Work Text:
Will was beyond exhausted, his muscles aching pleasantly from a grueling practice session, and then having to stay late to shoot some promo shots. He trudged up the apartment steps, craving the moment he gets to flop down on the couch and pull Mack into his arms. But when he pushed the door open, the air had something else entirely.
Mack was on the couch where Will expected him be, but instead of the usual sprawl of limbs and lazy grin, he was coiled tight like a spring, arms crossed, chin tucked stubbornly against his chest, hood up and lips stuck out in a cartoonish pout.
Will knew that pout. Not the "I'm genuinely hurt" one—that one was rare and always softened with vulnerability. Definitely not the “my tummy hurts and I want to die dramatically” one, which usually came with Mack draped over furniture like a Victorian widow. No, this was much worse: the “I am annoyed about something objectively ridiculous and intend to make it your problem” pout.
Will mentally ran through the list of things that could have triggered Mack's pout—left the milk out again, forgot to record that baking show Mack liked, accidentally used his fancy conditioner as body wash. Nothing fit.
“Hey baby, you okay?” Will ventured, kicking off his shoes with deliberate slowness, watching Mack’s profile for any flicker of reaction.
“Fine,” Mack said, voice pinched and tight-lipped, like the word was being forcibly extracted from him.
Will moved to behind the couch, resting his forearms on the back cushion and leaning down to press a kiss to Mack’s cheek. Mack didn’t pull away, but he didn’t lean into it either—a stalemate.
Will walked around and sat himself down next to Mack on the couch, the cushions dipping under his weight. Mack scooted two inches away, the movement so deliberate it was practically theatrical.
“Mackie, baby,” Will tried again, reaching over to tug gently at the strings of Mack’s hoodie. “Talk to me.”
“There’s nothing to say,” Mack muttered, chin still tucked.
Okay, this wasn’t Will first rodeo, he knew how to handle Mack’s moods—especially the ones that came with extra dramatics. He leaned back against the cushions, stretching his arms along the back of the couch, letting his fingers brush the fabric near Mack’s shoulder. Subtle, but deliberate. Testing the waters. “You sure?” he asked, voice light. “Because last time you said ‘nothing’s wrong,’ it turned out you were mad because I said if I could get coffee with any hockey player it would be Gretzky and not you.”
“That was stupid, this is serious,” Mack muttered, though his lips twitched slightly at the memory.
Will took that as progress. He slid his hand down to squeeze Mack’s knee, thumb tracing idle circles through the fabric of his sweatpants. “Okay, serious,” Will agreed solemnly. “So serious that you won’t even tell me what I did?”
“You know what you did,” Mack grumbled, finally lifting his head just enough to glare at Will from under his hood. The effect was ruined slightly by the way his bottom lip was still jutted out in that ridiculous pout, but Will wasn’t about to point that out. Not yet, at least.
“I really really don’t,” Will said, letting his amusement seep into his voice just enough to make Mack’s glare sharpen. His thumb kept tracing those slow circles on Mack’s knee, the touch feather-light and teasing. “Unless this is about the conditioner thing again—”
“This is so much worse than the conditioner thing,” Mack huffed, finally turning fully toward Will, though his arms remained crossed. His hood had slipped back slightly, revealing the mussed hair underneath—a telltale sign he’d been running his hands through his hair in frustration. Will fought the urge to reach out and smooth them down.
Will glanced around for clues—dishes done, no takeout containers in sight, the TV paused on... oh. Oh no. The Ford Bronco commercial thumbnail stared back at him, Mack’s phone was still open on the coffee table with Twitter pulled up. A quick scan revealed the problem: his own face, mid-laugh in the ad, retweeted twelve thousand times with captions like “WHY IS HE LIKE THIS” and “the way I’d let him run me over.” Will bit his lip hard to stop the laugh bubbling up.
“Mackie,” Will said slowly, the realization dawning on him like sunlight breaking through stubborn clouds. “Is this about the Bronco ad that came out today?”
Mack’s silence was answer enough. His jaw tightened, his fingers digging into his own biceps where his arms were still crossed. Will could practically see the steam coming out of his ears.
“Baby, what’s wrong with the Bronco ad?” Will asked, voice softer now, amusement giving way to something warmer. He shifted closer on the couch, their thighs brushing, and Mack didn’t pull away this time—progress.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know,” Mack muttered, voice dropping into that low, grumbly register that always made Will’s chest tighten. His fingers flexed against his arms, like he was physically restraining himself from saying more.
