Chapter Text
Fuck.
That's all Troy could think right now.
He was fucked.
He had routine, he had stability, and now it was all gone. All because he decided to open his fucking mouth against Dallas Kent ONE time.
Troy was willing to put up with a lot of shit when it came to Dallas, and he meant a lot, but this was different. Not when it puts other people at risk. Not when it puts Julia at risk.
And that's how Troy ended up in Ottawa, with a four year old and a lot of baggage.
***
Troy was expected at his first Centaur’s practice by 9:00 AM. He could do this, he thought to himself. Guardian’s morning practices had always been at 7:00 AM, meaning this new schedule gave him a lot of buffer time. Maybe this is why they always lose. No, Troy shook his head. This was his new team, he needed to get rid of these thoughts quickly and keep his head down if he wanted to continue playing.
Why bother making a good impression, they all already think of you as an asshole. Troy shook his head harder this time. He didn’t have time to spiral. Right now he had an hour to wake up an already tired 4 year old, and get to practice before the rest of the team arrived.
He knew it wasn’t going to be easy considering he and Julia didn’t get into their hotel until nine last night, and of course she couldn’t sleep until he found her favorite stuffed bear that was conveniently packed under everything else Troy owned. By the time he finally got his daughter into bed it was around twelve, and his insomnia and anxiety combined was the perfect recipe for a pretty restless night.
He set up two bowls of Julia’s favorite cereal he had packed with them in case she got hungry in the car. He didn’t even have any fucking milk. Great. The cereal definitely didn’t follow his regularly set diet, but right now he had too many problems to worry about things like that. He checked the clock on the microwave in their small hotel room and decided it was late enough to finally try to wake up his tired daughter.
“Hey Jellybean, you’ve gotta wake up sweetheart,” he said gently nudging her.
He watched as she shifted slightly and gripped her stuffed bear ‘bunny’ tighter. They were still working on animal names.
“Come on I already set up breakfast for us,” He added, nudging her a little harder this time.
“No.”
“Please?” This time he watched as a small set of pale blue eyes peered out from beneath the blankets to look at him.
“Mmm, no.”
“Please, for me”
“I’m tired,” she drew out.
“Then I guess me and bunny are going to have to eat all of the lucky charms marshmallows by ourselves,” at the name of her favorite cereal he watched her shoot up to a sitting position.
“No! No! Look, I'm awake!” He grinned at the young girl desperately trying to prove to him that she was in fact not sleeping, even while talking to him and moving.
“Alright let’s go silly,” He ruffled her straight dark brunette hair that closely resembled his black hair, and he picked her up to carry her to their sad excuse for a kitchen table.
After eating breakfast the two of them followed a routine they had pretty much mastered at this point, which included him attempting some type of hairstyle she asked for and resulting in either a ponytail, her hair staying down, or a braid that he was quite proud of himself for learning.
By the time he finally got his daughter out the door (with a lot more tears and attitude than he would have preferred), he now had an hour and a half to drop her off at daycare and make it to practice.
The daycare he found was just about 10 blocks from the arena so he figured he would make it to practice on time. He could do this, he thought to himself. He parked his car on the side of the road by the curb and walked around to get Julia out of her car seat. As he picked her up he felt her tiny hands grip onto the hood of his hoodie behind his neck. Her small gentle hands, not calloused or rough like his, made him nearly tear up at how innocent she was.
He walked her up the small set of concrete steps into her classroom doorway where he met her teacher. The younger woman had long blonde hair and green eyes along with a colorful flowy skirt that almost made her look like a perfect teacher stereotype. When he finally got the courage to look Julia in her eyes is when he saw them. The same icy blue eyes Troy had his whole life. He could see the tears swelling in them.
“Daddy?” She asked while her eyebrows scrunched together in confusion.
Okay, he definitely couldn’t do this.
He didn’t want to leave her. God, he never wanted to leave her again. But he had too. He just wished it wouldn’t be so damn hard.
He gently set her down on the ground in the doorway while crouching down to meet her height and spoke softly to her, “It's ok Jellybean, I’ll be back later I promise, but Daddy has to go to work alright?”
“No, not alright. I don’t want you to leave,” she shook her head furiously.
“I don’t want to either but I have to sweetheart”
“No you don’t, just don’t go, don’t leave me here,” Now she was fully sobbing and all Troy could do was hug her.
“I love you baby, I promise I’ll be back later,” Unfortunately she only latched on harder to him until her teacher crouched down as well to rub her shoulders and softly tell her that everything was going to be okay. Troy felt ashamed at the fact that he didn’t even think he could guarantee that.
