In a world without WIll Smith, Macklin moves to San Jose and is immediately so fucking lonely. The most lonely you can imagine a boy being while he’s surrounded by a bunch of people. Training camp was one thing, because it’d been a week straight of stimulation, non-stop, like a repeated hammer hit to the head. When it was over, he’d gone back to Vancouver and slept for sixteen hours straight in Connor’s bed. And that was pretty nice. It’s usually nice with Connor, unless he’s in a bad mood, which he wasn’t when Mack woke up. He was standing over the stove, making protein pancakes with blueberries.
Summer went by so quick that Mack couldn’t tell you a single thing he’d done in the weeks between July and August, but whatever it was, Connor had been pretty much glued to him. Or maybe the other way around. Probably the other way around. Just a tactic to avoid Dada and his sadistic training regimen though, not any kind of indication that Mack’s got some weird doglike separation anxiety thing.
The day he was supposed to fly back to San Jose, Mack was for sure being mopey and annoying, tears threatening to spill out whenever he heard a sad song on the radio or looked out the car window while he and Connor shared an Uber to the airport. They were going together, but they'd obviously catch separate flights to different parts of the States. After making it through security, Connor patted his cheek all condescending like, and said “you’re gonna kill it, superstar.”
It sounded like he was being sarcastic, or maybe Mack had just told himself that so he could be mad instead of missing him. Either way, Mack grinds his teeth and chews his cheek until it bleeds but he gets through it. He gets through it pretty good, actually, first goal seven minutes into his first actual game. He feels elated, head in the clouds, especially when Toff and Reavo put him on their shoulders in the locker room and start chanting baby shark, baby shark. It gets everyone going, and then he’s getting passed around like a puck bunny and this warm feeling bubbles up in his chest. Like hot chocolate on a cold night but also your favorite people are there and they’re all saying really nice things to you. Unreal, kind of like a dream.
The feeling passes pretty quick though, when the Sharks lose their next game, and Mack doesn’t score, and sometimes he doesn’t net anything at all, four games straight, even though it’s all he wants.
In January, after a rough loss, Mack puts his fist through a wall in a Columbus hotel and his roomie, another rookie who was drafted 4th overall last year, goes “you will pay for that?” And yeah, fuck, he’ll pay for it. He just wishes the guy, Michkov, would ask why he’d done that, or if he was okay, or press his palms into Mack’s shoulders so they’d come down from where they’re up around his ears. Just like, actually, he wishes Connor were here. His Connor, off-season and available and nice most of the time.
Home games aren’t much better, at least not ones they lose, which is almost three quarters of them. Mack’s alone almost all the time when he’s not at the rink. Alone in Jumbo’s guesthouse aside from when Tabea drops off tupperwares full of meal-prepped something. Protein, vegetable, carb. It feels like a fucking tomb in there, like Mack is dead and nobody comes to visit. He thinks about DoorDashing himself warm cookies and milk then thinks about walking into traffic instead. He asks Toff for driving lessons and Toff jokes that he’d be better off paying a professional, but Mack doesn’t care. He’s pretty bad at driving but unbearably worse at being alone.
The last game of the season is versus Edmonton and it ends in a shutout. Mack’s so pissed, buzzing, his whole body feels like it’s full of angry bees or something, because everyone else was so checked out. “We played hard,” Reavo bullshits, tries to comfort him, fingers kneading into his lats. It wasn’t about winning for Mack though, it was about putting the puck in the net so he could finish his rookie season with one more goal than Michkov.
That feels pretty bad, honestly, like maybe he’s not a team player. Maybe he’s too selfish and up his own ass, takes every failure like a brick to the head, but what’s Mack supposed to do? All he knows is hockey. He wouldn’t be good at like, accounting or lawyering or baristia-ing, really anything that isn’t on ice. Maybe he could drive the Zamboni.
Connor picks Mack up from the airport and says, “you look like shit,” which Mack’s grateful for because it’s probably the closest thing to welcome home he can handle without crying. Back in Connor’s room, he strips down out of his sweats and falls face-first into the bed, lets Connor sit beside him and rub small circles between his shoulder blades. He lets Connor kiss him on the mouth too, and it’s all wet and warm and feels just right. When they separate, a line of spit still connects their lips, and Mack makes a face like he’s grossed out.
