[Hockey RPS - The Consequences of Irresponsible Behavior: A Goalie's Guide - Part Ten]

[annabeth.livejournal.com]

In the locker room, after he's won the bet, Helm is at his locker sulking as Chris strips out of his gear. He's been sitting next to Howie since he's been mentoring him, but these last few weeks, his friend has been very quiet around him.

It's not like Chris doesn't know why, but he feels badly that Howie doesn't even talk to him anymore, not really—which is why he's surprised when, all of a sudden, Jimmy puts a hand on Chris's arm.

"I can't believe you scored on me," he says. Chris glances over at him, caught off-guard. Making—and winning—a stupid bet with Helm has apparently been an ice-breaker (no pun intended) with Howie.

Chris shrugs. "I'm glad you didn't stop it. I had making my daughter happy riding on that goal."

His hand is in his lap, and he's kind of staring at it like it holds the secrets of the universe. He makes a fist and then faces Chris.

"I'm really an idiot," he says, definitely in confession-mode. Chris is wary of where this might go.

But Jimmy makes no move to touch him again or come any closer. He's simply sitting, his blond hair mussed and sweaty, an earnest look in his very blue eyes.

"You—" Chris begins to say, but Howie manages to halt the words in his throat with only a look.

"Just hear me out," Jimmy says softly. "I don't know how long it's going to take me to get over you. It's hard, at home, being with Rachel and knowing I should be happy about our baby, but... I still find myself awake at night, thinking about you."

Howie swallows visibly. "I made a commitment. When I got married, I didn't intend to fall in love with someone else. And, well, I am not going to break up what I do have for something I can't have. No matter what I may have said in a moment of drunken idiocy."

Jimmy takes a deep breath. Chris can feel a tightness in his fingers; looking down, he's making fists. Howie sounds so mature—and so much more intelligent than Chris.

"I love my wife. I'm resolved to get over you, Ozzie. But... please don't stop being my friend." This last is said in a small voice, and Chris, even though he probably shouldn't, picks up Howie's limp hand for a moment.

"Of course," he says. "I promise you that. And I promise not to take advantage of you again."

He's not sure he can keep the second promise, but he is damn well going to try.

Jimmy smiles, pulling his hand back. "Thanks, Ozzie," he whispers, then turns back to getting out of his own gear.

A weight Chris didn't even realise he was carrying is gone. When he wraps the towel around his waist and heads for the showers, if Howie's watching him with longing, Chris doesn't know—but he really thinks that things will be okay between them from now on.

///

Chris calls Jenna the moment he gets home.

"Hey," she says. "I'm a little busy right now, do you mind if—"

He interrupts, bad manners or not. "It will only take a minute."

"All right," she says, sounding vaguely harassed. "But I have to nurse Max and change Kelsey, and my mom went out to get milk because we're completely out and Syd's insisting on cereal."

"Great, that's kind of what I was calling about. Syd asked to stay with me the last time I was over there, and I promised her I'd talk to Helm. Well, I guess technically I tricked Helm into it, but I wanted to make sure it was all right with you if she stayed with us for about a week. I think she needs a vacation."

"And what about Mackenzie?" Jenna asks, concern in her voice.

"I don't think Mackenzie wants to be around me right now," Chris says, trying to keep the hurt from being audible. "If it's okay, I want to talk to Syd and explain things to her."

"You're going to regret it," Jenna tells him firmly. "Especially when you have a game the next day and Syd's wetting the bed at three in the morning, but... I guess it's okay. You have a plan in place for who is going to watch her while you and Darren are out?"

"I've got something lined up," he says, even though he doesn't, quite. He hasn't actually asked Julie or Malts yet.

"Well, I've gotta go, so I'll let you talk it over with Sydney. Bye," she says, and then he listens to the ambient noise as Jenna takes the phone to their daughter.

After a bit, his little girl's voice comes over the line.

"Daddy!" she says excitedly. "I got a new stuffed monkey yesterday."

"Hey, baby girl," Chris says. "I've got a surprise for you. You remember you said you wanted to stay with Daddy for awhile?"

"I can stay?" she asks, shrewd little girl that she is.

"You got it," Chris tells her, gratified by the thrilled squeal she lets out. "Just for a few days, hon, but yes, you can stay."

