Hockey Fic - Shovel Talk
Title: Shovel Talk
Author:accidentallymel
Summary: 5 times Jack told someone not to break Sid's heart +1 time someone told him
1. February 2003
“So I hear you’ve been spending a lot of time with Sid recently.”
Jessica slowly puts her book down and blinks up at him. “What are you, the Sid police?” she asks. Jack crosses his arms over his chest and scowls at her.
“I’m his best friend,” he says. She rolls her eyes at him and picks up her book again.
“Relax, Johnson. We’ve been working on a project for English.”
“You’ve been nice to him,” Jack says abruptly. She puts the book down again and looks at him curiously.
“Yeah, he’s a good guy - why wouldn’t I be nice to him?”
Jack’s scowl deepens. “He’s not used to people being nice to him. Look, just - don’t hurt him, okay?”
“Or you’ll beat me up?” she says, amused now. Jack shakes his head.
“I don’t hit girls,” he says. “But I will find a way to make you sorry if you hurt him.” He turns and walks out of the library, passing Sidney on his way in. Sidney sits down across from Jessica and begins pulling his English supplies out of his backpack, smiling at her. She smiles back at him, and wonders why his best friend says that he isn’t used to people being nice to him. Who wouldn’t be nice to Sidney?
2. February 2008
The team is out, celebrating a win against the Kings at home, when Colby knocks into someone on his way back from the bathroom.
“Sorry, man,” he says, turning around to see if he’s done any damage. He’s a little surprised to see that it’s one of the King’s defensemen, but smiles in welcome anyway. “Hey, Johnson. You looking for Sid?”
Johnson shakes his head. “Looking for you, actually. You got a minute?”
Colby shrugs. “Sure. What’s up?”
Johnson looks a little awkward, but determined. “Sid talks about you a lot,” he says, then stops. Colby is confused but willing to go with it.
“He talks about you a lot too,” Colby offers. “Says you’re his best friend.”
“Yeah,” Johnson says, taking a deep breath. “So this is me, as his best friend, warning you. Don’t hurt him.”
“Don’t. . . hurt him?” Colby says, confused. “Okay, I’ll try, but sometimes accidents happen at practice, you know - it’s not like anyone wants to injure one of our best players-”
“I’m not talking about that,” Johnson interrupts, impatient. Colby is still lost.
“Okay, then, what are you talking about?” Johnson gives him a look, then, and Colby feels like a lightbulb has just gone off over his head. “No, okay, look, it’s not like that-”
“I don’t care what it is or isn’t like,” Johnson says. “Don’t hurt him, or you’ll regret it. Understand?”
Colby would kind of like to argue that it really isn’t like that, but Johnson has a mulish look on his face that says he wouldn’t get very far. So he holds up his hands and nods. “Got it. Don’t hurt Sid. I’ll do my best.”
“Good,” Johnson says, before craning his neck to see over Colby’s shoulder. “Is Sid here?”
“Nah, he headed out around 10 minutes ago,” Colby says, waving at the door. “He doesn’t really care for these places.”
Johnson gives him an unimpressed stare - right, he probably knew that already - and nods at Colby. “See you around, Armstrong.”
“See you,” Colby calls after him, bemused, as Johnson heads for the door. When he gets back to the table, Flower looks over at him curiously.
“What took you so long, man? Did you fall in?”
“Fuck you, Flower,” Colby responds, and it devolves from there into a round of chirping about everyone’s bathroom habits, and Colby puts the odd conversation out of his mind.
3. December 2009
Max can’t think of any particular reason why Jack Johnson would be calling him, but he’s bored so he picks up the phone. “Hello?”
“Hey,Talbot. This is Jack Johnson.”
“I know, I do have caller ID. How did you get my number?”
“Asked Sid. How do you have my number for caller ID?”
“Got it from Sid. So, did you call for a reason?”
Johnson clears his throat. “Heard he’s taking you home to meet the family.”
Max blinks a little at that, startled, then starts laughing. “He told you about the commercial? Man, that thing’s going to be gold.”
Johnson doesn’t sound all that amused. “He wouldn’t have agreed to it if he didn’t want to do it, Talbot. Don’t be a dick.”