“I’m not pretending,” Will said, nudging Mack’s knee with his own. “You gotta spell it out for me, sweetheart. Commercials are part of being a hockey player. You do them too.”
Mack exhaled sharply through his nose, the sound somewhere between a scoff and a sigh. “Yeah, I do commercials,” he said, finally uncrossing his arms just to gesture vaguely at the frozen screen. “But mine don’t look like that.”
“Like what?” Will asked, genuinely perplexed. He leaned forward to squint at the paused commercial thumbnail—just him standing by the Bronco in perfectly normal sweats and a t-shirt.
“Like—” Mack floundered for a second, hands fluttering in the air before he pointed accusingly at the screen. “Like that! You’re all hot and shit!” The words burst out of him like he’d been holding them back for hours, his cheeks flushing immediately after, as if he hadn’t meant to say it quite like that.
Will blinked once, twice, then let out a startled laugh that was halfway to a wheeze. “Wait—hold on—” He wiped at his eyes, shoulders shaking. “You’re mad because I’m ‘hot and shit’ in a car commercial?”
Mack’s cheeks burned brighter, his fingers curling into fists against his thighs. “It’s not funny,” he insisted, though the way his bottom lip trembled betrayed him. “The entire internet thinks you’re—you’re—” He waved his hands again, as if the motion could summon the right word from thin air. “Hot!”
Will bit his lower lip hard, trying—and failing—to suppress the grin splitting his face. Mack’s shoulders hunched further, his fingers now gripping the fabric of his sweatpants like he might tear it. “You think this is funny?” Mack accused, voice pitching higher with indignation.
Will knew he should probably dial it back—Mack was teetering between genuinely grumpy and self-aware enough to know he was being ridiculous—but the sight of him all flustered and possessive was too good. Will pressed his lips together, forcing his voice into something resembling solemnity. “No, no, of course not. Dead serious. This is a national emergency.”
Mack’s eyes narrowed into slits. “You’re laughing,” he accused, jabbing a finger into Will’s chest.
Will caught Mack’s finger mid-jab, wrapping his hand around it with exaggerated gravity. “I’m not laughing,” he lied, his shoulders still shaking as he pulled Mack’s hand to his chest. “I’m just… deeply concerned about your distress.”
Mack yanked his hand back with a wounded noise. "You're mocking me," he hissed, but there was no real heat behind it—just that familiar, petulant edge that meant he was fighting a losing battle against his own amusement.
“I’m not, I promise, I’m just trying to understand,” Will said, though his voice cracked on the last word as another laugh bubbled up. He cleared his throat dramatically, rubbing his thumb over Mack’s knuckles where their hands were still loosely tangled. “Okay, walk me through it. What exactly about the commercial—?”
Mack exhaled sharply through his nose, his fingers twitching against Will’s. “First of all,” he said, voice dropping into something dangerously close to a pout, “the leaning.”
Will blinked. “The… leaning?”
Mack gestured wildly at the paused screen where Will was casually propped against the Bronco, one shoulder hitched against the driver’s side door. "Yes, the leaning," he hissed. "You were all—" Mack abruptly stood, nearly kneeing the coffee table, and mimicked the pose with exaggerated precision: shoulders back, one hip cocked, head tilted just so. "Like you own the damn car. Like you own the road. Like—" His voice cracked. "Like you knew exactly how good you looked."
Will's breath caught—half from laughter, half from the sheer absurdity of Mack's reenactment. The way he threw himself into the pose, chin tipped up in mock arrogance, was so exaggerated it bordered on performance art. "I was just standing there," Will managed, voice wobbling with barely contained amusement.
“Yeah but why were you standing like that?” Mack demanded, still frozen in his ridiculous pose before collapsing back onto the couch with a huff. “Nobody needs to lean that hard. It’s a car commercial, not a—a—” He flapped his hands again. “A thirst trap!”
Will let out a noise halfway between a cough and a whimper, pressing his forehead against Mack’s shoulder to stifle the laughter shaking through him. "A thirst trap," he repeated, voice muffled against Mack’s hoodie. "For a Bronco. Baby, it’s literally a family SUV."
“Yeah and I alot people on the internet wanna have your babies because of it,” Mack muttered, his voice so thick with sulkiness that Will had to bite down on his lip hard enough to draw blood to keep from laughing outright. He could feel Mack vibrating with indignation beneath him, the warmth of his thigh pressed against Will’s own radiating like a furnace.
“The only person who gets to have my babies is you,” Will murmured against Mack’s shoulder, grinning when Mack shoved at him halfheartedly.
