[fic] Gentle Places 3/?
Title: Gentle Places
Author: creepy_crawly
Pairing: as of now, none. Soon to be Kari Lehtonen/Niko Kapanen. Maybe some Kovalchuk in there, too. He's a secksi beast. (Atlanta Thrashers, yo)
Rating: As of now? Hmmm. R for language.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of these men. I really, really wish I did. Because then, you know, I'd own the Thrashers, and it'd be like, 'wooh! Free hockey!'. But no, I don't.
Warnings:Thrashers-centric fic. Abuse. Cursing. Slash. Hockey. An FOC named Olivia and all her family--but she's only here to move the plot along and get the boys together. *smirk*
Summary: In the end, we all need gentle places to rest our tired souls.
To see the earlier part(s), look here.
Kari woke briefly at five-thirty, hearing someone leave the house. Even though the sun was just barely starting to light the sky in a false dawn, and he was well accustomed to being awake and moving at that hour, Kari rolled over, pulled the blankets over his head, and went back to sleep.
He woke up later, the sun warm on his face as it slanted across the blankets. A thick, delicious smell was creeping through the house, and he could hear quiet laughter. Yawning, Kari sat up and stretched out like a cat. A pile of clothes sat, folded, on a chair. Yawning again, he got out of the warm bed and looked at them.
There was a pair of long jeans, tall enough that they mostly fit his long frame. They were a little loose at the hips, but that was okay by him. Quickly, he tugged on the shirt that was also on the chair. It was green, and emblazoned with the familiar logo of the Helsinki Youth Hockey League. Smiling, he ran his finger over the little polar bear above the word, ‘Maailmanmestari’.
“Stands to reason someone like Niko would be a world champion,” he sighed to his toes, sitting down on the bed to look at them. “Ew,” he added, wrinkling his nose.
The top of his foot was a dark, angry red-purple-blue. It seemed to be somewhat swollen, too, and at least two of his toes were jutting the wrong direction. Carefully, Kari tried to bend them. He winced, sucking air in with a hiss. Shaking his head, he decided not to try that again anytime soon.
With a sigh, Kari began to make his way carefully down the hallway. His fingers clutched nervously at the banister as he made his way down the stairs, wincing as he put weight on his foot. Slowly, though, he managed to make his way into the kitchen.
There, he was met by the sight of Niko stretching up to reach something in a high cabinet, a cellphone pinned between ear and shoulder and an exasperated expression painted on his face. At the table, a blonde girl was eating pancakes, swinging her legs as she turned the pages in a book. Next to her, Niko’s friend Andy was reading the newspaper, a pair of glasses perched on the end of his freckled nose.
“Oh, morning, Kari,” Niko said, smiling at him briefly before the phone call distracted him. “Mikä? Toki hän on naljailu.”
“You want pancakes?” the girl asked. “Here, let me get you some.” Nimbly, she hopped out of the chair and wandered over to the oven. Opening it, she grabbed a couple with a spatula, sliding them easily onto a plate. Smiling, she handed it to Kari. “Sit here,” she added, indicating an open seat at the table.
“Thanks,” he murmured, sitting down next to her. “What are you reading?” he asked, looking at the book.
She frowned. “Finnish textbook. Somebody thinks I need to learn to speak more languages,” she grumbled, tossing a meaningful look at Niko’s back. “So I’m learning Finnish so I can find out what he’s saying to his Mommy.”
Kari laughed. “If you want help,” he whispered behind a hand, “I can help you.”
She grinned. “It’s a deal, Mr…who are you?”
Behind him, Kari could hear Niko snorting. He chose to ignore his teammate, smiling at the girl instead. “I’m Kari…Kari Lehtonen. You must be Saskia…you don’t look like a Niklas to me.”
That made her laugh. “Yup. Saskia Messier, at your service,” she said, beaming. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Lehtonen. You play goalie for the Thrashers, right?”
He nodded.
“And what he’s been good and modest and not saying is that he’s very good at it, too,” Niko said, chuckling as he closed his phone and slid it in a pocket. “Better than you, anyway.”
“Yeah, well, I play better offense than you do,” Saskia growled, sticking her tongue out at the taller blonde. “So there.”
“You play goalie?” Kari asked, finishing off the first pancake.
