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It starts, as it always does, with an itching under his skin. It never changes and it’s frustrating, but it’s easily managed. Sid sets it to the back of his mind, tamps it down, and concentrates on hockey. The harder he plays, the better he plays, the more chances he’ll get. His determination should be terrifying, but no one thinks twice on it.
Sid has always been determined. It’s what makes him who he is.
He narrows his focus, barrels down the ice, and there . The puck is in the back of the net before anyone can stop him.
He’s slammed lovingly into the boards by Army, the crowds roar, and Sid closes his eyes and basks in the feeling of being surrounded, of being encased, of being wanted . The itch in his skin subsides — briefly. Later on in the locker room, surrounded by his team and surrounded by bare skin, he soaks in every touch. His skin tingles and he shivers, content for a while longer.
He doesn’t think that this might be abnormal. Everything he is is abnormal. He knows. He’s been told. So he’ll take this feeling any way he can get it. Affection, care, touch .
It’s not quite what he wants, but that’s okay.
———————
Zhenya doesn’t realize he’s misstepped until later.
He hadn’t thought about it, to be honest. He was still new, still unpracticed, still unknowing. The only thing he did know was Sid had just landed a sick goal and won them the game. He barrels Sid into the boards and can’t help babbling at him in Russian. He knows Sid doesn’t understand, but Sid still leans into his hug and smiles so brilliantly it takes Zhenya’s breath away.
That’s not the misstep, that’s just the beginning.
They’re in the locker room when it happens. Sid is walking around half-dressed and beaming at everyone. He sits next to Zhenya and just smiles, and Zhenya’s next action is automatic. He’s been in locker rooms since he was young and his celebrations are ingrained. He throws an arm around Sid’s shoulder and pulls him in, laughing joyfully.
He’s talking with Gonch and doesn’t even register the way Sid stiffens in his arms or the alarmed expression on Gonch’s face. Gonch reaches out, but before he can do anything, or before Zhenya figures out anything is wrong, Sid slumps into his hold.
That , Zhenya notices. He turns and smiles down at Sid, tugs him closer, before going back to his conversation with Gonch. Sid rests his head on Zhenya’s shoulder, and Zhenya has absolutely no idea that he has, in one move, successfully flipped his new team’s understanding of the universe on it’s head.
———————
Still, Gonch tries to explain later.
“So Zhenya. You know Crosby,” he says, hesitantly.
“Yes? Sid?”
Gonch tracks the expression on Zhenya’s face. He watches the way Zhenya’s eyes light up and the smile that forms at his mouth. In this moment, like in all other moments he mentions Sid around Zhenya, he despairs. He knows where this is going and where it is leading, and it’s already exhausting.
He sighs. Better to get it over with. “Sid doesn’t…. He’s not big on touching?” Zhenya frowns at him, and Gonch already feels a headache starting. “You hugged him earlier and he flinched, right? He does that.”
Zhenya shrugs. “I just surprised him. He was fine with it after, right? He didn’t pull away.”
Gonch opens his mouth, closes it again. “I guess?” That was pretty weird for Sid. Then again, had anyone ever just kept touching Sid after he flinched? He shakes his head. He doesn’t have time for this. “Just… be careful.”
Zhenya smiles at him. All big and bright with the positivity of a young man. It’s alarming how cheerful he is even after everything he’s been through. It makes Gonch feel very old, and truly he does not have the patience for this. This whole Sid-and-Zhenya thing is going to be hard enough without Gonch welcoming frustration in.
Zhenya will just have to figure it out on his own.
———————
By the time Zhenya is Geno, he still hasn’t figured it out. Sure, plenty of guys have tried to tell him that Sid has a thing about touching, but Geno has yet to see it.
“Maybe it’s just a Geno thing,” Flower says, one night at a bar.
Sid has gone to the bathroom and Geno ruffled his hair before he left. Sid just blinked, frozen for a long moment, before a small pleased smile graced his expression. The team commented on it the moment Sid was gone.
Geno rolls his eyes and turns to Gonch. “Has anyone ever tried to touch Sid?”
Gonch shrugs. “Anytime we have he flinches. We sort of took that as a pretty obvious ‘don’t touch.’”
“That's... fair. But he doesn’t seem to actually have a problem with it. I think he’s just not used to it,” Geno says. He can’t fathom how anyone who reacts as sweetly as Sid does could actually have a problem with physical contact.
Gonch stares at him for a long time before humming. “Maybe,” he says slowly. He sounds more convinced than the last time Geno brought this up. Geno takes it as a win.