“You’re so immature,” Connor tells him. “That’s why you had such a hard time. You’re like a little kid, always thinking things should be easy for you when they’re hard as fuck for everyone else.” Mack doesn’t know about all that. It’s late, and he’s sleepy, and he drifts off with his face pressed into Connor’s side.
Dada pretty easily reels Mack back in, tells him he had an exceptional season, tells him he’s only going to grow into his game. The praise hits like some kind of sedative, turns his brain off, makes him believe anything. It was all a ploy though, probably, just a lie so that Mack would come home and Dada could watch run up and down the hill on their street for half an hour.
“Am I done?” he asks, panting, tongue hanging out, hands on his knees.
“I think you’ve got one more in you,” Dada says, absently, eyes on his phone. And Mack does it. He does one more three times, until he feels like he’s gonna throw up.
The whole summer goes like that. Mack retreats to Connor’s place whenever he can, and they train together, and eat together, and sleep in the same bed. And they kiss sometimes, too, and Connor’s hand ends up in Mack’s pants, firm strokes until he’s oversensitive and squirming. Then he gets lulled into this false sense of security when Dada says he just wants to have some father-son time, even though father-son time always ends up with Mack sweating through his clothes and pissing lactic acid. He takes the good and the bad as they come, doesn’t complain, doesn’t want to seem like a little kid.
On draft day, Mack gets horizontal on Connor’s couch and snacks on the veggie tray his mom left out. Sharks have the 2nd overall pick and Mack’s just vibrating about it, pictures what he might be like, if he’ll be cool, if he’ll wanna be Mack’s friend. God, it’s embarrassing how bad he wants a friend.
Some wrestling chick announces it, Michael Misa, and Mack can’t take his eyes off the screen. He looks tall as fuck, taller than Mack maybe, or it could just look that way on account of how Bettman is basically a dwarf. He’s pretty too. Big, dark eyes that Mack wants to stare into in person. Curls that aren’t exactly curls because they’re lazy, flopping over his forehead a little. Mack bets he’d look so good with his hair grown out.
“Oh, shit, that guy,” Connor remarks. “Lardo played against him when he was on the Bulldogs. He put up insane numbers for Saginaw.”
“What’s he like?”
Mack feels like he’s going a little crazy, like something is burrowing behind his eye. He pulls out his phone and texts Warso for Misa’s number, which feels risky, but worth it, hopefully.
“I don’t know, Macklin,” Connor says, sounds kind of annoyed now. “I’ve never fucking met the guy.”
Mack spends the next week watching interviews, fangirling a little. Michael Misa seems so chill, so chronically go with the flow, about hockey and about everything, really. Mack imagines the comfort of that, being able to hang out someone like that, latch onto it and force his nerves into the back of his mind. It’s kinda pathetic, on account of how he’s never met the guy, got his number and was too nervous to text. He follows Misa on Instagram and gets bummed when it takes him two whole days to follow back.
When San Jose comes calling again, Toff picks Mack up at the airport, and he’s playing dad rock with his windows rolled down. Mack feels nothing close to devastated, feels nothing close to last year’s pit in his stomach. He’s excited, big gummy smile, tail would be wagging if he had one.
“Come over for lunch,” Toff says, pulling out of the passenger pick-up area. “Cat’s making soup and sandwiches. Then you can take Michael to SAP and show him around. Drive my car if you want.”
What comes out of Mack’s mouth is an even-toned, “Sounds good,” which is impressive for sure, since his whole body is saying pleasepleaseplease.
Then Michael Misa is in the Toffoli’s kitchen, standing beside the island with a turkey sandwich in his hand, tanned and pretty and looking at Mack like Mack is just some guy. Like Mack hasn’t spent the last bit of summer watching his interviews and scrolling through his Instagram, careful not to like anything even though god, he likes it a whole lot.
“Macklin,” Toff says, pointing between them. “Michael.”
Misa smiles, easy and lazy. “Hey.”
And Mack is so fucked. He’s so fucked and he has no idea what to say, little idiot brain skipping over how easy it’d be to tell him hey back. Instead, he looks at the little smear of red on Misa’s upper lip and goes “dude, is that ketchup?”