Saskia nodded. “Sometimes. Hopefully all the time. We just started playing with definite roles this year.”
“In the US, PeeWee teams play switch-up a lot longer,” Niko said, sitting down. “Sleep well?”
“Yes, thank you,” Kari said, smiling a little.
Niko smiled back. “Saskia, swap chairs with me, ‘kay, babydoll? And goalie-kins, pop your foot up here. There’s something not right about that.” He sat down in her chair, frowning as Kari flushed and lowered his eyes.
Kari nearly jumped as soft fingers stroked along his hand. He looked up into Niko’s eyes, shocked.
»Come on, Kari. Let me look at your foot? I’m not going to hurt you, I swear. I just want to make sure that you’re okay,« he whispered, Finnish smooth and quiet. His fingers were warm as they swept along the back of Kari’s hand.
Slowly, nervously, the goalie nodded. Carefully, he lifted his foot for the older man to look at.
Niko’s hands were gentle as they moved along his teammate’s ankle, testing for any injury there. Ankle injuries were murderous for hockey players, and goalies in particular. With the continuous, repetitive injuries they collected, goalies were often the first people on a team to be forced into retirement, too injured to carry on in the one place they considered home.
Moving towards the swollen, discolored part of Kari’s foot, Niko winced. As his fingers drew ever closer, Kari closed his eyes and drew a deep, shaky breath. Noticing that, Niko gently grabbed the goalie’s left hand in his own. When Kari opened his eyes to look at him, the center winked. »Squeeze as hard as it hurts,« he whispered. »Be brave. Almost done, yeah?«
Biting his lip, Kari nodded. Niko continued to feel along his foot gently, wincing when he felt things he shouldn’t have.
“Andy?” he asked, not raising his eyes from where they were on Kari’s foot. “Can you bring me the first aid kit-the one I use? I need ice, ace bandage, and splints. And whatever heavy duty painkillers you’ve got on hand.”
“Sure thing,” the redhead said quietly, leaving the kitchen quickly.
“What…what’s wrong?” Kari asked, panicked eyes searching his teammate’s impassive face.
“Nothing too horrible,” Niko said, squeezing the man’s hand. “It’ll heal, no doubt. It just might kinda-sorta-maybe be broken.”
Kari cut loose with a string of Finnish curses that had Niko raising his eyebrows in surprise. In all the time he had known the younger man (admittedly, not all that long), he had never heard language like that leave his lips.
“Here,” Andy said, returning. “You want me to call the ortho? I can probably get you in for an X-ray within the hour-I’m on call today.”
“Not just yet,” Niko said, shaking his head as he dug through the bag. “I’m gonna have Olivia take a look at it. I don’t think it’s quite broken yet-just a fracture, if that.” Gently, he ran his knuckles along the side of the now-quiet Kari’s face. “Come on, smile a little. It could be worse.”
“Oh?” Kari asked acidly.
“Could be your ankles,” Niko reminded him.
“Or you knees,” Andy added. “Or, heaven forbid, your hips.”
“Or your neck!” Niko said brightly. “Could be hella worse.”
Kari glared at him, fighting a grin. “Been there, done most of that.”
“Oh?” Andy asked, helping Niko stretch out the roll of Ace bandage.
“Ankle in fourth year, neck in fifth. Stress fracture to shins-both-in the same year. Seventh year, broke my jaw. Eighth year, broke my neck again, and my hip. Had knee surgery five times already, hip three.”
Niko whistled. “Okay, so, maybe they should just replace you with titanium already. Damn, anything you haven’t broken?”
“To date?” Kari asked, grinning slightly. “Only my nose.”
The other Finn laughed, gently twining the bandage around his foot, over the framework of bracing he had worked on only moments before. Andy’s long, gentle fingers helped him get everything straight, both of them doing their best to distract the goalie.
“There we go,” Andy said, clipping the bandage in place. “All done-well, done enough that I’ll entrust you to the care of someone as generalized as Ollie.”
“Don’t let her hear you calling her generalized,” Kari warned, looking over his bandaged foot. “Thanks.”
“No problem,” Andy said, winking. “I’m a trained ortho, kid, it’s my job to make sports stars ogle my handiwork. Or wait, no…it’s my job to put them back together. It just strokes my ego to see you ogling.”