"Can I bring my new monkey?" she asks. "And My Little Ponies?"

"You can bring your monkey and a couple of ponies," Chris says. "Not too much stuff, because Darren isn't used to little girls, remember?"

"Can I bring my tea set and my dollies?"

This might be getting out of hand, just a little. "Sweetie, you don't need to bring your whole room. Pick out what you want to bring, ponies or your tea set."

"Can the My Little Ponies have a tea party?" she asks slyly, and Chris laughs. His smart, clever little girl.

"All right, yes," he says. "And your monkey can come. I'll see you probably tomorrow. Okay?"

"I wanna go over tonight," she says. Chris sighs.

"It's too late tonight, honey. It's already dinnertime."

"Do you have cereal at your house, Daddy?" she asks.

"We do," Chris replies, "but I'm not going to pick you up tonight. I expect I'll be over tomorrow morning. Say good-bye now, love."

"Bye bye, Daddy," Syd says, and hangs up.

Chris is probably grinning stupidly at his phone when Helmer walks into the room. He's got Carey in his arms, wearing a little 'Stud Muffin' onesie.

"I gave him his first pacifier," Helm says. "He was crying."

"I didn't even know we had a pacifier," Chris says, noting that Carey is sucking contentedly on it.

"I bought one?"

"You bought one?"

"He cries a lot!"

"C'mere," Chris says. "I wanna hold him."

Helmer obediently steps closer and hands the baby to Chris. Carey's eyes are slipping closed, drifting off to sleep; the pacifier falls from his mouth.

Chris wishes he could stop staring at the baby, but he's just so precious.

Without looking up, he says, "I'm going to pick up Syd tomorrow. She should be able to sleep on the couch." He doesn't explain to Helm that he doesn't want to make her sleep in the same room with the changing table, and disrupt her whenever they need to take care of the baby. Then again, if it occurs to Helm that it's strange for her to sleep on his couch when he has a spare bed—technically Abby's bed—he doesn't say anything about it, either.

"This is going to be a disaster," Helm mutters.

"Did you feed him his dinner?" Chris asks, the warm weight of happy baby in his arms.

"No, I was just going to do that," Helm says, "but he went to sleep."

"Dare," Chris whispers. He meets his boyfriend's eyes. "I love you."

"I love you too." Helm kneels in front of them, and leans forward just enough to capture Chris's lips. After the kiss, he murmurs, "It's been forever since we've done it."

Now, how can he turn down an invitation like that? He grins, kisses Helm again quickly.

"Give me five minutes," he tells Helm, and his boyfriend blushes.

It's damn cute.

///

Chris puts the baby down, then goes into the bathroom to brush his teeth and change. By the time he opens the bedroom door again, it would be an understatement to say their bed looks inviting: Helm's lying on it, on his back, completely nude with his dick hard against his belly. It's clear he's been waiting for Chris and working himself up, because his hand is still idly playing with his balls when Chris walks in.

Suddenly changing into his pajamas seems silly, and Chris makes quick work of getting out of his flannel pants. He climbs onto the bed and leans down over Helm, pressing a kiss to his lips.

"Mmm, what a nice thing to come to bed to," he murmurs against Helm's mouth. Helm reaches around and grabs the back of his neck, yanks him in for a fiercer kiss, warring with Chris as to who gets dominance.

Chris gives no quarter, and after a few moments the kiss softens like butter in the microwave; Helm's tongue slowly winds around his, and then Helm's other hand is sliding up over his hip, leaving a trail of scorching heat in its wake.

By the time he surrounds Chris's cock with his fist, Chris is already hard enough to cut steel. He's gasping for breath against Helm's mouth, unable to keep kissing him.

And then Helm lets go; Chris moans in desperation and tries to find Helm's hand to put it back on his dick, but he doesn't have to wait long before he figures out what Helm was up to—other than no good, that is.

Helm's fist is slick with lotion or lube—probably lotion, due to the scent—and he's covering both of their cocks liberally with it.

Chris bends his elbows and balances on them to keep from crushing Helm's ribcage, but he presses his lower body down against Helm's, grinding their now slippery cocks together.

Helm makes a noise like he's dying, his head going back, neck a long white column in the dim light, and Chris bites down over his Adam's apple, at the same time reaching between their bodies to grip their cocks in his fist. He begins to pump them up and down and Helm's getting louder—Chris remembers probably too late that the baby is asleep nearby and covers Helm's mouth with his.

