Crack In The Ice - Chapter 11: Chapter 11

The national championships were just the beginning.
Chloe and I were set back a bit by my senior year. Between work, school and personal issues, my dedication to skating wasn't quite at its peak. I went from putting in more hours than anyone else to sometimes being too tired to make it to the end of the longer practices.
As soon as we graduated and people started leaving, I threw myself into the plan. We knew we were not going to make that Olympic season. But without Mack to corrupt me and Eli to distract me, I had both the time to live and breathe skating, and the inescapable desire to block the thoughts of abandonment from my head.
We made it to the podium earlier in the year. That was step one.
The ISU Challenger Series was step two.
We were only taking part in one event, but it was all we needed to continue making an impression. And nothing was going to stop us. Nothing was going to stop me. Not the nearly thirteen-hour flight time to Beijing. Not the pressure of the international competition at the Asian Open Trophy. And definitely not the fact that my shower wasn't working and no one at the reception seemed to care.
"Excuse me, ma'am," I try. The front desk worker doesn't lift her eye from the computer screen.
"Uhm, sir," I try again, at the second receptionist leaning over the first's shoulder, phone pressed to his ear.
This time, they both glance briefly at me, without ever interrupting the rapid stream of their muttered conversation. When they turn back to the screen without acknowledging me any further, I take out my phone to text Chloe.
I make one last pathetic attempt at getting the receptionists' attention. "Excuse me? Ma'am? Sir?"
The one on the phone puts it down, looking up readily. For a ridiculous second, relief washes over me. Until the confusing raucous of a large group of new arrivals floods the lobby and the man behind the desk hastily rushes to meet them while his coworker types into the computer.
Slack jawed, I follow him to where he meets the large group of men. As in, there's many of them and they're all above average human size.
That's all that really draws my attention until I see the flaming C on the back of one of their jackets. I do a double take and my eyes widen. The jacket owner turns and I'm met with a face at least ten years older than what I was hoping to see.
I turn around swiftly to face the reception counter for... what? What am I hoping to achieve? Hiding? Right in the middle of a giant hotel lobby?
"Liam?"
I turn my head. A wide, genuine grin that should be illegal meets my gaze. The little bit of stubble throws me off, but I know that face. And not just from my sister's poster. I used to make fun of Mack when she made out with that face.
"It is you!" Dean Miller says excitedly. "What are you doing here?"
I glance around us on impulse. Sure enough, wherever the Golden Retriever is, Eli isn't far away. My eyes linger on him for a second too long before I turn back to smile at Dean.
"Hey. I could ask the same of you," I say.
"We have a game tomorrow," Dean says.
I glance involuntarily at Eli as he comes to stand to Dean's side. "Uhm, in Beijing?"
"Pre-season games," Dean says, like it's obvious.
"Right." My eyes take another unauthorized glance at Eli. Finding that his have stayed fixed on me the whole time, I can't look away this time. "Are all your pre-season games in... China?"
"The NHL organizes some pre-season games abroad," Eli explains. It's all business, no underlying message or undertone hidden there. Which doesn't add up with the flutter behind my ribcage.
"We played the Bruins in Schenzen three days ago, and we're playing them tomorrow again here," Dean adds. "What about you?"
"Oh, uh. Skating event. ISU Challenger Series."
"Sounds cool. Is Chloe with you?" Dean asks.
No, I came to a skating event without my skating partner.
"Yeah, she's upstairs," I say out loud.
"Cool. Are you sharing a room? Eli and I are roommates."
"Uh, no. Chloe and I get our separate rooms."
Eli shives his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. "You probably want to go back to your room now."
"Uh, yeah. Yeah." I nod. Then remember why I even came down here in the first place. "Actually, uh... I kinda have an issue with my shower." I gesture vaguely toward the reception.
Dean frowns. "What's wrong with your shower?"
"If only I knew."
"You could probably use ours," Dean offers.
Eli and I both snap our heads to look at his friend, before our eyes meet again.
"I wouldn't want to... impose," I say.
"You don't. We're offering. Right?" Dean looks at Eli, who doesn't actually react. "We should get our room keys in a second."
"Oh, I think it's fine," I say. "Seriously, don't worry."
"Liam's probably tired," Eli chimes in. "The flight from home is long. He probably just wants to... go back to his room."
Dean frowns between the two of us. "But if his shower is broken."
"Hey, Miller! Blake!" A male voice calls from the other side of the reception counter, where the two receptionists seem to be handing out room keys.
"I'll go get ours," Dean offers.
Eli and I stare at each other as he leaves.
After a silence that lasts too long, he clears his throat, glancing down at his shoes before looking back at me. "What's wrong with your shower then?"
"I don't know. That's why I can't use it."
He nods. "Right. You sure it's broken?"
"Again. If I knew, I wouldn't need help."
"Maybe you're just not using it right."
"Wanna go take a look yourself if you're so skeptical?"
