#cakemakethme

Hockey players don’t switch often, per se, but it still happens enough that the first time Tyler switches, with Marchy, it takes the locker room a good half hour to swap the stories of who and when they switched. Apparently Marchy and Bergy hop in and out of each other all the time. Bergy also has a story about the time in 2010 when he and Crosby switched for an hour before a game; he tells it offhand but personally Tyler thinks the only thing more stressful than being in St. Patrice’s body would be being in Sidney fucking Crosby’s. He’s pretty happy chilling in Marchy’s, where he can be as annoying as he wants, thanks.

So it happens, and there are rules, both official—you don’t even have to scratch anymore if you’re switching on the same team, though of course often it’s best to scratch because people don’t know how to skate in each other’s bodies. Though there are stories that the Sedins don’t skip a beat when they switch, and that Crosby’s still lobbying to spend a game in Fleury’s body just to finally get him that Vezina—and unofficial, like how you’re not supposed to really talk about it outside the locker room or to burn any bridges.

Which all means that the first time Tyler blinks and he’s in a body a little bigger and a little heavier than he’s used to, he’s not really thrown. Or, no, it’s cool, because you switch with people you’re simpatico with and it’s only been a few months since he came to Dallas and it’s cool he and Jamie are so chill. But it’s not a thing—it happened overnight, so he wanders out of Jamie’s room, and into the kitchen, where Jordie’s making coffee.

“Hey—“ Jordie’s eyes narrow. Tyler’s pretty impressed, actually; Tyler hasn’t even opened his mouth. “Who are you?”

“Wow, rude,” Tyler retorts, and Jordie relaxes.

“Hey, Segs,” he says, “Figured it was you. Need to run downstairs to deal with Marshall?”

“My body, Jamie can handle him,” Tyler decides. He trusts Jamie. Or at least of him to come up and ask, it’s not like he doesn’t know where Tyler is. “Coffee?” He’s seen Jamie in the mornings, he knows that coffee isn’t necessary, exactly, but he’d still like it.

Jordie gives him coffee. It’s a few minutes later than there’s a knock on the door, and Tyler’s body is there. Tyler’s only switched a few times, so it’s still weird, seeing his body from the outside like this. How Jamie holds him differently, his shoulders folding in a little.

“You should have told me that hit was bad,” is the first thing Jamie says, rubbing at the bruise Tyler went to sleep with on his side. Tyler rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, sure, mom. I can feel exactly how much you hurt.”

“Whatever,” Jamie mutters, and Tyler didn’t know his body could look sheepish like that. “Jord—“

“One Segs coffee, here you go. Now you two handle it.” Jordie hands Jamie a mug of coffee, which Tyler knows his body needs, and then goes to his room. Tyler doesn’t think there’s much to handle, really; generally the switches don’t last more than a couple hours, twenty-four at most—though there’s a story that once Lemieux and Jagr switched for a full 72 hours, which no one’s been able to get either of them to confirm or deny.

So yeah, there’s nothing to handle. They get ready and go to practice and Tyler figures out what it feels like to skate like Jamie and Jamie bounces off a few guys he’s used to barreling through, and then sometime at their pre-game nap they’re back and its’ fine.

2) The second time they switch, Jamie’s a little more nervous. It’s just shitty timing, is all, is what he tells Segs, who rolls Jamie’s eyes, and grins, cocky and careless, an expression that Jamie’s body doesn’t pull off. Jamie really hates switching in general—he doesn’t like learning a new body and he really hates knowing someone else is inside his, figuring him out. It’s okay when it’s Jordie, who he switches with the most, but when it’s Tyler...Tyler, who was hot and knew it in his own body, and now is figuring out the differences in Jamie’s. Not that he wouldn’t have known before, but it’s…Jamie doesn’t like to think about it.

And also— “We can’t cancel,” Ruff tells him, them, and Jamie doesn’t swear or anything, but he feels like it.