He's nearly unbalanced when Helm thrusts his hips up sharply, slamming his pelvis into Chris's, striving to get closer, their dicks throbbing against each other, and Chris is trying to keep his grunts and moans behind his teeth, but it's damn difficult.

Helm lets out another noise, a delicious, sort of pathetic whimper, and sprays Chris's belly with come.

Chris sighs, caught up in his own pleasure, but still not quite to the moment of his own oblivion—what else is new—and he lets Helm's cock slide out of his hand, then attempts to wait patiently for Helm to take the hint and jerk him off the rest of the way.

Helm is panting and apparently still coming down, because he's even slower to catch on than usual, but he does, gripping Chris's cock and jacking him off quick and hard, just the way he likes it; Chris is vaguely aware of the baby making sounds like he's going to wake up, so he closes his eyes and draws all of his attention down to a point: the feel of Helm's hand on his cock, the cooling come on his stomach, the scent of Helm in the air; he comes hard, spurting over Helm's hand and belly, biting his lips hard to keep from shouting.

He's just barely finished, breath shuddering in and out of his lungs, when Carey finally decides to wake up with a piercing scream.

"All right, daddy," Chris says, utterly breathless. "Time to feed the baby."

"You really never do shut up," Helm says sleepily, and when Chris blinks the sweat out of his eyes, and focuses again through the post-orgasmic haze, his lover looks to be almost asleep. How that is possible with Carey crying right next to the bed, he has no idea, but he pokes Helm in the chest.

"Don't fall asleep. You need a shower."

Helm mumbles something, and Chris sighs. Typically, all that youth and energy and as suddenly as he's spent, he's exhausted. Chris gets up off the bed, finding one of his dirty t-shirts, and wipes at the come on his belly before grabbing something to put on.

It would appear he's wearing a pair of Helm's boxer shorts, rather than his own flannel pants, but whatever. He heads back into the bathroom to wash his hands, then returns to the bedroom to pick up Carey.

Helm is snoring on his side, legs curled up, bare ass gleaming in the streetlights outside the window.

Chris can't help but laugh a little, even as he's preparing Carey's bottle, because once he's done feeding and changing the baby, and putting him back down, apparently he's going to be cleaning up his boyfriend as well.

Then again, he can't say it wasn't worth it.

///

The next day is like a three ring circus. By the time Chris gets back to Helm's house—their house now, he'd like to think—with Syd, Julie is standing in their kitchen hanging the curtains that he and Helm so utterly failed to solve.

"Hey, Helmer, you couldn't solve the curtains any better than you can solve a goalie," Chris says immediately. Syd is clinging to his hand.

"Oh, Sydney!" Julie says, and twitches the curtains perfectly into place. "I didn't realise you were coming for a visit."

Syd has met Julie before, but suddenly she's shy and pressing against the backs of his legs.

"It's all right, sweetie," Chris says, turning a little and taking both of her hands in his. "You remember Julie?"

"I'm scared," Syd says in a small voice. Chris gets down on his knees so he can look into her eyes.

"What are you scared of?" he asks gently. Her things are still in the car, so he glances above her head at Helm, who is still glaring indignantly at him for the slight about his scoring ability.

Helm rolls his eyes and walks out the front door to bring her things in.

"I don't know," Sydney replies. Julie sits down at one of the kitchen chairs. Sydney clutches his hand tighter.

"We don't bite," Julie says softly. "How are you, honey?"

"My daddy says I can stay for awhile," Syd mumbles, as if she feels the need to justify her presence.

"And of course you can," Chris tells her. "No one is saying you can't. You'll see, baby, Helm will love you." He hopes.

"I hope you have a nice visit," Julie says, then stands up. "All right, Ozzie, I gotta go. Kris gets annoyed if he has to deal with all three kids for too long by himself. Or so he says. Personally I just think he likes having me around so he doesn't have to be the responsible parent."

"C'mon, love," Chris says. "Would you like to see the baby?"

Syd shoves her lower lip out instantly. "No," she says flatly.

Helmer trots back into the house with a suitcase and a giant duffle bag that Chris suspects is full of monkeys, ponies, and dolls. Plus stuff for the tea party, of course.

