Page 24 of Bro Code

“I guess not.”

“Why do you care?”

“Just something Rick said to me. Sounded like he talked him out of it.”

Nic eyed him a moment, then went back to his food. “Things with Liam are complicated.”

“Yeah? How so?”

He shoveled mashed potato onto his fork, not answering right away, then said, “I think that’s something you should ask Liam.”

They finished their food, and when Nic was done wiping his plate with the last bread roll, he got up and said, “I’m gonna chat with the boys, do you wanna come?”

Riley looked over at the table where Liam was sitting with Marks and Volcheck. He’d been getting a weird vibe from Liam ever since that disastrous first practice and could already imagine how cold the shoulders would be over there. He looked away. “Maybe at dinner,” he mumbled. “Lunch is pretty much done anyway, isn’t it?”

Nic’s mouth pressed into an unhappy line as he sighed, looking down at him. “Okay,” he said. “I’m gonna hold you to that.”

That evening he sat on his bed with ice wraps around both calves, scrolling TikTok and resisting the urge to open Grindr, because he knew Louis would be the only person there. He wasn’t interested in making another ridiculous mistake.

He’d sat with Nic, Liam, and the others at dinner. It was fine. But he sensed it was only fine because Coach Myers was sitting at the next table over, and everyone knew he was watching them. Team bonding wasn’t a “nice-to-have” in the NHL. It was more like enforceable law. If they weren’t all Kuumba-yahing around the campfire by Sunday night, Coach would probably punish them when they got back on the ice.

The vibe he’d been feeling from Liam hadn’t gone away with dinner. The guy seemed really unfriendly – Riley couldn’t recall if he’d been that way at the Olympics or not. He refused to even look Riley in the eye, and barely said anything while he cut his food into little squares and scowled.

Riley’s phone buzzed and a video call from his mom came through. Sighing, he swiped it open.

“Hey Eomma.”

Her eyes crinkled as she beamed at him from behind her reading glasses, strands of straight black hair falling around her face. Her lips were moving, but he couldn’t hear her, and Riley pointed at his ear and shook his head. She frowned and got way too close to the screen as she struggled with the settings. When she got it working she propped the phone on the coffee table as she sat on the couch.

“Riley-a. How’s it going?”

“Fine, Mama, how are you?”

“Good, good. Oh, here’s Appa.”

Dad sat beside her with two cups of tea. He was wearing his suit, like he’d just come from work, and Riley couldn’t resist teasing him. He was a product manager at one of those tech companies in Silicon Valley where everyone came to work in sweats.

“Hey Appa, how’s it going? Still overdressing for work?”

“I’m not overdressing, they are underdressing!” said Dad, immediately furious. “You tell me when it became acceptable to wear pajamas to an office. Hm? When was that?”

“Like, ten years ago?”

“Well I didn’t get the memo.”

“That’s because no one sends memos anymore, Dad.”

“I send memos!”

“Alright, alright.” Mom took the tea from him. “We’re all fine, Riley. How are you? Where are you, I can’t keep track.”

Riley chuckled bitterly. “Alaska.”

“Alaska?! I thought you played for Montreal now?”

“No, no – I do. We're doing a team weekend.”

“Ah, okay, I see. And it’s going well? Are you making friends?”