(fic) all I can say is I was enchanted to meet you
title: all i can say is i was enchanted to meet you
pairing: mike green/brooks laich, mike green/nicklas backstrom, mike green/tom wilson, john carlson/karl alzner
rating: r
notes: based on taylor swift's song, enchanted. ao3.
It’s really the worst kind of déjà vu, when Mike realizes that Nick is pulling away.
Honestly, Mike knows this is his fault, for letting this happen again. He should’ve learned his lesson after Brooks. He shouldn’t have let himself fall for a mostly-straight teammate, shouldn’t have let himself become the fuck buddy when hockey gets to be more important than girls, just to be tossed aside when things calm down and the balance shifts.
It starts with Brooks in Mike’s rookie year, when he’s fresh out of Hershey and looking for any semblance of stability. Brooks is there, teaching and helping and just daring Mike to fall in love with him. It really doesn’t take long, and in mid-January, Mike is offering Brooks a helping hand (or anything else) if Brooks ever needs it.
And then it’s a year later and Brooks meets Amanda, and Mike knows something is wrong the minute that Brooks calls him up and asks him to come over. Brooks sits Mike down on the couch and starts telling Mike how great this arrangement has been, how much it’s helped Brooks out on the ice when it’s been too long, but he’s just met this great girl, and really, it’s time for them both to get serious and start settling down.
Mike just nods along, eyes trained on the floor. Brooks finishes by saying, “You know I love you, Mikey.” The words sting in a way that Brooks couldn’t have realized, because Mike had been very careful to never let Brooks know that it was more than just messing around for Mike. He just swallows back the acid that’s forming in his throat, gives Brooks a fleeting hug, and retreats back to his apartment.
Nick is the first to notice that Mike isn’t hanging around Brooks as much. It’s not all that surprising, as after Brooks, Nick is the teammate that knows Mike the best.
“Come out with me and Stoff tonight,” Nick says after practice.
It’s only two weeks after Brooks dumped Mike, and he’s still feeling sorry for himself, so Mike tries to make an excuse. “Thanks man, but uh, I’ve gotta get some stuff done around the house, so. Maybe next time.”
“Greenie,” Nick clasps Mike’s shoulder. “You can’t mope forever.” Mike sighs in response but ultimately figures that yeah, Nick is right, and alcohol might do him some good.
The club that Nick and Stoff drag him to turns out to be perfect; too loud and energetic for Mike to think about Brooks. Stoff even convinces him to do more shots than Mike is proud of, which isn’t a great decision for his body, but every shot he throws back makes Brooks fade away.
When Mike wakes up that morning and stumbles into the shower, hung over and horny, he doesn’t think about the way that Brooks’ eyes would glaze over when he was turned on. He thinks about Nick’s smile under last night’s flashing club lights.
A few weeks later, Mike walks in on Nick jacking off in their hotel room. Mike knows that he should apologize, turn around, leave, and never bring it up again. Instead, he finds himself coming closer, offering, and grinning when Nick accepts. Afterwards, Nick returns the favor, and then it’s right back to where Mike started with Brooks, but Mike can’t bring himself to worry about how this one will end just yet.
Mike knows exactly what’ll happen, but somehow he’s never been able to stop himself. It’s a vicious cycle of crush, sex, and rejection.
At least Brooks is man enough to tell Mike straight-up when he isn’t interested anymore. Sure, it hurts like hell, but at least there’s finality to it.
Nick isn’t that considerate, and leaves Mike to figure it out for himself. Nick stops hanging out with Mike if Paul and Stoff aren’t with them, starts sitting further away on the couch and shrugging Mike’s arm off his shoulders. It’s worse still that they room together on the road and Mike has to listen to Nick talk on the phone every night in rapid Swedish, his voice smoother and sweeter than usual.
It really hits Mike in a New York hotel room the night before a game against the Rangers. They landed that afternoon, so they’ve had enough time to get restless and bored, but they can’t do anything fun about it like go out and get hammered.
It’s the exact kind of time when Mike and Nick would blow off some steam and mess around, so Mike closes his laptop and says to Nick, “You wanna?”