Max sputters out a laugh. “I’m sorry, have we met?”
Johnson sounds a little more amused at that, but his voice is still hard. “Not off the ice, not really. But that could change.” His tone changes at that, becomes threatening. Max rolls his eyes.
“Don’t worry, Johnson, your boy’s virtue will be intact,” he says, affecting a bored tone. Johnson sputters a bit at that.
“Too much information, Talbot,” Johnson says firmly. “Just don’t hurt him.”
“Yes, yes,” Max says testily. “Did you have anything useful to say or did you just call me to threaten me about Sid?”
“Nope, nothing else to say to you,” Johnson says before hanging up. Max is already planning how best to chirp Sidney about his taste in friends.
4. February 2010
Jonathan’s looking for an empty seat in the cafeteria when he hears someone calling his name. He looks up, expecting to see some of his teammates, but instead it’s someone wearing a Team USA tracksuit. He instinctively starts to head over before his brain catches up to his eyes and he realizes that the guy waving him over is not Kaner. It’s too late, of course - he’s already started over there and no matter how much he doesn’t want to deal with any of Kaner’s asshole teammates he can’t be rude.
“Johnson,” he says, nodding a little in acknowledgement as he sets his tray down. He’ll just have to eat as fast as he can to get out of there as soon as possible.
“Toews,” Johnson acknowledges him. “Good game last night.”
“. . . .Thanks,” Jonathan says, after swallowing the massive bite he’d just taken of his sandwich. There is a slight awkward silence at the table, as both of them eat their lunches and avoid each other’s eyes. Jonathan is almost finished with his food when Johnson speaks up again.
“You’ve been spending a lot of time with Sid,” he says, neutrally. Jonathan shoots him a look, but Johnson is concentrating on his food.
“Uh, yeah,” Jonathan says, not even trying not to sound judgemental. “He’s my teammate. He’s my roommate. He’s one of the best players in the world and I get the chance to pick his brains for two weeks. Why wouldn’t I spend time with him? What’s it to you, anyway?”
“Just - be careful. Don’t hurt him.” Johnson gives him a sharp look before picking up his tray and walking out. Jonathan shakes his head in confusion - why would he want to hurt Sidney? - before picking up his own tray and leaving.
That evening at dinner, Jonathan happens to glance over at Team USA’s table where Kaner is laughing at something Johnson just said. Johnson looks up and catches Jonathan watching, and Jonathan knows what his eyes look like and uses it to his full advantage, channeling “Fuck with him and I end you,” at Johnson as hard as he can. Johnson fucking winks at him, which - huh. His comments at lunch make a weird kind of sense now. Then Richie elbows him in the side and chirps him about paying attention, and he tunes back in to the conversation at Team Canada’s table.
5. June 2012
“Hey, Dutchy,” Sidney calls as they finish changing after the day’s training. “You up for going out to dinner tonight?”
“Sure,” Matt replies, towelling his hair briskly to finish drying it. “Is it a special occasion? Do I need to dress up?”
Sidney laughs at him. “Nah. Jack’s in town, wants to hang out. I thought you might like to come along. He’s got some restaurant he wants to go to.”
“Cool,” Matt says, throwing on his shirt. “I’m gonna head out, text me the details.”
“Will do,” Sidney says, fiddling with his phone.
Matt heads back to his place and spends a couple of hours playing video games. He gets a text from Sidney with the name of the restaurant and the time that they’ll be meeting and responds with cool see you there.
When he gets to the restaurant, Sidney and Jack are already seated. As he walks over to the table, he sees Jack lean over and mutter something in Sidney’s ear, and Sidney starts cracking up. Matt grins as he sits down - Sidney’s laugh is hysterical, okay - and notices Jack’s face kind of freeze for a second before he nods in welcome. Sidney’s still cracking up, but he smiles happily at Matt.
“Glad you could make it, Dutchy,” he says, once he manages to stop laughing. “You know Jack, right?”
“We’ve met a couple of times,” Jack says dryly. “How’s it going, Duchene?”
“Not bad, Johnson,” Matt says cheerfully. “Getting lots of good training done with this one.” He gestures at Sidney, who rolls his eyes.
