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The worst part about it all is that Conor knew that the Canucks were going to lose that night.
There are cosmic forces at work when a guy who leaves a team on purpose comes back to play his old team. In this story, the Canucks are the bad guys whose fans boos their old captain, so they stink. So Conor has had time to think about what would happen next.
But it actually hadn’t been a bad game for them, as much as a 3-1 loss goes. Conor had an assist with Rossi on their only goal, which felt like a gasp of fresh air after spending ages underwater.
He reminds himself that he is good at this sport. Most guys who play hockey don’t even touch ice full-time, and here he is, at 5’8. He forgets sometimes.
Conor nods to the rookies as they pass by him, talking about something he literally could not decipher if he tried. There are a lot of them now — fewer and fewer vets every week it seems, more stars of the OHL and WHL and QMHL and the NDTP. More and more whizkids, restless and fighting for a chance to finally start winning. Conor, one of the designated survivors, is there to guide their path.
His phone is warm in his pocket. He rubs his hands over his face. Conor, you coward. Just look.
He sighs, shuffling his phone out of his pocket, and peeks at the screen.
He sees his phone background of his dog and his kid in front of his first snowman. He goes to their text conversation, where his message of “Any dinner plans tonight” goes unanswered. He deflates.
Maybe he’s busy with press or social media or whatever victory ritual the Wild have with that cowboy hat. Quinn got a couple of assists, so he deserves a crack at it. Conor watches them whenever they come up on his feed, the ones with Quinn smiling weakly as Marcus Foligno, Brock Faber or Jared Spurgeon hugs him. He wants to message him about it, congratulate him, but no one likes an over-familiar old teammate.
He clicks off his phone and puts it back in his pocket.
He’d ask around if anybody else is meeting with him, but Quinn is not a conversation topic in this new locker room. The new guys talk about places to eat. Demmer and Mysie talk about golf. No one acknowledges the empty spaces where Quinn used to sit. Maybe it’s different for him than the other guys. Maybe the other guys don’t see Quinn everywhere they look.
The Quinn Conor knew was a different guy than Quinn the captain, Conor supposes. He strips off his shirt to throw it in the dirty clothes bin before putting on a random t-shirt he put in his bag. Maybe his Quinn was a little sillier, a little less serious. Trying to scoot out of paying for dinner for the nth time. Swimming in Okanagan Lake after training camp, heaving himself out of Brock’s pool just to get pushed back in.
Quinn’s hand around his waist at that club Kane made them go to in LA, the day after he apparently decided that was that. Conor knew in some abstract way that he was watching Quinn disappear deeper and deeper into his shell. By the time Quinn organized that final dinner, Conor knew what he was going to say before he said it. But he said it. Now he’s gone.
He can’t resist peeking at his phone again. Still no dice. He swallows hard.
The night is young. He can still - walk around, he guesses. Fuck, he doesn’t know what there is to do in St. Paul. Maybe look in store windows. They used to walk endlessly — talk about whatever. Hockey mainly. Books. Whatever it is.
Then someone stands in front of his locker, blocking his way out. It’s a serious-looking Wild employee with a clipboard, her hair pulled back with a clip.
“Conor Garland?”
“Yes?” Conor says. She clears her throat, consulting her clipboard.
“You’ve been selected by the Minnesota’ Wild’s Winner’s Room protocol,” she says, not looking at him in the eye. “You can accept, defer to another teammate, or decline.”
Conor’s heart skips. He checks the other guys to see if they’ve heard, but Victor and Lekki are still talking in the corner, undistubed. Conor has been left alone to mope, it seems. Still.
“Do I get to know who?” Conor says, making sure his voice is low.
“It will be the first, second, or third star tonight,” the woman says, unclipping a piece of paper from her clipboard. “I have a sheet for you.”
She hands him a sheet with the stars of tonight on it — Boldy, Faber, Kaprizov. Boldy got two of the three goals, Faber got 3 assists, and Kaprizov got a goal and an assist. They even have their faces printed out alongside their names in spotty black-and-white quality. Not Quinn, though. His heart sinks. That would’ve been too lucky.
Each team has a different approach to Winner’s Room. The Washington Capitals have guys who announce it to the whole locker room in case anybody wants to get with Ovi. The Oilers have a lush suite ready for the Winner’s Room, and messages are handed to players by team members discreetly. The Avs have a closet next door to their team showers with a fuck bench, and you get notified by a text message.
The Canucks rarely win, but the last time Conor went, he thinks their room was pretty good, if a little empty. They have a fully customizable sound system, which is cool, and a little table of refreshments, like it’s an office party.
