Talk cartoons to me

It had been a brutal game. Of course, these days, going up against the Centaurs usually is, ever since the deadly combination of Hollander and Rozanov on a line together started tearing through the league like a well-oiled machine. It doesn’t help at all that Casey’s team, the Vancouver Ravens, has been the laughingstock of the Western Conference for longer than Casey has even been there, (though, in fairness, he was only really drafted here two years ago, so it hasn’t been that long.) That is to say, the Centaurs really wipe the floor with them, and it’s not close. This seems to get Wahlström, Casey’s captain, predictably frustrated, because he starts to get really aggressive as they’re starting the third. And not in the good, ambitious way that would actually help them. In the stupid, headstrong, shouting insults way that he always does when they are losing.

“Stick your dick in Hollander yet today?” Wahlström spits at Rozanov as they line up for the face-off, but it sounds pathetic, even as he says it. Casey feels embarrassed.

Rozanov smirks. “I did, yes. Keeps the hips loose, and our stamina is great, you know?”

“I don’t wanna hear it, bitch.” Really riveting and original stuff tonight.

“You and your guys should try it sometime, huh? Maybe will stop you from losing ten games in a row. Who knows? Maybe is why me and my Shane are each getting a hatty tonight.” As always, Rozanov is unflappable, nothing more than a tickled grin as he bends over his stick.

“Oh fuck off, cocksucker.”

The chirping is loud enough that Casey and his linemate Routhier can hear it from either side of center ice, even over the racket the crowd is making all around them. This means of course, that the ref also hears it, and while that would slide in plenty of barns, it doesn’t slide in the gayest arena in the MLH. Wahlström is forced to swap out with Routhier as the ref signals he’s lost his face-off privileges. Not long after, Wahlström is ejected from the game for a particularly violent check followed up with a much stronger slur that the refs manage to overhear. He’s obviously not happy about it, breaking his stick on the boards as he goes, which sucks because it means he’s going to be making it everyone else’s problem for the entire trip down to Toronto tomorrow. Personally, Casey thinks the guy should maybe shut up about how unfair his situation is when all he had to do was hold his tongue for a few minutes, but that’s just him.

When they finally make it back, Wahlström is there, already stripped of his gear and fuming, and Casey can’t help but groan internally.

“Who the fuck does he think he is?!” the captain starts in, already way more worked up than the situation warrants. The other guys shuffle in around him.

Casey tries to tune him out, sitting down to start undoing his skates, and turns to Routhier beside him instead, hoping to maybe catch his eye so they can suffer together. Routhier, a blond centre drafted the year before him, always seems to know when he’s trying to have one of these silent exchanges, most likely because of experience, and when their eyes meet, Roots is quick to roll his eyes and let Casey know that he, too, is fed up with their captain. Quietly, Casey grins.

“We still meeting up at that ramen place tonight?” he manages to mutter underneath the cacophony Wahlström is making. He’d discovered the tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurant online just the night previous, and known Routhier would love to try it, if only to compare to all the delicious ramen they normally get in Vancouver.

Routhier nods back to confirm just as Wahlström calls out, “Y’know, those two could be the best in the league if they weren’t too busy fucking each other.”

And that’s just fucking asinine. Could be, like Hollander and Rozanov aren’t already good enough to be God’s gift to hockey. Casey can’t help but scoff to himself because it’s such a stupid stance to take. Could be? They are the best.

Around the locker room, pretty much everyone is avoiding eye contact with captain, presumably since they can also hear how dumb that sounds. That’s not the response Wahlström was looking for, apparently, because he gets up in the face of Webber, jabbing a pointed finger into his jersey like he’s making some salient point.

“Hey, listen to me. This would never happen on a respectable fucking team like ours, ok? Our guys are better than that,” Wahlström seethes.

“Shut the fuck up, Wally,” calls Pokorný, their goalie, and it’s just enough to undercut the tension in the room so everyone can move on with their day.

Casey tries to catch Routhier’s eye once more as the guys start packing up properly, but his shoulders are bunched up to his ears, and he’s in the middle of his very involved post-game routine, so Casey doesn’t interrupt. Him and Routhier are both superstitious as all hell, with long strings of rules they follow for every single game in order to ensure a victory, but Casey’s are mostly pre-game, and he knows Roots is having one of his moments he has sometimes, where he needs a bit of quiet. Which is fine, Casey knows not everyone can be one hundred percent all the time. He knows when to back off.