“Are you sure?” Jamie asks, again. He knows. He knows that cancelling for no real reason would just mean the press would jump on a story where there isn’t one, but, he can’t do a press thing in Tyler’s body, because that’s not how it’s done, and—

“I’ll be fine,” Tyler says, easy, and Jamie bites at Tyler’s lip. It’s not that he doesn’t trust Tyler to try. He does—Tyler’s been nothing but committed since he showed up. But Jamie’s still a new captain, and he already feels like he’s not enough and—

“Hey,” Tyler says, after they leave Ruff’s office. Jamie has to look up to look at him, which is a sensation that takes getting used to; he usually doesn’t have to look up to many people. Tyler probably doesn’t either, to be fair. “It really will be okay.”

“I know, but—“ Jamie goes to run a hand through his hair, but Tyler’s is shorter. “Just, I don’t—“ Either Tyler does great, and everyone knows how Jamie’s not a good captain, or he doesn’t do great, and everyone thinks Jamie failed. It’s a lose lose.

“Do you not trust me?” Tyler asks, and he says it cocky but Jamie’s learned him by now. Jamie shakes his head, instinctive.

“Of course I trust you, but—“

“Then don’t worry.”

“I will worry,” Jamie snaps, and takes a breath. “Look, Segs, this is—they still don’t know me as a captain, and I have to impress them, be someone they and you all rely on, and I can’t, and I can’t right now, so—“ Jamie cuts himself off, because Tyler didn’t need all that. “Just, take this seriously, please?”

Tyler’s eyes widen. Jamie knows his eyes are stupid big, so it’s really noticeable. “Yeah.” He swallows. “Don’t worry, Benny,” he says, and this time it’s not quite so easy. “I will.” Then he smiles again, that Tyler Seguin smile that somehow translates through to Jamie’s body. “I’ll even mumble in all the right spots.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Jamie says, but he can’t help but smile back.

(Tyler does take it seriously, and he does do fine, if more articulate than Jamie is normally. They’re back in their own bodies by the time Jamie can find Tyler again, and Tyler grins at him, which is even more in his own body. “Told you to trust me,” he says, and it’s in that tone of his that’s trying to be careless but is really eager.

Jamie nods back, puts his hand on Tyler’s shoulder. “I do,” he says, and Tyler goes quiet.)

3) So they switch in the next few years. More than most people. Apparently they’re pretty compatible, which makes Tyler slap Jamie’s shoulder and crow about best bros for life, or some shit like that. So they spend plenty of time in each other’s bodies, and it’s part of growing up.

Jamie sees what his body looks like when carried with Tyler’s confidence, that he’s got no reason to fold in on himself and mumble. He sees what it feels like to be in Tyler’s body, the way it feels to have people look when he’s expecting it, and starts to learn what it means when people do that when he’s in his own. He learns how Tyler skates and what it means to not be bigger than most people on ice, which doesn’t encourage his fighting habit, but Jamie’s body can take it and others can’t.

Tyler sees what it feels like to have the weight of responsibility, what it means to carry that if even for a little while. He learns how Jamie hurts, all the time, and doesn’t complain—though he certainly rats him out to the trainers, Jordie, and his mom; anyone who’ll listen and yell at Jamie for the way his hips scream at Tyler whenever he moves. He learns, too, what it means when he has to sit and listen; he learns how to pretend to be an anchor at least.

They don’t only switch with each other, of course. Jamie and Jordie still switch fairly regularly, though if it’s not a deal for anyone its really not a deal for them, who’ve been doing it since they started skating. They switch with their other line mates occasionally, other players. On their assorted national teams they switch sometimes too, of course. But it’s never quite like it is—it’s because they’ve been switching so much, Jamie rationalizes. That’s why Tyler’s body is so comfortable to him.

(Tyler thinks, well. He thinks that Jamie’s body is more comfortable to him because Jamie is comfortable to him, because somehow in the last few years everything about Jamie has become his home, because he’ll take closeness to Jamie however he can take it. He thinks, sometimes guiltily, that it happens so much because he wants so much, because it’s an excuse to feel out Jamie’s body even if it’s not nearly how he wants and he never crosses the unspoken lines of what you can do with other people’s bodies. He thinks that there’s nothing quite like the fix of how Jamie looks at him when he handles the responsibilities of Jamie’s body with care, when they’re back in their own bodies and Jamie smiles at him not like it’s unexpected but like he knew Tyler would do it, like he always has.)