“Don’t say that. You already know how I feel about the fact that you can’t get me pregnant,” Mack whined, shoving Will’s face away with his palm.
And boy did Will know how Mack felt about that matter, Will had a very long night comforting a very upset Mack who had just gotten his wisdom teeth out and was very high on painkillers when he suddenly realized that Will could not in fact get him pregnant, but that was a story for another day.
“So the leaning was offensive and people want my babies. Well fuck them, and fuck science, we’ll have a baby one day.”
“Yeah,” Mack smiled a bit. “Fine let’s do that.”
“Is that all?” Will asked.
“No that’s not all!“ Mack jabbed a finger at the frozen screen again, his nostrils flaring. “Then you had to go and smile like—like that.”
Will tilted his head, glancing at the screen where his own frozen grin stared back—perfectly normal, as far as he could tell. “Like what? It’s just my smile.”
Mack made a noise like a dying whale, dragging both hands down his face. "Just your—no. No, Will. That was not a 'just your smile' smile. That was a—" He gestured wildly at the screen. "A commercial smile. A 'people are giggling and kicking their feet' smile."
Will couldn't help it—he pressed his lips together so hard they turned white, but the snort escaped anyway. "People are kicking—Mack, it's literally just me smiling at a camera."
“Ugh, you are so stupid you don’t even realize!” Mack groaned, flopping backward onto the couch cushions like a Victorian maiden succumbing to a fainting spell. He threw an arm dramatically over his eyes. “That smile was practically flirting with the entire continental United States.”
“Mackie, come on—” Will leveled seeing how worked up his boyfriend was getting, his amusement softening into something warmer. He reached out, threading their fingers together and squeezing gently. “You know that’s not true. I wasn’t flirting with anyone. It’s just a smile.”
“Yeah, well I thought it was my smile, but apparently it belongs to the entire internet now,” Mack grumbled, tugging his hand away to cross his arms again—though the effect was ruined by the way his knees had migrated toward Will’s lap.
Will had to resist the urge to audibly say “awe” his baby was just too cute. He let his fingers trail up Mack’s thigh, pressing gently into the muscle there. “Baby, that’s my commercial smile,” he said softly, thumb tracing idle circles on Mack’s kneecap. “You don’t want that one.”
“Yes I do!” Mack insisted, twisting toward Will with such sudden indignation that his knee nearly jabbed Will in the ribs. “All your smiles are mine!”
Will caught Mack’s ankle before it could do any real damage, grinning as he tugged him closer until Mack was in his lap, still pouting. “Okay, listen,” Will said, cupping Mack’s jaw with both hands, thumbs brushing the stubborn frown lines at the corners of his mouth. “There’s a difference between my commercial smile and my Mack smile.”
Mack narrowed his eyes but didn’t pull away, his fingers curling into the fabric of Will’s hoodie. “Explain.”
So Will did. He nodded at the screen—his commercial smile: perfectly even teeth, eyes crinkled just enough to look friendly but not tired, chin tilted at precisely 12 degrees to catch the studio lighting. It was handsome. Generic. Empty. “See?” Will said, holding it for exactly three seconds before letting it drop. “That’s commercial smile. That’s for cameras.”
Mack frowned harder. “Still too hot.”
“I like my Mack smile better,” Will said, grabbing his phone to show Mack his lock screen, a candid shot from a few months back. Mack remembered the moment—Will laughing at something dumb he’d said, his nose scrunched up slightly, one eye squinted shut mid-laugh, his hair mussed from Mack’s fingers tugging at it seconds before. “See?” Will murmured, tracing the screen with his thumb. “This is the one that’s yours. The real one.”
Mack stared at the photo for a long moment, his frown softening incrementally as Will’s thumb brushed over the screen. Then his gaze flicked back up, eyes narrowing again. “Okay, fine,” he conceded, though his fingers tightened in Will’s hoodie. “I can forgive the lean. And I’m fine with the smile. But you still—” He jabbed a finger toward the paused commercial. “You used to angel eyes!”
“My what?” Will repeated, blinking rapidly as Mack launched into another tirade.
“You know how you always say that I have have big sad puppy dog eyes that I use to get what I want? Well you have the opposite you have these sharp cool blue angel eyes that you use to get what you want and you used them in the commercial!” Mack accused, gesturing wildly at the frozen screen where Will’s eyes were indeed looking particularly striking—the studio lighting catching the icy blue perfectly.
Will's breath hitched—half from laughter, half from the sheer ridiculousness of Mack's accusation. "Angel eyes?" he repeated, voice cracking on the second syllable as Mack nodded furiously, his own wide, dark eyes practically sparkling with indignation.