The Minnesota Wild apparently have a woman who comes in the locker room and abducts players. That’s different.
“I accept,” Conor says anyway, handing back the sheet to her. His standard response is that he’s just honoured to be chosen. He’s a small guy, and annoying, so he gets picked a lot, but he’s good at it and he enjoys it. Loose, easy sex. He can forget everything else and focus. Plus, it’s a good way to get to know guys and create a rapport. His dad always said it’s who you know, not how you know.
Maybe it’ll be a sticking point for Conor, a way of getting over it. Watching Boldy score a goal in the playoffs, knowing he got a piece of that in his prime. It doesn’t sound convincing to himself in his own head, but it couldn’t hurt.
“Leave your bags, we’ll drop them in your hotel room,” the woman says, turning to lead him out of the locker room. Tyler raises his eyebrows at him as he passes, and Conor shakes his head. Tyler nods, ever observant, before leaning over to confer with D-Petey about dinner.
The inside of the Minnesota arena is long and winding. Conor glimpses some random half-dressed players talking and chatting with each other in various hallways, but his presence largely goes undetected. Thank God. He imagines if he ran into Quinn like this, casually towed toward the room he’ll be fucked in, what he’d look at him like.
The woman drops him next to a green door marked WR and unceremoniously points him to a chair outside it like he’s in line at a doctor’s appointment. She hands over the clipboard with the standard one-page NHL Winner’s Room contract waiting on it before disappearing down a hallway. He reads the contract dutifully even though he knows what it’ll say.
Do you suspect you have any STIs or recurring symptoms of STIs? He ticks No.
Do you have a history of erectile dysfunction? No.
Do you consent to the sexual acts performed on you within the time period of up to 1 hour, including but not limited to oral, anal, and intercrural sex? Conor ticks Yes.
You have the right to revoke consent at any time within the time period. Do you accept and acknowledge this statement? Yes.
He signs the page and sits, staring off into space and feeling naked. This isn’t a bad intimidation tactic, all things considered. It just seems very public, like Bill Guerin could come over and start talking with him.
He re-adjusts his shoulders, slouching a little in his seat. They could’ve at least given him a different hallway. Does MacKinnon sit in this chair too?
The woman appears again, tapping on her phone. She grabs the sheet from him and looks it over, mouth pursed in thought. This is very low-tech, Conor thinks as she clips it back into her clipboard. The Mammoth does theirs on an iPad.
“You can go in,” she says, bringing out a set of keys from her pocket and unlocking the door, reaching in to flick on some lights before backing up to let him through. “Get comfortable, he’ll be here shortly.”
Then she’s gone before he can blink. Aren’t people supposed to be nicer in Minnesota? Conor thinks. Then he goes in.
The room is big, with shiny dark wood floors and a big, overstuffed bed with fluffy pillows in the middle. A cupboard of supplies is parked next to it, with four unopened bottles of water balancing on top, condensation still clinging to their sides. A roll of condoms the size of his head stands next to them, as well as brand-name lube and a black plastic trash can.
There’s a big Wild logo carpet on the floor, the green and red stark against the dark wood. Conor walks around to look at it head-on. It feels a little tacky, but he can see the team pride aspect of it. He hopes they wash the jizz out of it every so often.
He sits down on the bed, cold prickling at the exposed skin on his arms and knees. He pushes his hand through his hair and grabs his phone out of his pocket again.
The notifications are still underwhelming. The Daily Jaws posted 16 minutes ago. His Bauer package has been delivered. He switches to Instagram and watches as Foligno gives the hat to Bogosian, Quinn a pale smudge in the background.
The door creaks open. Conor clicks off his phone and slides it into his pocket.
Brock Faber comes slinking in, shifty and sweaty-looking in his glasses. He looks very uncomfortable, which is a weird energy for a Winner’s Room. Especially since he theoretically picked Conor to fuck. Or get fucked by, although that’s less common.
Maybe he just wanted to see what it’s all about. Some guys are like that. Conor is the least intimidating target. Conor straightens up, ready for whatever it is.
“Hey, man,” Brock starts, blush high on his cheeks. He’s not looking at him at all, eyes firmly on the cupboard of supplies beside the bed.
“Hey, Brock,” Conor says gently. He doesn’t know him that well, but he’s put him on the list of the best RHD under 25 several times with Quinn. Conor even remembers asking Quinn, a day or a year ago. They were in another city, maybe Seattle. Do you think he’s going to Milan?