“Yeah, and you’ve had sports stars stroke and ogle more,” Niko shot at him. He turned to Kari and smiled gently. “I’m gonna call Olivia. You can put weight on that?”
Kari nodded. “Yeah.” Carefully, he stood up.
Niko nodded, pulling his cell phone from his pocket. “Can I drive your Porsche?” he asked, dialing Olivia’s number.
The goalie laughed. “Yeah, sure.”
Niko grinned, listening to his phone ringing. “Hello, Olivia?”
“Niko? Hey, what’s up? Is Kari okay?”
“Well, as far as I can tell, mostly,” Niko answered. “His foot his swollen and severely bruised, though, and I think there may be a broken bone involved. Andy and I got his foot all wrapped up, though. I was wondering if you might be able to look his foot over during practise today.”
“I’m on call this morning. But I need to take my littlest sister to her figure skating lesson this afternoon, and that’s directly after you guys’ practise. I can bully Lindsay into being ready early, though, so I can be there about thirty minutes before your practise is done.”
“Okay, thanks,” Niko said, smiling brightly.
“No problem. Just remind Kari to stay off his damn foot as much as he can until I get a look at it. Remind him that that means sitting on his ass and watching Moose play goal, not putting on skates and warming up, not walking around, none of it.”
Dutifully, Niko repeated her message, a twinkle in his eyes. Kari snorted, sticking his tongue out at the older man.
Niko laughed. “He thanks you for the reminder, and swears he will do as told like a good little boy.”
“I bet,” Olivia snorted. “See you later, Niko.”
“Bye,” he answered, ending the call and slipping his phone into his pocket. He turned to Kari. “You’ll be tagging along with me. I’ll grab the crutches that I know are somewhere in this house-Olivia sounded fairly serious about you staying off your foot, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s to not pick a fight with a doctor. Then we’ll go to practise, she’ll check your foot, and so on and so forth.”
Kari nodded, sitting down in the nearby chair. “Thanks,” he murmured. “For everything you’re doing, I mean. For taking me in and giving me somewhere to stay, for helping me, for everything. I can’t even begin to thank you enough.”
Niko smiled gently. “There’s no need to thank me, Kari. I’m doing what any of your teammates would-what any friend would.” He pushed himself off the wall. “Do you have any painkillers you prefer?”
Kari shook his head. “In my bag, I should have a bottle of Naproxen 250. It’s in a little prescription bottle. That usually works.”
“Are you allowed to take that for things like this?” Niko asked curiously. “If it’s prescription?”
The goalie nodded. “It’s prescription as needed for pain of any sort. Being a goalie has been known to be dangerous to one’s health, you know.”
The other Finn laughed. “Alright, I’ll grab that. I’ll be right back, okay?” He sauntered away, heading up the stairs.
When he came back, he carried the small pill bottle in one hand and a pair of crutches in the other, held over his shoulders. He dropped the bottle on the table in front of Kari, scooping a water bottle off the counter with his then-free hand. Sitting down in the chair next to the goalie, he propped the crutches against the table and began to work on getting them tall enough for his teammate.
“How tall are you?” he asked.
Kari swallowed the pill in his mouth with a mouthful of water. “Six foot four,” he murmured.
“Six-four?” Niko asked, whistling. “Damn.” As he cranked the crutches up to the right height, he blinked. “Wait. If you’re six-four, and Andy’s taller than you are, how tall is he?”
Kari blinked. “Andy? He’s six-foot-six. Andy makes us all feel very, very short.” He smiled lightly, eyes darting up to meet Niko’s. “I’d always felt very awkwardly tall-I’m actually on the tall side for a goalie-until the day I met Andy Sutton.”
Niko laughed. “Yeah, well, I feel awkwardly short with all of you, so…” Standing up, he handed the crutches to his teammate. “Here. Try these.”
Carefully, the goalie stood up and accepted the crutches from the blond. Settling them comfortably, he stepped forward easily. He took a few more steps, then turned to smile at Niko. “Thanks. These are great.”
“No problem,” the blond said, grinning back. “Now, come on, Stretch. Let’s get out to the ice rink, shall we?”