“Yeah! They make you look pure and all American and shit,” Mack huffed, his fingers tightening in Will’s hoodie. “And you used them—for capitalism!”
Will pressed his forehead against Mack’s shoulder, shoulders shaking with silent laughter. “Angel eyes,” he muttered, fingers clutching Mack’s waist to steady himself. “Baby, I didn’t—I wasn’t even—I didn’t know I had those.”
Mack made an indignant noise, his fingers tightening in Will's hoodie. "Don't play dumb," he hissed, shaking Will slightly. "You've been weaponizing those eyes since college!"
“We we’re rivals in college,” Will placated, still grinning against Mack’s shoulder. “If I was weaponizing anything, it was my slap shot.”
Mack let out a sound somewhere between a scoff and a whine, pressing his forehead against Will's collarbone. "You're impossible," he mumbled into the fabric of Will's hoodie, his fingers still gripping tight. “Those eyes alone are enough to make people throw their underwear on the ice.”
Will let his grin widen, sliding his hands up Mack’s sides until his thumbs brushed the underside of his ribs. "Angel eyes are overrated," he murmured, tilting his head just enough to catch Mack’s gaze. "You wanna know what I think?”
“What?” Mack asked, his pout temporarily delayed by his curiosity.
Will leaned in, close enough that his lips brushed the shell of Mack’s ear. "My bedroom eyes are much better," he whispered, feeling Mack shiver against him. "And guess what? Only you get those."
Mack made a noise like a deflating balloon, his cheeks flushing darker. "For now maybe. How long until you do some sexy underwear commercial with those too?"
Clearly Will was going to have to pull out all the stops to settle this. “What if I pinky promise that all my bedroom eyes are yours?” he murmured, catching Mack’s pinky finger where it was tangled in his hoodie and hooking it with his own. “No commercials. No ads. Just you.”
“Fine, but you also have to promise that every ad you do you’ll be fully clothed,” Mack grumbled, still clutching Will’s pinky like it was a lifeline. His cheeks were flushed pink, but his lips were twitching, betraying the fight he was losing against his own amusement. “And No wet t-shirts. Or towel scenes. No—” He waved his free hand vaguely. “Weirdly tight pants. Actually, let me approve every outfit first.”
“Deal,” Will said solemnly, still holding Mack’s pinky hostage as he leaned in to press a kiss to his knuckles. “No wet shirts, no tight pants, and full outfit approval from my jealous—” Mack’s warning glare made him swallow the word mid-sentence. “—my very loving boyfriend.”
Mack’s glare softened slightly at the word "boyfriend," but he still huffed dramatically, flopping back against Will's chest like a disgruntled cat. "And no more close ups of your hands.”
Will blinked down at Mack sprawled dramatically across his chest. "Wait—my hands?"
Mack jabbed a finger toward the commercial thumbnail again. "Yes, your hands!" he hissed, as if it were the most obvious crime in the world. "That shot of you driving? Where they zoomed in on your grip on the steering wheel?" His voice cracked on the last syllable. "That was practically softcore pornography!"
It took everything in Will not to laugh, knowing that would only upset Mack more—though the way his boyfriend was sprawled across his lap, cheeks still flushed and lips still pouting, made it nearly impossible. "Baby," Will said, voice straining with the effort to keep it steady, "it's literally just my hand holding a steering wheel."
“Do you know what people on twitter are saying about those hands?” Mack continued, voice climbing an octave as he gestured wildly toward his abandoned phone. “They’re calling them ‘strong’ and ‘capable’ and—” He shuddered dramatically. “One person said ‘What I wouldn’t give to see that hand wrapped around my—’”
“Okay,” Will said, cutting Mack off and grabbing the phone before Mack could finish reading the tweet aloud. He tossed it onto the couch behind them, grinning when Mack made a noise of protest and tried to twist out of his lap to retrieve it. “No more Twitter for you.”
Will caught Mack around the waist before he could escape, hauling him back into his lap with a grunt. "Nope, we're not doing this," Will muttered, pressing a kiss to Mack's temple as he squirmed. "You're banned from reading thirst tweets about me. Doctor's orders."
“You’re not a doctor, you’re a stupid hot hockey player with stupid hot hands,” Mack grumbled, still attempting to twist away despite the arms locked around his waist. His fingers dug into Will’s forearm—the one currently preventing his escape, “now the entire world wants those stupid hot hands all over them.”