4) Then—they stop switching. For years. After spending a few hours in each other’s bodies about once a month, it’s down to nothing; and it’s not that they stop switching totally, either. Jamie and Jordie still bounce around, even after Jordie’s traded; Tyler and Rads are pretty compatible; watching Bish and Jamie try to navigate each other’s bodies is frankly hysterical. But they don’t switch with each other.

“It’s because we’ve learned everything we could ever know about each other,” Tyler says, laughing, when he’s asked about it, but Jamie—it worries him. He’d always secretly been a little proud of how often he and Tyler switched, for all its inconveniences. It meant that the chemistry really was there, that Jamie didn’t make up the fact that somehow someone like Tyler and someone like him clicked. So when it stops—the chemistry’s still there, on the ice, and they’re still friends, but Jamie…he doesn’t know. Something must have changed.

He asks about it, a little, when he realizes just how long it’s been—sees if any of the other guys he knows switches a lot stopped at all. He gets a very politely apologetic message back from Sid, who tells him that he and Geno still switch fairly regularly but he can ask around; something sharper from Pricey that it’s been off and on since PK’s trade but it hadn’t stopped before that; Duncs says it’s slowed down but he doesn’t sound worried. He gets the single word yes back from Carts, but Jamie’s not going to press on that one. Tyson’s probably the most expectedly unhelpful; his whole team sounds like they barely spend any time in their own bodies. But Tyson is the one who says, frankly, does Segs have an opinion? because he does unfortunately know Jamie too well.

And Jamie wants to think he’s grown up, that he’s not the kid who couldn’t look anyone in the eye, but…if what it comes down to is that Tyler’s moved on to other friends, now that he doesn’t need just Jamie; if Tyler’s gotten tired of Jamie everywhere but on the ice, then Jamie would rather wonder about it then hear a yes or no. Jamie doesn’t think he’s a coward, usually, but sometimes, well. Maybe he is. Maybe he’d rather pretend to have some parts of Tyler than learn he doesn’t have him at all.

Except then Jamie’s the last to leave one of Tyler’s hangouts, just the two of them a little tipsy on Tyler’s couch with the dogs splayed out between them, and Jamie looks over at Tyler, thinks about how he’s grown since he first came, how he’s filled out the boyish frame and how much more settled he looks, and how much Jamie loves him, and— “Is there something wrong with us?” He asks, before he can think about it.

Tyler’s brow furrows. “Why would there be something wrong?” He tilts his head, drags his gaze over Jamie, in a way that somehow doesn’t make Jamie uncomfortable anymore. “You look okay. I’m okay.”

“We don’t switch anymore.”

Tyler grins, slow and lazy. “I told you, it’s because we don’t need it.”

“Yeah, but—“

“No, it is.” Tyler rocks up onto his knees, so he can reach Jamie. “I don’t need to be in your body to know that you’re still hurting from that fight last week but aren’t complaining.” He pokes at Jamie’s shoulder, which has been bothering him. “To know that you need some water soon so you don’t get a hangover.” His finger’s on Jamie’s temple. Jamie shivers. “To know that you’re worried about something, and have been.” His finger moves to Jamie’s jaw, then pokes at where Jamie’s dimple would be, if it was there. Jamie snorts, and Tyler grins. He’s very close, his eyes glinting in the low light. “To know exactly where that is.”

Jamie can’t help but smile at that, because Tyler always makes him smile. Because he does know that too, knows every inch of Tyler, knows the shape of Tyler’s grin and the curve of every tattoo. But— “That’s not—a lot of the guys have that too, and they don’t stop, I asked.”

Tyler settles back on his heels. “They aren’t us.”

“Yeah, but—are you really saying we don’t know each other like Sid and Malkin?” Jamie asks. “I don’t...I don’t want things to be wrong between us.”

“Nothing’s wrong.” Tyler says it confidently, clearly, but—Jamie does know Tyler, and so he knows what Tyler looks like when he’s not saying something.

“Segs.” Tyler blinks. “Tyler.”

Tyler swallows. “Don’t ask me, Jamie. Please.”

