#phew!!!!

Normally Zhenya vets his brand trips pretty thoroughly. There are some people out there who jump at every sponsored vacation that’s thrown at them regardless of who’s picking up the bill, and while Zhenya’s not about to pretend he’s some scrupulously ethical guy who only shills products he supports with every fiber of his being, he’s also not interested in flaunting a lavish trip for some brand his followers have never heard him talk about before.

Some of his vetting is selfish, of course. He wants to be flown out to fun places with people he can actually tolerate, not the ever-growing mass of early-20s fitfluencers who all talk in the same cadence and over-filter their videos so their followers can’t clock the injection sites and surgery scars while they’re talking up some new weight-loss fad product as if it’s the secret to their looks.

Zhenya’s not like that. He’s still filming on the same camera he bought back when he first started recording himself, well before the pandemic and when the concept of being an influencer as a full-time career didn’t really exist yet. He doesn’t even think he knew the word ‘influencer’ when he posted his first video to YouTube all those years ago; he just wanted to make workout videos for people who can’t get to the gym and maybe raise his own personal trainer brand a little at the same time. Rent isn’t cheap in NYC after all, even on Zhenya’s Equinox salary, and new clients, especially ones above a certain income bracket, are never a bad thing.

When the pandemic hit, Zhenya seriously thought he’d have to somehow move back home, slink back to his parents’ house in backwoods Russia and admit that his dreams had been a little too big after all. Five years ago, he never could have guessed where he’d be now.

Quitting his day job had been risky, a decision he agonized over for weeks. But the partnership offers were piling up, and his manager was fielding high-profile celebrity requests by the dozen to have him come and design custom workout plans for them. The money piling up in his accounts was staggering, an unfathomable total to a boy who grew up in a one-bedroom apartment in an industrial post-Soviet town.

Even if it all comes crashing down tomorrow, it was worth every minute. Zhenya’s trying to be smart with his money, squirreling most of it away into investments he can live off and buying property instead of yet another shitty Amazon ‘must-have’, but he’s enjoying the fruits of his labor, too—the nice cars, the nice house, the nice vacations in five-star hotels.

He would not classify Buffalo in March as one of the nicer places he’s been to, but the reason he’s going makes this trip the most exciting one yet. The chance to watch his favorite hockey player break a Wayne Gretzky record as the Penguins’ guest isn’t something Zhenya would pass up in a million years.

«I don’t know what to wear,» he whines, stabbing at his phone until it switches to speaker and tossing it on the floor at his feet as he continues to paw through his closet. «Is it tacky to wear a jersey? Do I look good in jerseys?»

Artemy sighs so loudly Zhenya’s phone crackles. «You sound like a teenage girl,» he informs Zhenya, who rolls his eyes and holds up his plum puffer vest in consideration. Maybe this with a long-sleeve shirt…? «Of course jerseys are tacky. But everyone in the damn arena will have one on. Bring something else for after if you think they’ll let you take pictures you’ll want to post, but if you want to wear a jersey, wear one. You’ll look fine.»

«But which one?» Zhenya muses, turning to look at the long row of Penguins jerseys taking up nearly a quarter of his closet.

Artemy hangs up on him. Zhenya doesn’t bother calling back.

He does pack a jersey though—a game-worn one that Zhenya saved for months to afford and really had no business buying at the time. It’s not autographed, but Crosby scored 23 goals while wearing it, and Zhenya’s nostalgic for the Vegas gold color scheme.

He brings a hat from his collaboration with Goorin Bros too, one of the gray beanies. The black sold better, but Zhenya prefers the gray, and it’ll look better with his purple vest.

The Penguins offer to put him in a suite—apparently the demand isn’t high for premium seating in Buffalo this year, go figure—but Zhenya manages to wheedle a seat on the glass, right next to the visitor’s penalty box. He wants to be close to the action, where he can hear and see everything and hopefully get some good pictures.

The flight to Buffalo is short, but Zhenya upgrades himself to business class and spends the entire 90 minutes slouched in his seat scrolling through Sidney Crosby highlights on YouTube. He’s watched all these videos hundreds of times by now, but he could use a refresher—what if he meets Sid? He wants to sound like he knows what he’s talking about, like he’s a real fan, not just a clout-chaser or a puckbunny.

Stupid, really. The PR person hadn’t been sure Zhenya would be able to meet any players—they’re going straight from the game to the airport, everyone eager to get home after the road trip—but he’ll get a tour of the locker room anyway, and the team wants to take some pictures of their own to post.

They put him up in the same hotel where the team is staying, and Zhenya spends the afternoon fantasizing about walking down into the lobby, running into Sid, and charming him with some line that gets them talking.

The very thought of it terrifies him, so Zhenya orders room service and goes to bed as early as possible.

Zhenya’s been a Penguins fan for what feels like his entire life. When he was younger he was obsessed with Mario Lemieux and Jaromir Jagr—his parents couldn’t afford to put him into the hockey program in Magnitogorsk, but he used to play out on the pond with his friends, and he always had dibs on taping a 66 onto the back of his coat. Most of the kids in Russia cheered for Detroit, and Zhenya had a Red Wings hat too, but it was the Penguins he followed as best he could.