"I'm heading home," Julie says. "I left a casserole in the kitchen for dinner, and there should be plenty for Sydney too, if she's not too picky."

"She's picky," Chris says, returning to his feet. "I think I teach her bad habits."

"I like bad habits, Daddy," Sydney pipes up, shyness suddenly gone.

"I know you do," Chris says. He picks her up and plops her down on the couch. She swings her little feet, which don't reach the floor.

"I wanna play tea party," she announces, and Julie shuts the door behind her, and even through the wood, Chris can hear her laughing. It's clear she's amused by his predicament.

"You can," Chris says, "but you'll have to play by yourself for now. I have to help Darren make dinner and look after the baby."

"I hate babies," Sydney tells him. He pats her knee.

"Then why do you have all those dolls?"

"I don't know?" She looks confused, and the expression is so similar to Helm's that Chris has to stifle a laugh.

"Did your mommy pack your clothes and things?"

"No," Sydney says. "I did it myself. Mommy was too busy."

Chris pats her knee again. He figures if Jenna didn't help her, her grandmother probably did; there's no way she did it entirely by herself.

"Get your toys out, if you want. I'll play with you later, okay?"

Sydney nods. Then she pouts again. "I want a cookie."

"Dinner's gonna be ready soon—" Chris begins, but Syd gets that glint in her eye, and unless he wants her to throw a tantrum and completely turn Helm off to her forever, he better give her that cookie.

"Cookie," Syd repeats. She really is acting much younger than her six years.

Chris turns to Helm, who has been watching this exchange with wide, anxious eyes.

"Do we have any cookies?" he asks, feeling like he should have planned this better.

"I have some in my bag," Syd announces cheerfully, hopping down off the couch. "I stoled them from home when Mommy wasn't watching me."

She unzips the duffle and produces a package of Oreos. She rips the plastic open and sits down, cross-legged, on the floor.

"All right, sweetie, I'm going to get the baby, okay?"

Syd is absorbed in her Oreos now, not paying any attention to him.

Chris steps up to Helm and wraps an arm around him, leaning in close and pressing a kiss into the curve between his neck and shoulder.

"Carey needs a bottle, so I'll get that, you put the casserole in the oven?" Chris says.

"This is going to be a long week," Helm says in a defeated voice. "I don't get little kids."

"You'll get used to her," Chris says, and he lets go of Helm. They leave the room together, Helm heading into the kitchen, Chris for the bedroom.

When he gets to the crib, Carey is quiet but alert, his eyes open, smiling a little. He waves his little hands in the air and kicks his feet, disturbing his blanket.

Chris reaches in, slides his hand under Carey's bottom, the other under his head, and lifts him out of the crib. Carey gurgles and grabs the collar of Chris's shirt, pulling it towards him.

Chris disentangles his collar and bounces the baby a little.

"You hungry?" he asks, as if the baby is going to answer him. "I bet you are. And I think you're wet. Let's change your diaper and get you something to eat, okay?"

Maybe he's spent a little too much time with his six-year-old, he reflects as he brings Carey into the nursery to change him.

He makes quick work of the diaper and then, carrying the baby, makes the mistake of glancing into the living room on his way by.

In the ten minutes he's left her alone, Sydney has managed to dismember her Oreos, eating the filling, and is sitting on the floor still, only now she's surrounded by the chocolate cookie parts. They, and cookie crumbs—like an army of ants—are everywhere.

Chris wonders if Helm has a vacuum. Luckily, Helm is probably used to crumbs, seeing as until recently he lived in a bachelor pad with a room that was a danger to anyone who entered.

Syd has also abandoned eating the cookies and now has her ponies in her sticky hands. Between the toys and the cookies, their living room looks like... well, like a six-year-old is visiting. Helmer's going to kill him.

Carey starts to squirm in his arms, just beginning to fuss, and Chris can only handle one child at a time, so he takes Carey into the kitchen and begins to prepare his bottle. Helm is sitting in a kitchen chair, a vaguely shell-shocked cast to his features.

"Hold the baby while I finish making his bottle, would you?" Chris asks, and Helm nods, taking Carey when Chris hands him over.

"A very long week," Helm mutters, giving the baby his finger to suck on.

"She needs attention," Chris says.

The oven's buzzer goes off, and Chris goes to get Sydney for dinner.