“If something’s wrong, I need to know,” Jamie argues. He gets it, he doesn’t want to push, but if something’s wrong he needs to know so he can fix it, for the team and for them. “It’ll be okay, we’ll figure it out. We—“ Then Tyler’s leaning in, and Jamie thought he knew Tyler, but it barely pings that he does actually know what Tyler looks like when he’s about to kiss someone before Tyler does kiss him, just a press of lips before he’s pulling away, his eyes wide and terrified.

“Don’t hate me.” He tries for a laugh, but it doesn’t quite land.

Jamie blinks. “Segs.”

“That’s what’s off between us,” Tyler says, then bolts to his feet. “I’m going to—dogs. You can think about it. Figure out how to fix it, because it’s been years and I haven’t been able to figure it out.”

He’s out the door before Jamie can figure out what to say. In the end, he leaves, because it’s pretty clear Tyler’s not coming back until he does.

5) Tyler wakes up in a body not his own that he knows too well, and swears at the ceiling. “Seriously?” He demands, and rolls out of bed.

He wasn’t wrong about Jamie’s shoulder hurting, and there are even more aches and pains than the last time he was in Jamie’s body, years ago. Tyler’s not surprised. Jamie’s put on more muscle, in the last few years; his hair and beard changed the feel of his face, a little. Nothing Tyler couldn’t have expected. If he ever thought he’d be here again, and definitely not after last night.

(This is what Tyler hadn’t said—yeah, they knew each other well enough not to switch. But there was a secret, the thing Jamie didn’t want to see that bled out of Tyler whenever he looked at Jamie, the thing that Tyler couldn’t say, and Tyler couldn’t help but think that’s what was there, that Tyler’s wanting had grown out of control until it was between them.).

But then he’d been an idiot, last night, but—Jamie had been looking at him all worried and plaintive with his irresistibly big eyes and maybe Tyler had wanted to stop that look more than he’d wanted to keep the secret, or maybe he was sick of keeping the secret, or maybe it had meant something, that Jamie had been worrying, that he’d been asking. Or maybe this was just another time Tyler had been reckless and stupid.

And now—now he’s in Jamie’s body again, for the first time in years. He doesn’t know what that means.

He brushes Jamie’s teeth anyway, deals with his morning the same way they always have. It’s conveniently an off day today, and Tyler had been planning to avoid Jamie as much as he could, if Jamie let him. To have a day to wallow in knowing the feel of Jamie’s lips, the scrape of his beard. But apparently that’s not how the universe works.

Just to torture himself, Tyler puts a finger on Jamie’s lips, traces them. That’s all, he’s done now.

And he hadn’t been kidding last night, Jamie had needed to drink water and clearly hadn’t. So he goes to do that, and that’s when the door opens and there’s the scraping of dog claws that means that his boys are here.

Sure enough, they all swarm him—he’s never been quite able to tell if they can tell that he’s him or if they just love Jamie too. Jamie’s a few seconds behind them. It’s still a little bit of a shift, seeing how clear it is to Tyler that it’s Jamie in his body, how the way he holds himself is so himself even if he’s never quite figured that out. How Jamie’s got the expression on that he’s going to face the firing squad head on, which isn’t one that Tyler’s used to seeing in the mirror, is definitely a Jamie expression. God, Tyler loves him, and this is going to really suck.

“So, I guess we don’t have anything to worry about,” Tyler says, before Jamie can. He leans down to scratch Gerry’s head. “Switching back to normal.”

“Tyler.” Tyler’s voice isn’t as good at the firm captain voice as Jamie’s own, and Tyler doesn’t look up. “Come on, Ty.”

“I guess it was my fault, then. I kept a secret and it meant we didn’t—”

“What secret?” Jamie asks, and Tyler snorts.

“Come on. You know me better than anyone. You literally know me inside and out.” He gestures at Jamie-in-Tyler’s-body. “Do you really not know?”

“I—didn’t.” Jamie sounds surprised about that, disappointed in himself the way he gets when he feels like he let the team down. That’s not okay, ever.

“I really didn’t want you to. I think that’s why we didn’t switch, because I was trying to keep us—I don’t know. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you worried. I just didn’t want to have, you know. This conversation.”