“Nah, I promised Liza I’d call, actually,” Nick says, gesturing to his phone.
Mike doesn’t know what to say to that; just shrugs and heads into the bathroom to give Nick some privacy. He turns the shower on so he won’t hear through the door, and ends up just getting in and letting the hot water scald his back.
He doesn’t really want to do it, but Mike’s stuck in here for a while and he clearly isn’t getting any tonight, so Mike squirts some soap into his hand and gets it around his dick.
His strokes are rough and fast, closer to pain than pleasure, but it’s a good distraction from what’s happening on the other side of the bathroom wall. It takes a little longer than usual for him to get off, so that by the time Mike comes with a low grunt, Nick has already hung up.
After that, Mike doesn’t try to start anything, and neither does Nick.
The end of the season is both good and bad. Bad because Mike’s just finally come off of his injury, and he’s feeling better than ever, ready to go, and wanting to play and take his mind off Nick. Good because he can withdraw to Canada, only talk to Nick when he has to, lick his wounds and try to get over it.
It shouldn’t be as difficult as it is. Mike tells himself that it meant nothing to Nick, it was just something that friends did for each other, that it’s his own fault for getting attached and letting emotions get tangled up in it. It’s just hard to remember that after sleeping with Nick for the better part of three years.
Mike tries to keep as far away from anything hockey as possible; both because it stings to watch someone else lift the Cup, and because hockey reminds him of Nick. He makes himself watch the draft, though, because anything else would be irresponsible.
The draft is as boring as it ever is, and Mike isn’t really paying attention until GMGM stands up. And then Mike sees the baby-faced kid that they’ve just drafted, all innocence and smile and Swedish accent. He’s a carbon copy of Nick when Mike first met him.
Mike turns the TV off immediately. He sits in silence for a while before sending out a quick tweet, just so that the rest of the universe doesn’t catch on to his own personal hell.
Once that’s done, Mike contemplates jacking off or getting drunk, but neither really appeal to him. Instead, Mike just strips down and falls onto his bed, face first into the pillow, with no intentions of getting up unless he’s chased out by either a bear or a fire.
Mike gets through the rest of the summer mostly by distracting himself. He works out almost constantly, because he truly does feel great, so he might as well give himself and the Caps their best chance. Plus, he’s got plenty of energy left over from sitting on his couch for half of the season, so he figures now is the perfect time to put it to use. The constant exercise and resulting fatigue does its job of both bulking Mike up to the point of needing to buy new shirts, and not allowing Mike to think about Nick.
A hiccup comes at Mike’s golf tournament, when he does an interview with sportsnet and one of the guys asks why Nick isn’t there. Honestly, Mike hadn’t even invited Nick, knowing he wouldn’t come, and not wanting to hear the “no.”
He does his best to laugh the question off, but it isn’t enough, so he just swallows hard and tells the truth.
“He’s got a lovely girlfriend now, he’s in love.” The words hurt coming out of Mike’s mouth, but saying them out loud help, almost. It makes them more real, easier to accept. Nick isn’t Mike’s anymore-never was his to begin with.
But then the guy is asking something else, and then Mike is talking about his new contract. That perks Mike up immediately, because he’s excited for it, and can talk about it without wanting a drink.
It feels like minutes later that September is rolling around and Mike is heading back down to DC. He’s got a few days to kill before training camp starts. Usually he’d call Nick, but hanging out with him seems like the worst thing Mike could do right now. Sure, Mike’s done a pretty good job of pushing Nick out of his mind and getting over it, but he’s only human, and knows he shouldn’t push it.
Instead, Mike calls John, who’d texted Mike a few weeks ago, complaining of boredom. Mike knows there’s something deeper to John’s restlessness, something called Karl getting married. John answers on the first ring, and sounds more enthusiastic than Mike himself has felt in ages.
Mike heads over to John’s place, where they spent a few solid hours shooting the shit and watching football. The conversation doesn’t take a turn towards serious until there’s a sizable mountain of bottles on the coffee table.
“So,” Mike says, after draining the last of his bottle and adding it to the pile, “how was your summer?”