Eli's face flashes with something too brief to name, before he regains composure. Watching his throat move with a gulp makes me realize how my question could be interpreted.
"I didn't mean it like..."
"No, you probably didn't."
"I wasn't-"
"Of course not. Your girlfriend probably wouldn't appreciate that."
I frown, suddenly confused into shock. "What?"
Eli gives me a pointed look that seems just a tad annoyed. "Rachel?"
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"No."
"No what?"
"Rachel and I, we're not... Uhm, we..." I scratch the back of my neck, surprised by my own awkwardness. "She left. For college. New York."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"So you two aren't..."
"We never really were." I shrug. "I mean, we were but... It wasn't, like, serious."
"Right." Eli nods. "You don't do serious."
"Don't I?"
"Do you?"
My mouth opens to reply, but then Eli cuts me off, "Dean's coming."
"I have our keys." He grins. "Do you want to come up and use our shower or not?"
"Uhm," I glance at Eli and then Dean. "Eli was saying he might come up to my room to take a look at my shower." The flash of surprise in Eli's eyes is quickly tucked back into his usual mask of subdued emotions. I smile coyly at Dean. "He doesn't believe it's actually broken. Thinks I'm just incompetent."
"Just a gut a feeling," Eli mutters.
"Oh. Okay." Dean nods. "I'll head up by myself then. I always need to crash after flying and we should sleep before our game."
"Yeah, sure. Go ahead."
"Here's your key." Dean hands Eli his keycard.
"Thanks."
A few more players bid Eli good night as they pass us on the way to the elevator, and then we're alone.
"I'm supposed to take a look at your shower then?" He asks, a spark of challenge in his eyes.
"You were the one who didn't believe me."
"So it's a pride thing then?"
I bite back a smile. "What else could it be?"
He doesn't answer.
"Should we go up then?"
I'm not even sure what I'm doing. But when Eli follows me into the elevator, I don't have it in me to rationalize this. My room is right across the hall from Chloe's, and Helga's is just down by the end of the hallway.
I open the door without looking at Eli and step inside my room. He glances up and down the hallway before following me inside.
The room is the typical clean and sterile hotel room. The bed is big, centered against a blue painted wall, covered in white linens. A big plasma screen is set across from it, with a desk to the corner by the window, which stretches from ceiling to floor, like a wall of glass facing the outside world.
I walk up to the window to close the curtains, shutting us in, away from anyone's sight.
When I turn around, Eli is still standing where I left him, hand gripping the strap of his large duffel bag and face completely unreadable.
"What now?" He asks evenly.
"You tell me," I say.
"You brought me up here."
"And you followed me."
"To look at your shower."
"Right through there." I point to the door to the bathroom.
Eli pushes it open and I follow him inside. The bathroom is almost as spacious as the rest of the room, with a double sink and a hydromassage shower big enough to fit three large adults, full of buttons and levers to control all the water functions. Too bad the only water function I want isn't working. That is, simply running.
Eli takes a look, testing some of the buttons before he tries the center one I've tried to twist or pull countless times before going down to the lobby. The water starts running. He arches his eyebrows at me.
Turns out it was neither a twist nor a pull situation. It was both. First pull, then twist.
"Shut up."
He smiles. "I didn't say anything."
"I tried doing that too, you know." That's a lie.
"I did it better."
"Cocky much?"
"You're very defensive for someone who lost an intelligence match with a shower."
"Chinese showers are too complicated."
He snorts and I smile, taking a step toward him. He doesn't move away.
"Thank you for fixing my shower," I say.
He tilts his head. "Wasn't broken."
I take another step. "I still feel like I should show my appreciation."
His eyes slip briefly down to my lips and my stomach contorts with heat. I take another step forward, taking me back to memories of around two years ago, at The Lodge's kitchen, where I told him I wasn't stepping any closer.
I don't get any closer now either. Biting my lip, I wait for him to close the distance if he wants to.
For a couple of excruciating seconds, he waits long enough to make me feel like he won't.
Then he does.
It's the first time we've kissed since we said goodbye.
I don't know what I expected. Fireworks, butterflies, familiarity, neither, all of the above.
Our mouths fit together without ever having to take a moment to find our rhythm - the rhythm is already there, never forgotten. He asks for entrance into my mouth, or maybe I ask for entrance in his. Either way our tongues are involved.
His hand grips my waist while the other cups my face and I realize mine were already on his shoulders. I trail one down to his bicep and the other to his chest.
I've been dying to feel the changes in his body since I saw him again at home four months ago. He's solid. All hard muscle stretched taunt underneath warm skin. I want to see him, and just that prospect has me moaning into the kiss.
My hands rush to the hem of his t-shirt, trying to get it off, and Eli pulls away. I let him take a step back.
He's breathless and flushed, lips swollen from the urgency of our kiss. One hand goes up to his hair, pulling the gray beanie off.
He takes me in, eyes moving down my body languidly. I can only hope I look as affected as he does. Cheeks just as flushed, hair just as messy, chest just as erratic in its movements, lips equally parted and tingling for more. That desire to show him just how much he gets go md me is sudden but not a surprise.