“Please call each other Jack and Matt,” he says, half-jokingly but in the way that means he really means it. “Otherwise this whole dinner will be really weird for me.”
“Sure thing, Sid,” Jack says cheerfully. “So tell me all about what you guys have been up to.”
They swap training stories until the waitress comes by to take their orders, and then the conversation switches to things to do in Los Angeles. Jack has a lot of good suggestions, which makes sense because he’d lived here for almost six years.
“So how’s Columbus?” Matt asks, curious. Sidney kind of rolls his eyes but Jack lights up.
“It’s great,” he says, and starts telling them all about how great his new teammates are and how he’s looking forward to being part of the Jacket’s revival. Sidney chirps him a little about how the Jackets were never really good enough to be able to use the term revival and Jack punches him lightly in the arm.
“Ow,” Sidney complains. Jack just grins at him.
“Suck it up, you big baby,” he says. Sidney mock-pouts at him before sliding to the edge of the booth.
“I’m going to go wash my hands before the food gets here,” he says, stretching a little as he gets to his feet. Matt and Jack both grin at him.
“Thanks for letting us know,” Matt says, and Jack chimes in with,
“Yeah, Sid, keep us informed.”
“I hate you both, why am I friends with you,” Sidney mutters as he turns to leave. Matt aims a smirk at his retreating back, but when he turns back he finds Jack watching him with a serious expression.
“What’s up, man?” he asks, and Jack shakes his head.
“He likes you a lot,” he says, before taking a sip of his water. Matt smiles kind of stupidly, but whatever, he’s been looking up to Sidney for a really long time now and it’s nice to know that they really are friends now, he wasn’t just making it up. “Don’t break his heart,” Jack adds, and Matt shakes his head a little bit, because did he really just hear that?
“What?” he asks, a little disbelievingly. Jack narrows his eyes at him.
“You heard me,” he says. “Don’t break his heart, or you’ll regret it.”
“I think maybe we’re having a misunderstanding here,” Matt starts to say, except then Sidney comes back from the bathroom and Jack changes the subject and keeps it that way all through dinner.
+1. March 2014
After the outdoor game against the Blackhawks, the team goes out to a bar. Sidney invites Jack along because, he says, laughing, Geno and Flower had insisted. Jack goes along with it cheerfully enough, because he’s been hearing stories about all of the Penguins from Sidney for years and has met most of them in passing at least, but he’s never had a chance to really hang out with any of them.
The team’s mood is oddly cheerful, considering that they’d lost, but Jack isn’t going to complain about it. They’re a few rounds in when Sidney gets up and goes to the bathroom. After he leaves, Jack looks up from his drink to find that he is suddenly the center of everyone’s attention. “What,” he asks, warily.
“So, you and Sid,” Flower says, casually. Jack looks at him.
“Me and Sid what?”
“You and Sid finally together,” Geno contributes helpfully. Jack is suddenly very thankful that he’d put down his drink before this started, because if he’d had anything in his mouth he’d have spat it out across the table.
“What? No! What makes you say that?” They all give him identical pitying looks.
“Okay, so you drove up to watch the outdoor hockey game in Chicago, even though you have a game tomorrow,” Dupuis sounds very skeptical, “because you guys are just friends. You can stop lying to us at any point now.”
“Sid talks about you more than anyone else except his sister,” Kunitz says flatly from his seat across the table, when Jack fails to come up with anything coherent to say. “He goes to visit you when we have free days. You come to visit him. He watches all of your games.”
“What we’re saying,” Letang says, leaning across Flower to make his point, “is that if you aren’t dating Sid - why? And also, if you break his heart, you will never be safe on the ice again.”
The entire table nods, emphatically. Jack sits back in his chair, stunned. He hadn’t realized - except he had, hadn’t he? All those times he had this exact same talk with someone who was taking up more of Sidney’s time than he thought they should, and he hadn’t realized that he was jealous.
Sidney, with his usual exquisite timing, comes back from the bathroom then. “What’d I miss?” he says, frowning at Jack. “You look a little weird, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” he says, sounding a little off even to his own ears. “Listen, though I think I’d better get going - it’s a long drive back to Columbus.”
