Page 10 of Top Shelf
“Which is even worse,” I told him, allowing my smile to show just a little. “All the headlines will talk about how I ruined hockey by not saving the life of the future Gretzky.”
He blinked up at me. “Ovechkin broke his goal record already.”
It took me way too long to realize he was joking, and by the time I did, he’d glanced away again out of shame for a joke landing wrong.
“I’m really bad at this,” he said through a heavy sigh. “I’m…I’m sorry. I know I’m not normal.”
“I didn’t invite you over here because I wanted some typical frat boy douchebag on my couch,” I said, well aware I was probably insulting all of his friends.
He huffed a laugh through his nose and looked up at me through his long, thick eyelashes.Lord have fucking mercy on me, please. This man had no right to be so beautiful. “I thought the same thing when I first joined. I tried to fuck up so badly that I didn’t get accepted.”
I frowned. “Why do the…what’s it called? Pledging?”
“Mm.”
“Why do the pledging, then?”
Ferris’s lips twitched, and then his face bloomed into a smile, and he laughed. “I pledged because my parents and my brothers were tired of me acting like a…” He trailed off.
I raised my brow, and he huffed a lungful of air out in a single exhale. “Like a what?”
He shrugged and set his burrito on the small coffee table. “Like a weird, gay autistic kid. They wanted me to do at least one normal thing.”
I felt a sort of rage inside me that I was unused to. I didn’t get angry a lot anymore. Not since the accident that had stolen my career. Nothing compared to that, so it was easy not to get pissed off at the little things.
But those words? Knowing the people meant to love Ferris the most had said that shit?
“It sounds like?—”
“Please don’t say it sounds like they’re jealous of me,” he muttered quietly. “Everyone says that, but trust me, they’re not. I’m happy with who I am, but it’s hard too, you know?”
I didn’t.
“People see my little crochet hobby and think, oh, how cute. Look at those little birds he makes all the time. And they don’t see me rocking frantically back and forth on my bed, trying not to cry as I use crocheting to keep me from having an actual screaming meltdown.” He dared a look at me after he word-vomited all of that, his expression terrified like I was about to throw him out on his ass.
“Do your, uh…what are they, frat brothers?” He nodded. “Do they treat you like shit because of that?”
He shrugged. “Some of them aren’t the nicest. They think I’m a freak. But some of my best friends are also in that house, and, like, they also aren’t the nicest, but they’re nice to me.” He swallowed heavily. “Do you think I’m a massive cock becauseI’m glad they’re nice to me, even when they’re horrible to everyone else?”
I couldn’t help a small laugh. Fuck, the NHL was going to eat this man alive if he wasn’t careful. “No. I don’t think you’re a giant cock. I think people who treat you like shit—including your family—are the giant cocks. Actually, I like giant cocks, so let’s call them…roaches.”
He shuddered, hard. “Or we could not saythatword because they scare the shit out of me.”
“Mosquitos, then.”
His entire body relaxed against the cushions, and he looked at me with a grin that made me want to pin him by the throat and kiss him until he was ready to come from my lips and tongue alone. But he hadn’t come here to fuck me. He’d come here for advice.
“Is that the sort of thing you wanted advice about? People thinking you’re weird?”
He frowned, and then his brows flew up. “Advice…?Oh. Haha.” I loved the way he didn’t always laugh. He said “haha” like it was a word. “Right. My panic attack in the chat.” He blushed again and looked down at his hands.
His fingers were dancing in his lap, like he was nervous. Stimming. He was stimming. I’d had a couple of autistic patients in my residency who did the same thing. I fought the urge to cover them with my hands, but I knew that wouldn’t help him. He was self-soothing.
Then he noticed I was staring and clenched his fingers into fists. “Sorry. I know it’s?—”
“It’s not weird.” He looked startled that I cut him off. “I’ve had autistic patients. I get it.”
“Patients. You’re…” He frowned like he was trying to remember. “A doctor?”
