Page 69 of Gross Misconduct

“Griffin just hit a little hot streak. They haven’t played us. And when they do, we won’t make them forget,” I say.

“Whatever you’ve been doing, keep doing it. You’re on a hot streak, too.” Fuentes rolls up his yoga map.

“Oh, I will definitely keep doing it.” I hold my rolled up yoga mat over my hardening cock.

* * *

I spendmy Friday night at home going down a YouTube rabbit hole of 1990s NHL hockey games. I stand over my sink and eat ramen with one hand while holding my phone in the other. There are countless better ways to position myself, but I’m too sucked in to move.

An email notification dings on my phone, throwing me from my algorithm-induced haze. It’s from Darlene at the airport. Considering it’s being sent on a Friday evening, I can only guess what she wanted to tell me.

Dear Jack, while we all loved meeting with you, unfortunately…

I exit out of the email and return to YouTube. Oddly enough, I don’t have a reaction to the news. There’s no crestfallen dip in my chest. It feels more like I dodged a bullet. I shove another forkful of ramen in my mouth and decide to get serious.

I click open my web browser and navigate to a job board website. I scroll down endless open opportunities and upload my resume machine gun style. This is what I’m supposed to do, right? Keep applying until someone bites. It feels like there’s not much choice involved with a job hunt, which there should be since I’ll be spending forty hours each week there. I wish I had some direction here, some secret talent that I could leverage. I hate feeling so lost. Hopefully, the universe has a clearer idea for my future.

After sending untold numbers of resumes into the ether, most of which will never be acknowledged, someone buzzes my apartment. My dick immediately assumes it’s Griffin and gets hard.

“Hey sexy,” I say into the intercom, deciding to have a little bit of fun this evening.

“It’s Dad.”

Awkward. His voice is the ultimate boner killer.

“Are you expecting someone?” he asks.

“Just being stupid. One second.” I bang my head against my front door as penance for my dumb move. Then I buzz Dad up.

He comes with a box in hand. I recognize it from when I sifted through my old bedroom for the lucky bracelet.

“I figured you should have this. I should’ve asked you what you wanted to keep from your old room before I packed it up.” He can’t make full eye contact with me, like he feels just as awkward as I do. Dad only came to my apartment once and looked around in disgust. He probably remembered the swanky high-rise I used to live in with a walk-in closet as big as this whole studio.

“Thanks.” I take the box from him. Inside are medals and trophies from my hockey days. Framed clippings. It’s a sad, cluttered shrine to a guy I used to be, the one who was going to finish what his dad started.

“There’s a lot of great stuff in there. Your first hockey jersey from your peewee days. A letter you wrote to yourself in crayon about how you were going to be MVP when you got older.” Dad smiles warmly at the box, unable to resist the pull of memories.

“I remember that.” In fifth grade, we had to write a letter to our future selves. I wrote about being a pro hockey player who drives a flying car. Half-right isn’t bad. I flip open the letter. “How has my handwriting gotten worse?”

“And your bobblehead collection. I didn’t throw those out.”

“All three of them?” I wanted to be one of those kids who collected things, but it rarely lasted past a few items. I either got bored or forgot about it when hockey started up.

Dad laughs as I pull out the bobbleheads of the players from my favorite team. I idolized them growing up, until they passed me over in the draft. I keep eyeing Dad, the warm and fuzzy moment between us feeling like an alien experience. It’s odd not having him scowl in withering disappointment.

I ride the moment rather than question it. I dig farther in the box and pull out an old picture from my first game. Mom and Dad flank me, proud as can be.

“There were some old pictures in the bottom of your old closet. Thought you might, I don’t know…you might want them.”

Mom is beaming, her smile taunting me.

“Why did she leave?” I ask.

Dad sighs. “We got married way too young. I was barely twenty, and she was nineteen. We’d only been dating a few months when she got knocked up, but her parents were strict Catholic.”

I snort. “I figured it was a shotgun wedding.” Their expressions in their wedding photo read more as panic than romantic bliss.

“In a way, I don’t blame her for leaving. She held out hope that my shoulder would improve, and I could play again.” He shrugs, defeated. “This is not the life she wanted.”

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