Overwhelming - Part 2
Fandom: Hockey RPF
Pairing: Patrick Kane/Jonathan Toews
Rating: mature
Word Count: 8,730
A03 here!
Pat turns around and then Jonny’s hand is on his shoulder, twisting him back around. For a moment he thinks he’s actually going to get punched. Then Jonny’s growling “I could say something nice if you were ever good enough to deserve it.”
Patrick narrows his eyes.
“Fine. Prove it. Every time I play better than you in a game for the next month, you have to compliment me.”
Pat doesn’t get any points in Jonny’s chart the next game either - and he knows somehow that Jonny is still carrying around that original chart on their road trips, can picture him filling in the points by hand after games even though he’d have already done the calculations in his head too.
He’s not as bothered by the loss this time.
Patrick is too wired to hang around with the guys after the game and he’s not sure he can handle Jonny right now, even without Jonny complimenting him again. He heads back home instead, hoping to wear himself out with the shittiest of made-for-tv movies. If that doesn’t do the trick, he’s got all the Twilight audio books on his iPod. He’s listened to them so many times on road trips that he’s got them memorized now and can listen without really paying attention to them. It relaxes him enough to doze off.
He can’t get Jonny’s voice out of his head tonight, though.
He’s sprawled on his back so that he can wear both earbuds comfortably, listening to Edward tell Jacob that they could be friends if Jacob wasn’t trying to steal his reason for existing. It’s a terrible line, and such bullshit anyway. Everyone knows werewolves and vampires can’t be friends. That’s, like, against everything vampire lore stands for. He’d usually be giggling through this scene, but he keeps thinking about what it would sound like if he got Jonny to read Twilight out loud to him.
Probably angry and put-upon.
Jonny definitely wouldn’t do the voices, Pat decides, but if (god forbid) he gets injured this season he’s going to try and guilt trip Jonny into reading him to sleep just to see his face. Sharpy could help him film it for posterity and also give it to the police in case Pat’s mangled body is found in a dumpster afterwards.
Jonny would probably do a good Edward voice by accident, all irritated with the world and trying to assert how solemn and controlled he is. He could totally do the creepy watching through the window too. His eyes get seriously intense when he’s focussed.
Pat feels a frisson of heat shoot up his back at the idea of Jonny just - watching him like that, staring him down like he’s going to take him apart.
He’s got his hand in his boxers before he even realizes what he’s doing. Pat whines, pressing up into the palm of his hand involuntarily for a moment, then drops his hips back down on the bed. With his eyes closed, he tries to let his mind float and focus on the physical sensations, stroking as slowly as he can manage. He can’t seem to stop himself from coming back to the image of Jonny across the room though, watching him.
Pat brushes his other hand up against his neck, thumb running across like he can erase the memory of ‘you’re good’ pressed deep below his skin. He shudders and comes immediately.
He can still feel Jonny’s lips against his neck like a brand.
The voice in his ears is talking about the vampire army and the upcoming battle, but all Patrick can hear is Jonny telling him how good he’s been, how well he’s playing for him.
Pat throws the iPod across the room.
---
He gets more points than Jonny the next day and he’s not sure if he’s even happy about it. They’ve lost to the Flames in overtime, and his playing was nothing to be ashamed of - he’d gotten one of their goals and assisted on the other, giving them an early lead. He just can’t help but feel like he should have done more.
Jonny sits down heavily on the bench next to him.
“Kaner,” he says quietly.
Pat doubts either of them are in a pleasant enough mood to talk about this game, not with media waiting just outside. Jonny’s not insinuating himself into his space in the same way either. This feels less intimate.
They both unlace their skates in silence.
“Hey,” Jonny bumps their shoulders together before Pat can stand back up. “You did well out there. We just couldn’t hold onto the lead. We’ll do better next time.”
It’s not the kind of specific compliment he’s been giving out for their bet, but Patrick feels too raw to care. Jonny looks like he wants to go home and sleep until he can forget about the score. Losing in overtime when you feel like you’ve come so close is always rough.
“Yeah,” Pat manages. “Yeah, okay.”
