Page 117 of Puck You Both

Wall catches my wrist. "The bottle has spoken."

"It's my game—"

"Your rulings are final. You ruled. Talk."

I may or may not have just lost at the game I invented.

"Fine. A real one. Today, in Berg's office.” I look down at my hands, my callouses suddenly fascinating. “The relief wasn't just about staying with the Vipers. I'd survive Anaheim. I'd hate the driving and I'd survive." So far so good. Practically an adult. "But losing the Vipers means I'd lose both of you, too."

Patrick leans forward. "You wouldn't—"

"Not at first, I wouldn't." My words come out fast now, faster than he can lay one of his reasonable hands over it. "I know you'd be wonderful about it. For some time. You'd come over every weekend, then every other weekend. Then something would come up, and you'd skip a few, and then we'd see each other every month, and then one day we'd all agree that it was too much, too far, and for the best." I start rapid-blinking to take back the stupid tear that has stupidly started forming. "And then that'd be it."

There. Vault open. Contents all over Patrick's rug.

"That would never happen," Patrick says, at the same time as Wall says, "You'd still be ours."

Ours.

The word creeps in between my ribs and squeezes, so I desperately grab the first technicality that presents itself, cause I’d be damned if I cry twice in one day. "Ours, huh?” I go for a brow wiggle which I’m not sure I’m nailing. “That is dangerously close to a noun."

"Well, it’s a pronoun."

"Oh, fuck you."

Wall's mouth curls at one corner, and Patrick's hand lands on my ankle.

This is exactly why I invented this game. For them to suffer.

I grab the bottle and send it flying, because that’s what this game—for them to suffer, for fuck’s sake. It nearly takes out a beer bottle, comes back around, and picks Wall again.

Ha! Justice.

"I already went," he says.

"Bullshit round doesn't count. House rules."

Wall turns to Patrick and squints. "You let him invent this."

Patrick looks at him for a moment, then at me. "He invented us."

Everything in my chest trips over everything else and I summon all of my power to redirect my focus from what’s going on inside me to where Wall’s jaw has started working through whatever he least wants to say.

When it comes, it's flat and even, like he’s trying on purpose. "I don't know what I am anymore."

He pauses, letting it hang there for a moment, and my brain, physically unable to endure a second of tense silence, runs my mouth, "A goalie?"

"Don't help." He lets out a small chuckle, but his eyes stay on the bottle. "Twenty-eight years I thought I knew. I thought I was straight, and it wasn't even a decision. It was like being right-handed. Then I walked into a video room for a puck."

"Best puck retrieval in league history." I just can’t stop myself, can I?

"I looked into it. Afterward. The terminology."

Patrick's thumb moves once against my ankle, and Wall's own thumb circles the rim of the bottle between us.

"Bi fits some days. Then some days it doesn't. As far as I can tell, the accurate label is 'the two of you,' and that one’s not in the literature. I checked." He lets out a sharp breath that sounds dangerously close to a self-deprecating chuckle. "I label my whole damn life. How come I can’t label myself?" He sighs. "Well, that’s it. That's the secret. This is no fun. Spin the bottle."

He’s about to do just that, but Patrick’s free hand gets there first and keeps the bottle still. "Labels are so other people can find things. You already know where everything is."