When they drafted Sidney Crosby and Zhenya got a look at him on TV for the first time, that just sealed it. He’s followed Sid’s whole career, digging through the bowels of the internet for game footage in the middle of the night until he moved to America and could watch games at a reasonable hour, and the first vacation he took in the US was to Pittsburgh, to watch the Penguins play up in the rafters of the Igloo.

Now that Zhenya makes real money he’s been to a lot more games, in much better seats. He’s talked about the Penguins on his platforms as long as he’s been on social media, sometimes dedicating entire videos to rant about poorly-officiated games or gush over a play Sid made that didn’t get enough attention. He supposes it was only a matter of time until someone on the team stumbled onto his account, but he still can’t believe they reached out to invite him to potentially watch history be made.

The hotel gym is deserted the next morning, and Zhenya runs off as much of his nervous energy on the treadmill as he can tolerate. He spends too long primping in the mirror after his shower, pushing his hair back and forth until he remembers he brought his hat and rolls his eyes at himself before cramming it onto his head.

The Penguins send a car for him late afternoon, and Zhenya spends the hour before warmups wandering KeyBank center with a pretty brunette from the comms team. She giggles and blushes when he casually flirts with her—Zhenya might be gay but he has eyes, he can appreciate a beautiful woman, and everyone likes to be flirted with.

He has time to grab a canned cocktail before heading down for warmups, settling into his seat and sipping on his drink as he films a quick video to post to his feeds. When the players come out Zhenya practically plasters himself to the glass, staring raptly as the Penguins skate past him and getting as much footage as he can to sort through and post later.

He’s never had seats this good. This fucking rules.

It gets even better a few minutes into the game when Sid takes a penalty and spends two minutes barely two feet from Zhenya’s seat. Normally Zhenya would be watching the penalty kill through his fingers and holding his breath, but this time he spends the entire penalty half-turned in his chair so it’s not quite so obvious that he’s staring at Sid.

Sid sprays water down the back of his jersey and then in his mouth, and Zhenya learns what it looks like when he has drops of water on those big red lips up close. He spends most of the two minutes chatting with the penalty box attendant, but when there’s about half a minute left and he’s standing up in preparation to skate back out, he glances to the side, right at Zhenya.

Zhenya watches Sid’s eyes widen, then glance up at his hat, and then the penalty is over and Sid skates back out to rejoin the game.

“Holy shit,” Zhenya mutters, placing his phone in his lap so his shaking hands don’t drop it. “No way, holy shit?”

He’s so flustered by the direct eye contact that he almost misses when Sid officially passes the record, a beauty of a goal that sends Zhenya and what feels like the entire arena to their feet. The applause is long, even from the home fans, and Zhenya practically wears out his thumb taking pictures of the scoreboard, the bench, the crowd, and himself. He didn’t get a video of the goal, but there will be enough footage posted all over—Zhenya got to see it with his own eyes, practically in front of him.

Unfortunately, that’s the high point of the game. Zhenya winces through most of the second period, and even a pair of goals in the third to make the final score a little less mortifying doesn’t quite match the emotional high of Sid’s goal.

Zhenya loves seeing his team in person, though, even when they lose, and he’s shaken off his disappointment by the time the brunette comes to take him to the players’ area.

Zhenya wrinkles his nose at the workout facilities—he’s still an Equinox snob at heart, sue him—and badly wants to poke through the refrigerator in the player’s lounge, but when they approach what can only be the locker room he clams up.

The girl—Emma—pauses with her hand on the door, looking up at him. “They’re all going to be in the change room by now,” she says reassuringly, adjusting the camera around her neck. “And they know we have a guest, so you’re not intruding. I know this is a little weird, I hated coming down here when I first started, but they’re totally used to it. If anyone pops in it’s because they watch your stuff and want to say hi—some of the younger guys were really excited when we told them you were coming tonight, and I’m pretty sure Tanger follows you. Anyway, don’t worry about it. We’ll be in and out.”

Tanger does follow Zhenya. That happened about three years ago, and Zhenya spent most of the afternoon having a quiet panic attack in his apartment when he got the notification. He didn’t think that meant Tanger actually looked at his posts. How embarrassing.

The Penguins are expecting content out of this, so Zhenya squares his shoulders and flashes his brightest smile at Emma, who turns pink and lifts up the camera, pushing the door open and clicking record.

Zhenya hams it up in the room, putting on the slightly-exaggerated public personality he’s been cultivating for years. It’s not entirely fake, Zhenya wouldn’t be able to sustain it for this long if it was, but it’s a little bit more than he is in real life. It plays well on social media, so whatever.

Once Emma’s happy with what she got, she takes a few pictures of Zhenya on his phone. He flips through them before they leave, pausing on the one of him sitting in Sid’s locker and looking to the side—that’s the one, he thinks. He’s glad he took his jersey off for these pictures.