Yeah, Quinn said, his hair dark between his fingers. He’s on the bed next to him, watching the Canes/Devils game with his hoodie tucked up against his chin. He’s so young, though. He might need a couple more seasons.
So do you, Conor said. Quinn had rolled his eyes, grinning at him.
No, I’m getting older, Quinn says, cryptically. His stubble was dark on his cheeks, his mouth pink. Conor had wanted to touch him, just to assure himself that he was really sitting there next to him. Looking back, he knows he should’ve, just so he could’ve memorized how his skin feels under his fingers. It didn’t really matter, of course.
Brock scratches the back of his neck, breaking Conor’s focus. His cheeks are still red. “Uh, so. Funny story.”
“Yeah?” Conor says, sinking feeling returning.
“Um, so I promised. Okay, it’s hard to explain, but I was second star tonight.”
“Yes,” Conor says. “I saw that, nice job.”
“Thanks. Uh. But. I don’t know if it’s different in Vancouver. Quinn hasn’t mentioned anything, like, super different.”
“You and Quinn talk about Winner’s Rooms?” Conor says, squinting.
“No,” Brock says, blinking. “Jesus Christ, no. Um. But we have, like. A substitution program here. If any of the top three stars don’t want to, like, you know, another guy can substitute.”
Not like the Canucks, then. The guy who gets the Winner’s Rooms either takes it or leaves it. Maybe they thought it would be better for team performance if you either had to shit or get off the pot.
“Yeah,” Brock continues. “So I have to ask you. Uh. Would you accept a substitution for Winner’s Room?”
“A substitute?” Conor says, not completely following. “Someone asked you?”
“Yeah,” Brock says. His glasses are fogging up somehow. “Would you accept a substitute?”
“Who?” Conor asks, knowing the answer already.
“Quinn?” Brock says, voice higher with uncertainty.
A pause. Conor leans back. Quinn’s smile in the back of his mind.
“He asked you to switch.”
“When the stars of the game were announced, yeah,” Brock says, scratching the back of his neck. His University of Minnesota shirt is truly worn through. “I told him I’d ask.”
Silence. Anger simmers. He imagines Quinn going to Faber after the game to plead for his Winner’s Room when all he had to do was respond to Conor’s texts. Where is he now? Outside, waiting to see if Brock will come out and say No, man, he said no?
Something hot brews in Conor’s chest, tight on his lungs. He shrugs his shoulders, trying to loosen the feeling and keep his cool.
“Uh, for what it’s worth,” Brock says, raising his chin like he’s being brave. “He talks about how you in the room.”
“Sure,” Conor agrees easily, pressing on a bruise that developed without him realizing, in between knowing Quinn wanted to leave and coming to terms with the fact that he did. He doesn’t want to hear how Quinn speaks about him to other guys. He can’t imagine it. He doesn’t want to.
“He says you know a lot. About hockey stuff and books. I also know you have, like, a movie thing. I like movies too, so he mentioned it.”
Like he and Faber are going to bond over it.
There’s an ugly and petulant side of him that comes out in times like these. He’d probably like Brock in another room, at another time. If he had ever made it to the Olympics.
“Does he talk about Brock?” Conor says. It’s a selfish question, one kept in his heart. Brock loved Quinn — he would sit for hours talking to him too, next to the both of them.
“Huh?” Brock says. Oh.
“Boeser. Does he talk about Boes?”
“Uh, sorta,” Brock says, looking sheepish and slightly guilty. “Just that he’s from here.”
Distantly, he feels bad for Faber in all of this, standing there, watching Conor grapple with the present. He’s been in the middle of a feud before.
“If it’s not the time, I can tell Quinn you said, like, not right now.” Brock puts out his hands. “No pressure.”
Conor is thankful to Brock for giving him the out. But, exhausted with himself and this room and with Quinn, cannot find a reason to say no. At the heart of him, he doesn’t want to say no. The other option is not seeing Quinn at all, and that’s worse.
“Okay,” Conor says, cracking his neck to one side and then the other. Getting ready for the fight. “I accept the substitute.”
“You sure?” Brock says, eyebrows creeping up behind his frames. “I can tell Quinn something came up. Not that you said no. I know it can be awkward with this sort of stuff.”
“Thank you, Faber,” Conor says. Brock’s a good guy. “It’ll be fine.”
“Okay,” Brock says as he heads toward the door, looking back at him with concern. “Good to see you again, dude.”