John doesn’t pretend to think that Mike is asking about golf or the Jersey beach trips. He just sighs and hands Mike another beer. “I’ve had better.”
“You wanna talk about it?” Mike asks.
“You wanna talk about yours?” John asks with a sad kind of humor to his voice.
“Point taken,” Mike says and drops the conversation altogether. It’s not John; Mike knows he could tell John anything without fear of chirping, especially given John’s situation. It’s just that Mike doesn’t want to open up the feelings box when he’s just gotten it locked up and hidden in the back of the attic.
Neither of them brings it up again until John is walking Mike to the door, about to head back to his place for the night.
“At least he’s not married,” John says.
Mike doesn’t respond, just nods his head and closes John’s door. It’s a bitter sort of perspective; the exact kind that Mike needs.
Training camp can’t come fast enough, and when the first day arrives, Mike just sort of wanders through the halls of Kettler, taking it in, realizing how much he’s missed it. He’s got the added entertainment of watching the prospects, all looking overwhelmed in the best possible way.
Mike is standing behind the glass, watching a few prospects warming up, when someone walks up to stand next to him. He looks over, expecting to see Oates, but is instead greeted by a really tall guy with impressively spiked hair. The guy just watches Mike staring at him for a minute, before stepping to the side and holding out his hand.
“Hi, I’m Tom Wilson,” he says. Mike keeps staring. “Uhm, the draft pick?”
“Oh, right, yeah,” Mike clears his throat. He reaches out to shake Tom’s hand, and is surprised by how firm Tom’s grip is. The confusion makes sense to Mike, since he’d stopped watching the draft after Forsberg. “Sorry, I clearly wasn’t paying enough attention to the draft.”
“Clearly,” Tom laughs. There’s just enough playful sarcasm to the word to tug somewhere in Mike’s gut.
Mike does the math in his head and decides that okay, six years isn’t that bad, especially when six years looks like this; all muscle and ripple and mystery. And then Tom smiles a brilliant smile that puts the stars to shame, and Mike knows he’s absolutely fucked.
But maybe, this time, in a good way.
~fin
pairing: mike green/brooks laich, mike green/nicklas backstrom, mike green/tom wilson, john carlson/karl alzner
rating: r
notes: based on taylor swift's song, enchanted. ao3.
It’s really the worst kind of déjà vu, when Mike realizes that Nick is pulling away.
Honestly, Mike knows this is his fault, for letting this happen again. He should’ve learned his lesson after Brooks. He shouldn’t have let himself fall for a mostly-straight teammate, shouldn’t have let himself become the fuck buddy when hockey gets to be more important than girls, just to be tossed aside when things calm down and the balance shifts.
It starts with Brooks in Mike’s rookie year, when he’s fresh out of Hershey and looking for any semblance of stability. Brooks is there, teaching and helping and just daring Mike to fall in love with him. It really doesn’t take long, and in mid-January, Mike is offering Brooks a helping hand (or anything else) if Brooks ever needs it.
And then it’s a year later and Brooks meets Amanda, and Mike knows something is wrong the minute that Brooks calls him up and asks him to come over. Brooks sits Mike down on the couch and starts telling Mike how great this arrangement has been, how much it’s helped Brooks out on the ice when it’s been too long, but he’s just met this great girl, and really, it’s time for them both to get serious and start settling down.
Mike just nods along, eyes trained on the floor. Brooks finishes by saying, “You know I love you, Mikey.” The words sting in a way that Brooks couldn’t have realized, because Mike had been very careful to never let Brooks know that it was more than just messing around for Mike. He just swallows back the acid that’s forming in his throat, gives Brooks a fleeting hug, and retreats back to his apartment.
Nick is the first to notice that Mike isn’t hanging around Brooks as much. It’s not all that surprising, as after Brooks, Nick is the teammate that knows Mike the best.
“Come out with me and Stoff tonight,” Nick says after practice.
It’s only two weeks after Brooks dumped Mike, and he’s still feeling sorry for himself, so Mike tries to make an excuse. “Thanks man, but uh, I’ve gotta get some stuff done around the house, so. Maybe next time.”
