Across the Line (In The Zone) (25 page)

Chapter Forty-Four

Needing comfort, Calder drove to a place he hadn’t been to in ages—Caroline’s Creamery. Best ice cream on the planet. He ordered a double scoop of pistachio fig and strawberry cheesecake in a waffle cone with fudge and goddamn multicolored jimmies and it was fucking incredible. Ice cream made as good a lunch as it did breakfast. Kicked the shit out of frozen yogurt any time of day.

As he completely trashed his healthy-eating regimen, he tried to come to terms with Hart’s announcement. Ever since Becca had called Hart’s sexuality into question three months ago, he’d wondered and dismissed. At the time, it had seemed impossible that Hart could have kept a secret like that for so long. But he had.

That pissed him off. He felt betrayed and hurt. He and Hart had been best friends. Best enemies, too, but that was part of being brothers. They were
brothers.
Brothers didn’t hide huge, essential parts of themselves from each other. They didn’t suddenly pull away and shut each other out without explanation and remain aloof for years.

Caroline’s Creamery was about a quarter mile from the beach, so he walked briskly west and made a serious dent in his ice cream. He concentrated on the flavors, determined that if he was going to fuck it up with all those empty calories, he’d enjoy every bite.

The entire cone was gone by the time he laid eyes on the surf. He inhaled deeply. The briny air and sticky breeze cleared his head. He stood and watched the waves for a while. The approach and recession of the water was usually soothing. Today, it just felt like salt in the wound.

His phone rang. He looked at the screen and almost laughed.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Calder, honey, Hart told me what happened at practice.”

“Yeah, it was...an eventful morning.”

“Are you all right?”

It was weird how, at the sound of his mother’s voice, he could almost smell her floral perfume. In his mind, he could see her concerned expression and feel her reaching out across thousands of miles to give him a cellular hug.

He rubbed his eyes hard.
You will
not
fucking cry.
“Sure. I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be fine?”

“Because your brother just dropped an atomic bomb on you. You didn’t know, did you?”

“Did
you?
”

“Dad and I have known for years, but—”

“He told
you guys
but he didn’t tell me?” Calder’s anger resurfaced explosively, like an eruption of Old Faithful.

“No, he didn’t tell us. Dad and I figured it out ourselves. We saw signs and put two and two together, but we didn’t let on to Hart that we knew. We decided when he wanted us to know, he’d tell us.”

“So I’m the last to find out. Terrific.”

A moment passed. A pelican dove into the water.

“Honey, you need to talk to your brother.”

“I will. Just not today.”

“He’s still your brother, you know. That hasn’t changed. He still loves and cares about you.”

“Oh, come on, Mom. He effing stabbed me in the back today. It’s like if you called me one day and said, ‘Honey, I have a confession to make. I’m not really a human. I’m a space alien.’”

“Calder, please. Don’t be a drama queen.”

“Hart’s the queen, not me.”

“Calder Shepherd Griffin, you stop that right now.”

“I’m serious, Mom. He’s not the person I thought he was.”

“I can’t argue with that, but he didn’t stab you in the back. Put yourself in his shoes.”

No fucking way.
Couldn’t say that to his mom, so he kept his mouth tightly shut.

“Think about it,” his mom said. “He’s a kid. He begins to realize he’s different. He doesn’t know how to tell anyone or if he wants to tell anyone. I mean, how was he supposed to bring something like that up? At the dinner table? ‘Hey, I got this urge to kiss one of the guys on my team today and I’m thinking I might be gay.’”

Calder felt sick to his stomach. It was the ice cream. Had to be.

“When he does finally figure it out for sure, again, how does he tell people? Especially us. What if we reject him? What if we’re disgusted? Then he’s lost his family and has nowhere to turn.”

Damn it. He didn’t want to hear this. He wanted to nurse his anger for a while longer, but he couldn’t very well hang up on his mother.

“Mom, how could he have possibly thought we’d turn our backs on him?”

She sighed. “I don’t know. That is all speculation on my part. When we talked to him earlier, your father and I didn’t do much more than assure him that we loved him no matter what and we’re glad that he’d finally decided to share this with us. Which is what I think you should do too.”

* * *

By the time he’d devoured a hot dog, an extra-large tub of popcorn and watched the last of the credits of the Hugh Jackman movie roll by, Calder had organized his emotions. Toward Hart, he still felt angry but accepting. Mostly.

His brother was gay. That was a fact and it wasn’t going to change. During a very brief moment, Calder had been able to admit that he was glad that his brother wouldn’t have to live a double life anymore, but then he went back to feeling betrayed. Hart owed him an apology and an explanation.

When he got home around four, Becca wasn’t there. Not surprising. He was starting to think it might be a good idea to get a dog so at least some creature in the world was glad to see him when he got home. He was just about to shove a game into his Xbox when she called.

