heyyy!! i love all your work so much, i was wondering if you could write something about what it would be like to be jacks girlfriend during his usntdp / 2019 era !!
When It Was Still Small
Pairing: Jack Hughes x Reader
Word Count: 701
Request open!
24 days of Christmas | Hockey Masterlist | Hockey Masterlist II
Jack Hughes Playlist
A/N:hey lovelies 🤍 just a quick note — if you’d like to repost my fics on other platforms (wattpad, etc.), please ask me first. i’m always happy to talk about it, i just don’t want to find out from someone else 🫶
thank you for understanding & for all the love you show my work
Dating Jack in 2019 feels like living between rinks.
Between cold air and warm coffee cups.
Between early mornings and late-night FaceTimes.
Between who he is and who everyone keeps telling him he’s going to be.
He’s still in the program. Still wearing USA gear that’s always a little too big. Still stuffing his life into duffel bags and backpacks and the trunk of whatever car someone’s driving him in that week.
And you’re woven into all of it.
Sometimes that looks like sitting on the floor of his room while he tapes a stick, watching him work like it’s something sacred.
“Does it really matter if it’s crooked?” you ask.
Jack glances up. “Yes.”
You smile. “It looks the same to me.”
He shakes his head, grinning. “That’s because you don’t respect the craft.”
You reach over and poke his knee. “I respect you.”
His ears go pink immediately. “That’s worse.”
Sometimes it looks like waiting in rink lobbies with vending machine snacks and numb fingers, because you finished homework and drove straight there just to see him for ten minutes before he gets on a bus.
He always finds you.
Always.
Still in gear, helmet under his arm, eyes lighting up like the rest of the world just got quieter.
“You came,” he says every time, like he’s surprised.
“Obviously,” you answer every time.
And he always leans in like he can’t help it, forehead bumping yours for half a second before someone yells his name.
Sometimes it’s long distance.
Those are the hardest days.
He calls you from hotel rooms with ugly carpets and buzzing lights, flopping backward onto the bed.
“I’m so tired,” he groans.
You laugh softly. “You say that every day.”
“Because I am every day,” he says. Then quieter: “I miss you.”
You turn onto your side, phone tucked against your cheek. “Me too.”
There are nights he talks nonstop.
About practice.
About something Quinn said.
About a goal he almost scored.
About how weird it is that scouts are always there now.
And then there are nights he’s quiet.
Those are the ones you learn to listen harder.
“I don’t want to mess this up,” he says once, staring at the ceiling while you’re on FaceTime.
“Mess what up?” you ask.
“All of it,” he admits. “Hockey. My future. Us.”
Your chest tightens. “You won’t.”
He swallows. “What if I do?”
You sit up a little. “Then you’ll still be Jack. And I’ll still be here.”
He looks at the screen for a long second.
“…That helps more than you think.”
Being his girlfriend in this era means loving him when things are uncertain.
Before contracts.
Before schedules are locked.
Before he knows where he’ll live in six months.
It means watching him balance being a teenage boy and someone the hockey world keeps circling.
It means him showing you articles on his phone, eyes wide.
“Is this crazy?” he asks.
You nod. “A little.”
He laughs nervously. “I don’t feel crazy. I feel like… I still forget to do my laundry.”
You smile. “Both can be true.”
Sometimes it’s just you and him in the back of a car after a game, legs tangled, sharing fries because neither of you ate.
He presses his forehead to yours and says, “When this gets big… don’t let me get weird.”
You raise a brow. “Weird how?”
“Like I forget who I am,” he says. “Or who matters.”
You kiss his cheek. “You won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because you care too much,” you say softly. “And you love too loud.”
He smiles at that. “You love me loud.”
“So do you,” you answer.
And he does.
He loves you in texts sent too often.
In stolen minutes.
In excited rants.
In tired hugs.
In the way he always pulls you closer when the world starts getting louder.
Being Jack Hughes’ girlfriend before the NHL, before the draft suits, before the cameras really settle…
is loving a boy with big dreams and tired eyes,
holding his hand while he grows into them,
and choosing him not for who he might become,
but for who he already is.
Right here.
Right now.
When it’s still small.
