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1
Jack flies to Las Vegas tomorrow, so Bitty decides to be a little extra for dinner because god knows his boyfriend deprives himself of A LOT of things, including his diet. He slabs an extra layer of butter on the chicken and refrains from lessening the amount of sugar in the pies.
Bitty fills him in on the usual SMH drama, like how insufferable their teammates were, especially on how messy they were being in the locker room, with Jack offering a few nods and smiles.
Jack is a man of a few words, not very expressive of his feelings, but that’s okay because Bitty can pretty much fill the silence. If anything, Bitty prides himself on unburdening Jack from small things. Besides, Bitty can do this forever– talk about Beyonce, new pie recipes, Samwell rumors, or basically any topic under the sun, while he stares at his perfect boyfriend and his equally perfect face.
Everything was rainbows and butterflies… not until Jack came back from Las Vegas.
—
When Jack returns three days later, something feels different.
Bitty had been counting down the hours until he could pick Jack up from the airport, had even submitted a letter of absence due to medical reasons to the school, and had even packed his favorite apple pie that morning. Bitty noticed it though, the moment Jack walks through arrivals with his hockey bag slung over his shoulder. Jack’s smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, the extra stiffness in his demeanor. Even until now as they’re both waiting for Shitty and the gang. Jack’s usually not talkative after away games, a given, since Bitty can imagine the exhaustion of playing hockey, plus the back-and-forth roadies and flights. He knows how exhausting it can be, because he is a hockey player too, isn’t he?
He glances every now and then at Jack who seems to be spacing out and feels more than exhausted… a feel of uneasiness perhaps?
Beeeeep
Both of them snap back to alertness, and they both look at each other as a sound from Shitty’s car horns loudly outside. They take their first few steps outside the porch, Bitty laces his arm around one of Jack’s, when he realizes that Jack’s not wearing a coat.
“Honey, where’s your coat?”
“Oh, uh.” Jack tries to break free from Bitty’s grasp, Bitty turns back first.
“It’s OK, honey, I’ll get it for you!”
Bitty disentangles himself from Jack. Once inside, he grabs Jack’s hanged coat from the rack when he touches something hard inside the pocket.
“A… casino chip?” Bitty thinks incredulously.
He then realizes THIS was the coat Jack wore on his way home from Vegas. “Did Jack go out the night after their Aces game?” he thinks.
He hands Jack his coat, and then asks nonchalantly. “Jack, honey, I thought you didn’t go out during your Vegas game?”
Jack looks at him confused, and before he says anything else, Bitty opens his palm and places the little green and white disc in his.
Jack’s face is blank, but he pockets the chip swiftly.
“Yeah, Bits. Tater gave it to me. I think he and a bunch of the guys went out.”
“Hmmmm… Wasn’t Tater feeling unwell that night? You told me you were both going to have an early night?”
Jack shrugs “Well, he was fine enough to go out when the guys asked him to.”
He was about to say that he never saw Tater in any of the group photos on IG, but his thoughts were interrupted with the ensemble of their friends’ exclaims
“BITTY! JACK!” their friends collectively jeer and wave as they peer out their heads outside Shitty’s vehicle window. Shitty’s face is bright at Jack, enthusiastically patting the side of his seat to signal Jack.
Bitty sits beside Holster who seems to be talking to Ransom about a newly opened cafe downtown Providence, while they talk over Lardo who was in between them. Honestly, they could have just sat next to each other, Bitty thinks fondly, and he could have admired his friends a bit longer if he hadn’t caught Jack’s blank face ahead, eyes fixed ahead of the road. He seemed to be in a headspace of his own while Shitty bombards him with his law school antics.
“Inside my head, I was thinking, ‘the least you could have done is gotten us free coffee y’know? But enough about my riff-raff, let’s get to the good stuff! How’s the league treating you Jack? You doing ok?”
Bitty glances more curiously at Jack
“Uhh… Jack? Hellooooooo?”
It takes Shitty waving at Jack’s face and Bitty shaking him to get him to realize that Shitty was talking to him.
2
Bitty is taking out his pie to sit on the counter when he hears a familiar voice on the screen. The oozingly confident voice eerily bouncing off the walls of the Haus. Bitty feels a shiver down his spine and then immediately feels annoyed knowing exactly who it is. He comes out of the kitchen and into the living room to see the man in a black hoodie, blond hair pushed back because of sweat.
“Parson, we all watched that 3-4 game in Vegas, which saw you reuniting with your old teammate from Rimouski, Jack Zimmerman. Were you able to find time to catch up?”
At that, even through the pixels, Bitty detects a slight shock from Kent before answering.
“I, uhh, we did exchange a few words to each other, though as you know, it was our beloved A’s birthday and my rookies weren’t waiting for another minute to get out.”
Kent on the TV seemed to regain his composure and was able to flash a grin back to the camera again.