“I don’t have much time, but Hart called and told me what happened. Are you okay?” Before he could answer, she said, “Hold on a sec. No, that prep table has to be two feet to the left and that one should butt right up to...right. Like that. Perfect. Thanks. Okay, sorry, I’m back. Now, tell me, are you okay?”

He gave a weak laugh. “Honestly? I feel like I’ve been run over by a big rainbow bus.”

“Well, I hate to say I told you so...”

“Then don’t!” He sighed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. I’m just still feeling raw.”

“Of course you are. It’s going to be a while before you adjust.”

“It’s not really the gay thing I’m upset about. It’s that he kept it secret from me
.
All those years. We were a team, you know? They called us Double Trouble because we were the team to beat in the neighborhood. But he shut me out. He pretty much kicked me off the team with no explanation.”

“Calder, I don’t know what to say. That really sucks, but you know what? You were close once and you’ll be close again. Hart’s a great guy who had some heavy-duty stuff to deal with. Yes, he made a mistake with you, but everyone makes mistakes. The way I see it, you just—and I say ‘just’ even though it’s going to be hard—you just have to forgive him and move on. Remember hockey wisdom? You can’t do anything about what happened before. You have no control over that. It’s over. You have to look ahead to how great you guys can be together now, Double Trouble Part Two, right?”

He was mulling that over when her voice got distant as she addressed someone else. “Are you kidding me? How did this happen? Don’t they check these things before they leave the factory?” Then she came back to him. “Sorry about that. It’s crazy down here.”

“It’s okay. I understand.”

“Which is why I love you so much. Look, we can talk more about this when I get home or tomorrow maybe.”

“Okay.”

“Love you. Bye.”

He heaved a sigh full of self-pity as he hung up. Noticing his phone was down to twenty percent power, he headed toward the kitchen where he had a charger plugged in. Just as he was setting it down, it signaled a text message from Hart.

We need to talk.

Calder hesitated, thought about ignoring him, then typed,
No shit.

Can I come over?

Why the fuck not? He had way exceeded his quota on drama anyway. A little more wasn’t going to make too much difference.

Sure.

An hour?

Fine.

Chapter Forty-Five

When Hart rang the doorbell, Calder opened the door, nodded at him, turned around and headed for the kitchen.

Hart closed the door behind him. “Becca at work?”

Calder laughed humorlessly. “That’s a big yes. I think if I got her a sleeping bag, she’d never come home.”

“Things will even out. Once her place opens up for business, it’ll be different.”

“We’ll see.”

Thirsty and, frankly, needing alcohol, Calder took two beers out of the refrigerator and opened them. He handed one bottle to Hart, then raised his in a toast.

“So, here’s to my big brother, who apparently woke up today and decided to fucking cross-check me.”

Hart frowned. “Calder, come on, it wasn’t like that. I wasn’t planning to come out today. It was a spontaneous thing. I—I just read that story about that kid—his name’s Jesse Kimball, by the way—and something snapped. I was so pissed off. I wished I could have been there to kick the shit out of those guys who beat him up. I wanted to do something to help him.”

“And you think coming out yourself will help him?”

“Maybe. I think it always helps to find out you’re not alone.”

“Ah, not always. I wasn’t the only one you dropped a bomb on today. I think the entire team caught the fallout along with me, but funny how that didn’t really comfort me much, considering I looked like a fucking moron because I’m your fucking brother and you never fucking told me you were fucking gay.”

He slammed his bottle on the counter so hard, he flinched, expecting it to shatter. That would have been the icing on the cake—cutting the shit out of his hand. Thankfully it didn’t break.

Hart winced. “I’m sorry. I should have told you a long time ago.”

Calder scoffed. “Ya think?”

“You know, I wanted to tell you, Calder. I did. But at the beginning, I wasn’t even sure I was gay. It took me a while to even come to terms with the possibility. Then once I knew...” He shook his head. “I was ashamed. I was afraid.” Hart’s voice sounded rough.

Sighing, Calder rubbed a thumb over the condensation on his beer bottle. “When did you find out?”

“I knew for sure when I was fourteen.”

“That means I was eleven. I probably wouldn’t even have known what you meant.”

“And I would have explained it to you and then you would have been disgusted.”

Calder scoffed. “You don’t know that. I idolized you, damn it. In my eyes, you could do no wrong. You know why? Because I knew you were going all the way. You were going to play for the fucking NHL. Everyone could see it. But you closed up. You shut me out.” He clamped down hard on his emotions. The anger, the hurt was right there, ready to spill over and make a huge fucking mess.

Unwanted memories flooded Calder’s mind no matter how hard he tried to keep them out, all those times his brother—once his best friend—had pushed him away without explanation. For a long time, Calder had tried to get Hart’s attention any way he could. He’d tagged along at times when he knew Hart didn’t want him to. He’d saved up his money so he could take Hart to a Rangers game for his birthday, and they’d gone and had a good time, but afterward, the door shut again. He’d busted his ass with hockey, thinking that was all Hart cared about and if Calder could excel there, Hart would notice and be proud of him. They’d be Double Trouble again somehow, maybe even...shit.