So, now instead of arriving to practice an hour earlier like he would have preferred, Troy spent the next 30 minutes crying in his car. Great first day Barrett.
***
By the time he finally got to the rink there was nobody there. Perfect. Before anybody else had time to arrive he quickly changed into his gear and headed out onto the ice for some time alone.
The second Troy stepped onto the freshly cleaned rink it's like he has a small moment where all of his worries and stress just disappear. Even if he knows they're not actually going anywhere, it's that split second that he finds himself missing more and more everyday.
Unfortunately, he has what feels like 10 minutes to himself before his new teammates slowly start gathering on the ice as well. All he can focus on is how close they all are with each other.
Troy watches as the young blonde rookie, who he is pretty sure is named Luca but he can never remember names, throws his head back in laughter at a story one of the veterans, Boodram, is telling him. At the same time Dykstra is practicing some type of drill with another rookie Young, who Troy notes has a significantly weak backhand.
He watches them all laughing and telling stories with each other. He wanted that. He wanted that so bad. He wanted to be a part of that. But still he kept his head down and continued the drill he was in the middle of before letting himself get side tracked.
Eventually Coach Wiebe made his way onto the center of the ice and called for the team to gather around him.
Brandon Wiebe was significantly younger than Troy’s old coach, Bruce Cooper. Cooper was known across the whole league for being a hardass and pushing the limits of his players beyond their breaking points. Troy recalls several times he’s seen players leave Cooper’s office in near tears, which would end in Kent reluctantly making fun of them for being “pussy’s”.
Wiebe, unlike Cooper, had only been coaching the Centaurs for around 2 years. That meant Troy had no clue what type of reputation his new coach would have.
Troy noticed at that moment that Rozanov was nowhere to be seen. Quite strange considering he was team captain, but he knew the guy was known for being weird. Honestly Troy wasn’t too excited to meet his new captain anyhow. Rozanov perfected the asshole persona, he could perfectly get under somebody’s skin but still never say anything actually repulsive. Troy also knew that his years of being “best friends” with Kent gave him the reputation of being the wrong kind of asshole. A monster.
Almost as if summoned by Troy’s thoughts, Rozanov walked onto the ice at that exact moment, and he wasn’t alone. He had a…puppy? He was carrying a small mountain dog with him onto the ice. Did Ilya Rozanov, his new captain, the league's known ‘scary Russian’, really just bring a puppy to a MLH practice?
That would have been the moment when Cooper lost his shit, but to Troy’s surprise he just heard Wiebe mutter under his breath, “Jesus fucking Christ they have a puppy now”.
He turned his face to watch his Coach gently shake his head in disbelief, but what scared Troy the most was the fact that the man was laughing. Before he could think any further about the scene that was slowly painting itself in front of him, he was abruptly pulled from his thoughts by a loud voice.
“Ilya, you can’t just take Chiron onto the ice!”
Troy quickly turned his head towards the entrance to the rink where a man was now standing with his arms crossed. He didn’t look like a hockey player, he was slightly pudgy with golden hair partially covered by a red and black Centaurs toque, a light blue denim jacket with pins that he couldn’t see what they were representing, and the prettiest green eyes Troy had ever seen.
He must’ve zoned out because next thing he knew the man was standing right in front of him.
“Hey, you must be Troy Barrett right? I’m Harris, the Centaurs social media manager,” he held out his arm for Troy to shake his hand.
He lifted his hand slowly to meet the other man’s, still in shock at the presence that surrounded him. Troy always knew people saw him as cold and avoidant, but part of him believed that’s just how some people were built. He never thought it could go the opposite way. Now though, the man standing in front of him felt like the embodiment of sunshine. Troy felt like while standing next to him he could smell small notes of apples and what he could only imagine home felt like.
The next thing he noticed about the man were the pins that he couldn’t see before but now had obvious pride statements and flags on them, most of which he didn’t know the meaning to. He wished for just once he could be like Harris. That he could be out. That he could be himself. Unfortunately, Troy knew he could never be that brave. The thought made him feel sick to his stomach that he would never truly get to be himself, if not for himself than not even for his daughter. And great, now he was thinking about Julia which only brought a deeper frown to his face.