Will pulled Mack closer, wrapping both arms around his waist as Mack flailed halfheartedly against his chest. “Baby,” Will murmured against the shell of Mack’s ear, feeling him shiver, “the entire world can want my hands all they like.” He pressed a kiss just below Mack’s jaw, grinning at the way Mack’s breath hitched. “But guess who’s the only one who actually gets them?”
“The answer better be me,” Mack muttered, but his squirming had slowed considerably, his fingers now loosely gripping Will’s wrists where they rested against his stomach.
Will tightened his grip slightly, pressing another kiss to the side of Mack’s neck—partly to soothe, mostly because he couldn’t resist the warmth of Mack’s skin against his lips. “Obviously you,” he murmured, grinning when Mack exhaled sharply but didn’t pull away. “These hands have mapped every inch of you, Mackie. They know exactly how to touch you.” He punctuated the words with a gentle squeeze to Mack’s waist, relishing the way Mack’s breath stuttered.
“Only me?” Mack asked, his voice still thick with petulance, but the way he arched slightly into Will’s touch betrayed him. His fingers flexed against Will’s wrists, his grip loosening from protest to permission.
“Only ever you,” Will murmured, pressing another kiss to the pulse point beneath Mack’s jaw. He could feel Mack’s heartbeat stuttering against his lips, the rhythm betraying how quickly his indignation was dissolving into something softer. “You think I’d let just anyone have these hands?” He flexed his fingers against Mack’s waist, grinning at the way Mack squirmed. “They’re custom made for you.”
“Damn right,” Mack muttered, but his voice lacked its earlier heat, the words muffled against Will’s collarbone where he’d finally slumped in surrender. His fingers traced idle patterns on Will’s forearm, his earlier dramatics giving way to the quiet contentment that always followed their bickering.
“Are we good?” Will asked, lips brushing Mack’s temple where he’d buried his face against Will’s shoulder. The quiet hum Mack gave in response was noncommittal at best—the kind of noise that meant he wasn’t not okay, but he wasn’t ready to admit it either. Will grinned, sliding a hand up Mack’s back to knead at the tense spot between his shoulder blades. “C’mon, sweetheart. You know there’s nothing to be jealous about.”
“I just wish everyone else knew it,” Mack mumbled into the fabric of Will’s hoodie, his fingers twisting the drawstrings absently. His knee bumped against Will’s thigh—less of a protest now, more of a grounding touch. “I don’t like sharing.”
“Baby, we are in a very very public relationship,” Will murmured, lips brushing Mack’s hairline as his fingers traced circles over his shoulder blades. “We did a joint interview last month where you literally sat on my lap.”
“I guess. Maybe we should just get married already,” Mack grumbled into Will’s collarbone, his voice muffled against the fabric of Will’s hoodie.
“I haven’t even gotten to propose yet,” Will said, grinning as Mack’s head jerked up at the implication.
“Well do it faster,” Mack whined, shoving weakly at Will’s chest—but the effect was ruined by the way his fingers immediately curled back into the fabric of Will’s hoodie, clinging rather than pushing away.
Will’s breath caught—half-laugh, half-shock—as Mack’s words hung between them. “Oh, is that how this works?” he teased, curling his fingers around Mack’s hips to steady him as he squirmed. “You just demand a proposal now?”
“Well if you had a wedding ring on your stupid hot hands, people might stop—” Mack gestured vaguely toward his phone, still abandoned on the couch cushions. “—being so thirsty about them.”
Will’s laughter bubbled up uncontrollably this time, muffled only by pressing his face into Mack’s shoulder. “You’re insane,” he managed between breaths, fingers tightening around Mack’s waist. “You want me to propose just to scare off thirsty Twitter fans?”
Mack’s nose scrunched in defiance, his fingers twisting the hem of Will’s hoodie tighter. “It’s not just Twitter,” he muttered, avoiding Will’s gaze. “There’s Instagram. TikTok. That one hockey forum that still thinks we’re faking our relationship for PR.” His voice climbed an octave, indignant. “They have a thread dedicated to your hands, Will. Twenty-seven pages.”
“Well when I do propose, it will be because I want to marry you,” Will murmured, pressing a kiss to Mack’s forehead, “not because Twitter needs a reality check.” He felt Mack’s breath hitch against his collarbone, the way his fingers stilled against Will’s hoodie—caught somewhere between indignation and surrender.
“Fine,” Mack huffed, deflating against Will’s chest like a sulky balloon. His fingers still twisted the fabric of Will’s hoodie, but the fight had mostly drained out of him. “But don’t make me wait too long.”