Page 27 of Drop the Gloves
Warm-ups were boring.Completely unstructured chaos.Not that Riley necessarily minded chaos.The chaos of a good play or a line brawl, that was fun.This was just…everyone going through the motions until the real thing started.Riley was one of the rare players who didn’t have a pre-game routine.No regimen of stretches, no skating exercises, no must-do superstition that would bring disaster if performed wrong, nothing.Sixteen minutes of dicking around.
Today, Riley did some slow laps to get his feet moving and kill time.
The arena was slowly filling, with a fair number of green and yellow jerseys mixed with the Nor’easters’ baby blue and black.Riley expected it to be a tough game, which was always a plus in his book.Though honestly, he was just glad they played in Vermont during October and not, say, February; when he’d played here, Riley had always liked the fanbase in Vermont, but he sure as fuck didn’t miss the weather.
Riley spotted Abernathy standing alone by the boards.He was stickhandling with a furrowed brow, like something was on his mind.Which was a problem.Abernathy was a decent player, but the more his brain was spinning, the worse he did.Put him against his cousin, he tanked.Make him think about checking, he tanked.Have him get in his own head about fighting…shit, that one was on Riley if it happened tonight.
Without letting himself think it through too much, he skated over to Abernathy and swung his stick like a baseball bat so it smacked him on the ass.
“What the—?”Abernathy turned, spotted Riley, and glared.Well, he wastryingto glare, but when his face soured like that, he looked more like a disgruntled kitten than anything else.“What are you doing?”
“For good luck,” Riley said, because it was the first thing he could think of.
“How exactly is hitting my ass good luck?”
Riley shrugged.“I dunno, but if you score today, we’ll know it worked.”
Abernathy rolled his eyes and turned away.Still, he was smiling slightly and not glowering at the ice anymore.Mission accomplished.
He whacked Abernathy on the ass again.“If it works, I’ll be more than happy to do it again next game,” he called over his shoulder as he skated away.He didn’t believe in luck, but sometimes shit like this helped guys get out of (or into) their own heads.If it worked, it worked.Riley wasn’t about to question the process.
(And hey, he wasn’t going to give up an excuse to give Abernathy’s ass attention.Riley was almost out of crush territory, but he was only human.He deserved his fun.)
Sometimes he wished hedidhave some sort of good luck charm for himself.Not often, but there were days he could use a little nudge away from his thoughts.Especially when he played his growing list of former teams.
Riley didn’t like looking back.The teams he’d played for, the guys he’d played with, it’d been good times, but it was over.Plus, going down memory lane would mean thinking about why he’d left and who exactly he was smashing into the boards.It was the number on their backs and their value to their team that he targeted, not the guy he’d won a Cup with or the guy whose kid’s birthday party he’d gone to.
It was more fun that way.Less mental load or whatever.Because at the end of the day, Riley loved playing his style of hockey.All out, all the time, ready for anything.It was a style that had earned him minutes throughout his career, because he wasn’t afraid of the hard matchups.Most of the guys were bigger than him, but as his youth coaches always told him, he had more grit.There was nothing more satisfying than upending a guy twice his size or making them lose their shit when he got under their skin.
Which he’d done in Vermont, again and again.Most of his former teammates had also moved on, retired, or jumped ship to warmer climates when their contracts allowed, but there were some franchise players who remembered him.Sometimes guys like that thought friendships off the ice mattered.Like Riley shouldn’t be throwing his weight around against them.
Like they hadn’t loved Riley for doing it when he was on their side.
“What the fuck, Riley!?”David Bates screamed at him after a questionable late hit.(Okay,reallyquestionable, but it was a juicy opportunity.) “Why you always gotta be such a dick?”
“What’s that about my dick?”Riley asked.“You miss it?”
Now, he’d never once done anything sexual with anyone on the Nor’easters.Not even hinted at it, because he knew it wouldn’t go well.Which was too bad, since Vermont seemed like a decent place to be queer, but that didn’t always carry over to sports-dominated spaces.Riley had read the locker room on day one and decided, nah, he wasn’t going to push his luck.Despite popular opinion, Riley knew how to keep his head down and mouth shut.
But that was when he had to share space with the homophobes.Now that he only saw them maybe three times a season and promptly got on a plane after, he used it against them.
The sucker punch was a calculated risk.Given he wasn’t even facing Bates when he punched Riley in the jaw, he knew he’d get the call from the refs.He was laughing as he tumbled to the ice, because it was just too fucking easy.Leaning back on his elbows, he made sure to spread his legs and waggle his eyebrows.Which was probably stupid.The whistle had blown, and the refs were coming, but that was no reason to tempt Bates to finish what he’d started.
Bates took a stride towards Riley, looking like he was about to tackle him.Riley tensed, because having a 215-pound defenseman land on him wasn’t going to be pleasant, but it never happened.Abernathy had skated between Bates and Riley, a human shield that was way too gentle when he said, “How about we calm down here.”
It was kind of sexy, actually.
“How about you get the fuck out of my way?”Bates said.
Abernathy had a hand on Bates’ chest.A light touch, but a warning nonetheless.
Definitely sexy.
“Nope,” Abernathy said.“Not happening.You’re going to the box.”
Bates looked about to escalate things (fuck, Abernathy wasnotready for another fight, period.Could Riley get up in time?) but a ref came to the rescue.Abernathy kept his protective guard until Bates was far enough away, then he turned to Riley.
“I feel like you probably deserved some of that.”