///

Chris is awfully lucky that, since he hadn't bothered to ask Julie before he picked up Sydney, she's still willing to babysit during the week when Syd's not at school. He is going to kick his best friend's ass for not asking her like he said he would, though.

He gets a phone call on his cell while getting ready for the game on Monday, though, from Julie.

"I had to pick Syd up from school," she says. "I don't want you to worry, but I thought you should know she threw up in class."

Chris is tying his skate, but he stops at once, ready to put his street shoes back on if he needs to be at home with his daughter.

"Is she all right?"

"She's fine," Julie says, and there's the faint sound of a scuffle. Muffled, like Julie's just covered the receiver, he hears, "Kamryn Rose, do not even think about taking your diaper off. And Sydney, could you please give the bear back to Kamryn?"

"Is she being too much trouble? I'll come get her." Chris begins to unlace his skate, which earns him a dirty look from Nick.

"No, not at all. And she ate some Play-Doh at school; they think that's why she got sick. Not to worry. I do have three kids of my own." He can hear her smiling. "But I just wanted to let you know I went and got her."

"Thanks for that," Chris says, beginning to lace up his skate again. Nick, across the dressing room, rolls his eyes in exaggerated fashion.

"Bye, Oz," Julie says, then hollers, "Kamryn Rose! Pick up that diaper this instant and—oh, for crying out lou—" and the line goes dead.

Chris feels a little guilty for asking her to babysit at the moment, but she didn't say no, right?

///

On Wednesday, when Chris wakes up to prepare for the pre-game skate, he pads into the kitchen rubbing his eyes to make coffee. Then he rubs them again and groans.

At some point while the adults were sleeping, Syd apparently got up and thought that pale yellow curtains weren't pretty enough: she has drawn, in what appears to be red and green Sharpie markers, flowers all along the edges that she could reach.

Helm is going to kill him.

"Sydney Osgood!" he bellows, which causes a high thin wail from the bedroom and a suitably cowed child, when she turns up in the doorway.

"What is this?" he asks her. She stares at her feet.

"I wanted to help," she says. Chris bites down on his tongue. It's difficult to punish her when she didn't do it to misbehave, but at the same time, she needs to know that the behaviour was unacceptable.

"We do not draw on the walls, right?" he says.

She turns her wide, innocent stare onto his face—it's like looking into his own face when he makes that expression. "I didn't, Daddy," she says with perfect logic.

"No, I suppose you didn't," he says to himself. She isn't being literal on purpose, he just forgot how literal little kids are. "You don't draw on curtains either. You should only draw on your construction paper."

And it isn't like he hadn't had to run out to the store at seven in the evening to buy her the paper because she wanted to draw.

He didn't give her Sharpie markers though; he gave her crayons.

And now they have to replace the curtains all over again.

Chris can't help feeling like he's a failure no matter what he does.

Helm picks that moment to come up behind Sydney, Carey in his arms, his too-long hair mussed all over the place.

"Your daughter is a terror," he says.

"Get used to it," Chris snaps. "That baby is going to grow up and he's probably going to be just as bad."

"Not my kid," Helm says.

"If it's your kid, probably, yeah," Chris argues. He sighs. "C'mon, Syd, go get your stuff ready to go to Julie's." From there, Julie will take her to school, and pick her up again when she gets out because Chris will be at the arena.

But Julie is going to fucking kick his ass for allowing the new curtains to be destroyed already. Maybe he won't tell her. Maybe he'll just live with the childish flowers adorning them now.

He bundles Syd up for the outdoors, zipping and snapping her jacket closed, then takes her hand.

As they trot down the walkway, Helm with the snuggled-up baby, Chris has a sinking feeling that Sydney is going to blab to Julie anyway.

///

On Friday, Helm can't hide his relief as Chris zips Sydney's coat, getting ready to take her home. In the last two days, she managed to lose Helm's car keys—they found them in a fishbowl under the sink, go figure—and poured red food colouring in the toilet bowl, causing Helm to shriek suddenly from the bathroom early Thursday morning.

"I think I'm pissing blood!" he'd shouted, and come running into the bedroom. Chris had found the little bottle of food colouring after they put the lights on and both had examined the bowl for a far greater length of time than Chris has ever wanted to spend staring at urine.