I bite my lip again. "I still need a shower."
He gulps.
"You should join me."
He shakes his head. "I can't."
"Shower?"
"No, I-" He closes his eyes, like he needs to sober himself up to say this. "I have a game tomorrow. I can't do this."
I raise my eyebrows. "You can't have sex before a game?"
Eli licks his lips, eyes on me. "Not like this."
At first, I don't know what he means. Like this because it's me? Because it's a man? Because it's been so long? Because we haven't talked about the million things we could have talked about?
"It may be just a pre-season game but..." He looks like he's struggling to get the words out. When they finally come, it's through gritted teeth. "I need to be able to move."
Oh. Like this.
Smiling, I step into his space again, leaning in to drop a kiss on his neck. He doesn't resist me, leans into it in fact. I drop another kiss just beneath his jaw, then graze my lips softly over his ear.
"What if I do it?" I whisper. "Like that."
He pulls back to look at me. "Yeah?"
I nod.
"What about your competition?"
"Not for a couple of days." I trail my lips over his warm skin to kiss his cheek.
Eli's shaky breath fills me with hope. When his hand comes back to my waist, my stomachs does a full three-sixty turn.
"Okay," he whispers against my lips before we kiss again.
My hands move with a will of their own, pulling his t-shirt over his head. He looks just as it felt beneath my hands. Strong shoulders, smooth chest, hard stomach, muscular arms. All firmly set underneath pale golden skin.
I never knew I was so into the jock body type until I was. Or maybe it's just Eli. Maybe that's my type now. Just Eli.
The rest of our clothes are off in a blur. The shower is in fact not broken as we get on it. We kiss under the jets of warm water, hands exploring each other desperately. Like we've been starved of this for too long - which I guess we have - and we don't know when we'll ever have it again - which I guess we don't.
Eli's skin flushes under the warmth, glistening with water. When he kisses my neck, hand sliding down expertly to touch me, my brain ceases all activity for a solid second. I have a vague notion of his mouth descending from my neck to my chest, and his hand working wonders on me, before it registers in my under-performing brain that Eli is on his knees.
There's a single moment of realization before his mouth takes me in and my legs fail me, making me lean on the shower wall for dear life. One of Eli's hands on the back of my thigh steadies me.
I don't even get to properly relish in the image of Eli Blake, naked and wet, on his knees before me. It's honestly embarrassing the little time that goes by before I put a hand on his head and cry, "I'm too close."
Instead of listening to my warning, though, Eli keeps going. All the way to the end of the line. And through that too.
At first, I'm too high on the ecstasy of completion. Then, after a while, I'm stunned stupid by the realization of what just happened. Of what Eli just did for me.
"I thought we agreed to do it the other way." It sounds almost like a whine, but I'm past caring.
Eli smiles, still on his knees. That image will haunt me till the end of my days. "We will. It's just easier like this. I mean, if it's your..." He blushes suddenly as he trails off.
It's my turn to smile. "My first time? Like this, yeah. But this isn't really fair."
Eli stands up to say something, but I take him in my hand before he can open his mouth. His head drops to my shoulder, hands gripping my arms. I smile proudly to myself at the desperate hiss that escapes his lips.
"If you keep that up," he starts, voice strained. A useless threat. Unfinished and empty.
I keep it up.
Eli's grip tightens around my biceps. "It's been a really long time."
I'm fascinated by that confession. It makes me want to keep going even more. So I do.
And Eli lets go soon after.
I give him a minute to recover before we get cleaned up in silence. Eli leaves the shower first. Anyone else and I would be confused. But, from Eli, I know it means he's giving me time to take as long as I want in the shower. I appreciate it.
He's sitting on my bed, in a towel, when I get out. When I approach, he spreads his legs invitingly for me to stand in front of him, like a natural response of his body to my proximity.
We kiss. Like this kiss is the only goal. I still can't get over how perfectly our lips fit together. It's almost all-consuming.
Everything from here on is incredibly slow and sweet.
We find our position horizontally with ease, bodies fitting together like they were always meant to be that way. Eli's hands take their time to explore my body all over again, everywhere, even after my extra twenty minutes in the shower.
Of all the times I thought of this, I never knew if I could truly find it in me to really want to try it. But ever since I met Eli I'm starting to get the sense that there isn't anything I wouldn't try, as long as it's with him.
It's all worth it.
Eli is unbelievably gentle, hanging off of every word of instruction or request out of my mouth. It's just like that first night, even if our roles are reversed. I feel fully in control, of my own body and Eli's. And by the end, I'm so incredibly sated that I think I'll fall asleep right away unless I force myself to stay awake. To bask in the afterglow, which I find lasts even beyond the immediate euphoria, into a calm sense of satisfaction.
It's in that mellow, lax state, trying to hang on to consciousness, that I'm in when I hear Eli sneak out the room in the middle of the night.