He must have zoned out a little too long staring at the man’s pins, now with a scowl on his face he realized. He looked back up to meet the man’s eyes and noticed the smile that before had met his eyes was now turned into a small displeased straight line. Troy knew he was known to be a homophobe and overall horrible person, but he was hoping to change. Now he wasn't even around the man for more than what felt like 5 minutes and his darkness already started to dim the lightness that swarmed Harris.
“Uh yea I’m Troy” and because of reasons he couldn’t explain he truly didn’t want the man to hate him, so small talk it was. Something about Harris made Troy feel strangely safe, safe in a way he never felt before. Part of him wanted to just yell at the man,“I promise I’m not a homophobe, I’ve actually been gay my whole life, but im way too much of a coward to ever do something about it, and I’m petrified of what will happen to my daughter or my career if I ever do” and quite frankly that scared Troy a bit. As a result, he decided “Cute dog, he's yours?” was the better option to go with.
He wasn’t really sure what he said that brought the smile back to the man’s face but he excitedly said, “Well, Chiron is training to be a therapy dog, but until then he’s staying with me and Roz has made him the teams ‘official team dog’”
“Mm, that’s cool I guess,” because honestly Troy knew nothing about dog’s, he never had one growing up and Cooper would have rather burned himself alive than let his team waste time on something stupid like that.
“So, not that I want to get all business-y, but I noticed you don’t really have a social media presence, and we have to film an introduction video for the team socials so I was hoping we could set up a time for us to do that,” Harris told him.
“Oh uh yea sure”
“Perfect, any chance we could do it after practice some time this week?”
“No,” he said bluntly.
“Oh?” The man was now staring at Troy with wide eyes.
Realizing he must have sounded rude he quickly chased his answer with, “Sorry, I meant I can’t do after practice this week, or any week for that matter, but any other time should be fine”
“Okay, sounds great! I’ll let you know when I figure out a time that should work in both of our schedules. Do you mind giving me your phone number?”
Troy nearly felt himself choke at the question, “What?”
“You know, to contact you about media things or team events.”
“Oh yea sure,” Troy gave the other man his phone number but he couldn’t ignore the slowly growing pitt in his stomach that wished Harris had meant something else by asking for it. No. Sure when he was younger he had interactions with guys, and he even had a two year relationship with Adrian, but not now. Not when he had to consider Julia.
His thoughts were pulled from his slowly growing spiral when he heard Wiebe yell at Rozanov, “Roz, ten minutes and then you’ve gotta get that dog off the ice so we can start practice already”
“He has a name, and twenty.” Troy watched in horror as his new captain spoke back to his new coach. He could tell Wiebe clearly was much more relaxed than Cooper was, but a stunt like that would’ve gotten even Dallas Kent a one way ticket to Cooper’s office back in Toronto.
“Twelve,” Wiebe said grinning.
“Eighteen,” Roz fought back
The shock Troy was feeling must’ve shown on his face as well because as his head spun between the two men like he was watching a tennis match he felt something grip his shoulder. “You alright there bud?”
Troy turned back around suddenly to look at Harris, “Yea, just surprised I guess”
“By what? If you don’t mind me asking of course”
“Cooper would’ve never let that happen”
“Your old coach?” Harris asked, looking more confused than he had a moment ago.
“Oh, yea”
“What do you mean he wouldn’t have let it happen?”
“Just that if I tried something like that it would’ve been bag skates until I puk-” Troy quickly cut himself off when he realized he was sharing way too much with somebody he just met. What was wrong with him?
He felt his whole body start to heat as Harris asked in a concerned tone, “Did he do that normally?”
“No, it was nothing, just forget it.” He hissed. He could hear the attitude in his own voice as he said it but this was really not a conversation he wanted to have right now. Harris must’ve also gotten the signal to drop it because he quickly changed the topic to something else.
“So, how are you liking Ottawa, see any sights yet?”
“No, I just got in last night”
“Really? And you’re already at practice? I’m sure if you need it Wiebe will let you take a day off to adjust”
“No, it's fine really. I don’t want to be a burden to the team.” Harris just nodded slowly at Troy.
The pair sat in a comfortable silence for a short amount of time just watching the team play with the puppy that he was pretty sure was named Chiron. He wasn’t sure exactly what it was in that moment standing next to Harris, but something about being in his presence continued to make him feel safer than he had in a long time. He liked that Harris seemed to understand him before even truly getting to know him. Instead of calming him though, that only made Troy worry further. He knew how people could be, even the ones he cared most for could turn on him at any moment. So for the sake of himself and his daughter he knew it was best to just not trust anyone else.