Then she refused her mid-afternoon nap and lost one of the saucers to her tea set. She cried for an hour over that, in perfect concert with Carey—who doesn't seem to like Chris's daughter any more than Helm does—until Helm stepped on the plastic saucer getting his coffee in the kitchen and, in the process, landed hard on his ass in the middle of the floor. The hot coffee that splashed over his shirt and jeans had caused him to curse, loudly. That had led to Syd repeating, for another straight hour, "Darren said shit, Daddy." To which he had replied, every single time, "I know, Princess, but you shouldn't repeat what he said." This had led to Helm curling up on the couch with his ears covered, pained and frustrated. (That made Syd say it even more. It had been quite the vicious cycle.)

Jenna is not going to thank him for it if Syd goes home saying 'shit'.

As Chris finishes helping her get her mittens on, he's grateful that she didn't wet the bed during the week—Helm is unnaturally attached to his couch, even if the thing is a piece of shit. He doesn't think Helm would have taken too kindly to having it permanently ruined.

Plus, Helm is already pretty annoyed—not to mention down—about the number of losses the team has suffered while Syd's been staying with them. If Chris didn't know better... hang on, he doesn't really know better; for all he knows, Helm holds Syd responsible for the fact that the team is losing.

"I don't wanna go home, Daddy," Sydney whines, pulling her mittens off again. She's taking off her coat, too, and Chris wants to say shit himself, frankly.

"But you have to," he says firmly. "I told you this was only temporary."

"I don't know what tempr'ry means," she says, big blue eyes on his. Obviously, she figures that if she doesn't know what it means, he can't hold her to it.

"It meant you would only be here a week," he says. He thinks he might remind her of how much she disliked the baby at Helm's house as much as she dislikes the twins at home—especially if she keeps taking her overcoat off. And now her sweater. Great.

Chris takes her hands, pulls the sweater back down over her head.

"Noooo, Daddy," Syd cries, trying to tug away from him. Helm is already in the car, and if he doesn't hurry up and get her out there, both Helm and Carey are going to freeze to death.

He supposes that Helm would probably be okay, but he can't very well leave a ten-week-old out in the car in this weather.

"I'm sorry, kiddo, but you have to go home. Don't you miss Mommy?"

"No," Syd says stubbornly. "I like Darren's toys."

Uh-oh. "What toys, honey?"

"He let me play with his video games?"

"Did he let you, or did you play with them anyway?" Chris asks. Syd averts her face. Oh, no. Helm is going to murder him and scatter the pieces, probably up in the wintry wilds of the Canadian woods.

Though that would leave him to raise Carey alone. He's going to point this out if Helm starts getting any homicidal ideas.

He zips up her coat again, then picks her up so she can't undress herself again.

"It's time to go," he says, carrying her out the front door and locking it behind them. Syd buries her face in his chest, and Chris would really like to know how this backfired so badly. He still feels guilty, and he just gave Syd as much of a week as he could.

Chris wrestles her into the car, fastening her seatbelt, then climbs into the front.

Helm is refusing to look at him.

Chris wonders if Helm is biblical enough to do something like withhold sex for an equal amount of time to the time that he had to put up with Chris's daughter. Or who knows, maybe he's cruel enough to hold out longer.

Chris wouldn't even last a week.

///

It doesn't occur to Helm to withhold sex, but he does absolutely, categorically refuse to help clean up the house after the visit.

Chris has always hated vacuuming. Though he has to admit, when he's finished, that Helm's house looks a lot better than it has since before he moved in.

///

"You wanna explain to me how half of my video games are now so scratched they won't play?" Helm asks Chris Sunday afternoon. Chris can feel his face heat up.

"I—" He's got this brilliant idea in his head to lie, but Helm sees right through him.

"Did your daughter do this?"

Chris deflates. "I'll replace them," he says in defeat. "I don't know when she did it."

"Even my NHL 11," Helm says mournfully. "I was going to play that one this afternoon."

"You play that one too much anyway." Chris lounges back on the couch, one arm behind his head, and considers turning on the TV to see what's on.

After all, Helm won't be using it to play a video game, at least not at the moment.

"I play it because I like scoring on you," Helm says. Chris reaches underneath him, unearths a throw pillow, and throws it at Helm. Helm ducks, and it knocks over one of Helm's framed pucks.