“Oh,” Sidney says, sounding a little - hurt? “I guess, yeah, you have a game tomorrow, don’t you? You probably should get going.”
Jack takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I should. Hey, c’mon, you want to walk me to my car? Say a proper goodbye?”
“Okay,” Sidney says, stepping back from the table to let Jack get up. “I guess. I’ll be right back,” he tells the rest of the guys, who wave him off with varying degrees of fondness for Sidney’s weird.
“So, goodbye,” Sidney says, when the two of them have made it outside. Jack grimaces at the cold - they don’t call it the Windy City for nothing, the wind is blowing right into his face. Still, he’d rather do this away from the prying eyes of Sidney’s teammates.
“Sid,” he says, then stops, cold, because what if the guys were wrong? What if he’s about to ruin everything? But Sidney tips his head up and says, “Yes?” and Jack just can’t not do it, because he’s apparently been in love with his best friend without even realizing it for years, and that makes him the most ridiculous of those movie cliches that he and Sidney like to mock. So he takes a deep breath and presses forward.
“So it’s been brought to my attention that we’ve been acting like we’re dating,” he says, and winces, because that was absolutely the wrong thing to say. Sidney’s face twitches, and Jack rushes onward before he can say anything, “And I was just realizing that I would really like it if we were. Dating, I mean. So we could. Date, that is. If that’s alright with you?” He looks at Sidney hopefully. Sidney is wearing a weird expression.
“Jack,” he says, and that doesn’t sound good, so Jack takes a preemptive step backwards, but he goes on to say, “I thought that we were dating. I mean. Didn’t you?”
“Since when?” Jack demands, then says, “No, stop, wait, that is a conversation for another time, when there is heat and not wind blowing ice down my coat. So what I got from that is that yes, we that is alright with you. Excellent. Would it also be alright with you if I kissed you now?”
“That might also be better if we waited until there was heating,” Sidney points out dryly, but reaches out to grab Jack’s hand when he goes to step back. “That wasn’t a no, stupid, just a comment on your timing. You should work on that,” he says, even as he leans up and pulls Jack down into a kiss.
Author:accidentallymel
Summary: 5 times Jack told someone not to break Sid's heart +1 time someone told him
1. February 2003
“So I hear you’ve been spending a lot of time with Sid recently.”
Jessica slowly puts her book down and blinks up at him. “What are you, the Sid police?” she asks. Jack crosses his arms over his chest and scowls at her.
“I’m his best friend,” he says. She rolls her eyes at him and picks up her book again.
“Relax, Johnson. We’ve been working on a project for English.”
“You’ve been nice to him,” Jack says abruptly. She puts the book down again and looks at him curiously.
“Yeah, he’s a good guy - why wouldn’t I be nice to him?”
Jack’s scowl deepens. “He’s not used to people being nice to him. Look, just - don’t hurt him, okay?”
“Or you’ll beat me up?” she says, amused now. Jack shakes his head.
“I don’t hit girls,” he says. “But I will find a way to make you sorry if you hurt him.” He turns and walks out of the library, passing Sidney on his way in. Sidney sits down across from Jessica and begins pulling his English supplies out of his backpack, smiling at her. She smiles back at him, and wonders why his best friend says that he isn’t used to people being nice to him. Who wouldn’t be nice to Sidney?
2. February 2008
The team is out, celebrating a win against the Kings at home, when Colby knocks into someone on his way back from the bathroom.
“Sorry, man,” he says, turning around to see if he’s done any damage. He’s a little surprised to see that it’s one of the King’s defensemen, but smiles in welcome anyway. “Hey, Johnson. You looking for Sid?”
Johnson shakes his head. “Looking for you, actually. You got a minute?”
Colby shrugs. “Sure. What’s up?”
Johnson looks a little awkward, but determined. “Sid talks about you a lot,” he says, then stops. Colby is confused but willing to go with it.
“He talks about you a lot too,” Colby offers. “Says you’re his best friend.”
“Yeah,” Johnson says, taking a deep breath. “So this is me, as his best friend, warning you. Don’t hurt him.”