Huh, Jack never mentioned that, Bittle thinks. More annoyed at seeing Kent’s vain smile, he turns off the TV just before Kent’s smile burns at the back of his head permanently. He swiftly goes back to the kitchen with a slightly heavier stomp to his feet to check on his pies, but already has his phone pulled out from his pocket.
On auto-pilot, he removes his mittens and opens Twitter, and then navigates through the first recommended word in his search bar, ‘kent parson’. He knows this isn’t healthy at all, but there is an odd satisfaction to scratching a raw itch .
He clicks and sorts posts to most recent tweets to filter out the ones he’s already seen. He winces at the clips and gifs from the interview, his hands becoming more tense, his eyes getting a little more strained with every scroll — Kent grinning in slow-mo with subtitles, some parts chopped to Kent’s shocked face and momentary fluster. Hundreds of tweets with hashtags of #pimms, #jackparse or #190
“i bet my soul their loved towards each other never faded even after years and probably reconnected that night lol
#Pimms #iwilldieonthispimmshill”
“lol they’re probably in touch and are pretending to be more casual than they actually are”
“bro it’s really delulus making everything gay about hockey. bros were just teammate gtfo”
“these delulus probably don’t know shit about hockey and just here to ship. touch grass”
Bitty closes his phone, hating himself a little bit. There’s no reason to mind Kent because Jack has already chosen Bitty, and yet, Bitty does. Hate Kent. Bitty takes a deep breath and concentrates to flush out all of the things that he brushed through. It doesn’t work 100%, since he still feels a lingering annoyance and uneasiness.
Knowing Kent secondhand from Ransom and Holster for the first time, he was in awe — a player who didn’t fit in the “traditional” hockey player standards with height at “5’10”, he was often met with accusations of being too fragile or weak to be in the league. More so, him being drafted first invited a lot of questions and raised eyebrows, and yet he proved everyone wrong by captaining his team to 3 Stanley Cups, multiple individual awards, and a consistent points leader in the league for years.
Though once he discovered Jack’s previous “affiliation” with Kent, it felt like all these accolades mocked him. They were things Jack wanted too, and Bitty can only offer so much. His Moo Maw always reminded him that love’s like a pie–if it ain’t warm, nobody wants a second helping. He remembers the Parson’s chilly air the first time he saw him up close. Bitty knows there’s no competition there; he’s got the warmth and the pies covered. He takes another sigh and focuses on the thought of his and Jack’s meeting tomorrow instead.
He takes his phone and calls Jack.
Line is busy.
Line is busy.
He calls for the third time and is now starting to scratch his index finger against his apron when Jack finally answers.
“Bits.”
Jack’s voice is stern and somehow a bit… annoyed.
“Jack…honey, how are you?”
“All good. Something wrong?”
“Ohh, uhh… Were you talking to someone, honey? You seemed to be on the phone with someone else before this call.”
“Was just talking to Maman,” Jack says dryly.
“Oh… I see… Did you talk about anything in particular?”
“Nothing more than the ordinary.”
Silence filled the air and when it seemed like Jack was not planning on adding more, Bitty asks.
“Do you and Kent Parson still keep in touch?”
Bitty flusters when he hears these words come out of his mouth. He knows that Kent is, and might always be, a sore topic between him and Jack. The mention of Kent seems to make Jack unhappy, and he always wants to make Jack happy, so never does Bitty ever want to cross a line that would make Jack feel otherwise.
“What?” Jack’s voice is higher, sounding a bit impatient.
“I—uhh. because, well, honey…” But then he thinks back at all the posts, and all the shippy things he’s read, but it all feels too convoluted to say in a few words that would make Jack understand that it’s gotten stuck in Bitty’s throat.
“No, I do not text with Parson anymore.” Jack says a little too sharply.
“—but do you stay in touch with him? Uhm, in any way at all?”
“No, Bittle, I do not.” Jack says straightly
Bitty bites the inside of his cheeks.
“Is this the only reason why you wanted to call? Because I’m pretty preoccupied at the moment.”
Bitty shrinks a bit on himself, because Jack’s probably right. Jack already has a lot on his plate and has not done anything at all to distrust him. If anything, he shouldn’t be paying any mind to that piece of work, Kent Parson. He had all this grand gesture to come to the Epikegster after all and Jack was anything but compelled to Kent’s invites.
“Uhm… I’m so sorry, Honey. I know you’re busy and all…”
Jack sighs heavily from the other end of the line.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry Bits. It’s just. I think we should just cancel for tomorrow.”
“WHY?”
“I’m gonna have to review a lot of tapes. Coaches want to try out new lines for the next game, see what will likely work.”
“I… uhh.. is that so, honey?”
Bitty wishes he could add something more. He swallows a lump in his throat along with disappointment.
“OK, I guess I’ll see you the next time… ”
From the heaviness of where they left off, Bitty slumped against the counter.