“Let’s go,” Kari said, nodding. He followed the other man out of the kitchen and out of the house. It took him only a short time to get down the stairs, belying his familiarity with crutches. Back on the flat concrete of the driveway, he trailed Niko to his Porsche and waited patiently while he unlocked the car. When the doors were unlocked, he slid the crutches into the back, then got himself comfortably settled in the front.
“Mmm,” Niko purred, starting the car. “I love this car.”
Kari laughed, eyes sparkling. “She is a beauty, isn’t she,” he remarked proudly, lovingly stroking the upholstery. “My baby.”
His teammate smiled, watching him out of the corner of his eye. “So, when did you fall in love with Porsches?” he asked.
“Hmm? Oh, I think I was about…oh, geez, I couldn’t have been older than eight, I think,” Kari admitted, a small smile of remembrance crossing his face. “It was at the Maailmanmestari Goalie Camp of 1991-yeah, that was the year I turned eight. Kivi Jokinnen was there, and we got to ask him questions. Some kid asked him what his favourite thing was, after goalkeeping, of course. Kivi just grinned and said he couldn’t keep goal if his baby-his Porsche-wasn’t completely okay.”
“You got to meet Kivi Jokinnen?” Niko asked, eyes wide. “Man, but I hate you now.”
Kari laughed. “You’ve probably been to Maailmanmestari Camp yourself.”
“Yeah, well, I never got to meet the great Kivi Jokinnen,” he snorted. “I did get to meet the ever-impressive Sergei Fedorov, though, so I guess it all balances out.”
“I’ve met Sergei Fedorov,” Kari protested. “He scored on me!”
Niko snorted hysterically. “How long have you been playing hockey? Who got you into it?”
“My mum,” Kari responded, “when I was two. She gave my older brother a little foam hockey set-two hockey sticks, a little inflatable goal, and little foam balls to use as pucks. My brother forced me to play goal for him. I quickly learnt to block out of self-defense.”
“Oh, so much like how I learnt to play, then,” Niko chuckled. “The boys in the neighbourhood needed someone else so that they could really play hockey. For years, they just played with the girl across the street. Then I turned five-I was already playing hockey, just like my father wanted-and they decided I was big enough to play with the big kids.” He laughed.
“The boys in our neighbourhood drafted me very, very quickly,” Kari snickered. “The other kid who played goalie was truly awful, and he was damn grateful to get out of the goal.”
“If I remember correctly,” Niko remarked, parking the car in his customary spot, “in your average pick-up game, the worst skater ends up in goal. Unfortunately,” he added dryly. “We’re here, by the way.”
Kari hopped out easily, balancing on his good leg. Hobbling, he made his way to the back door and popped it open. Reaching inside, he grabbed the crutches Niko had loaned to him and swung himself up on them easily.
Niko raised an impressed eyebrow at the other man’s practiced ease. He waited until Kari had backed away, and then reached forward and slammed the car door shut. “Let’s go,” he said, smiling. “After you, Kari.”
“Thanks,” the taller man murmured, returning the smile. He waited patiently as Niko popped open the trunk and grabbed his bag, swinging it easily over his shoulder. Once he had the bag, he grabbed his skates and tossed them about his neck, and then reached for the roll of tape that had fallen out of his bag.
“Taping sticks this morning?” Kari asked quietly.
“Ha. Yeah,” Niko laughed. “I do truly hate having to wrap tape around sticks all morning.”
“I can do it for you,” Kari offered. “It’s not like I’ll be doing anything else.”
“Really? Thanks, Kari,” said Niko, beaming.
Kari smiled back shyly, ducking his face. “No problem,” he said quietly. Before Niko could say anything more, Kari quickly hobbled toward the doors of the rink.
Shaking his head at the other Finn’s odd behavior, Niko followed him to the doors.
A/N: Okay, now, everyone go check out my awesome background. 'Tis sexy collageness, it is. *grins* Also, I'm gonna take this moment to brag that I has finished NaNoWriMo, with more than the words needed. That having been said, it'll take me until the end of the year at least to finish beta-reading and editting and posting. So stick tight, yo.