“Don’t. . . hurt him?” Colby says, confused. “Okay, I’ll try, but sometimes accidents happen at practice, you know - it’s not like anyone wants to injure one of our best players-”
“I’m not talking about that,” Johnson interrupts, impatient. Colby is still lost.
“Okay, then, what are you talking about?” Johnson gives him a look, then, and Colby feels like a lightbulb has just gone off over his head. “No, okay, look, it’s not like that-”
“I don’t care what it is or isn’t like,” Johnson says. “Don’t hurt him, or you’ll regret it. Understand?”
Colby would kind of like to argue that it really isn’t like that, but Johnson has a mulish look on his face that says he wouldn’t get very far. So he holds up his hands and nods. “Got it. Don’t hurt Sid. I’ll do my best.”
“Good,” Johnson says, before craning his neck to see over Colby’s shoulder. “Is Sid here?”
“Nah, he headed out around 10 minutes ago,” Colby says, waving at the door. “He doesn’t really care for these places.”
Johnson gives him an unimpressed stare - right, he probably knew that already - and nods at Colby. “See you around, Armstrong.”
“See you,” Colby calls after him, bemused, as Johnson heads for the door. When he gets back to the table, Flower looks over at him curiously.
“What took you so long, man? Did you fall in?”
“Fuck you, Flower,” Colby responds, and it devolves from there into a round of chirping about everyone’s bathroom habits, and Colby puts the odd conversation out of his mind.
3. December 2009
Max can’t think of any particular reason why Jack Johnson would be calling him, but he’s bored so he picks up the phone. “Hello?”
“Hey,Talbot. This is Jack Johnson.”
“I know, I do have caller ID. How did you get my number?”
“Asked Sid. How do you have my number for caller ID?”
“Got it from Sid. So, did you call for a reason?”
Johnson clears his throat. “Heard he’s taking you home to meet the family.”
Max blinks a little at that, startled, then starts laughing. “He told you about the commercial? Man, that thing’s going to be gold.”
Johnson doesn’t sound all that amused. “He wouldn’t have agreed to it if he didn’t want to do it, Talbot. Don’t be a dick.”
Max sputters out a laugh. “I’m sorry, have we met?”
Johnson sounds a little more amused at that, but his voice is still hard. “Not off the ice, not really. But that could change.” His tone changes at that, becomes threatening. Max rolls his eyes.
“Don’t worry, Johnson, your boy’s virtue will be intact,” he says, affecting a bored tone. Johnson sputters a bit at that.
“Too much information, Talbot,” Johnson says firmly. “Just don’t hurt him.”
“Yes, yes,” Max says testily. “Did you have anything useful to say or did you just call me to threaten me about Sid?”
“Nope, nothing else to say to you,” Johnson says before hanging up. Max is already planning how best to chirp Sidney about his taste in friends.
4. February 2010
Jonathan’s looking for an empty seat in the cafeteria when he hears someone calling his name. He looks up, expecting to see some of his teammates, but instead it’s someone wearing a Team USA tracksuit. He instinctively starts to head over before his brain catches up to his eyes and he realizes that the guy waving him over is not Kaner. It’s too late, of course - he’s already started over there and no matter how much he doesn’t want to deal with any of Kaner’s asshole teammates he can’t be rude.
“Johnson,” he says, nodding a little in acknowledgement as he sets his tray down. He’ll just have to eat as fast as he can to get out of there as soon as possible.
“Toews,” Johnson acknowledges him. “Good game last night.”
“. . . .Thanks,” Jonathan says, after swallowing the massive bite he’d just taken of his sandwich. There is a slight awkward silence at the table, as both of them eat their lunches and avoid each other’s eyes. Jonathan is almost finished with his food when Johnson speaks up again.
“You’ve been spending a lot of time with Sid,” he says, neutrally. Jonathan shoots him a look, but Johnson is concentrating on his food.
“Uh, yeah,” Jonathan says, not even trying not to sound judgemental. “He’s my teammate. He’s my roommate. He’s one of the best players in the world and I get the chance to pick his brains for two weeks. Why wouldn’t I spend time with him? What’s it to you, anyway?”