It’s Kent’s fault, really. Bitty can feel it. He was probably instigating a mind game with Jack. It’s something Kent likely does for fun. But Jack and Bitty are happy. Jack chose him. Bitty repeats it like a mantra and tries to put aside the blond, hateful man in his head.
3
The Sunday during that week, he did not want to bother Jack, though he did want to keep in touch with him… in some way so he writes
“Hi honey,
I remembered your mom asking me abt the details of the new oven we ordered for your apt. Could you screenshot the details from the online store, honey?)
An hour after, Jack sends him a ‘here you go Bits’ along with 2 photo attachments. He pinches at each of the picture to zoom in, only to see a notification banner at the top of one screenshot.
Parson: Updte me abt the ritual, Zimms :p
Bitty found himself frozen, staring at his phone, as if he’s been hit by a bucket of cold water.
Kent? Kent who? Kent, as in Kent Parson??? Did Jack know anyone named Kent other than THAT Kent?
He didn’t know they were talking??? And right after he asked Jack and reassured him that they were in no way in touch with each other?
Jack is not a liar, he would never lie to him.
He steadies himself and the shake of his hands while he dials Jack again
‘Bittle I told you, I will be busy—’ Jack’s voice hoarse and breathy
‘I didn’t know you were in communication with Kent again?’
‘I really am not, how did you—’
‘it was on the photo you sent over, Jack. what are you two talking abou—’ he feels himself getting frustrated too but he tries his best to contain himself.
“Bittle, I told you, it’s hockey, you wouldn’t understand” Jack says authoritatively, in a voice that does not invite any follow-up questions.
“But… But I play too, Jack—” Bittle says resigned, because he really did not want to have this conversation now. Not now, when he only wanted to talk to Jack, and wanted to see Jack.
“You play college hockey, Bittle, it’s not really the same thing. Don’t need to think too hard about it. Good night” and the line gets cut off, leaving Bitty staring at his phone.
His eyes start to well up with tears, because he might not have been playing professionally, but the frankness of it hurts, but also, all these questions pile up in his head.
When did Jack and Kent start talking again?
What were Jack and Kent talking about?
What was Jack talking to Kent about that he can't talk to Bittle about?
What ‘ritual’???
Bitty feels dizzy thinking about all these and presses his palms against his eyes before closing them.
But maybe Jack was right, he doesn’t know hockey like that, and yet it doesn’t make it less hurtful. Though maybe Jack was already exhausted coming back from a roadie.
Or is it… could it be… if so, could he be that stupid???
Bitty’s fingers frantically searched up in the NHL app and he suddenly feels so, so, so stupid.
He looks up the Falcs’ previous games and realizes Jack’s team is at a 3-game losing streak, and it all made sense to Bitty. How could he be so inconsiderate to his boyfriend?
He feels bad for doubting Jack, and Jack was right, maybe he really doesn’t need to concern himself fully with the reality and all technicalities that come with Jack’s job.
He feels himself relax from his nervous energy from 5 minutes ago, and reminds himself that he definitely needs to sleep now because of an 8 AM exam on Food History which he needs to pass so that he wouldn’t be more of a burden to Jack.
Like a ritual, Bitty stretches out his hand to his table and grabs the mini Jack figure he gifted Bitty last Christmas and smooches the figure with as much affection as he can muster as if it is the real Jack.
He lies down and makes a mental note to call his boyfriend the earliest he can the next day.
—
Falcs loses to the Rangers, 5-2
Bitty slumps back to his computer chair when the horns signal the end of 3rd period and starts to weakly key in his phone to console Jack.
You’ll get them next time, honey! You did great!
Bitty stares at the ‘delivered’, waiting for it to turn to ‘read’. Before it does, he leans in on his desk and feels himself drift off.
Cold wind presses on his face and wakes him. By instinct, he grabs his phone and realizes that he’s been napping for 3 hours.
He goes through his phone and sees a bunch of notifications— mostly from the SMH chat, a whole rollercoaster that recapped the Falcs’ game, enthusiastic until it went down to bargaining and consoling Jack for a comeback.
He passes through more notifications, but none from Jack, so he sends another batch of messages.
Jack?
and then to add more urgency
???!
Bitty worries for the lack of utter response from Jack, and maybe a bit frustrated, though maybe that’s fair for a 4-game losing streak. Even Bitty hasn’t gone on a losing streak that long. So he lets it go.
—
Falcs and Islanders go to shootout after they tied 2-2.
Bitty is about to bite his nails by the time the shootout begins. When Jack buries the puck top shelf, Bitty finds himself jumping up and down because THAT is his man, and HIS man just scored the game-winning goal that broke their 4-game losing streak. He is so proud of Jack.
The first thing he does is text Jack.
“CONGRATS, HONEY!!! YOU’RE THE BEST”
If only Bitty could tweet to the world ‘CONGRATS TO MY MAN’ and allow everyone to admire the wonderful man that his boyfriend was… but he settles for ‘GREAT GOAL FROM ZIMMERMAN! CONGRATS, FALCS! #GoFalcsGo’.