Maybe even play on the same NHL team.

But none of that had worked. Calder eventually accepted the fact that his big brother didn’t want the same kind of close relationship he did. He’d blamed it on ego. Hart obviously enjoyed his status as one of the NHL elite and couldn’t be bothered with the little people. But that hadn’t been it at all.

He tried to figure out what he would have done if Hart
had
come out to him when they were kids. He wanted to think he would have been fine with it, but truthfully, he couldn’t put himself back in that eleven-year-old mindset. Maybe he
would
have rejected Hart. He hadn’t always behaved with maturity or logic at that age, but hell, what kid did? That still didn’t excuse Hart from withholding the truth once they were adults.

Hart shook his head. “I’m sorry, Calder, but that was part of the problem. You, Mom and Dad, my coaches...you all had an image of who I was, who you wanted me to be.” Hart heaved a heavy sigh. “And that image just got clearer and more definite. I didn’t want to disappoint anyone. It got to the point where I didn’t think I’d be able to tell any of you until I retired from hockey.”

Calder didn’t want to accept that explanation. He wanted to nurse his anger longer. After over a decade of being kept in the dark—he thought he deserved more than twelve hours of being pissed off. But honestly, he could almost put himself in Hart’s shoes. Back then, the pressure on Hart had to have been enormous. People told him every day he was going to make it to the big leagues, that he was going to be as big as Iginla, Teemu Selänne, Jagr. The entire town had created an idealized mold for him and Hart had done his best to fit himself into it.

Hart straightened and faced Calder. “So, I’m sorry, CS. I swear I didn’t mean to hurt you. I was talking about it with Jeremy earlier and I realized that what I did was pretty self-centered. I was so wrapped up in keeping it a secret and pulling away so you wouldn’t notice that I didn’t really think about how you would see it.”

Calder let out a humorless laugh. “Well, I thought your head got too big. I thought you were just leaving your little brother in the dust.”

“No. No. That wasn’t it at all.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that night I fought Riggs? You had the perfect opportunity. All you had to do was say, ‘Riggs was right. I’m gay.’ But you didn’t.”

“Because I was still fucking afraid, damn it.” Hart pushed his hands through his hair, mussing it. “We were finally on the same team. We were even on the same line. I didn’t want to fuck that up. Everything was exactly the way it should have been. That was the night you showed everyone what you can really do. Did I tell you how proud I was of you that night? I don’t think I did. I should have.” Hart glanced at him, his face tight with anguish. “I should have told you a lot of things.”

Glancing away, Calder searched inside himself for the knot of resentment that he’d harbored for so long and found it had unraveled to the point where he could probably, with more time, pull it apart completely. Knowing Hart’s side of the story helped a lot.

Hart went out onto the balcony and leaned, elbows on the railing. As traffic noise drifted upward and the muffled voices of people on the sidewalk reached his ears, Calder went to stand next to his brother. Not knowing what to say, he sighed, matched his stance and nudged him with his shoulder. That was all it took.

Hart bent his head, his shoulders shaking.

Goddamn it.

The feelings that Calder had been keeping a lid on suddenly exploded and hot tears fucking sprayed out of his eyes like windshield wiper fluid. Before he knew it, he and Hart were embracing. They stayed that way for a long moment, their arms tight around each other like iron bands. As he struggled for breath, Calder imagined all those shit emotions he’d been stockpiling for the past twelve years coming out of his pores like sweat. He almost—
almost—
understood why women cried all the time. It might have felt good if it hadn’t also felt so fucking emasculating.

Stepping away, Calder yanked the neckline of his T-shirt up to wipe his eyes, while Hart pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket.

Honestly, a handkerchief? Calder wondered now how deep in the sand his head must have been not to have seen signs like this. There was metrosexual and then there was just gay.

They went inside and decided the occasion called for some bar food and a pint at a pub down the street. A couple of hours later, they were engaged in a friendly but highly competitive game of darts, which Calder won, and just before they went to their respective cars, Calder put a hand on Hart’s shoulder.

“What?” Hart said, turning.

Calder rubbed his nose. “Um, that thing back at my house? I’d appreciate it if we kept that to ourselves.”

“What thing? Our discussion?”

“No, the...you know, breakdown.”

Hart pressed his lips together and Calder had the sneaking suspicion he was smothering a laugh.

“Hey, I don’t want Becca or the guys to know I was crying, okay? Is that a crime?”

“No, little brother. Not at all. I completely understand.”

And yet, the next day Calder found a surprise in his stall and knew Hart had been the one to put it there. As his teammates got dressed for practice, Calder picked up the tissue box, tossed it one-handed, caught it and laughed.