Jonny knocks their shoulders together once more and says “next time” like he’s making a promise.
Patrick wonders later if Jonny’s forgotten about their bet. He’d assumed that Jonny’s competitive nature would prevent that from happening, but really, what are the chances Jonny is still carrying around that score sheet just because Pat got up in his face once? Even Jonny isn’t petty for that long. He doesn’t get as many points as Jonny out of their next couple games, so there’s no way to know without asking him, and Pat doesn’t want to hear that Jonny’s forgotten when he can’t get it out of his head.
He finally plays better than Jonny, just barely, getting a single assist against the Oilers. It’s not anything special, not something that Jonny would normally compliment him on, so when Jonny boxes him in against the locker room wall after the game he knows the bet’s still on.
“Hey, Jonny.” He’s aiming for casual, but what comes out is a little breathless. Jonny’s eyes dip down to his mouth before he’s pinning him with a look that Pat can’t decipher.
“Patrick.”
“Sorry I couldn’t score for us,” Pat offers. This is weird even for them, and they may be off in the corner but the team’s going to start stareing soon if Jonny keeps looming. They hadn’t played badly tonight; the Oilers had just been unusually strong and they’d only won with a one point lead. He and Shaw’d had some good shot opportunities partway through but hadn’t been able to sink them.
Jonny shakes his head and leans in a little closer, then presses his thumb into the bruise that’s blooming on Pat’s shoulder like he’s testing him. Patrick braces himself back against the wall to keep himself from pushing into it. If his mouth falls open a little, well, nobody else is watching them yet.
“It’s alright,” says Jonny. “You kept at it. You’re always so persistent - it’s one of the things I admire most about you. It’s like you’re still out to prove the world wrong for every time they’ve doubted you.”
He digs his thumb in harder just for a second, like he’s waiting to see if Pat will say something back, before he eases off and goes to clap Saader on the back and congratulate him on his goal.
Pat lets out one slow breath.
He’s shoving his pants down at home as soon as he kicks his apartment door shut, pressing his own hand down on his shoulder with his free hand and coming all over himself in the front hallway like he’s a teenager again.
Pat hopes later, while he’s kneeling on the floor trying to wipe come off of his shoe rack, that being this open and honest is doing as much for Jonny as Jonny’s compliments are doing for him. Then he has to stop and press his dick down when he suddenly pictures Jonny jerking off over him.
“No,” he says firmly to his own junk, feeling like he’s scolding a puppy.
He had promised he’d go over to Jonny’s before he went to sleep to drop off one of his mom’s recipes. She’d cooked for both of them last time she visited, and Jonny’s been on this whole responsible adulthood kick lately where he insists on learning to cook and clean better even though they both have shittons of money and can totally hire people to do that. Pat’s mom thinks it’s sweet. Pat thinks it’s ridiculous, but he’s still gonna make Jonny cook for him in exchange for passing the recipes along. Out of the two of them Jonny’s less likely to set the kitchen on fire.
Pat had hoped since the bar that Jonny might be in this for more than friendly reasons, and he’s even more inclined to think that’s the case after the way Jonny was watching his mouth tonight. He’s gonna ask him about it soon if Jonny doesn’t crack first. He just doesn’t want to be hanging out at Jonny’s with a boner while Jonny talks about their moms.
Jonny catches him by the arm though when he’s dropped off the recipe and is turning around to leave.
“What’s that?”
He’s tugging the loose collar of Pat’s shirt to the side to reveal - oh.
Pat guesses he must have pressed into that bruise harder than he realized; it’s darkened to a nasty shade of purple. Jonny’s staring at it like he knows what Pat’s been up to, eyes dark, and Pat shifts uncomfortably for several long moments.
Jonny finally steps back inside his hallway, letting him go.
“You should ice that tonight.”
Pat pushes down on it, testing to see how tender it is, and Jonny watches, unblinking.
“Yeah,” he says softly, pressing once more, hard enough that he winces. “I guess I should.”
Jonny watches him leave.