Eventually Harris’s booming voice returned as he shouted across the rink, “Roz, I’ve got to take Chiron back up to my office”
Troy watched in astonishment as one of the scariest players in the league actually pouted at Harris.
“But Harris, he is our new goalie”
“Nice try Roz, but I’ve saved your ass more times than I can count”
Troy knew he was forgetting something all day long in the back of his brain, but it wasn’t until he looked up and matched the voice he just heard to the face that was standing on the other side of that rink that he realized what it was. Wyatt Hayes. The man he had tormented for years in Toronto alongside Kent. Unfortunately nobody else knew his situation with Dallas, so to them Troy was just the same monster as him. And his new teammate knew the worst of it.
He could feel his heart rate pick up rapidly as he stared at the man. Not here Barrett, not now. He needed to calm himself, and quickly. So, he did the only thing he knew how to do. He pulled the glove off of his right hand and began to dig his finger nails into his palms.Dammit . When even that didn’t work, he moved his hand up his arm and pressed his nails, now harder than before, into his bicep.
Pain. Troy knew pain. He quite frankly only ever knew pain. The feeling of his nails slowly breaking through the skin behind his undershirt pulled him back to reality slowly. His vision became shaky for a small second as he felt his pulse go down slowly. At the same time he heard Wiebe yell from the center of the rink, “Come on boys, can we attempt an actual practice now?”
He must have spaced out, which wasn’t fairly irregular, but he was thankful Harris must not have noticed what he just did because he now had the small puppy in his hands as he turned around to wave goodbye to Troy with a large smile on his face. Troy sent a small wave back to him.
Wiebe gathered the men and began to name off a few drills for them to start with. Practice started pretty easy compared to what he was used to in Toronto. He figured he could just glide through his first practice with ease. The team began moving into small scrimmages and he noticed he definitely wasn’t playing his best, but compared to most of the Centaurs he was still significantly better than a lot of them. He could see some promise in the younger players like Haas, but overall most of the team just seemed out of order and a mess.
Even though he recognized he was playing better than a majority of them he was still caught off guard when Wiebe yelled at him, “Barrett, I want you to practice with the first line, see how that goes”. Troy knew Ottawa was bad, hell everyone in the league did, but were they so bad that they were that desperate enough to put him immediately on the starting line?
He looked back at the player who he just took the spot from, Dillon, expecting some type of salty or pointed glance coming his way, but instead he was met with no reaction at all. In fact it looked like he was already smiling at Chouinard and Haas who played on the second line. In Toronto being replaced made that person a personal enemy to you. Someone you were set to fight with the whole season until you reclaimed your original spot. Troy had to fight as hard as he could to stay on the first line. But here? It didn’t matter where they were, because they were all a team. And Troy felt like he was sitting right on the outside of it all.
“Are you sure coach?” Troy asked, eyes still wide.
“It’s just to test your chemistry for now,” Wiebe responded, shrugging off Troy.
During the drills Troy could feel himself getting slower than usual. Focus. That was what he had to tell himself all practice. He really didn’t think anyone else would notice though because if he was being quite frank, his worst pretty much matched the team's pace.
That was until one of his drills with Rozanov, Bood, and Haas. The four were standing together on the blue line when Roz looked at Troy and said, “Barrett, you look like shit”.
Bood laughed alongside Ilya who seemed to think Troy’s confused look was hilarious. “Yea man, the last time I looked that exhausted was when Milo was a newborn,” that made Troy tense up. He could feel the room start to heat around him. Did they know? How would they know? Had he already given away his biggest secret before he even made it through full practice?
He could feel his breaths get faster and faster until he was brought out of his spiral by Bood slapping his back and saying, “Relax Barrett, I was just kidding”
“Oh, yeah,” he responded, while putting his head down and focusing back on the drill.
This was going to be a long day.
***
After practice Troy practically ran to the locker room. All he wanted was to go pick Julia up from daycare and never leave her again. Obviously he knew that wouldn’t be possible, but until he had to leave her again he could at least have tonight with his daughter.
He changed as quickly as he could out of his practice uniform in hopes nobody would see the blood stained on his undershirt and the skin around where his nails previously dug into his skin.
“Geez Barrett, you got a date or something?” Troy whipped his head around to see Holmberg, one of the rookies, sitting down in the stall next to him commenting on the speed of his changing.
“Yea, something like that,” He had definitely spit his answer out before thinking, but at this point he would take any excuse he could to leave this place and get to Julia. He really didn’t want to start off lying to his new team, but hiding a secret as big as his daughter left little room for the truth.