Bitty keeps retweeting NHL recaps of Jack’s goal and is scrolling through posts with the tag ‘Jack Zimmerman’ when he sees a picture of Kent.
‘OMYGOD, KENT PARSON IN NY???’ he sees in one of the posts, so Bitty zooms in on the picture to make sure. And no doubt, it is. Kent, wearing an all-black outfit — a black snapback, a black suit, a black coat, and on top of it all, a sleek pair of shades that goes well with the whole fit. The dark selection of shades allows a beautiful contrast with his blond locks. The shades hide his eyes, but nevertheless, all of his features are obvious who it belongs to.
Bittle would hate to admit it to himself, but Kent looked sharp and dazzling. Bitty isn’t insecure with the way he himself looks, loves the way he can make his lithe body spin and skate on the ice. And while Kent doesn’t have a dancer’s physique like his (which he makes sure Jack appreciates very much), and Kent’s bulked up a lot now, but he’s small and blond, like Bitty. It’s not the first time Bitty has wondered if Jack sees that. He pouts at the thought; he shuts out the implications.
Bitty feels ticked, and paranoia clings to him, and he can’t seem to shake it off.
As much as Bitty liked how Jack won, he did not like the way his heart was going wild inside his chest.
Mechanically, he searches for Kent’s name on Twitter to get the confirmation he needed that Kent WAS at NY… not tonight, but last night, around MSG…
Could he have possibly cornered Jack? Did he want to see Jack playing??? Did he want to talk to Jack? Were they able to meet???
Bitty and Jack aren’t out to the team, but they are out to Tater - which, unfortunately, is an accident, when Bitty mistakenly snuck his love letter in the wrong gym bag when he visited Jack. At an after-practice, Jack witnessed a very excited Tater who seems to have gotten a love letter in his bag, and went from all giddy until he went all silent, and by the end of the letter confused. He hesitantly confronted Jack about it because the end of the letter was stamped in curly, neat handwriting:
“—to the love of my life, Jack-Laurent Zimmerman, I cannot wait to have your last name (but only until we decide which state do we want to marry in)
Hoping to be yours forever,
Eric Bittle”
Encapsulated in the letter is a printed picture of Bittle kissing the miniature Jack figure that he gifted during Christmakkuh.
Bitty contacting Tater is kind of his last resort — mostly because he’s been verbally warned by Jack not to make use of his contact that he so insistently registered in Bittle’s phone one time they (accidentally) met and Tater was able to match that that was the ‘Bittle’ who wrote the love letter for Jack, Jack’s significant other.
Bitty then tucks away all his nervousness of Jack’s possible reaction to him reaching out to Tater
‘Hi Tater! This will probably be sent under an unregistered number, but this is Eric Bittle.’
and then he realizes that Tater might have forgotten who he was, so he immediately sends another text
‘Although you might remember me as Bitty or Bittle, Jack’s friend.’
just to be sure he remembers him, he adds more context
‘We met last time you played your away game against the Bruins’
Bitty was about to lock his screen when he immediately gets a response
‘hi
i rmmbr u bitty
u r jacks bf yes?’
Bitty was a bit taken aback by the very prompt and straightforward response and then he goes forward to fulfill his mission
“Yes, haha!
So… I was meaning to ask a question, if it’s okay?
“yes”
Bitty paves through the lack of clarification
“Did you and Jack go out last night?”
“no”
Bittle feels himself relax when his phone lights up again
“zimmboni went out but not w me”
“oh”
“smthng wrong itty bitty?”
“Oh, no. I only wanted to check on Jack…
You know if he’s dealing ok with the loss streak”
“no worry itty bitty
he wnt home last nyt b4 curfew”
“Thank you, Tater! Are you with Jack now?
Uhm… Could you please not tell Jack I reached out? I wouldn’t want him to know I worry too much.”
and then
“Anyway, I’ve already taken up too much of your time when you should be celebrating with the team. Congrats on the win, and please give my regards to Jack :)”
“tnx bitty. i tell jack when he come back from outside
taking long call from friend he says”
“Bless you heart. Thanks again, Tater!”
Friend? Friend?
Oh. Oh. He feels his stomach churn as if he’s being dropped with one anxiety bomb after another.
4
The upcoming weeks feel like a passing haze of self-negotiation ever since he exchanged texts with Tater. Bitty is constantly arguing with himself: is Jack growing more distant from him or has he always been this way? Has their relationship always been like this?
Jack rejects his ‘eat out’ invitations which Bitty is especially sad about because he’s been meaning to feed Jack this new pastry in the shop that he, Jack and their Samwell crew went to last time.
Jack also isn’t picking up what Bitty is putting down about spending the night over at his apartment in Providence, though when Bitty asks directly to go to a newly opened bakery that just opened downtown Providence, Jack just shrugs and has an excuse on the ready.