“Thanks. Bye,” Conor says, and waits until the door clicks shut to spring forward and rush to the bathroom to look at his hair. It ultimately doesn’t matter — his hair will never stay in its place anyway, but he wants a good impression. He’s vain — he’s good at pretending he’s not. But he is.
The last time he saw Quinn, Conor’s beard had been shaved, hair still short enough to brush his ears. Now it’s longer, like it always is at the end of the season. His stubble isn’t quite at mountain man level yet, but it’s about a week out. He has dark bags under his eyes, but that’s neither here nor there.
He feels like he should look different, like all of this should’ve made some mark on him. He just looks more tired than he did before. He looks deeply into the mirror and sighs, jittering around the parts that need tweaking. Jeez, Conor, he thinks as he swipes his hair out of his eyes. He won’t care. Like any haircut would’ve made Quinn stay.
The door handle clicks.
Conor doesn’t hold his breath on purpose, but it’s caught there in his chest. The door swings open in the mirror.
The fear that everything will be different between them, the fear that nothing will have changed.
“Hello?” Quinn says. His voice is quiet in a quiet room. “G?”
Conor can just see the top of his head. His whole chest aches. He should’ve told Faber no.
“Hey,” he warbles, tucking one last strand behind his ear. “I’m in the bathroom.”
There are quiet, hesitant footsteps on the floor. Then Quinn’s there at the doorway, wearing the same after-game BodyArmour long-sleeve shirt and shorts that he wore in Vancouver.
He looks the same. His hair is long, longer than it was in Vancouver, brushing his shoulders. The ends slightly curl.
Maybe he hasn’t found a hairstylist in St. Paul like the one he left in Vancouver. But it makes his face look very soft all of a sudden. Less pale and drawn, less serious. His eyes, big and green.
“Hi,” Conor says, aware of change more than ever.
“Hey,” Quinn says quietly. His eyes dart around Conor’s face, looking for something.
“I hear you’re my substitute,” Conor says. He doesn’t want to move from his spot, pressed up against the bathroom counter.
“Yeah,” Quinn says, looking like he wants to speak more but pressing his lips together before he does. “I asked Brock, he said he didn’t mind.”
His voice is hoarse, like he’s been yelling. He might be speaking extra softly to not scare him. Conor wants to lean closer to hear him better, grab his shoulders like he used to.
“You didn’t want Mysie?” Conor says, tone artificially light. “Maybe some new blood? Zeev?”
Something tightens in Quinn’s face, somewhere near his mouth. “It’s nice to see you too.”
“You could’ve answered my text, Huggy,” Conor says, tone carefully level.
“You could’ve picked up one of the eighty times I called, G,” Quinn says. Conor’s eye twitches.
Quinn’s right. Conor had been screening his calls for the better part of four months, unable to hear him try to be normal again. It won’t be normal. The team they were both on for four years is no longer there, not in any way that matters.
“I should’ve,” Conor says instead. Honesty is probably the best policy in this scenario. “I was afraid you’d think - I don’t know, Quinn. We’re the worst team in the league. I didn’t think you cared.”
Obviously, Conor knows that it’s an insult to Quinn to think he didn’t care, not when he used to keep tallies of the worst teams of the league and what their draft chances were with him. They watched all of the draft last year. Quinn had an opinion on every guy in the top 32, noting what he liked and didn’t like. And truly, Quinn doesn’t dislike the Canucks — honest to God, he doesn’t. He disliked being on the Canucks and losing, being the mouthpiece after the fact, getting just a taste of winning before he loses ten in a row.
This is everything that Conor’s said to rookies, to his family, to Demmer. Here he is now, saying the opposite to Quinn like he doesn’t know him.
Getting him angry is close to making him feel something. To Conor, that’s a win regardless.
“I do care,” Quinn says, voice getting a little more thready. He’s not meeting his eyes now, which isn’t uncommon with Quinn. “I was on the team longer than you were, G. I still have friends there.”
“Yeah?” Conor says. “When’s the last time you talked to them?”
Silence. Fil mentioned that he hasn’t said a word to him, neither with Mysie or Brock. It’s expected. It’s still painful, especially when Quinn is posting pictures with Brady Tkachuk and Josh Norris like they’re still roommates. Maybe they’re not good enough to matter to him, maybe not cool enough.
“Why am I here?” Conor says, quietly. The bathroom sink is cold under his fingers. “I don’t understand.”
Quinn looks at him again, his eyebrows knit together. The bathroom light is flattering on Quinn’s face: warm light on Quinn’s forehead, his nose.