Oh, that, and I have an entire set of Thrashers (and a few non-thrashers, and one ex-thrasher) icons for Christmas. I can make any for anyone, provided you give me enough advanvce warning. *grin*
Author: creepy_crawly
Pairing: as of now, none. Soon to be Kari Lehtonen/Niko Kapanen. Maybe some Kovalchuk in there, too. He's a secksi beast. (Atlanta Thrashers, yo)
Rating: As of now? Hmmm. R for language.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of these men. I really, really wish I did. Because then, you know, I'd own the Thrashers, and it'd be like, 'wooh! Free hockey!'. But no, I don't.
Warnings:Thrashers-centric fic. Abuse. Cursing. Slash. Hockey. An FOC named Olivia and all her family--but she's only here to move the plot along and get the boys together. *smirk*
Summary: In the end, we all need gentle places to rest our tired souls.
To see the earlier part(s), look here.
Kari woke briefly at five-thirty, hearing someone leave the house. Even though the sun was just barely starting to light the sky in a false dawn, and he was well accustomed to being awake and moving at that hour, Kari rolled over, pulled the blankets over his head, and went back to sleep.
He woke up later, the sun warm on his face as it slanted across the blankets. A thick, delicious smell was creeping through the house, and he could hear quiet laughter. Yawning, Kari sat up and stretched out like a cat. A pile of clothes sat, folded, on a chair. Yawning again, he got out of the warm bed and looked at them.
There was a pair of long jeans, tall enough that they mostly fit his long frame. They were a little loose at the hips, but that was okay by him. Quickly, he tugged on the shirt that was also on the chair. It was green, and emblazoned with the familiar logo of the Helsinki Youth Hockey League. Smiling, he ran his finger over the little polar bear above the word, ‘Maailmanmestari’.
“Stands to reason someone like Niko would be a world champion,” he sighed to his toes, sitting down on the bed to look at them. “Ew,” he added, wrinkling his nose.
The top of his foot was a dark, angry red-purple-blue. It seemed to be somewhat swollen, too, and at least two of his toes were jutting the wrong direction. Carefully, Kari tried to bend them. He winced, sucking air in with a hiss. Shaking his head, he decided not to try that again anytime soon.
With a sigh, Kari began to make his way carefully down the hallway. His fingers clutched nervously at the banister as he made his way down the stairs, wincing as he put weight on his foot. Slowly, though, he managed to make his way into the kitchen.
There, he was met by the sight of Niko stretching up to reach something in a high cabinet, a cellphone pinned between ear and shoulder and an exasperated expression painted on his face. At the table, a blonde girl was eating pancakes, swinging her legs as she turned the pages in a book. Next to her, Niko’s friend Andy was reading the newspaper, a pair of glasses perched on the end of his freckled nose.
“Oh, morning, Kari,” Niko said, smiling at him briefly before the phone call distracted him. “Mikä? Toki hän on naljailu.”
“You want pancakes?” the girl asked. “Here, let me get you some.” Nimbly, she hopped out of the chair and wandered over to the oven. Opening it, she grabbed a couple with a spatula, sliding them easily onto a plate. Smiling, she handed it to Kari. “Sit here,” she added, indicating an open seat at the table.
“Thanks,” he murmured, sitting down next to her. “What are you reading?” he asked, looking at the book.
She frowned. “Finnish textbook. Somebody thinks I need to learn to speak more languages,” she grumbled, tossing a meaningful look at Niko’s back. “So I’m learning Finnish so I can find out what he’s saying to his Mommy.”
Kari laughed. “If you want help,” he whispered behind a hand, “I can help you.”
She grinned. “It’s a deal, Mr…who are you?”
Behind him, Kari could hear Niko snorting. He chose to ignore his teammate, smiling at the girl instead. “I’m Kari…Kari Lehtonen. You must be Saskia…you don’t look like a Niklas to me.”
That made her laugh. “Yup. Saskia Messier, at your service,” she said, beaming. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Lehtonen. You play goalie for the Thrashers, right?”
He nodded.
“And what he’s been good and modest and not saying is that he’s very good at it, too,” Niko said, chuckling as he closed his phone and slid it in a pocket. “Better than you, anyway.”
“Yeah, well, I play better offense than you do,” Saskia growled, sticking her tongue out at the taller blonde. “So there.”
“You play goalie?” Kari asked, finishing off the first pancake.