———————
“You don’t mind do you?” Geno asks Sid one day out of the blue.
Even after Sid parses the question he’s pretty sure he doesn’t understand. He looks up at Geno curiously. “Mind what?”
Geno sort of gestures broadly at the two of them. Sid takes a moment to consider their position. They started on opposite ends of the couch, but by the time they got settled with dinner and drinks and a movie, Sid had nudged his way closer. Eventually it ended, as it always did, with Geno throwing an arm around his shoulders and tugging him in. Sid shivered as the warmth from Geno’s body reached him and spent the last five minutes trying to get as close to that warmth as he could. The end result being him basically in Geno’s lap and Geno wrapped around him like a leggy octopus.
It’s amazing . So much affection, so much touch. His nerves keep firing at will as Geno keeps holding him, and it’s so good Sid wants to drown in it.
“Me touching you,” Geno finally says after Sid’s finished squirming even closer.
Sid freezes. “Do you mind?” he asks. There’s a long moment during which he’s reminded that this isn’t normal. Geno has never asked before, has only given, but Sid knows this isn’t right. This isn’t something he’s supposed to have.
It hadn’t been so bad when he was younger. When he was younger, it was allowed. He was allowed to hug his mom and his dad and his friends. It wasn’t until he got older that things changed. He became good at hockey. He became great at hockey. He stopped having friends and started having rivals, no matter that it wasn’t what he wanted. Hugging became a baby thing. A girly thing. An emotional thing. You could hug on the ice, in celebration, but outside of that, it was weird.
He remembers the first time he went to hug his dad and got a pat on the head instead. When he first flinched from his mom’s touch, trying not to look like a little kid. He remembers the people that would shout and curse and hit him instead. Hockey is violent, sure, but no one ever mentions that life is violent too. Jealousy is violent. He still remembers having to hide his jersey, having to hide himself , just to be left alone.
By the time he got to Shattuck, he knew the rules. Only girls want hugs. Only babies want hugs. Men don’t want hugs.
He had Jack, but Jack wasn’t big on physical touch. Sid was leagues away from home, with few friends, many unintentional rivals, and a feeling of loneliness so potent it lumped in the back of his throat.
That’s when the itch started. He never talked about it, never mentioned it, but it was there. A twitching, hissing, burrowing thing that slid under his skin and stayed there. It caught his skin on fire and left the hairs on the back of his neck permanently raised. The only time it left was on the ice and in the locker room, at the height of celebration.
The first time Jack got drunk and hugged him for a good solid minute was the first time he remembers it going away.
The problem being, he was so unused to touch that he froze, and even a drunken Jack was aware enough to realize that. He pulled away, apologized, and never touched him again. Sid didn’t know how to ask for it back. Especially when he knew Jack didn’t hug very often anyway.
He never knew how to ask for it. Besides, that would be a weird thing to ask for. Only children asked for hugs. Only children needed them. Or girls. Girls were fine to hug. Girls tended to take it the wrong way if you hugged them, though. In fairness, everyone tended to take it the wrong way. Which is how Sid knew it was wrong. Another thing to chalk up on his laundry list of weirdness.
He knows it’s not normal, but Geno has never asked. The only reason he would be asking is if he’s finally noticed it’s not okay. Someone told him it’s not okay. Someone told him Sid is not okay.
He tries to pull back, but Geno won’t let him. Instead, Geno wraps his arms around his chest and buries his face in Sid’s neck, and just… holds on.
Sid freezes and stops trying to push Geno away. “I’m sorry?” he says, asks, he’s not sure. He doesn’t want to be sorry, but he should be.
“Shh, is okay. Is fine. We’re fine. Come here.” Geno’s hand slides up his back and into his hair, and Sid shudders violently at how good it feels. He lets himself be tugged down and rests his head on Geno’s shoulder. “You like it?”
Sid’s heart lurches into his throat. He shouldn’t. He’s not supposed to, but— “I do,” he murmurs. He can’t deny it. Not to Geno. Not ever to Geno.
“Then it’s good,” Geno says. His breath is hot at Sid’s neck, and the heat slides into his skin and down. Down and down until Sid has to bite his lip. Everything feels good and Geno feels good and Sid gasps for air. He has to breathe carefully to try to calm down.
He’s managed to settle into a pleasant and hazy headspace when Geno presses his lips to his neck. Just like that he’s knocked back into himself. “Geno.”
“Shh,” Geno says and kisses his neck again. Sid can feel the dampness of it and his skin chills as the air hits it. He shivers and it’s not just from the cold. “You like it?”