The most embarrassed that Bitty felt is when he sent a link of a male red lingerie to give hints about wanting…something. Which Jack pointedly ignores in favor of replying to another thread on the GC inquiring about Chowder’s hips were ok and if he wasn’t injured.
Bitty is supposed to be studying his French but somehow has been reading the same line for the nth time.
He massages the bridge of his nose and leans further down the table. He tries going through it over and over in his head and he can only come up with one conclusion.
Was he being cheated on? Was Jack cheating on him? Was Jack cheating on him WITH KENT?
His stomach churns at the thought because he can’t imagine Jack ever cheating on him, or even capable of doing it for that matter. What would be worse, is if it’s with Kent, as if it’s not cliche enough—still being in love with your ex, finding someone who resembles their ex, only to be reunited with his ex and reignite the fire.
Only that he KNOWS. HE KNOWS FOR SURE that Jack wouldn’t do that to him not unless Kent has had a hand on it, if not the initiator. Kent, from what he’s heard from the Epikegster, was and probably still is desperate for Jack.
Bitty slumps towards the table and heaves out a big sigh.
He goes out of the library with a determined expression to fight his boyfriend’s evil ex-boyfriend.
—
Bitty locks in on this during their next SMH get-together when they all drove together to Jack’s apartment. It’s the first time he will get to see Jack in person again after a month, that time when he came back from Vegas. It’s, oddly the first time he’ll get to be in Jack’s place again after he got back from Vegas, hopefully for not-cheating reasons,
They all play a game of beer pong, of which Jack participated in only because Shitty vouched to take all of Jack’s shots for him. Everyone’s having so much fun but Bitty is there for a mission— to have a look at Jack’s phone to prove that if Jack is indeed cheating on him, Kent’s grimy mitts will have been all over it. Bitty will only need to warn Jack and give him “the talk” because Kent has probably manipulated Jack for so so many years that they were forced together that Jack had had to suffer, and had so little agency against Kent’s words even to this day.
So he waits until Jack and the gang have fallen asleep due to varying levels of sobriety before sneaking in to get ahold of Jack’s phone. He keys in Jack’s number code–Alicia’s birthday and Bad Bob’s reversed jersey number–and opens Kent’s messages.
He scrolls up the lengthy exchange, a lot of which don’t make sense to him. There isn’t anything particularly incriminating. They just read like an extended inside joke, and reading them like this, crouched in the dark with bated breath, trying to find a hidden meaning, a dirty joke he can’t quite catch, feels like being an unwanted bystander.
Kent 10:43pm
you still give tinky winky energy in your interviews btw
yeah because i lead the team on the greens
Kent 10:50pm
yeah keep telling yourself that
did you tingle your antennae yet
are the caps gonna lose on friday
maybe
fiddle your own antennae Lala
Kent 10:53pm
naw i’m the sun baby, baby
i have a lot riding on this
He scrolls further up
Thread started the night after Jack’s game against LVA.
5
“Sweetpea, can we talk?”
Jack startles. This is the first thing that Bitty asks as soon as he opens his eyes. He nods.
“Honey…. I… I just… I want you to be open to me… I know that you and Kent were good friends too even.. even before you two became ‘just physical’, ”
Because Bitty will take what Jack is willing to give him, even if that means seeing Kent. It’s also not as if Jack cheated on him, not that he thinks Jack could ever do that… especially to him…
He reaches out a hand to Jack’s cheek, and very slightly he senses Jack flinch.
He looks into Jack’s eyes and sees bewilderment? Confusion? Being mirrored back to him.
Jack momentarily presses Bitty’s hand with his before releasing it.
Jack looks down to his lap and sighs heavily.
“Okay, Bittle.”
And then, Bitty sighs in relief because for a moment, he thought that Jack might have said something else.
He would muscle out Kent out of their relationship if he has to, because he knows that Jack loves him, and Jack chose him over whatever Kent was offering. He then snugs closer to hug Jack, wrapping his arms around his man, thanking all the pie gods that he has the best boyfriend
—
He doesn’t want to think that he has set himself up for this because suddenly he realized that Jack says Kent’s name more than his, and gets reeled in all of their conversations, if he wasn’t the topic of discussion. In Bitty’s more positive take on things, Jack was more… loose and talkative, but that also meant that Jack’s bringing up his 3-time Stanley Cup winner, 2-time Art Ross winner, GQ front page ex more than he realized in weeks.
One time, Bitty was at Jack’s for the weekend. Bitty was in the middle of telling Jack about his new obsession, Cowboy Carter, a hallmark of modern pop culture as much as Renaissance was, thank you very much. And as usual, Jack doesn’t talk too much, but he is looking at Bitty, every now and then nods, and Bitty is glistening at all of Jack’s attention when Jack’s phone ring on the coffee table
As if by cue, they both look at the lit up screen.
