sam thinks he knows misa pretty well at this point. he's had their entire juniors careers and then their rookie season together to poke and prod at misa like a bug he wants to dissect and it's been a particularly fruitful investigation. except for the one tiny detail he can't seem to crack: nick lardis. at first, sam completely glazed past it. a childhood friend that was both luke's and mike's, plays in the nhl now, plays rocket league with misa all the time, has the privilege of being in misa's pinned texts that he mostly responds to (sam, family gc, nick lardis). and then misa goes and says they're dating, have been dating, are actually together together, romantically. sam doesn't get it.
the whole premise doesn't make any sense. porter martone pining away in philly for misa? yeah, that tracks. misa and spence's weird childhood tension thing? sure. misa actually being in a committed long term relationship with nick lardis is absurd, but apparently that's the world sam lives in. both the misas show up to vancouver with nick lardis standing off to the side, and sam just squints at him. he's soft spoken, a little boring, has a big arm tattoo that sam has heard mike call "kinda sick" genuinely, and that's about all. mike and him bro hug once after hill sprints and sam still can't figure out how this isn't some elaborate prank on him. he sidles up to luke the next morning, the night of which sam previously watched mike and lardis go up to their room without touching once, to ask, so lardo and mike? it's hard to tell if luke is just not a morning person like his brother or if he genuinely thinks sam is an idiot. yeah, they're just not into pda, is all luke gives him.
not into pda feels like an understatement. sam cannot imagine that they even have sex, what would that look like? have they kissed? do they even hold hands? their relationship cannot solely be sustained off of rocket league and working out together. and yet they've been dating, all the way back in juniors when sam didn't think to ask, hey are you in a weird long distance relationship with the world's most boring man? is it because lardis is older, is that what gets misa going? the whole forbidden my older brother's friend thing? it was at the end of the season, only a few games left when sam asked one of this thousand ice breaker questions to fill the car ride to SAP, who was your childhood crush? sam was expecting something like kim possible, or mrs. spence, or some random middle school teacher. instead, misa didn't look up from his phone and said, nick lardis. sam laughed, and then stopped laughing because, you have to be joking. misa, was in fact, not joking. lardo apparently was the guy who taught little misa how to tie his shoes, and walked to school with him, and gave him his old gloves. sam can't get his head around any of it.
the thing is, misa thinks dating lardis is nice, low maintenance. it started when he was sixteen and everyone, mostly his friends back in oakville, kept pestering him about getting a girl which misa didn't want to do. it didn't make a lot of sense, he was in saginaw most of the time, and when he wasn't at practice or doing school work, he just wanted boot up his pc and fuck around, so not a lot of time for dates. and then nick lardis had gotten a tattoo which wasn't exactly related to misa's problem but it was cool, and seemed very important to sixteen year old misa at the time. it'd been a vaguely easy idea, him and lardo started going out and people stopped bothering the both of them. dates didn't matter because they always worked out together, and played video games, and made sure to see each other when their teams were against one another. all easy. misa doesn't really care that they've been dating for three years now, they just aren't that serious, they're easy. if lardis came up to him and said let's end things, it would be sad but more so because he might not want to do things together anymore. when misa says stuff like this out loud, zayne says he's insane and needs to date someone he's actually into, which is bullshit. misa is into lardis. he likes the tattoos, and his hockey, and his face, and that he's soft spoken and doesn't mind sitting in silence, and everything else. zayne says he can't settle into a mediocre marriage at nineteen but what does that guy know?
they may not be pda heavy but it's not like they don't touch. there's a photo of lardis kissing misa on the cheek while he holds up his diploma, and another of lardis holding his hand through a river luke wanted to look for rocks in during the summer before misa's rookie year. and the sex is fine. misa greatly appreciates that dating someone for so long means they know you well enough to hit all the right notes and be simply into the act of wanting you to have a good time. misa can roll over on the bed and go, do you wanna have sex? and lardo will say, yeah, give me a second. and similarly, lardis will pull misa's headphones off him and ask can you blow me after this round? and then that's what they do. he doesn't understand why sam seems so weirded out by their relationship. it's a lot of questions all the way up the grouse grind. have you said i love you? yes. have you had sex? obviously, dude. is it any good? it's cool. does cool mean really bad or just fine, is he not giving it to you good? shut up. do you guys go on dates? we play rocket league. does your mom like him? yeah, of course. does his mom like you? yes. who asked who out? i don't remember. what do you do for anniversaries? he bought me new shin pads last year. do you even like him? what the fuck, yes.
sam still thinks he might be being pranked which is mostly why he isn't having a moral crisis about trying to steal nick lardis' boyfriend right in front of him. he's got misa pressed into his chest on the couch and all lardis does when he comes downstairs is take one sideways glance and ask if misa ate already. and then lardis says nothing when sam is rubbing sunscreen on misa's back, or when he was shaking misa around by his chin, or when he wrapped a towel around misa's shoulders and kissed the top of his head (as a joke, a really good joke). no one is saying anything about it actually, even luke who is giving him some side eyes but mostly remains uncaring. there's one night where misa gets drunk off mack's stash of high noons, sits in sam's lap and then leans over to make out with nick lardis right in front of him. nothing even happens after the fact, misa just gets up and tries to beat his brother in smash. again, makes no sense. sam has even tried asking if they're in some weird open relationship even though that seems way too cool of both lardis and misa. the answer misa gives is, i don't think so. unhelpful and sam's next course of action might genuinely be asking lardis if he can just take over as boyfriend.
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