“Just - be careful. Don’t hurt him.” Johnson gives him a sharp look before picking up his tray and walking out. Jonathan shakes his head in confusion - why would he want to hurt Sidney? - before picking up his own tray and leaving.
That evening at dinner, Jonathan happens to glance over at Team USA’s table where Kaner is laughing at something Johnson just said. Johnson looks up and catches Jonathan watching, and Jonathan knows what his eyes look like and uses it to his full advantage, channeling “Fuck with him and I end you,” at Johnson as hard as he can. Johnson fucking winks at him, which - huh. His comments at lunch make a weird kind of sense now. Then Richie elbows him in the side and chirps him about paying attention, and he tunes back in to the conversation at Team Canada’s table.
5. June 2012
“Hey, Dutchy,” Sidney calls as they finish changing after the day’s training. “You up for going out to dinner tonight?”
“Sure,” Matt replies, towelling his hair briskly to finish drying it. “Is it a special occasion? Do I need to dress up?”
Sidney laughs at him. “Nah. Jack’s in town, wants to hang out. I thought you might like to come along. He’s got some restaurant he wants to go to.”
“Cool,” Matt says, throwing on his shirt. “I’m gonna head out, text me the details.”
“Will do,” Sidney says, fiddling with his phone.
Matt heads back to his place and spends a couple of hours playing video games. He gets a text from Sidney with the name of the restaurant and the time that they’ll be meeting and responds with cool see you there.
When he gets to the restaurant, Sidney and Jack are already seated. As he walks over to the table, he sees Jack lean over and mutter something in Sidney’s ear, and Sidney starts cracking up. Matt grins as he sits down - Sidney’s laugh is hysterical, okay - and notices Jack’s face kind of freeze for a second before he nods in welcome. Sidney’s still cracking up, but he smiles happily at Matt.
“Glad you could make it, Dutchy,” he says, once he manages to stop laughing. “You know Jack, right?”
“We’ve met a couple of times,” Jack says dryly. “How’s it going, Duchene?”
“Not bad, Johnson,” Matt says cheerfully. “Getting lots of good training done with this one.” He gestures at Sidney, who rolls his eyes.
“Please call each other Jack and Matt,” he says, half-jokingly but in the way that means he really means it. “Otherwise this whole dinner will be really weird for me.”
“Sure thing, Sid,” Jack says cheerfully. “So tell me all about what you guys have been up to.”
They swap training stories until the waitress comes by to take their orders, and then the conversation switches to things to do in Los Angeles. Jack has a lot of good suggestions, which makes sense because he’d lived here for almost six years.
“So how’s Columbus?” Matt asks, curious. Sidney kind of rolls his eyes but Jack lights up.
“It’s great,” he says, and starts telling them all about how great his new teammates are and how he’s looking forward to being part of the Jacket’s revival. Sidney chirps him a little about how the Jackets were never really good enough to be able to use the term revival and Jack punches him lightly in the arm.
“Ow,” Sidney complains. Jack just grins at him.
“Suck it up, you big baby,” he says. Sidney mock-pouts at him before sliding to the edge of the booth.
“I’m going to go wash my hands before the food gets here,” he says, stretching a little as he gets to his feet. Matt and Jack both grin at him.
“Thanks for letting us know,” Matt says, and Jack chimes in with,
“Yeah, Sid, keep us informed.”
“I hate you both, why am I friends with you,” Sidney mutters as he turns to leave. Matt aims a smirk at his retreating back, but when he turns back he finds Jack watching him with a serious expression.
“What’s up, man?” he asks, and Jack shakes his head.
“He likes you a lot,” he says, before taking a sip of his water. Matt smiles kind of stupidly, but whatever, he’s been looking up to Sidney for a really long time now and it’s nice to know that they really are friends now, he wasn’t just making it up. “Don’t break his heart,” Jack adds, and Matt shakes his head a little bit, because did he really just hear that?
“What?” he asks, a little disbelievingly. Jack narrows his eyes at him.
“You heard me,” he says. “Don’t break his heart, or you’ll regret it.”
“I think maybe we’re having a misunderstanding here,” Matt starts to say, except then Sidney comes back from the bathroom and Jack changes the subject and keeps it that way all through dinner.