It’s a distracting part of their relationship, one that Conor knows he can’t express in the words Quinn will understand. Quinn is handsome like a guy you see once in a bar and never again, except he saw him every day for years. If that guy wanted to watch hockey games with you and play chess. Being picked by the guy with a quiet, sweet voice who is really good at hockey, knowing he’s your friend on purpose.
How could Conor escape it? How could he want to? The feeling under the betrayal of Quinn leaving — heartbreak. Quinn leaving is one thing. Quinn leaving Conor is another.
“I wanted to talk to you,” Quinn says, like he’s directly from Conor’s dreams. Conor’s expecting him to say, “Let’s list all of the best defensive forwards in the league. You go first,” next. Maybe “These other guys aren’t better than you are.”
Conor misses Quinn every time he has to watch that commercial with them in it play on Sportsnet. Conor misses Quinn every time he steps outside. His kid is named Quintin. He says his name every day.
“Yeah, well, I missed you too,” Conor says, trying to be nonchalant, looking off to the side. But it’s annoying how he can’t hide any big emotions — the slight shake of his shoulders, his wet eyes. So he lets it show in his oversized shark t-shirt, his baggy shorts. Naked in every way but the one they’re both here for.
Quinn watches him for a second before his expression shutters, his shoulders sagging. He steps closer, and Conor straightens up before Quinn hesitantly puts his arm around his shoulders and presses his cheek next to his.
“I’m sorry,” Quinn says, his mouth muffled against his chin. His whole body is warm and damp. There’s nothing to be sorry for, Conor wants to say, but it won’t come out. Brock hasn’t been the same since he left. They’re trading everybody on the team not named Buium or Cootes. Quinn’s leaving swung a wrecking ball into an old, shaky building. He got to leave before it collapsed. Conor leans his face against Quinn’s instead of saying anything.
Conor can only hear the pipes in the wall clanking and Quinn’s slow breathing if he forces himself not to think. Maybe he should order room service instead of going outside in the cold tonight. Maybe he should delete Quinn’s number after this.
Quinn lets go after a while, slowly bringing up his hands from his shoulder to his neck. His fingernails are cut short, grazing his cheeks. His eyes are pink. Quinn leans in to kiss him, eyebrows scrunched together like he’s worried about Conor pushing him off.
His lips are wet with sweat and spit, bitten hard and scratchy against the cold air, but he’s a good kisser. Conor grabs his wrist and holds on for dear life. In the moment, Conor can’t remember how he could ever forget what he smells like, how warm he is. His sweaty palms.
In another life, maybe this doesn’t happen in a Winner’s Room, where Conor knows it’s just an opportunity to release steam. Maybe it’s in Quinn’s old Yaletown apartment after dinner. But Conor likes to make a narrative out of things that don’t exist — that’s how he convinced himself he was going to the Olympics with Quinn, with JT, with Kells. He just assumed that’s what would happen, because it made sense.
He stayed home instead. He’ll play on a losing team forever.
Quinn gasps against his mouth as Conor bites down on his bottom lip, panting open-mouthed and kissing him until Conor digs a hand into his lower back, and then lower, near the waistband of his shorts and under his shirt.
So what if it only happens here? Conor can do this. Conor is not too bad **at sex — he’s made guys he and Quinn have talked about cum in ways he’ll never repeat in public. He can show him a good time.
Conor drags Quinn’s shirt gently over his head, appreciating for a moment. His chest is pale, like the rest of him, no chest hair in sight, and he’s muscled and built lean like a boxer. Conor’s seen this chest in many configurations — seen it in pools and in showers and in locker rooms, in his bathroom before they leave for a flight. It always makes his hair stand up on end. His mouth waters.
Quinn looks bewildered at the sight of his own naked chest, so Conor takes his shirt off too, tossing it in a heap on the floor. Quinn then looks bewildered at Conor’s chest too, eyes locked at his shoulders and abs like he’s never seen them before. His cheeks are pink.
Conor knows he looks pretty good, even at the scrawny end of the season, so he preens a little. Flexes what he can flex without looking too obvious. He still sneaks donuts, but he largely follows the trainer’s advice and lifts a little heavier the day after.
Conor waits for Quinn to make any sort of move, but he doesn’t. He just stands there, eyes wide like he can’t move. So Conor stretches upwards, grimacing at the pops and clicks in his neck. He can lead this dance.
So Quinn looks affronted as Conor shoves him back into the room, and Conor flips some of the light switches on the wall so it’s a little more atmospheric. The whole room is suddenly washed in a golden glow.
Quinn sits on the bed, looking up at him as Conor comes closer. He looks devastated.