Kenny Incoming Call
Bitty wishes he didn’t immediately look at Jack’s face and clocked the way Jack’s eyes light up and his lips quirk in a tiny smile. Wishes he wasn’t quick enough to notice the change of nickname in Jack’s phone.
Jack looks at him and before he opens his mouth to say something, but Bitty snatches the headstart— he smiles sweetly at Jack, shoos him away with his hands, urging him to take the call.
Because, if anything, he can be the cool boyfriend. He is the cool boyfriend, he assures himself.
Jack smiles back and doesn’t spend another second to linger as he moves swiftly to the living room
Bitty was feeling good about himself and his decision, though the moment that Jack disappears, he was left with feelings of bitterness, curiosity, and a little bit of self-loathing. Instead of going back to the kitchen to prepare his new pecan pie recipe, he can’t help but linger near the living room, though before he’s fully satisfied with the distance, he hears something he’s never heard from Jack when both of them are together, and he winces at the unfamiliarity of it all.
He hears Jack laugh. Cackling, full-stomached and almost out of breath.
—
Another time, Jack asks Bitty for his PB&J recipe.
He was about to say that he can always make Jack wants whenever he wants it, only for Jack to follow up with
“I wanted to recommend it to Parse”
He absolutely wanted to say no, he didn’t want to, but instead, he smiles sweetly at Jack and musters an “Of course, Honey. I’ll send a link over to you.
So Bitty begrudgingly looked up an online PB&J recipe which came from a website he and his Moo Maw mutually hated because it gave inaccurate measurements and sent it over to Jack.
—
In a post-game interview, Jack is once again asked about Kent, which Bitty thought is funny and frustrating at the same time. No matter how many years it has been from when Jack and Kent won the Memer and was together at the Q, somehow, reporters and interviewers always find a way to throw in Kent’s name in a lot of interviews.
"One last thing - Kent Parson mentioned in his post-game last week that you two have a special connection on the ice that never really goes away. Would you agree with that assessment?"
"Parse said that?" Jack's expression softens slightly. "Yeah, I guess some things just stick with you. Though someone should remind him that connection didn't help him much last time we played the Aces and I was mentally chirping his backcheck." His lips quirks in that way when he’s laughing at his own joke and waiting for the rest to catch on, like a private smile of sorts. "Thanks everyone."
It was as if he opened the Pandora’s box because now, Jack and Kent is now closer than ever, back to casually chirping each other on interviews, and well Jack looked so happy doing so, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world, as if they never lost contact, as if they never hurt each other, as if they never talked so harshly against each other in the Epikegster.
6
Bitty rushes to head over at Jack’s on a weekday, leaving Samwell early and decidedly missed 3 subjects that day so he could do this. He can’t go on like this. He’s losing his mind at the way Kent is slowly reeling Jack back under his nose, and Bitty can’t do a single thing about it
The Falcs are on another 4- game losing streak, and Jack isn’t talking to him again, refuses to answer any of his calls. His Moo-Maw told her Bitty one time that he had an instinct “like a woman’s” with the way Bittle will always know when the pastries they make are about to finish baking.
And now he is sure, all his instincts are screaming at him to go check out on Jack.
By 10 AM, he arrived around Jack’s neighborhood where he asked the cab driver to drop him at least a mile away so he could walk to Jack’s apartment without alarming him.
He tiptoes as silently as possible and sees that the living room is empty. He carefully peeks at the kitchen, and everything seems in place. He then proceeds to go upstairs where Jack is most probably in his room, if he isn’t already out. He carefully turns the knob, which, to his surprise, is unlocked. Jack is usually very cautious for his security even in the confines of his own home.
He slowly opens it and sees Jack’s back, standing in front of his bed, and oh. OH. Lord have mercy.
Bitty can’t seem to comprehend the view that he’s faced with.
Jack was… NAKED.
A hockey glove on 1 hand…
And held with his gloved hand was his phone… a video, Bitty recognizes, was playing
“Sometimes changing speeds like what he’s doing right now… SCORE! PARSON! Parson leads the Aces to a win in the shootout!”
It was… it was.. it was a video of Kent’s best shootout goals highlights
And if that wasn’t enough, Jack’s hand was shaking which was a motion that Bitty knew too well.
“Jack!” Bitty cries out.
And Jack’s head whips up to Bitty, face white and eyes wide like he’s seen a ghost
“BITTLE WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?!” Bitty witnesses how Jack’s face transitions from shock, anger, and then finally, a look of guilt, like he has been slapped with a spoon and Jack suddenly realized what he looked like at this moment. And it looks like, well. He looks like he is buttering his biscuit.
“I…” Bitty says weakly.
When Jack finally seems to snap back to reality, the first thing he does is pause whatever was playing on his phone and then remove the glove where his phone was and then grab his blanket to which he hurriedly used to drape himself before he’s finally facing Bittle.