+1. March 2014
After the outdoor game against the Blackhawks, the team goes out to a bar. Sidney invites Jack along because, he says, laughing, Geno and Flower had insisted. Jack goes along with it cheerfully enough, because he’s been hearing stories about all of the Penguins from Sidney for years and has met most of them in passing at least, but he’s never had a chance to really hang out with any of them.
The team’s mood is oddly cheerful, considering that they’d lost, but Jack isn’t going to complain about it. They’re a few rounds in when Sidney gets up and goes to the bathroom. After he leaves, Jack looks up from his drink to find that he is suddenly the center of everyone’s attention. “What,” he asks, warily.
“So, you and Sid,” Flower says, casually. Jack looks at him.
“Me and Sid what?”
“You and Sid finally together,” Geno contributes helpfully. Jack is suddenly very thankful that he’d put down his drink before this started, because if he’d had anything in his mouth he’d have spat it out across the table.
“What? No! What makes you say that?” They all give him identical pitying looks.
“Okay, so you drove up to watch the outdoor hockey game in Chicago, even though you have a game tomorrow,” Dupuis sounds very skeptical, “because you guys are just friends. You can stop lying to us at any point now.”
“Sid talks about you more than anyone else except his sister,” Kunitz says flatly from his seat across the table, when Jack fails to come up with anything coherent to say. “He goes to visit you when we have free days. You come to visit him. He watches all of your games.”
“What we’re saying,” Letang says, leaning across Flower to make his point, “is that if you aren’t dating Sid - why? And also, if you break his heart, you will never be safe on the ice again.”
The entire table nods, emphatically. Jack sits back in his chair, stunned. He hadn’t realized - except he had, hadn’t he? All those times he had this exact same talk with someone who was taking up more of Sidney’s time than he thought they should, and he hadn’t realized that he was jealous.
Sidney, with his usual exquisite timing, comes back from the bathroom then. “What’d I miss?” he says, frowning at Jack. “You look a little weird, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” he says, sounding a little off even to his own ears. “Listen, though I think I’d better get going - it’s a long drive back to Columbus.”
“Oh,” Sidney says, sounding a little - hurt? “I guess, yeah, you have a game tomorrow, don’t you? You probably should get going.”
Jack takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I should. Hey, c’mon, you want to walk me to my car? Say a proper goodbye?”
“Okay,” Sidney says, stepping back from the table to let Jack get up. “I guess. I’ll be right back,” he tells the rest of the guys, who wave him off with varying degrees of fondness for Sidney’s weird.
“So, goodbye,” Sidney says, when the two of them have made it outside. Jack grimaces at the cold - they don’t call it the Windy City for nothing, the wind is blowing right into his face. Still, he’d rather do this away from the prying eyes of Sidney’s teammates.
“Sid,” he says, then stops, cold, because what if the guys were wrong? What if he’s about to ruin everything? But Sidney tips his head up and says, “Yes?” and Jack just can’t not do it, because he’s apparently been in love with his best friend without even realizing it for years, and that makes him the most ridiculous of those movie cliches that he and Sidney like to mock. So he takes a deep breath and presses forward.
“So it’s been brought to my attention that we’ve been acting like we’re dating,” he says, and winces, because that was absolutely the wrong thing to say. Sidney’s face twitches, and Jack rushes onward before he can say anything, “And I was just realizing that I would really like it if we were. Dating, I mean. So we could. Date, that is. If that’s alright with you?” He looks at Sidney hopefully. Sidney is wearing a weird expression.
“Jack,” he says, and that doesn’t sound good, so Jack takes a preemptive step backwards, but he goes on to say, “I thought that we were dating. I mean. Didn’t you?”
“Since when?” Jack demands, then says, “No, stop, wait, that is a conversation for another time, when there is heat and not wind blowing ice down my coat. So what I got from that is that yes, we that is alright with you. Excellent. Would it also be alright with you if I kissed you now?”
“That might also be better if we waited until there was heating,” Sidney points out dryly, but reaches out to grab Jack’s hand when he goes to step back. “That wasn’t a no, stupid, just a comment on your timing. You should work on that,” he says, even as he leans up and pulls Jack down into a kiss.