"Hey!" Helm cries. "Isn't it bad enough that your kid was here and wrecked half my stuff?"

"She did not," Chris argues. "Just the... curtains... and..."

"And the bruise on my ass," Helm growls. "My video games. My toilet is still stained red. I can't believe I let you talk me into having her over."

"Don't complain about the bruise on your ass," Chris says. "You liked it way too much when I bit down on it last night."

"Don't change the subject!"

"Well, it was good practise! Like I said before, Carey's going to be a little kid too at some point, and you might as well get used to it."

Helm drops down into the chair and puts his face in his hands. "I'm not ready for this."

"It's a few years off—"

Carey enters the conversation by beginning to cry from the other room.

"I'll get him," Helm says. "I don't really want to talk to you anymore right now, anyway."

Chris wanders into the kitchen to rummage through the fridge. It becomes increasingly apparent, however, that there isn't much in there to eat, bottle of ketchup notwithstanding.

Drapes hasn't dropped by in awhile with some of Julie's home cooking, so Chris steals a glance at the curtains, thinks maybe he shouldn't even try it, and then yells into the other room,

"I'm going to the store to get something for us to eat for dinner!"

He heads to the bathroom to piss before he goes, and Helm pushes the door open, holding the baby.

"Could you take him with you?" he asks meekly. Chris finishes up and flushes, then washes his hands and faces Helm.

"You can handle it—"

"I just want some time without any kids around," Helm says with downcast eyes. Chris gets the feeling he's being played, but Helm does look awfully miserable and he did put up with Syd's antics for a whole week.

"All right, sure," he says. "Give him to me, I'll dress him to go out."

"Make sure he's warm enough," Helm says, handing him over, but reluctantly. Chris finds it interesting that Helm just asked him to take the baby out, but yet he's not quite ready to stop holding him.

"Why don't you go out and replace your games while I'm getting dinner," says Chris as he puts a little fuzzy sleeper on Carey. "I'll pay you back for them."

Helm fidgets in the doorway. "Don't forget his coat. Or his mittens."

"I won't, Dare. It's not like I've never taken a baby outside before."

"Okay. I'll get dressed."

"Your daddy is worried about you," Chris tells Carey, who smiles up at him. "You're such a cutie-pie. I bet all the girls are going to go crazy for you."

"Or maybe the boys will!" Helm calls from down the hall. Chris grins.

Still addressing the baby, he agrees. "Or maybe I'll be fighting boys off with a stick. My goalie stick ought to do it."

"What's wrong with my stick?" Helm asks, pulling a sweater over his head.

"My stick is bigger." Chris gives Helm a shit-eating grin and waits for him to get the double entendre.

"You're a dick," Helm says, pouting. Chris lifts up the baby and adjusts him against his shoulder.

"You love me."

"I think I'm going to have to kick him out," Helm says to Carey, who is gurgling in Chris's ear.

"You wouldn't dare," Chris says. "Then you'd have to raise the baby all by yourself."

"I could do it," Helmer insists. Chris lifts one eyebrow.

"You'd be calling me inside of ten minutes to come help you."

"Fine, you can stay. Just don't ask me to let your kid stay with us again any time soon. It is still my house."

"If you want dinner, I have to get going," Chris says, putting an end to the foolish conversation. He doesn't want Helm to get any ideas about actually kicking him out.

"Okay."

Chris wrangles a kiss out of Helm as he wiggles by him in the doorway, and he's pleased by the fact that Helm, even though he's probably still annoyed with him, kisses back.

///

Chris is idly pushing the cart through the grocery store, Carey in his baby seat, when he glances up from the hot food—trying to cook something could be a disaster—and spies Nick, who is standing all by himself in the middle of the aisle.

At first, Chris doesn't notice anything particularly strange, until he realises that Nick is... well, just standing. He's staring off into space as if he's completely forgotten where he is.

Nick has both hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans, and he doesn't have a cart. Chris shifts uneasily on his feet, and as if the baby senses his discomfort, Carey fusses a little, waving a mittened fist in Chris's face.

What is Nick doing? If he came to the store to buy something, it's impossible to tell, because he doesn't have anything even near him that he might be buying. There's no basket set on the floor...

Honestly, Chris thinks to himself, Nick seems utterly lost, as if the purpose of his life, once clear to him, is now distant and unfocused, and he has to force himself to remember that he doesn't know much about Nick's life these days.