You’re the one who left us, Conor thinks as he crawls into Quinn’s lap, feeling his hands hesitantly grip his ass in response. You left. You left me.
His stats plummeted to the worst he’s ever been when Quinn left, and everyone kept asking him how he was and what happened to him.
He leans forward and kisses him anyway.
Quinn goes to lie back on the bed, and Conor follows him down, bracing his elbows on either side of his head. Quinn still has his shorts on, and while Conor really wants to lie there and listen to Quinn sigh all night, they only have an hour. He reaches down to tug at Quinn’s waistband, finger the warm skin there. He sucks on Quinn’s jaw, then the hinge of his neck as he inches down.
“Wait,” Quinn says quietly, finally finding his voice. He grabs Conor’s shoulder, not pushing him off, just holding him. Conor backs up to look at him. “Are you sure?”
“You wanna stop?” Conor says, breathing heavily as he looks at Quinn, squinting. He can stop. He can get off of him and sit a normal distance next to him. He’s pretty sure.
“Uh,” Quinn starts, looking thrown. He licks his lips again. There’s a part of his bottom lip that’s pinker, like he’s ripped off a bit of skin there, and he keeps tongueing it. “Do you?”
“I don’t mind,” Conor says, artificially nonchalant. It’s an understatement. He’s been granted something he’s wanted for a long time. His Gold medal, hung up in his office, Quinn’s picture across from it. “You sure you want to waste a Winner’s Room?”
“I’ve never had one,” Quinn says quietly, looking at the ceiling past him. His cheeks are pinker.
“The other guys never pick you?” Conor says, sitting back on his heels, grimacing as his foot starts prickling with lack of blood. “No way.””
“I know. I usually decline,” Quinn says. “Or forfeit.” He still doesn’t look at Conor. “It’s not something I’m interested in.”
“So why today?” Conor asks. It’s the obvious question. If he were IMac, he’d ask that one. Along with How did it feel to leave your team of seven years behind? Do you think the fans are still going to boo you every time you touch the puck next season? Should they?
Quinn considers him for a second before leaning up on his elbows. He’s very close to Conor’s face. Conor can see the red mark his helmet left on his forehead. His bones under his skin. Conor can feel his eyes crossing as he tries to look Quinn right in front of him.
Quinn kisses him again instead of answering, which is very Quinn. He’s a kisser, Conor notes as Quinn grazes his bottom lip with his tongue. Some guys aren’t kissers.
His brain is pleasantly fuzzy as he leans them both back down. Quinn’s hands are warm at his hips, inching Conor’s shorts and underwear down his thighs. Conor hopes he wore nice briefs today and not the holey ones from ten years ago. He can’t remember. They’ve been on this roadtrip for a while.
He feels Quinn’s warm hands slide up his thighs, grabbing handfuls of the thick muscle there and squeezing. Then they drift over to Conor’s cock, sliding along the hairy base of it, steadily harder since they hit the bed. Quinn makes a sound like a gasp into Conor’s neck, unsteady and thin, when he gets his hand around it.
Conor wants to sit up on his knees to watch him do it, unabashed. He’s got a great memory, ask anyone. The image of Quinn — eyes wide and green, mouth red and shiny, spit on his chin where Conor shoved his tongue in his mouth— will stay in his mind long after Quinn forgets his name.
His hips jerk involuntarily, deeper into Quinn’s tight fist. Quinn grunts before bringing his hand to his mouth and spitting on it before reaching back down for it, fist forming around his cock again.
It’s electric. Quinn’s eyes watch him as his hips slowly work up a rhythm. He feels unmoored to anything but where his hands touch the bed and where Quinn’s hand strokes his dick.
“Yeah?” Quinn whispers, finally interrupting the grunting and slick sounds of skin on skin. “You like that?”
There’s an earnest tilt to the question. It’s not porn talk. Conor doesn’t think Quinn could really talk at length about his big, hard cock anyway, but the question makes his brain hiccup regardless.
“Yeah,” Conor says, feeling his eyelids shutter close as Quinn slowly quickens the pace. “Yeah, Huggy, that’s good.”
Singlemindedly dedicated to everything he does. It makes sense that it extends to sex too.
Conor opens his eyes to make a joke about it; maybe they’ll create a new award just for this called the Hughes. But Quinn is looking at him, expression raw and naked, stripped down to the studs. He’s breathing deep, eyes wide, like he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“Hey,” Conor says. Quinn stills, waiting for something. A command. He tries to clear his mind, refocus on what’s important. Conor’s in here getting jerked off in Quinn’s Winner’s Room. How is that fair. “Come here.”