Jack takes a deep breath before pinching the bridge of his nose before talking
“I said what are you—”
“This IS just part of your ritual… RIGHT HONEY??” Bitty’s eyes pleading for a response, voice a little high.
“How did you—” Jack starts in horror but then suddenly stops when he sees Bittle walking towards him.
Bitty sits next to him, body pressed closely to Jack. Bitty was quiet, and eventually worked up the courage to say
“Honey… I can… I can help you with that if you want…” Bitty starts to lean over to Jack and attempt to remove the draped blanket from the other side where Jack’s other hand was holding it behind him
Jack, as if by instinct, repelled himself from the attempt, and their sudden abrupt movements caused Jack’s phone to fall off the bed, as well as… the casino chip. And for a moment they were looking at each other. Bitty wanted to stall more time before saying something else, to assure Jack that he would understand only if he’d let Bitty in, that they could stay together as long as they loved each other. So what he does instead is reach out for Jack’s phone only to be met by the rude and frank truth in the form of Kent Parson’s picture with his cat and only wearing gray sweatpants, one which is posted in his Instagram.
Bitty realizes that this, this picture… it’s not a web search picture, it’s a saved one. Apparently only one of the many Kent Parson’s pictures saved on Jack’s phone folders.
Jack grabs his phone swiftly and dread paints his face when he realizes that Bitty has already gone through the folder.
They both sit in silence, both submerged in their own thoughts with all of the revelations that had come in the short period of time.
Finally, after some time, Bitty croaks out a response “Jack, honey… I… I think we can still make this work…”
Jack’s eyes slowly flick over to Bitty’s.
“And… and… maybe, if we just cut off Kent…”
And before Bitty says everything he’s about to say, the look in Jack’s eyes tells him everything that he needs to know. Because Jack’s eyes looked like a mix of hurt, yearning, and… and pity.
And Bitty feels like he’s about to hurl so he stands up, does not look at Jack’s beautiful pitiful face and leaves with all the remaining dignity he has.
7
It’s not that Jack lies.
Jack hadn’t meant to reconnect with Kent Parson, but it had felt so natural to fall back to what they were, and he had felt the happiest after a long time.
It’s an inevitability that Jack’s eyes never left Kent the whole game against LVA, he never was very good at that even back then. Kent was as exhilarating and vibrant to look at, especially on ice, as if no time had passed since the last time he saw him in the Epikegster. He feels the familiar buzz and beating against his ribs that he always made Jack feel, and he’s a bit too anxious to poke at it more if he ever gets another solo moment with Kent. He buries these feelings along with the sting of his 3-game losing streak AND against Kent.
And so, meeting Kent accidentally outside the casino felt like fate laughing at his face when he had only meant to pick up Poots. They met each other’s eyes as soon as Kent was exiting the establishment and Jack was waiting outside, and it seemed like he was also doing the same.
Jack sees Kent tense and seems to hesitate, before finally deciding to come over to Jack’s side
“Hey, Zimms”
Kent says in a fond tone that it just felt so natural to return back the fondness
“Hey, Kenny”
And they both pull up a small, curt smile.
“You, uhh, had a good game back there, Zimms”
“Heh, we lost, though, so obviously it wasn’t good enough. Not good enough to break our losing streak”
“You weren’t the only one playing in your team, you know? And a lot of your SOGs were just very unlucky.”
“Unlucky? Or just not skilled enough?” He thinks in an attempt at self-sabotage
And as if Kent had read his mind, and the silence, he says
“Zimms, did you remember how we broke our losing streak back in the Q?”
He flashes a mischievous grin at Jack. Jack takes a moment to remember, and then he flushes because it WAS outrageous, even by hockey players’ standards.
“Don’t be silly, Kenny”
“How about this, you owe me one if the ritual works, Zimms” he says in his confident, competent tone.
Jack snorts, never giving any verbal agreement to Kent, though he knows that both he and Kent can never really turn down a challenge from each other.
Kent starts walking towards him, quickly slipping a hand in Jack’s coat. Jack is electrified by the touch even beneath layers of clothing.
“Just a little something to remember our bet by.” Kent then looks up at Jack with a smug smile o, and Jack… he fights a powerful urge to get close… and before he allows himself to daydream, Kent already starts walking in the other direction.
He reaches down in his pocket and fishes out a casino chip
“I’ll see you around, Zimms” Kent says when his back is turned from Jack
“-- and…” He stammers, a contrast to Kent’s usual stature.
“I hope you remember not to be too hard on yourself.” This, Jack thinks, is Kent being vulnerable, and it catches him off guard. Their years apart has made him forget that a vulnerable Kent can evoke as many feelings as when he’s angry.
–
When he got back from Vegas, he found himself torn between feeling frustration for their continuous losing streak, and whatever he’s feeling towards Kent. He tries to bury the latter, tries to deny giving any meaning to their interaction that night, because, well, he already has a boyfriend, and he’s already moved on from the person that he was back in the Q.