Sid knows that this time he’s asking an entirely different question, but his answer hasn’t changed. “I do.”
Geno’s pleased hum, and the hand that slides down his stomach, is one of the last things he registers properly before his senses scatter to the winds.
Geno’s hands are so big. Sid knows this, but it’s an entirely different experience to know what they feel like on his back compared to his stomach. Geno’s fingers skitter at his waistband, and Sid is arching into his touch before he realizes.
He chokes on absolutely nothing when Geno slips his hand into Sid’s pants and wraps his ridiculously long fingers around his dick. There’s a completely different itch under his skin right now that he doesn’t recognize but builds with every stroke of Geno’s hand. It’s so good, and so hot , and Sid’s skin feels like it’s burning. He needs, he needs, he doesn’t know what he needs, but he knows it involves Geno.
He whimpers and Geno shushes him softly. “Got you. I got you,” Geno says and thumbs the crown of Sid’s dick, smearing the fluid there, before twisting his hand and slicking it down.
Sid bucks up, and everything is so wet now that it slides easily. His mouth opens on a gasp that he buries in Geno’s throat, and it’s there that he muffles every desperate sound he makes. It’s just so good . He can’t stop moving, and he can’t stop moaning, and he’s not sure what he’s going to do when this is done, but it’s okay because Geno has him. He trusts Geno. Geno will make everything okay.
Geno’s hand twists again and it punches a deep groan out of Sid. His nerves are overloaded with pleasure, and he tries to hold back, tries to hold on to this one perfect moment, when Geno slides his free hand up Sid’s spine.
The touch of his nails scraping up his skin has Sid arching his back and he loses himself. He moans loudly as his dick jerks in Geno’s tight grip and he comes. Geno’s hand keeps stroking him through it, and Sid can’t help fucking into his hand as Geno uses his come to ease the way.
His skin is one giant buzzing ball of nerves by the time he’s done, and he can barely do much more than gasp for air as he tries to settle back down. He notices Geno jerking himself off and registers Geno’s grunt against his neck. The shudder that escapes Geno shakes Sid too, and while he should be upset that he can’t reciprocate, he finds it hard to feel anything but fuzzy contentedness.
He closes his eyes, presses a kiss to Geno’s shoulder, and sighs.
———————
Geno wonders how anyone could ever think Sid doesn’t want to be touched. Even half-dazed with orgasm, Sid threw himself into every stroke of Geno’s hand. Even now that he’s finished, he’s pressing kisses into Geno’s shoulder and rubbing his cheek against Geno’s neck like a touch-starved cat.
Touch-starved…. Oh. Well that would make sense wouldn’t it? Not that it matters much now. Geno plans to make sure Sid is never wanting for his touch. He sweeps his hand up Sid’s back again just to revel in the way he shivers, and grins stupidly.
Geno admits he’s probably a bit come-dumb himself, but it’s not like he hasn’t earned it. He makes a pointed attempt to stay as close to Sid as humanly possible as he nudges him off the couch and up the stairs. He slips his fingers over every inch of Sid’s skin in the shower, and the sight of Sid looking at him with half-lidded eyes, glazed in pleasure, is one that Geno is going to hold close for the rest of his life.
In that moment, he decides that he’ll have to make sure to tell the team that Sid definitely enjoys affection, and they should make a point to touch him more often. Maybe not in the way Geno just did, but Sid being hugged more often is something that should happen. Geno is a giving soul. So long as Sid is in his bed at the end of the night, he’s perfectly fine with it should others chose to give Sid affection.
He just needs to convince Sid to stay in his bed.
———————
Sid tries to take some initiative when they reach Geno’s bed. Geno helps him in and tucks both his body and the blankets around Sid and it’s amazing. It’s better than anything Sid’s ever had.
He thinks he could make it better, though. He shifts until he’s on his back and meets Geno’s curious gaze. It takes Geno a while to figure it out, but Sid manages to tug him enough that Geno finally drapes overtop him. From the toothy smile Geno presses into his neck, Sid is pretty sure Geno doesn’t mind being used as a substitute blanket.
“Thank you,” Sid murmurs softly.
Geno just wiggles on top of him and presses a kiss to his neck. “Shh, no thanks. Just sleep.”
Sid giggles and wraps his arms around Geno, running his hands over his skin. There’s miles and miles of bare skin and warmth pressed against him and Sid’s heart thumps wildly as the itch in skin vanishes as if it were never there.
He thinks, for the first time, there’s a good chance it won’t ever come back.