“Use protection,” He heard a familiar Russian voice yell from across the locker room. Troy felt a chill go up his spine and in return gave back a forced sloppy grin. He knew it didn’t look very convincing, but he didn't have the energy to fake a laugh right now.
With the amount of conversations starting around him, Troy took that as his sign he could finally leave. He tossed his bag over his shoulder and started to walk out, but when he turned around one last time he noticed the glare Wyatt Hayes was giving him. He assumed there would be heat and anger coming from the goalie, but instead the man just looked confused, or rather concerned.
***
The rush of relief he felt seeing Julia after what felt like the longest practice of his life was something he had never felt before.
“Daddy!” She shouted as she jumped into Troy’s arms. He picked her up and held her like he never wanted to leave her again. That was the truth though, and if he was being honest he had no clue how he was supposed to do this everyday.
Seemingly forgetting he was standing in the doorway to his daughter’s daycare, he was surprised to hear a voice speaking to him from behind. Quickly coming back to reality he turned to face the woman. “Sir, did you hear what I said?”
“Sorry, could you repeat that?”
“I said, you were late to pick up today, and as you are aware we have a very strict three lates policy before your daughter will be removed from our program”
Troy quickly pulled out his phone to check the time, “It’s only 5 minutes past the pickup time,” he told the woman.
“And as I’m sure you are aware, we have a very strict policy” she repeated, giving him a pointed look.
Troy could feel himself growing angrier by the second and in not wanting to lash out in front of Julia he scoffed at the woman and held his daughter tighter, giving his full attention to her now saying, “let’s go”.
***
He repeated the process of dropping off his daughter and missing her every moment they were apart for over a week. His mind was so focused on Julia that he was barely making any effort to connect with his new teammates. That was, with the exception of Harris.
Two days after their first meeting Troy arrived even sooner than normal to practice to film the media video that the man had asked for previously. If Troy was being honest he really did not want to do anything for social media, but a larger part of him didn’t want to disappoint Harris again.
Troy walked into the media office that morning to see Harris sipping on some crazy sugary latte that he was pretty sure was closer to being considered a milkshake than it was coffee. “Troy, good morning!”
Even though the man had his usual smile plastered to his face, Troy could see the tiredness in his eyes. “Tired?” He asked in an attempt to make conversation.
“Yea, I’m not usually a morning person at all and my coffee hasn't quite had time to kick in.”
“Oh, yea”
“How about you?”
“What about me?” Troy asked, furrowing his brows.
“You a morning person?” Harris asked with a short giggle.
“Oh uhm yea I guess, I mean I’m usually up around five in the morning no matter how I feel about it”
“Five?!” Harris shouted back as his eyebrows flew up.
“Yea?”
“Jesus, and I’m over here complaining about getting up at seven”
“Hah, sounds nice”
“Man, I don’t know how you do it”
“I mean I kind of have to”
“Yea,” Harris responded, though Troy could feel the note of suspicion in his attitude. “Well let’s get started on that interview yea?”
“Oh uhm, yea sure”
Harris jumped up out of his office chair and started walking out of the door. Troy had no clue where they were going but he had no problem following Harris wherever. Eventually they made it down to the ice where there was a chair set up in the middle with a camera pointed at it.
“Right there,” Harris said, pointing at the seat.
Troy shifted into the seat until he finally got comfortable in the chair that felt like it was just a tad too small for his quads. Harris looked at him and asked if he was ready and when he said he was Harris began the questioning.
“Okay, first things first, easy questions. Where did you grow up?”
Sure that would have been an easy question for a normal person, but that wasn’t Troy. He unfortunately had nothing but problems with where he grew up. Fuck it, he hated Vancouver.
“Canada”
“Cute, but I’m going to need you to be a bit more specific,” Something about Harris calling Troy cute made his cheeks flush, but he decided not to unpack that as of now.
“Oh, Vancouver,” even mentioning the city brought a metallic taste to his mouth.
“Perfect, okay next, what's your favorite color?”
He had not really thought about what his favorite color was before. In hindsight it didn’t seem like something that should've been difficult but it was never something that crossed his mind. He decided to go with the color he wore the most often.
“Black I guess”
“That’s a joke right?” Harris asked, looking like he was waiting for Troy to tell him he was just kidding. “Troy, you don’t mind if I call you Troy right?” Suddenly the flush of his cheeks was back, paired with a strange fluttering feeling in the pit of his stomach as Harris called him by his first name.