--
Pat was planning to bring it up the next time Jonny had to give him another compliment - probably just by leaning forward and kissing him. Maybe. If they were actually off somewhere semi-private the next time and not in the middle of the locker room. And if none of the team was watching them. And if they weren’t on camera when it happened. And -
There may be some flaws in that plan.
What he’s not expecting is how drained he feels when the next time he scores for their bet is during a loss in Nashville that breaks their four game win streak. Patrick’s exhausted, frustrated over giving up seven goals to the Predators, and not in the mood to deal with Jonny at all when he knocks on his door that night.
Pat cracks the door open a couple inches. He’s on Skype with Erica, listening while she fills him in on what the rest of the family’s been up to and their Thanksgiving plans. He’ll be missing it again this year, since it falls in the middle of their six game road trip, but it’s reassuring that they keep him in the loop. Some of the other Americans on the team will probably order food together from room service and cram into one hotel room like last time.
“Oh, it’s you.” When Jonny opens his mouth, Pat just slaps one hand over it. “Not tonight.” He can’t listen to Jonny say something nice about his goal when they lost. All he wants to do tonight is talk to his sister and then go to sleep before he can over analyze every play they made.
Jonny peels his hand off, though, and gives him a considerate look. “Even if it has nothing to do with the game?”
That’s new, and Pat hesitates long enough that Jonny takes it as an okay.
“You look great in those boxers,” Jonny deadpans.
Pat looks down.
He’s stripped down to a t shirt and the joke boxers his sisters gave him last year for the Fourth of July. They’ve got little blue stars on them and a red and white striped waistband. The real beauty, though, is the gigantic eagle on the crotch.
Pat slams the door on him because he doesn’t want Jonny to get a swelled head and start thinking his jokes are actually clever, but he’s too late, because Erica is watching them from his laptop over on the bed and she’s practically cackling.
“So,” she says once she’s stopped laughing enough to, well, breath and talk again. “I wonder what he’d do if you wore Canadian boxers.”
“I’m not putting anything with beavers on it on my junk,” Pat grumbles and realizes too late just how it sounds. He can’t even be mad at Erica when she starts laughing at him again - he walked right into that one.
At least he goes to sleep in a better mood.
Pat gets an assist in the only goal they score against Colorado. Jonny’s the one out of sorts this time, and at first Pat thinks he’s in a poor enough mood that it’s going to be a write-off. He wouldn’t even hold that against Jonny; it was five to one and Jonny’s doing that thing with his eyebrows that says he’s going to spend the night watching every replay and picking apart their mistakes until he’s satisfied that they’ll all Be Better next time.
What he’s not expecting is for Jonny to square his shoulders like he’s preparing for battle and stomp over to him in the middle of the locker room.
The team is staring at them.
“You don’t totally suck and you’re a valuable part of this team,” Jonny grits out.
Pat’s pretty sure he can hear Sharpy laughing.
“Uh, thanks man,” he says carefully, trying for a sympathetic shoulder pat in hopes Jonny will stop looking so miserable. It’s a bullshit compliment, as far as the terms of their bet go, but he doesn’t really want to kick Jonny while he’s already down. Jonny lets out this awful sigh though and pushes his knuckles into the base of his skull where he rubs when he’s getting a stress headache.
“Sorry, no, I mean, I do mean that too, but uh…” Jonny frowns and tries again. “Having you here makes losing less shitty. I’d rather lose with you than win without you on my team.”
Everyone is definitely staring at them.
“Alrighty,” says Pat, rocking forward on his toes to close some of the space between them. “You want to go get dinner, you giant emotional wreck?”
He figures to hell with it, the team’s going to figure it out pretty quickly if they start dating or whatever anyway, they’re past subtlety already, so he wraps an arm over Jonny’s shoulder and guides him out of the locker room.
“I’ll buy cheesecake and let you steal part of it so you don’t feel as badly about breaking your nutrition plan, and then you can complain about how terrible it is that we fucked up in this one game even though we’ve been great all season,” he offers, playing his trump card. Everyone who thinks their captain is hard to deal with when he’s in a bad mood is just not paying attention - Jonny is easy to read. Jonny slumps against him and lets Pat herd him out.
“Yeah, okay.”
[ Part 3]