Saskia nodded. “Sometimes. Hopefully all the time. We just started playing with definite roles this year.”
“In the US, PeeWee teams play switch-up a lot longer,” Niko said, sitting down. “Sleep well?”
“Yes, thank you,” Kari said, smiling a little.
Niko smiled back. “Saskia, swap chairs with me, ‘kay, babydoll? And goalie-kins, pop your foot up here. There’s something not right about that.” He sat down in her chair, frowning as Kari flushed and lowered his eyes.
Kari nearly jumped as soft fingers stroked along his hand. He looked up into Niko’s eyes, shocked.
»Come on, Kari. Let me look at your foot? I’m not going to hurt you, I swear. I just want to make sure that you’re okay,« he whispered, Finnish smooth and quiet. His fingers were warm as they swept along the back of Kari’s hand.
Slowly, nervously, the goalie nodded. Carefully, he lifted his foot for the older man to look at.
Niko’s hands were gentle as they moved along his teammate’s ankle, testing for any injury there. Ankle injuries were murderous for hockey players, and goalies in particular. With the continuous, repetitive injuries they collected, goalies were often the first people on a team to be forced into retirement, too injured to carry on in the one place they considered home.
Moving towards the swollen, discolored part of Kari’s foot, Niko winced. As his fingers drew ever closer, Kari closed his eyes and drew a deep, shaky breath. Noticing that, Niko gently grabbed the goalie’s left hand in his own. When Kari opened his eyes to look at him, the center winked. »Squeeze as hard as it hurts,« he whispered. »Be brave. Almost done, yeah?«
Biting his lip, Kari nodded. Niko continued to feel along his foot gently, wincing when he felt things he shouldn’t have.
“Andy?” he asked, not raising his eyes from where they were on Kari’s foot. “Can you bring me the first aid kit-the one I use? I need ice, ace bandage, and splints. And whatever heavy duty painkillers you’ve got on hand.”
“Sure thing,” the redhead said quietly, leaving the kitchen quickly.
“What…what’s wrong?” Kari asked, panicked eyes searching his teammate’s impassive face.
“Nothing too horrible,” Niko said, squeezing the man’s hand. “It’ll heal, no doubt. It just might kinda-sorta-maybe be broken.”
Kari cut loose with a string of Finnish curses that had Niko raising his eyebrows in surprise. In all the time he had known the younger man (admittedly, not all that long), he had never heard language like that leave his lips.
“Here,” Andy said, returning. “You want me to call the ortho? I can probably get you in for an X-ray within the hour-I’m on call today.”
“Not just yet,” Niko said, shaking his head as he dug through the bag. “I’m gonna have Olivia take a look at it. I don’t think it’s quite broken yet-just a fracture, if that.” Gently, he ran his knuckles along the side of the now-quiet Kari’s face. “Come on, smile a little. It could be worse.”
“Oh?” Kari asked acidly.
“Could be your ankles,” Niko reminded him.
“Or you knees,” Andy added. “Or, heaven forbid, your hips.”
“Or your neck!” Niko said brightly. “Could be hella worse.”
Kari glared at him, fighting a grin. “Been there, done most of that.”
“Oh?” Andy asked, helping Niko stretch out the roll of Ace bandage.
“Ankle in fourth year, neck in fifth. Stress fracture to shins-both-in the same year. Seventh year, broke my jaw. Eighth year, broke my neck again, and my hip. Had knee surgery five times already, hip three.”
Niko whistled. “Okay, so, maybe they should just replace you with titanium already. Damn, anything you haven’t broken?”
“To date?” Kari asked, grinning slightly. “Only my nose.”
The other Finn laughed, gently twining the bandage around his foot, over the framework of bracing he had worked on only moments before. Andy’s long, gentle fingers helped him get everything straight, both of them doing their best to distract the goalie.
“There we go,” Andy said, clipping the bandage in place. “All done-well, done enough that I’ll entrust you to the care of someone as generalized as Ollie.”
“Don’t let her hear you calling her generalized,” Kari warned, looking over his bandaged foot. “Thanks.”
“No problem,” Andy said, winking. “I’m a trained ortho, kid, it’s my job to make sports stars ogle my handiwork. Or wait, no…it’s my job to put them back together. It just strokes my ego to see you ogling.”