Quinn does. He brings his hands to his waistband and shuffles his shorts down his legs. Conor watches on his heels as the underwear Quinn wears — Ralph Lauren, a true All-American — gets dragged down with them, hooking around his ankle as he tries to shake it off his leg. He gets to enjoy the view now, at least a little.
Quinn’s a hairy guy from the chest down, and he’s not a trimmer either. Conor wants to bury his face underneath his pelvis like a dog, huffing the smell and licking at the skin. He peeks at Quinn before doing it anyway, impulsive, breathing it in because he’s sure he’ll remember how this feels now, rubbing his face in it.
He can hear Quinn’s startled chuckling above his head, so he rubs his stubbly chin against Quinn’s hip too, watching as the pale skin there gets redder and redder. Quinn’s fingers tug in his hair, curling into fists at the nape of his neck. Not guiding him anywhere, just holding it. The red marks disappear, slowly but surely. Not good enough.
He repositions his head and sucks hard on a delicate part of Quinn’s inner thigh, enough that Quinn’s resulting gasp is mostly hiss. He draws back to see the round imprint of his mouth on Quinn’s leg redden quickly with no sign of fading after a minute of waiting. It’s a no-no in the Winner’s Room to leave any mark, obviously. If Quinn wanted to, he could take this up with NHLPA and get Conor banned from future Winner’s Rooms entirely.
Quinn’s face is more struck than offended. He bites his lip as he barely nods in response to Conor’s raised eyebrow. Conor puts his thumb right in the middle of his bruise and presses it as he leans forward to finally lick up Quinn’s dick. Quinn’s hands in his hair pull, hard enough that Conor hisses around the head of Quinn’s dick before going in to bob his head on it.
Sucking dick is easy when you’re good at it - finding the good spots, how deep a guy likes it. Quinn isn’t a super vocal guy, as he expected, so he enjoys every minute twitch of Quinn’s hips, every deep breath of a guy trying not to lose it. Conor loves this. Quinn pulls harder and Conor gasps around him, pulling back to raise his eyebrows at Quinn, who just looks amused. A strand of spit connects Conor’s mouth to Quinn, and he licks his lips before getting back to it.
He can feel Quinn get closer as he starts to get sloppy, his whole body tightening like a coil before he -
“Yeah,” Quinn sighs, and Conor swallows because he doesn’t want to drag that stupid garbage can over and spit into it. Quinn’s dick is soft and drooling still when Conor finally lets it flop back on his stomach. Quinn himself looks a little wrecked, but again, not changed past recognition. He looks like the Quinn who would take a walk with him anywhere if he’d ask.
He kisses the little hickey on Quinn’s thigh, the only proof he’d been there. Then he gets back up, wiping his mouth with his arm, searching for where he threw his underwear.
“Hey,” Quinn says, the words thick and garbled in his throat. Conor looks back to where Quinn is blearily blinking at him. “Wait.”
“Okay,” Conor says, leaning back on the bed to look at him. He looks less impressive than usual with his soft dick on his belly. “Hey.”
“We have a couple of minutes still,” Quinn says. He presses his lips together. “I can get you back on the road after.”
“Yeah?” Conor says quietly. He is softer in a way he doesn’t like or recognize, especially because he knows he won’t see Quinn consistently enough to feel normal again. But he wants to pretend. “Yeah, okay.”
Quinn leans up and grabs his shoulder to bring him in closer. Quinn’s shaved chin is prickly underneath his hand, kissing him without letting him up to breathe. He lets Quinn push him back on his elbows and Quinn resumes stroking him like they never stopped.
“You like this,” Conor says. Quinn looks up from hyperfocusing on stroking his dick to consider this question.
“No comment,” Quinn decides on, smiling up at him. Conor could kiss him for that smile. So he does. He can feel the shape of it still under his mouth before Quinn kisses him back.
He cums halfway in Quinn’s hands not two minutes later, like he’s in high school, contorting tight into Quinn’s shoulder and grunting. Quinn knocks his shoulder back and laughs as Conor tries to dodge his cum-covered hand. Quinn grabs a paper towel from the nightstand and gently scrubs the cum off it.
Conor goes off to finally find his underwear, feeling like he’ll start humming old rock songs if he’s not careful. Quinn is shouldering his t-shirt back on when the warning knock on the door sounds. Conor waits the requisite three seconds before yelling back, “Hello?”
“The hour is up. Can I come in?”