“Oh,” Emma says, and Zhenya looks up guiltily—she’s been so nice, but he’s sure he’s keeping her from getting home. She’s staring down at her phone. “So, Sid wants to meet you? Is that cool? He’s still with the trainers, but can you wait a few minutes?”

Zhenya’s brain shuts down.

He must reply with some form of affirmative, though, because Emma taps something on her phone before guiding Zhenya out of the locker room and back to the player’s lounge.

“I’m so sorry, but I have some stuff I need to take care of before we head to the airport,” she says apologetically. Zhenya can hear her phone vibrating in her hand. “Are you okay waiting here alone? Sid knows where you are, he should come find you soon.”

“Sure,” Zhenya says faintly, and Emma smiles at him before rushing off.

Zhenya looks around the room, then shakes his head and sits on the couch, taking a deep breath. He’s going to meet Sidney Crosby—he needs to get it together.

He distracts himself by making a few color adjustments to that picture and typing out a few different captions before settling on one. He debates over the hashtags, but it’s not like the Penguins could possibly be surprised—Zhenya’s very, very out, and he’s never shied away from praising Sid’s looks as well as his hockey on his platforms. If they don’t know, that’s their own fault.

He’s just hit post when someone clears their throat.

Zhenya’s head whips up so fast he almost pulls something in his neck.

“Hey there,” says Sidney Crosby, standing a few feet away from Zhenya and dressed in the tightest, most threadbare pair of lululemon leggings Zhenya’s ever seen. “Geno, right? Thanks for sticking around, sorry to make you wait.”

“Um,” Zhenya says intelligently, fumbling his phone into his vest pocket as he gets to his feet. “No problem, like, fun to see the locker room and stuff.”

Sid steps closer and sticks his hand out. Zhenya takes it, praying his palm isn’t as sweaty as the rest of his body feels. Sid’s hair is still damp, but he smells like cologne, and Zhenya wonders if he’s going to faint. “Great to meet you, man,” Sid says, smiling at Zhenya. His teeth are so white. “We’re all big fans, the boys were pretty excited when Jen told us you were coming. Tanger’s gonna be pissed at me forever, he really wanted to meet you but he’s still stuck with the docs.”

“Oh wow,” Zhenya says, holding Sid’s hand for a hair too long before dropping it. Up close, Sid’s mouth is so red and his eyes are enormous. He’s a little shorter than Zhenya thought, but he’s broad, and his biceps are straining the sleeves of the t-shirt he’s got on. “Um, I’m not know you watch. Well, I know Tanger follows, but I don’t think he actually watches, you know.”

Sid bites his lip. “I follow you too,” he says, voice low like he’s sharing a secret. “I’ve got a…I think they call it a finsta? It doesn’t have a profile picture or anything, you wouldn’t know it’s me. But I started following you during the lockdown, your videos were great. I was getting so bored with the stuff the trainers sent out, and everything else I found was like…it just wasn’t good, you know, but then Tanger found your account and—” Sid pauses, and Zhenya watches in amazement as his face turns red. “Sorry. Jesus, I’m babbling, I get like this after games. Anyway. Sorry we couldn’t get a win for you, but I hope you had fun anyway.”

“Best,” Zhenya rushes to reassure him. “Your goal, like, it’s so good, classic Crosby goal. So cool to see you break the record, I can’t believe. I’m a fan for so long, I never think I get to see something so close like that.”

Sid’s smile returns in full force. “Oh, you’ve been a fan for a while, eh?” he says, tilting his head coyly. Abruptly, Zhenya realizes he’s being flirted with. “Well, it’s a shame it took so long for us to get you down here—I would have loved to have met you sooner.” 

“Yes,” Zhenya says dumbly, reaching up to scratch the back of his neck. Is this really happening?

Sid’s eyes follow his hand, widening when he looks up at Zhenya’s beanie. “Oh, your hat! I saw that when I was in the box, that’s really cool. Goorin, right? Kris has a ton of stuff from them, I remember when your collection came out. You got any extras of those lying around?”

Zhenya takes a deep breath and decides to be brave. “Yes, I have at home, lots of colors,” he says, reaching into his pocket for his phone. “I can send to you, maybe? But you’re have to tell me what kind you want, like, hat or beanie, what style—maybe you give me your number, I can send you pictures?” He unlocks his iPhone and holds it out, hand shaking only a little.

Sid stares at it for a minute, and just when Zhenya thinks he’s made a horrible mistake snatches it out of his palm. “Maybe instead you should come to Pittsburgh and bring some with you,” he says, pulling up the messenger app and starting a new thread. “I mean, probably it would be better for me to see how they look, right? And it’ll save you shipping. If you’ve got time you could stay a while, come to a few games—we have another roadie coming up, but our last couple of games are at home. What do you think?” When he hands Zhenya his phone back, his smile is sly and his eyes are sharp.

Zhenya heads back to his hotel with Sidney Crosby’s phone number burning a hole in his pocket. It’s a good thing his flight isn’t until later tomorrow—there’s no way he’s sleeping any time soon tonight.