“Yeah, and you’ve had sports stars stroke and ogle more,” Niko shot at him. He turned to Kari and smiled gently. “I’m gonna call Olivia. You can put weight on that?”
Kari nodded. “Yeah.” Carefully, he stood up.
Niko nodded, pulling his cell phone from his pocket. “Can I drive your Porsche?” he asked, dialing Olivia’s number.
The goalie laughed. “Yeah, sure.”
Niko grinned, listening to his phone ringing. “Hello, Olivia?”
“Niko? Hey, what’s up? Is Kari okay?”
“Well, as far as I can tell, mostly,” Niko answered. “His foot his swollen and severely bruised, though, and I think there may be a broken bone involved. Andy and I got his foot all wrapped up, though. I was wondering if you might be able to look his foot over during practise today.”
“I’m on call this morning. But I need to take my littlest sister to her figure skating lesson this afternoon, and that’s directly after you guys’ practise. I can bully Lindsay into being ready early, though, so I can be there about thirty minutes before your practise is done.”
“Okay, thanks,” Niko said, smiling brightly.
“No problem. Just remind Kari to stay off his damn foot as much as he can until I get a look at it. Remind him that that means sitting on his ass and watching Moose play goal, not putting on skates and warming up, not walking around, none of it.”
Dutifully, Niko repeated her message, a twinkle in his eyes. Kari snorted, sticking his tongue out at the older man.
Niko laughed. “He thanks you for the reminder, and swears he will do as told like a good little boy.”
“I bet,” Olivia snorted. “See you later, Niko.”
“Bye,” he answered, ending the call and slipping his phone into his pocket. He turned to Kari. “You’ll be tagging along with me. I’ll grab the crutches that I know are somewhere in this house-Olivia sounded fairly serious about you staying off your foot, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s to not pick a fight with a doctor. Then we’ll go to practise, she’ll check your foot, and so on and so forth.”
Kari nodded, sitting down in the nearby chair. “Thanks,” he murmured. “For everything you’re doing, I mean. For taking me in and giving me somewhere to stay, for helping me, for everything. I can’t even begin to thank you enough.”
Niko smiled gently. “There’s no need to thank me, Kari. I’m doing what any of your teammates would-what any friend would.” He pushed himself off the wall. “Do you have any painkillers you prefer?”
Kari shook his head. “In my bag, I should have a bottle of Naproxen 250. It’s in a little prescription bottle. That usually works.”
“Are you allowed to take that for things like this?” Niko asked curiously. “If it’s prescription?”
The goalie nodded. “It’s prescription as needed for pain of any sort. Being a goalie has been known to be dangerous to one’s health, you know.”
The other Finn laughed. “Alright, I’ll grab that. I’ll be right back, okay?” He sauntered away, heading up the stairs.
When he came back, he carried the small pill bottle in one hand and a pair of crutches in the other, held over his shoulders. He dropped the bottle on the table in front of Kari, scooping a water bottle off the counter with his then-free hand. Sitting down in the chair next to the goalie, he propped the crutches against the table and began to work on getting them tall enough for his teammate.
“How tall are you?” he asked.
Kari swallowed the pill in his mouth with a mouthful of water. “Six foot four,” he murmured.
“Six-four?” Niko asked, whistling. “Damn.” As he cranked the crutches up to the right height, he blinked. “Wait. If you’re six-four, and Andy’s taller than you are, how tall is he?”
Kari blinked. “Andy? He’s six-foot-six. Andy makes us all feel very, very short.” He smiled lightly, eyes darting up to meet Niko’s. “I’d always felt very awkwardly tall-I’m actually on the tall side for a goalie-until the day I met Andy Sutton.”
Niko laughed. “Yeah, well, I feel awkwardly short with all of you, so…” Standing up, he handed the crutches to his teammate. “Here. Try these.”
Carefully, the goalie stood up and accepted the crutches from the blond. Settling them comfortably, he stepped forward easily. He took a few more steps, then turned to smile at Niko. “Thanks. These are great.”
“No problem,” the blond said, grinning back. “Now, come on, Stretch. Let’s get out to the ice rink, shall we?”