It’s the same woman from before. Conor looks back at Quinn, who nods before sliding on his shorts.
“Come in,” Conor says. The door creaks open again, and there she is, with the same clipboard. The lightness in Conor’s heart dims a bit to see her take in the bed, the lowered lights with pursed lips.
“Hello. If you’re done, please sign this,” she says, gesturing the board and a pen at them. Conor nods and scoops his hair out of his face while he picks up her pen and signs underneath his name. Another NHLPA contract. She comes to the bed and offers the same to Quinn, who wipes his hands off on his shorts and signs his name under a scratched-out BROCK FABER.
She nods at both of them as she clips her papers in. “You’re free to leave. Good night, gentleman.” Then she leaves, the door left ajar behind her.
Like that, the mirage disappears. Quinn looks pained again, and Conor misses the smile that rested there before. This look — the frown, chewing on his lip — it’s the same face Quinn had in that restaurant, in a private room in the back of the steakhouse in December.
Conor’s hands were shaking as he re-traced the corners of the menu until they were peeling. Tyler and Fil caged him on both sides, pressing against him so he wouldn’t run out of there. How drawn Brock’s face was when Quinn said how much he loved them all, how he had to leave to do this for himself. Quinn, the guy who sacrificed his chance at 4Nations to miss the playoffs with them, who could’ve won the Norris last year if they hadn’t been so fucking bad at hockey.
Fil stood next to him right as Quinn was hugging Tyler and Brock a distance away, outside the restaurant, in the cold air of New Jersey.
“Sorry,” Fil said quietly. A man of few words.
“Yeah,” Conor said, swiping under his eyes and nose conspicuously. “Sorry to you too.”
“It’s different,” Fil waves it away. “You know.”
Conor watches as Brock says something to Quinn and he laughs, surprised at whatever he said. Quinn looks at him briefly, like he was wondering if Conor heard it too, before looking away.
“No, Fil,” Conor said, annoyance prickling that Fil noticed it, that Conor couldn’t pretend that no one did. “I think maybe that was in our heads.”
“Not really,” Fil said mysteriously, crossing his arms against his chest, looking at the proceedings. Fil, just as inscrutable as Quinn. Conor doesn’t even know what he’s trying to say, but he nods, sliding his hands into his pockets in his jeans.
“The shit we will have to deal with tomorrow,” Fil continued, shaking his head. “I won’t forgive him for that. And the captain shit. Christ.”
“Well, that’s a good thing, Fil,” Conor said, trying to joke. “You’ll be a great captain.”
Then they stand in silence, watching as Quinn looks their way and visibly swallows. Brock and Tyler are the easy ones — they have big, blonde sensibilities. Fil and Conor are the ones he went to in the end, the ones who saw him at his worst.
This would be the worst for Quinn, for sure. But Fil and Conor are no longer his to lean on. His brothers are probably in a car a block away, waiting for him to be done with this strange interaction with Quinn’s past. The other Canucks are three thousand miles away from their families, from Roger’s Arena, unmoored in this strange new present.
A lump formed in Conor’s throat then, and he swallowed and swallowed, and it never went away. He doesn’t remember how Quinn said goodbye to Fil, but he remembers Quinn not meeting his eyes as he leaned in to slap his back. Then he disappeared into a car.
“You still want dinner?” Conor says casually, here and now. “We’re here tonight and tomorrow morning.”
Like a dog, begging.
“I have to review tape,” Quinn says, gliding past the question as he grabs his phone from his pocket and checks the time. “I would, G. I’m sorry. We gotta get ready for playoffs.”
The better team won. Conor won’t be able to give him one any time soon.
“Okay,” Conor says, nodding woodenly. “It was nice seeing you, Huggy.”
Conor wants to touch him again. He’ll get greedy with it if he gets too much, though - he’ll start sending him messages on Instagram after every game, start following his brothers in case they post about him.
Quinn comes in to hug him briefly and slap his back goodbye. For a second, it feels like it’s the old them again. It feels like pulling out his teeth one by one to leave that. Like fighting a bigger, meaner guy for the sake of it. knowing he's leaving the game after.
He checks his phone as he hurries through the dark hallways of the Grand Casino Arena, dodging Wild staff and getting into the town car the organization had waiting for him in just his shorts and his t-shirt.
Tyler
Hope everything’s okay bud
Tyler
Missed you at Chilli’s
On Instagram, Doc sends him the picture of all of them smiling for the camera. Fil’s in the corner of it, smirking and blurry as he takes the selfie.
They’ll win it next time.