“Yea, I don’t care”
“Well Troy, nobody's favorite color is black”
“Mine is?”
“No it’s not”
“I feel like that’s not something you really get to decide for me,” He could feel his lips slowly curing up. The more comfortable he got with Harris the more his friendly snarkiness came back to him, something he hadn’t had since Toronto.
“It is when you’re wrong”
“Fine then, what should it be?”
“I don’t know, maybe something normal?”
“Like what?”
“Blue, red, green, orange, honestly quite literally anything except black,” Harris made a face that said this should have been obvious to Troy.
“Fine then my favorite color is blue”
“Well now you’re lying, and that is not a great way to start off on a new team,” Even though Troy knew Harris was only joking he felt his face fall back into a straight line. He was lying to his new team, every time he was with them. Every time he was away from Julia.
“Alright new question, what is your coffee order?” Harris asked, pulling Troy from his thoughts.
“I don’t know, like normal?”
“What do you mean normal?” Harris said in a confused tone.
“Like I don’t add anything to it if that's what your asking”
“Oh my god. Troy Barrett do you have any type of personality”
“Yes I do, for your information.” He chirped.
“You have done nothing to prove that statement correct yet,” Troy was now smiling at the sight of Harris laughing, even if it was pointed at him.
“Next, what is your favorite snack? And so help me god if you say something like rice cakes or salmon I’m going to lose my mind”
“...salmon is actually pretty good,” Troy could see the moment Harris lost it.
“Salmon? Salmon!?” He was now almost shouting. “Troy things like cake, chips, and ice cream exist, and you pick salmon?”
“To be fair, I’ve never actually had ice cream before,” If Troy thought Harris was shocked before, the other man was now staring at him in utter disbelief.
There was a long pause before Harris eventually asked, “What?”
“I’ve never tried ice cream,” he said again. This was starting to confuse Troy now, as if trying ice cream was something every person had to do in their lives.
“That literally can’t be true”
“It is, it's never really fit in my diet before”
“What about when you were a kid?”
“My dad never really let me have sweets or anything, said it took my focus away from hockey and that I had to stay in shape,” He could see Harris’s smile fall a bit and something that looked like sadness, or rather pity, appear in his eyes. Troy hated that. He hated when others felt sorry for him. His problems were nobody but his own to worry about, and if he couldn’t man up and handle them then he wasn’t a man at all. That’s what his father had told him his whole childhood.
“Well you’re going to have to make room in your silly hockey diet, because I’m taking you out some time to go try ice cream”
He loved the idea of going out with Harris, but he knew with Julia he would never have time. “I’m not sure if I have time at all,” He knew it sounded like he was making up excuses so in hopes to not sound too harsh he quickly followed it up with, “sorry”
“All good, whenever you’re free just shoot me a text and we can go get some,” He knew he got Harris's phone number on the first day but after arranging the first introduction interview in person he realized he probably wouldn’t have a reason to ever text him. Now, he found himself hoping for any reason to have to contact Harris.
Harris continued with more questions that Troy provided with answers that seemed to surprise the man with how ‘boring’ he was. Eventually the social media manager had enough answers he figured he could compile into a video that made Troy look like he had any personality at all.
“Alright, I think we're all set here, thank you for doing this” Harris said while disassembling his camera set up.
He stood up out of the chair he was sitting in and made his way over to where the other man was working, “Oh, your welcome I guess”
Harris nodded at him with a smile on his face, “I know I poked fun at you most of the time, but seriously this was really fun so if you ever need anyone to talk to just stop by my office I’ll be happy to talk”
Troy noticed that this interview was the first time he had actually laughed or smiled since leaving Toronto. He realized that he didn’t want to stop talking to Harris. With that thought the fluttering in his stomach and flush of his cheeks came back to a point where it was no longer ignorable, and he realized he needed to get out of here before he gave himself away.
In his best attempt to not make a total fool of himself he looked at Harris and thanked him, followed by him speed walking off of the ice. Once he knew he was clear of the man's vision he leaned against a wall in one of the hallways. Every time he blinked all he could see were Harris’s green eyes staring at him.
Harris made him feel safe, feel happy, feel loved. Unfortunately Troy knew he would have to push these feelings down just like everything else he feels. If not for the sake of his hockey career, then for the sake of his daughter, and shit. This was the first time since leaving Toronto that Troy had forgotten Julia existed. His daughter was suffering in some daycare distraught at the idea of being away from him, and he forgot about her.
He felt like he was a horrible father.