“Let’s go,” Kari said, nodding. He followed the other man out of the kitchen and out of the house. It took him only a short time to get down the stairs, belying his familiarity with crutches. Back on the flat concrete of the driveway, he trailed Niko to his Porsche and waited patiently while he unlocked the car. When the doors were unlocked, he slid the crutches into the back, then got himself comfortably settled in the front.
“Mmm,” Niko purred, starting the car. “I love this car.”
Kari laughed, eyes sparkling. “She is a beauty, isn’t she,” he remarked proudly, lovingly stroking the upholstery. “My baby.”
His teammate smiled, watching him out of the corner of his eye. “So, when did you fall in love with Porsches?” he asked.
“Hmm? Oh, I think I was about…oh, geez, I couldn’t have been older than eight, I think,” Kari admitted, a small smile of remembrance crossing his face. “It was at the Maailmanmestari Goalie Camp of 1991-yeah, that was the year I turned eight. Kivi Jokinnen was there, and we got to ask him questions. Some kid asked him what his favourite thing was, after goalkeeping, of course. Kivi just grinned and said he couldn’t keep goal if his baby-his Porsche-wasn’t completely okay.”
“You got to meet Kivi Jokinnen?” Niko asked, eyes wide. “Man, but I hate you now.”
Kari laughed. “You’ve probably been to Maailmanmestari Camp yourself.”
“Yeah, well, I never got to meet the great Kivi Jokinnen,” he snorted. “I did get to meet the ever-impressive Sergei Fedorov, though, so I guess it all balances out.”
“I’ve met Sergei Fedorov,” Kari protested. “He scored on me!”
Niko snorted hysterically. “How long have you been playing hockey? Who got you into it?”
“My mum,” Kari responded, “when I was two. She gave my older brother a little foam hockey set-two hockey sticks, a little inflatable goal, and little foam balls to use as pucks. My brother forced me to play goal for him. I quickly learnt to block out of self-defense.”
“Oh, so much like how I learnt to play, then,” Niko chuckled. “The boys in the neighbourhood needed someone else so that they could really play hockey. For years, they just played with the girl across the street. Then I turned five-I was already playing hockey, just like my father wanted-and they decided I was big enough to play with the big kids.” He laughed.
“The boys in our neighbourhood drafted me very, very quickly,” Kari snickered. “The other kid who played goalie was truly awful, and he was damn grateful to get out of the goal.”
“If I remember correctly,” Niko remarked, parking the car in his customary spot, “in your average pick-up game, the worst skater ends up in goal. Unfortunately,” he added dryly. “We’re here, by the way.”
Kari hopped out easily, balancing on his good leg. Hobbling, he made his way to the back door and popped it open. Reaching inside, he grabbed the crutches Niko had loaned to him and swung himself up on them easily.
Niko raised an impressed eyebrow at the other man’s practiced ease. He waited until Kari had backed away, and then reached forward and slammed the car door shut. “Let’s go,” he said, smiling. “After you, Kari.”
“Thanks,” the taller man murmured, returning the smile. He waited patiently as Niko popped open the trunk and grabbed his bag, swinging it easily over his shoulder. Once he had the bag, he grabbed his skates and tossed them about his neck, and then reached for the roll of tape that had fallen out of his bag.
“Taping sticks this morning?” Kari asked quietly.
“Ha. Yeah,” Niko laughed. “I do truly hate having to wrap tape around sticks all morning.”
“I can do it for you,” Kari offered. “It’s not like I’ll be doing anything else.”
“Really? Thanks, Kari,” said Niko, beaming.
Kari smiled back shyly, ducking his face. “No problem,” he said quietly. Before Niko could say anything more, Kari quickly hobbled toward the doors of the rink.
Shaking his head at the other Finn’s odd behavior, Niko followed him to the doors.
A/N: Okay, now, everyone go check out my awesome background. 'Tis sexy collageness, it is. *grins* Also, I'm gonna take this moment to brag that I has finished NaNoWriMo, with more than the words needed. That having been said, it'll take me until the end of the year at least to finish beta-reading and editting and posting. So stick tight, yo.
Oh, that, and I have an entire set of Thrashers (and a few non-thrashers, and one ex-thrasher) icons for Christmas. I can make any for anyone, provided you give me enough advanvce warning. *grin*