free rein.

When continuing to hold the position became uncomfortable, I finished my shower, toweled off, and wrapped the towel around my waist, ignoring the clothes Slone laid out on the counter for me while actively avoiding the mirror. Knowing my face showed signs of my crying fit and seeing the evidence left behind were two things.

One deep breath turned into two, then three, then another three before I got up the nerve to open the door.

FOURTEEN

SLONE

Unable to sit patiently and wait for Trey to return, I stood to straighten the loft. Not that the place needed much to make it look magazine-perfect and professionally styled. A tweak of the couch pillows to align them perfectly. A tug of the throw blanket so that it draped just so. The unmade bed loomed, beckoning me, making me wish for a night that went differently from the one before.

That thought led to another, and I ended up back in confusion city. Inference came in handy, but I hated it. From all the things Trey said, I gathered a couple of things.

One: His dad equaled mega prick and needed his attitude adjusted. Two: Trey’s family thought more about image than happiness. Three: Trey’s mental wellbeing seemed not to matter one iota to them. I could be wrong. I could be reading too much into his words and the tone of his voice, and the hesitation in the way he said things. I’d been wrong before. A few times. More than a few, but never about things my gut told me were true.

When I can’t contain the antsy-ness by straightening up the already clean loft, I found my phone. Certain there would be massive amounts of texts since everyone left me standing alone with the sexy beast of a boy who just scurried off to the bathroom. Luckily…sadly…fuck, who knew which would’vebeen better. All I could attest to was the lack of correspondence from my erstwhile friends. Instead of the tediousness of plowing through text after text after intrusive text, there was a singular message.

From Priest of all people. And not in the group chat either.

Priest

You still alive, or did that sexpot you dragged home off your ass?

Me

Don’t you have three partners of your own to keep track of?

Priest

Partners already, huh? Working fast, I see.

Me