“What’s this conversation?”

“The one where you’re very you and mumble something about how you love me as a friend and all that,” Tyler says. He’s rehearsed this one a fair amount. He didn’t think he’d have to see himself say it, but hey, he can handle some new torture. “It’s fine, I get it.”

“What if that’s not the conversation I want to have?” Jamie asks, and Tyler’s head jerks up. The expression on his face—Tyler thinks he might sort of know it, but only because he knows how he feels when he looks at Jamie. “I—I didn’t think about it, but you know me, I didn’t…but, I mean, you’re—you, even when you’re in my body, and—” This isn’t the mumbling Tyler had expected. This is—

“You’ve got to use your words, bro,” Tyler tells him, because there’s something dangerously like hope now, and that’s—he need to squash it fast if he’s going to squash it.

Jamie makes a face, and it’s recognizably the face he makes when he’s frustrated by people demanding he talk. But he takes a breath. “I hadn’t thought about it until last night,” he says, slowly, carefully. Looking Tyler right in the eye, because it’s Jamie, and of course he is. “But—that doesn’t mean I don’t want to think about it now.”

“Look, Jamie.” Tyler says. He needs—this has to be out there. “I love with you.”

“Yeah, you’ve said.”

“No, not in a bro way—or yes, in a bro way,  but also in a in love with you way.” Jamie makes a face, quick and gone. “What?”

“Just—that’s not something I thought my body would tell me,” he says, and Tyler snorts, starts to laugh.

“Seriously, bro? Now?”

“It’s weird!” Jamie protests, ducking his head in a way that would flush his cheeks if it were on his body. Tyler’s vain enough to think that it’s pretty cute on his body too, if not as cute.

“Weird because it’s your body, or because of what I said?” He asks. Marshall’s nosing at his leg, and he pets him absently.

“I mean, it’s weird both ways, but not in a bad way. I—“ Jamie shakes his head. “I, you know I’m shit at this, Segs, I—“ he shakes his head again, takes a step forward, then stops. “Fuck.”

“What?”

“Well, I’d have kissed you then, but it’s my body and that’d be even weirder,” Jamie starts out strong, and ends up muttering, and Tyler—he can’t do anything but laugh, because Jamie is reacting better than he’d ever dream and he’s being fucking cock blocked by his own body.

“Fine. So when we switch back—“

“Then, um. Yeah.”

“Yeah.” Tyler knows just how stupid Jamie’s face looks when he’s doing a dumb smile; he hadn’t known how stupid his own face looks. He can’t bring himself to care.

6) “I’m telling you, it’s weird,” Jamie says, again, months later, when they’ve switched back and kissed and more and then switched a few more times, for good measure—not as often as in the early years, but enough that Jamie doesn’t worry about it anymore. Also enough that all the guys he’d asked can be comforted that no, they’re fine, Jamie was paranoid.

“Okay, but flip side.” Jamie’s body rolls over, props himself up on one arm. It’s a very Tyler move, the way he likes to lean over Jamie and kiss him until Jamie rolls them over because he’s done with Tyler’s teasing. “It’s been a week and I want to fuck.”

“Tyler,” Jamie rolls his eyes. “No.”

“Jamie,” Tyler counters. “Yes. You want me to.”

“Yeah, you, not me.”

“I thought you said I was me no matter what body I’m in.”

“Yeah, but it’s me, so—no.”

“Okay, fine.” Tyler grins. “How about you don’t look, and I blow you? I don’t have any problem with blowing myself.”

“No, really?”

“Hey, I work hard for that body, I like to appreciate it,” Tyler retorts, smirking. He drags a finger up his own abs, which Jamie couldn’t conceive of but does send shivers up his spine. “And I know what that body likes.”

He makes a compelling argument, as long as Jamie closes his eyes and he doesn’t talk. Jamie sighs. “Fine. But don’t talk, I don’t want to hear myself.” He shuts his eyes, but he can still hear Tyler’s grin in his own voice.

“I don’t need to be talking for what I’m doing.” Jamie groans. He’s pretty sure other captains don’t have to deal with this shit.