“Greenie,” Nick clasps Mike’s shoulder. “You can’t mope forever.” Mike sighs in response but ultimately figures that yeah, Nick is right, and alcohol might do him some good.
The club that Nick and Stoff drag him to turns out to be perfect; too loud and energetic for Mike to think about Brooks. Stoff even convinces him to do more shots than Mike is proud of, which isn’t a great decision for his body, but every shot he throws back makes Brooks fade away.
When Mike wakes up that morning and stumbles into the shower, hung over and horny, he doesn’t think about the way that Brooks’ eyes would glaze over when he was turned on. He thinks about Nick’s smile under last night’s flashing club lights.
A few weeks later, Mike walks in on Nick jacking off in their hotel room. Mike knows that he should apologize, turn around, leave, and never bring it up again. Instead, he finds himself coming closer, offering, and grinning when Nick accepts. Afterwards, Nick returns the favor, and then it’s right back to where Mike started with Brooks, but Mike can’t bring himself to worry about how this one will end just yet.
Mike knows exactly what’ll happen, but somehow he’s never been able to stop himself. It’s a vicious cycle of crush, sex, and rejection.
At least Brooks is man enough to tell Mike straight-up when he isn’t interested anymore. Sure, it hurts like hell, but at least there’s finality to it.
Nick isn’t that considerate, and leaves Mike to figure it out for himself. Nick stops hanging out with Mike if Paul and Stoff aren’t with them, starts sitting further away on the couch and shrugging Mike’s arm off his shoulders. It’s worse still that they room together on the road and Mike has to listen to Nick talk on the phone every night in rapid Swedish, his voice smoother and sweeter than usual.
It really hits Mike in a New York hotel room the night before a game against the Rangers. They landed that afternoon, so they’ve had enough time to get restless and bored, but they can’t do anything fun about it like go out and get hammered.
It’s the exact kind of time when Mike and Nick would blow off some steam and mess around, so Mike closes his laptop and says to Nick, “You wanna?”
“Nah, I promised Liza I’d call, actually,” Nick says, gesturing to his phone.
Mike doesn’t know what to say to that; just shrugs and heads into the bathroom to give Nick some privacy. He turns the shower on so he won’t hear through the door, and ends up just getting in and letting the hot water scald his back.
He doesn’t really want to do it, but Mike’s stuck in here for a while and he clearly isn’t getting any tonight, so Mike squirts some soap into his hand and gets it around his dick.
His strokes are rough and fast, closer to pain than pleasure, but it’s a good distraction from what’s happening on the other side of the bathroom wall. It takes a little longer than usual for him to get off, so that by the time Mike comes with a low grunt, Nick has already hung up.
After that, Mike doesn’t try to start anything, and neither does Nick.
The end of the season is both good and bad. Bad because Mike’s just finally come off of his injury, and he’s feeling better than ever, ready to go, and wanting to play and take his mind off Nick. Good because he can withdraw to Canada, only talk to Nick when he has to, lick his wounds and try to get over it.
It shouldn’t be as difficult as it is. Mike tells himself that it meant nothing to Nick, it was just something that friends did for each other, that it’s his own fault for getting attached and letting emotions get tangled up in it. It’s just hard to remember that after sleeping with Nick for the better part of three years.
Mike tries to keep as far away from anything hockey as possible; both because it stings to watch someone else lift the Cup, and because hockey reminds him of Nick. He makes himself watch the draft, though, because anything else would be irresponsible.
The draft is as boring as it ever is, and Mike isn’t really paying attention until GMGM stands up. And then Mike sees the baby-faced kid that they’ve just drafted, all innocence and smile and Swedish accent. He’s a carbon copy of Nick when Mike first met him.
Mike turns the TV off immediately. He sits in silence for a while before sending out a quick tweet, just so that the rest of the universe doesn’t catch on to his own personal hell.
Once that’s done, Mike contemplates jacking off or getting drunk, but neither really appeal to him. Instead, Mike just strips down and falls onto his bed, face first into the pillow, with no intentions of getting up unless he’s chased out by either a bear or a fire.