So he tries to focus on the next game instead. He watches more tapes, takes notes of recent Rangers games.
Bitty, out of nowhere, asks him about Kent, and honestly, any distractions were the least of his concerns. He thinks, though, that that was probably only half true, because losing at hockey and letting his team down was already one thing. Rethinking his feelings towards Kent and what he’d like to do about them was already too much. So he tells Bitty to cancel, because his mind would probably be elsewhere anyway.
–
They lost against the Rangers and are now on a 4-game losing streak. The feeling of loss and incompetence is harder to fight off when he’s all alone in his apartment. He wanted to cave, never leave the room, and just disappear.
The “ritual” Kent mentioned was looking too outrageous when he’s at his wits’ end.
Jack doesn’t believe in rituals as much as other hockey players, but he and Kent in the Q were so desperate to end their losing streak. They tried different things, not letting the hockey sticks touch the ground until you're on the ice, eating PB&J at a certain time, jumping twice before they enter the rink, and none worked.
Until they heard some of their teammates talk about how their rituals involved jerking it the night prior to their games, some more specific, saying they jerk off thinking about a staple celebrity crush.
“That’s so basic” Kent rants to Jack when they were in their shared room
“I don’t think hockey gods find anything favorable with that because how does it differ from their usual activities?”
Jack remembers laughing heartily at the ridiculousness of the discussion, because both of them LOVED hockey, but only Kent was passionate about the non-scientific side of hockey. He wouldn’t usually participate in these discussions but he adored watching Kent nerd out.
“If you were on a mission to ask for a favor from the hockey gods, you must be doing something special!!! like… like wearing your favorite glove on one hand while beating your meat… OH! and you have to fap thinking about your favorite hockey player…. and… and you have to have one thing near you that’s related to that player… OH and you can only do this ritual for near-desperate times like a loss streak minimum of 4”
And so, this is exactly what Jack does. The Falcs’ losing streak ends, and he had to call Kent about it. From there, Jack is reminded that, this, whatever he and Kent had, was so easy. He remembers why the two of them stuck to each other, as if they never needed the others outside their rink because they understood each other in a way that no one else can.
–
At some point, Bitty asks him to be more open to him, even if that meant never tiptoeing to Bitty about subjects including Kent.
And so they go back to texting, calling, and chirping each other. Sometimes, Jack even feels that they’ve never lost contact, that they were still in the Q, and the only blatant reminder was that now, they’re now playing for different teams.
–
The Falcs is in another losing streak, and he is back in the pits again. He didn’t want to be in the situation of a 4-lose streak for obvious reasons, but for the non-obvious reasons, was because the last time he jerked off thinking about Kent, being his favorite player, he also realized that that might just not be it… he was feeling more than just attraction, and admiration.
Their reconnecting made him want more… more time with Kent… more of what they’re doing… more of Kent… all of these realizations were fueling him up, but he’s also careful to balance the glove on his other hand where his phone was playing Kent’s shootout highlights that he didn’t realize the door opening and a voice all too familiar–
“Jack!”
8
It has been 4 months since his unspoken breakup with Jack, and though Jack has had everything to do with the breakup as much as Kent’s, he would be lying to himself if he didn’t think that he mostly attributed it to Kent.
Bitty has been fairly doing well aside from his online stalking tendencies and a bit (a lot) of crying at night. He realized that there can still be good things in life to look forward to despite the fact that he got broken up with the love of his life who has been snatched away by his toxic NHL superstar ex (though he has nothing that could back this up), he was dealing well — SMH was having a good season, he was assured by his thesis advisor that he will be able to graduate on-time, Shitty found him a potential internship.
Jack has been radio silent since the embarrassing incident in his apartment — nothing to him and the groupchat. Now Bitty sits in one of their benches in the Faber passing time, spectating at the rookies and scrolling when he sees a new ‘In the Bag’ Vogue video with Kent at the thumbnail. It was odd having a guy hockey player be featured in one of these videos though with as much gritting of teeth, he has to admit that Kent definitely qualifies to be in one of these.
The video starts of with Kent, in a black turtleneck and black slacks with his sleek silver belt wrapped around it just by his hips, accentuating his toned figure, showing off his black Keepall Bandoulière Louis Vuitton bag, which was a bit smaller than Bitty would have imagine. He goes through the contents of his bag, explaining this and that with his signature smile, and a very practiced, though not shorting of charm laugh — airpods, a pen, chewing gum, sunglasses, a fragrance decant…
And then Bitty’s eyes widen at the familiar sight of a casino chip in the colors of green and white as the camera zooms in on it.
“— and as you know, hockey players are pretty serious about their rituals, but I guess this is more of like a lucky charm that I carry around” he blushes and then smiles, more to himself than the camera as he seems to momentarily fixate at the small round plastic situated between his thumb and index finger as if reminiscing memories around it.
Bitty sat silent as the video ended, he thinks that that’s all the confirmation he needed.
—