Finally, Wahlström gives up his tirade and stalks angrily out of the room, with all eyes on him as he goes out to the team bus. There’s a bit of relief seeing him leave, but ultimately the atmosphere has soured so far past the point where that would solve anything. God, Casey is so, so tired of their shitty, stupid captain. And it seems like everyone else is too.

“Wahlström is definitely getting traded before the season is up,” Casey remarks to Roots while they wait for their food in the restaurant later.

The place is a lot shittier than he’d anticipated. He hadn’t expected anything up to the standards of Jinya, of course, because they are ultimately in Ottawa, not Vancouver, but he’d sort of been hoping for something more than a wobbly table and tinny music trembling out of ancient speakers, which is what they have ended up with. But the menu selection is great, and Routhier hadn’t complained when they’d been shown to their tiny half booth by the window, so Casey figures he can overlook his gripes in favour of bitching with his linemate about dumb shit.

Routhier shakes his head. “I thought he had a no-move, no?”

“I mean, yeah,” Casey agrees, “But I mean, you saw that room right? Everyone hates his ass, and he clearly doesn’t even want to be here. I’d bet you real money that management is all over him with offers, or if they aren’t they will be after today.”

“I hope so.”

Roots is a man of few words, which Casey appreciates, because he likes to talk people’s ears off, and it’s easier to do when the person he’s talking to is happy to listen. When the waitress arrives with their food, two orders of black ramen, and they start to tuck in, he keeps chatting, going on about the game.

“I can’t believe he said that shit about Hollander and Rozanov. Like, what are you talking about, they could be best in the league, motherfucker they are the best. Like, what?”

“Yeah. Pretty stupid.”

Casey swirls his soup around thoughtfully, picking apart his half egg. “I bet you Rozanov’s right though, y’know? Like I bet it makes them better.”

Routhier freezes with his chopsticks in hand, and gives Casey a questioning look. “I’m not following.”

“You didn’t hear him? He was saying it like, kept their stamina up and stuff, it was like good for the hips.”

“Oh.” Routhier’s focus goes back to his ramen, studiously twirling the noodles around. “You mean like, sex?”

“Yeah, like sex.” Casey nods, before taking a big helping of noodles and making a loud slurping noise. Roots gives him a disapproving look, but Casey doesn’t care because it’s supposed to be polite or whatever. When he’s finished, he chimes in further.

“But not like just sex, y’know? Like obviously plenty of guys in the MLH are having sex. It’s gotta be a gay sex specific thing,” Casey says, “I mean hell, probably the next best guy after Hollander and Rozanov is Scott Hunter, and he’s doing the same thing they’re doing.”

“I think it’s a little different. They are teammates,” Routhier points out, shifting in his seat awkwardly.

Casey presses on anyways, because he can sense he’s onto something here. “Hey, maybe that’s what gives them the advantage over Hunter. Like that shit has obviously got to improve your on ice chemistry like nobody’s business, right? Honestly it’s probably better if it’s teammates, driving up their stats like crazy.”

Routhier doesn’t respond to that, preferring to take a sip of his broth and look out the window. Casey gets it; it’s sort of an uncomfortable topic, talking about gay guys in the league. Personally, it’s not something that Casey has ever been bothered by. To him, it doesn’t seem like his business, and it doesn’t really affect him in any way, so he’s not sure why it has everyone so up in arms. If Routhier doesn’t wanna talk about it, though, that’s fine with him. Casey’s happy to slurp his soup in peace.

Routhier surprises him though, speaking up without looking. “It doesn’t bother you at all?”

“What, gay guys?”

“Yeah.” Routhier takes another sip. “You don’t think it’s weird?”

Casey shakes his head with surety. “Nah man. If it works it works, y’know?”

“Mm. Yeah, I guess so.”

They lapse back into silence for a minute while they finish their food. Casey kinda feels like he’s cracked the whole thing wide open here, if he’s being honest. The Centaurs had, after all, gotten drastically better in the last few years, and if he thinks about it, those changes had only seemed to happen once they’d had gay players on the roster. And they only seemed to get better the more they added. Maybe the league had been overlooking what was honestly a fairly well-proven strategy purely out of homophobia, and Casey was only seeing it now because he wasn’t one of those guys that got bothered by that.

“Actually, if it works so good, maybe we should try it,” Casey realizes.

This is where it officially goes too far.

——