The following day they get on the ice, simple drills that they’ve all been doing since they were kids. Or at least David has. It’s hard to tell with some of them.

David’s unsure if it’s rust or simply bad training, but if their team is going to win at the end of the month, they need to tighten up. He says so to Caldwell at the end of the day, and Caldwell drops the grim expression he always seems to have, barking out a laugh, which startles David.

“You’re really going to be something,” Caldwell says, and it sounds nice, but David’s not sure if it’s a compliment or not.

Jake insists on driving him home that night too, and the night after, not pushing him to talk, acting more like a chauffeur than anything. It makes David uncomfortable for some reason he can’t name, and he finds himself awkwardly asking if Lourdes wants to come and get a drink at the bar with him, even though neither of them should be drinking.

Jake chews his lip, not saying anything. David doesn’t know what he was thinking.

“No, I—” Jake says finally, and David’s ready to turn around and head inside, before he continues, “You want to come over to mine? Watch a movie or something? I’ve got all the fixings to make these monster salads my dad used to make, they’re awesome, they’re not even like salads.”

“I—” David says, then, “Okay.” He gets back in the car.

Jake has to backtrack west to get to his place, which makes David feel dimly guilty, since it means he’s been going out of his way every day. He isn’t staying at a hotel, like David was expecting, but a fairly upscale condo.

“Is this yours?” he asks, when they get inside. He does have the money to throw away, but it seems like a waste.

“It belongs to a buddy of mine on the Marlies,” Jake says. “He’s letting me crash here since he’s out of town anyways.”

David wonders what kind of ‘buddy’ Jake’s talking about. Whether he fucks around with all his ‘buddies’, since he was so insistent that David was one.

“You want a beer?” Jake asks, wandering towards the kitchen.

They may be legal in Ontario, but they’re training, even if it’s been pretty lacklustre thus far. Jake smirks, like he knows what David’s thinking, and ends up bringing them both a bottle of water.

“Thank you,” David says, when Jake hands it over, then sprawls on the couch beside where David has perched, not close enough to touch, but close enough that David can feel the heat of his body. He swallows hard around the knot tying in his throat again, and then around a sip of water, which doesn’t clear it, however much he wants it to.

“What do you want to watch?” Jake asks. “He’s got like, hundreds of channels. There’s a whole channel for action movies, it’s pretty—”

David leans in. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, not even when he’s doing it, and the brim of Jake’s baseball hat hits him in the forehead while Jake’s mid-sentence.