Mike gets through the rest of the summer mostly by distracting himself. He works out almost constantly, because he truly does feel great, so he might as well give himself and the Caps their best chance. Plus, he’s got plenty of energy left over from sitting on his couch for half of the season, so he figures now is the perfect time to put it to use. The constant exercise and resulting fatigue does its job of both bulking Mike up to the point of needing to buy new shirts, and not allowing Mike to think about Nick.
A hiccup comes at Mike’s golf tournament, when he does an interview with sportsnet and one of the guys asks why Nick isn’t there. Honestly, Mike hadn’t even invited Nick, knowing he wouldn’t come, and not wanting to hear the “no.”
He does his best to laugh the question off, but it isn’t enough, so he just swallows hard and tells the truth.
“He’s got a lovely girlfriend now, he’s in love.” The words hurt coming out of Mike’s mouth, but saying them out loud help, almost. It makes them more real, easier to accept. Nick isn’t Mike’s anymore-never was his to begin with.
But then the guy is asking something else, and then Mike is talking about his new contract. That perks Mike up immediately, because he’s excited for it, and can talk about it without wanting a drink.
It feels like minutes later that September is rolling around and Mike is heading back down to DC. He’s got a few days to kill before training camp starts. Usually he’d call Nick, but hanging out with him seems like the worst thing Mike could do right now. Sure, Mike’s done a pretty good job of pushing Nick out of his mind and getting over it, but he’s only human, and knows he shouldn’t push it.
Instead, Mike calls John, who’d texted Mike a few weeks ago, complaining of boredom. Mike knows there’s something deeper to John’s restlessness, something called Karl getting married. John answers on the first ring, and sounds more enthusiastic than Mike himself has felt in ages.
Mike heads over to John’s place, where they spent a few solid hours shooting the shit and watching football. The conversation doesn’t take a turn towards serious until there’s a sizable mountain of bottles on the coffee table.
“So,” Mike says, after draining the last of his bottle and adding it to the pile, “how was your summer?”
John doesn’t pretend to think that Mike is asking about golf or the Jersey beach trips. He just sighs and hands Mike another beer. “I’ve had better.”
“You wanna talk about it?” Mike asks.
“You wanna talk about yours?” John asks with a sad kind of humor to his voice.
“Point taken,” Mike says and drops the conversation altogether. It’s not John; Mike knows he could tell John anything without fear of chirping, especially given John’s situation. It’s just that Mike doesn’t want to open up the feelings box when he’s just gotten it locked up and hidden in the back of the attic.
Neither of them brings it up again until John is walking Mike to the door, about to head back to his place for the night.
“At least he’s not married,” John says.
Mike doesn’t respond, just nods his head and closes John’s door. It’s a bitter sort of perspective; the exact kind that Mike needs.
Training camp can’t come fast enough, and when the first day arrives, Mike just sort of wanders through the halls of Kettler, taking it in, realizing how much he’s missed it. He’s got the added entertainment of watching the prospects, all looking overwhelmed in the best possible way.
Mike is standing behind the glass, watching a few prospects warming up, when someone walks up to stand next to him. He looks over, expecting to see Oates, but is instead greeted by a really tall guy with impressively spiked hair. The guy just watches Mike staring at him for a minute, before stepping to the side and holding out his hand.
“Hi, I’m Tom Wilson,” he says. Mike keeps staring. “Uhm, the draft pick?”
“Oh, right, yeah,” Mike clears his throat. He reaches out to shake Tom’s hand, and is surprised by how firm Tom’s grip is. The confusion makes sense to Mike, since he’d stopped watching the draft after Forsberg. “Sorry, I clearly wasn’t paying enough attention to the draft.”
“Clearly,” Tom laughs. There’s just enough playful sarcasm to the word to tug somewhere in Mike’s gut.
Mike does the math in his head and decides that okay, six years isn’t that bad, especially when six years looks like this; all muscle and ripple and mystery. And then Tom smiles a brilliant smile that puts the stars to shame, and Mike knows he’s absolutely fucked.
But maybe, this time, in a good way.
~fin