His wife and kids are back in Sweden, and Chris keeps turning him away—which he should do, but he feels a little guilty now that he's seeing Nick like this.

It hits him then, that Nick looks lonely and small somehow, as if he's not the larger than life defenceman he's always been before anymore. Chris stares a moment longer, then makes up his mind to leave Nick to his thoughts. It might be cruel, but it also might be a kindness: Chris can't offer him any comfort, is the last person who should try. It's true that Nick broke up with him first, but Chris knows he's put his teammate through the wringer since, crawling back to him while drunk then spurning him; turning down his declarations of love and, well...

But Carey chooses that moment to stop fussing softly and wails. Nick starts visibly, turning and apparently coming back to himself. When he sees Chris, for a split second his face brightens immeasurably, a smile starting, and then he must remember that things are strained and difficult between them now, because the smile disappears.

But while he's not obviously smiling anymore, there's a faint sheen of remembered happiness about him that suggests he's just happy to be in Chris's presence.

With a mental shrug, Chris pushes the cart closer.

"Hi, Nick," he says. "How are you?"

Pathetic small talk. The only type of thing they say to each other in the locker room nowadays. Once, if he'd seen Nick in the store, he would have walked up close and murmured something about the apples for sale, or whether he should have Swedish meatballs for dinner that night. There used to be innuendo and double entendres everywhere, and Nick and he would share secretive glances, aborted smiles.

But those times are gone. Speared through the heart by Chris's infidelity and Nick's inconstancy. The problem being, of course, that Nick figured out much too late that his heart was set on Chris.

"Hello, Oz," Nick says softly, in that sweet, smooth voice of his. But he sounds sad. He manages a smile for the baby, who is still crying, but it's wilted around the edges; after all, Nick is perfectly aware that Chris coming here with Helm's baby is yet another reminder of just how serious his relationship is.

"Cold out," Chris says lamely. Nick nods. Carey cries. Chris pats his tummy and pushes the carriage back and forth a little to try and simulate rocking in the hopes he'll quiet down.

"Yeah," Nick whispers. "Can I pick him up? Maybe he'll stop crying."

This is possibly the first time that Nick has regarded the baby with anything but thinly veiled anger about how Carey has affected Helm, Chris, and the locker room, but just as Chris is going to assent, he remembers that it's not his baby.

This is Helm's competition, right here, and he doesn't think Helm would be very happy if Chris shared any kind of domestic moment with his ex-lover. Chris knows it wouldn't mean anything, but does Nick? And would Helm be able to understand that?

With a pang, he demurs,

"No, I've got it." He unsnaps the straps and lifts Carey out of the seat, resting the baby against his shoulder. Carey quiets a bit, but he's still fussing even as Chris sways in place.

"He's trying to eat his hands," Nick says quietly. "I think he's upset about the mittens."

"Yeah, probably," says Chris with a little laugh, remembering too late that the easy camaraderie between them is gone. Nick looks wistful, as if he wants to take advantage of Chris's lapse, but finally knows better.

At that moment, Homer walks down the aisle towards them. He offers Chris a huge smile, then says to Nick,

"Did you find food?"

Nick smiles at Homer, apparently relieved that some of the tension dissipated when their mutual friend came up to them.

"I didn't yet, no." Turning back to Chris, he says, "I've got to go. Homer and I are... making dinner. It was nice running into you. Take care of that baby."

He walks away before Chris can say good-bye, so fast he's practically running. Homer gives him an apologetic little wave and takes off after his friend.

Chris finishes up finding something to eat for him and Helm, but he can't stop thinking about Nick and how much he misses him.

He doesn't want him the same way as he used to—he'll probably always want to fuck him, but he knows that's not what he wants out of his life anymore—but he misses their easy friendship, too. Now, they're practically strangers; teammates who share the same locker room and breathe the same sweat-scented air, but no longer go out for drinks together or have meaningful conversations.

Chris is barely even conscious of the checkout girl flirting with him because of the baby—Oh, my gosh, you're Chris Osgood! Is this your new baby?—because he can't stop remembering the fun times he and Nick used to have.

He forces himself to forget all their old troubles, because if the relationship is well and truly over, he'd like to retain only the fond memories.


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