Power Play

Chapter 3-1

Chapter 3

Ryan skirts his mother’s questions about

Dante. Yes, they just met. Yes, he’s in the skate club. Espinosa,

that’s his last name, that’s all Ryan knows. He works at the skate

shop in town—no, Ryan doesn’t remember seeing him there before. If

he had, he would’ve gone down to Later Skater more often, every day

in fact, but he doesn’t tell his mother this. She doesn’t know he’s

like that. He personally doesn’t plan to inform her, either.

She must notice he doesn’t date girls—he was never Mr. Popularity

in high school and he’s not one of those guys with the drop-dead

looks, not like Dante is—but she’s never said anything, she’s never

come out and asked him if he’s gay. He thinks she doesn’t really

want to know. That’s okay, though, because he doesn’t really want

to tell her.

Actually, he doesn’t think anyone

knows. His dad doesn’t, definitely not, and there wasn’t anyone in

high school he fooled around with—he was the shy sort, wasn’t given

to experimentation, the only guy he liked was the school’s center

on the basketball team and he wasn’t about to approach him.

He wasn’t that gutsy. Jacoby might suspect something, he’s Ryan’s

roommate at the college…or rather, he was, before the accident. The

only guy Ryan’s ever been with was a boy he met at a frat party he

went to last semester—Jacoby said they should have a good time

before the final game of the semester, just let loose before exams,

what would it hurt? The guy’s name was Noah something or other,

Ryan can’t remember his last name, but from the moment he walked

into the party, he felt the guy staring at him, watching him,

waiting. After three or four beers, Ryan managed to make eye

contact across the smoky room, and with a nod of his head, Noah

indicated the darkened hall that led to bedrooms at the back of the

house. Another swig of his drink to bolster his courage and Ryan

followed him.

Noah was tall and skinny with a mop of

blonde curls on the top of his head, not really Ryan’s type but he

was the first boy to ever show interest in him, and the alcohol

made him bold. When Ryan closed the door to one of the bedrooms

behind him, Noah was there, pushing him up against the door, his

hands on Ryan’s chest, smoothing their way down to his waist, his

mouth hot and wet against Ryan’s own. Fingers fumbled at his belt,

his zipper, his crotch, rubbing and kneading until Ryan moaned, his

arms coming up around Noah’s neck, his hands fisting in thick

curls. He felt hands slip into the front of his pants, into his

underwear, grasping at flesh that had never felt another’s touch,

and he never thought it’d feel like this, furious and eager and

needy. Noah’s lips were softer than he imagined, his fingers

probing and gentle and his knees went weak, he had to grip the

boy’s hair to keep himself standing, he had never felt this

before. Then Noah knelt before him, took him in his mouth and Ryan

gasped his name, yes, yes, yes—

A knock on the door, and suddenly Jacoby’s

voice interrupted them. “Ryan? You in there, man? We’re heading

back to campus.”

Almost reluctantly, Ryan pushed Noah away.

He struggled to get his zipper up over his swollen erection and

wondered how bad it would look if he just told the guys to forget

it, leave him here. But they had a game the next day, which meant

practice at first light, and he was already going to be hung over.

“Sorry,” he mumbled. Noah wiped his mouth with the back of his

hand, shrugged like it was no big deal, didn’t bother to give him

his number or even a kiss goodbye. Ryan wanted to ask if he could

see him again but who was he kidding? It was the heat of the

moment, the feel of another’s mouth on his d**k, the kisses and the

hands and that was it, this guy meant nothing to him.

When he opened the door, Jacoby saw Noah’s

disheveled hair, Ryan’s shirt pulled free from his jeans, and

frowned. On the way back to the dorm, he told Ryan to be careful.

“Noah’s got a reputation,” he said darkly. “You don’t want to mess

with him.”

“I wasn’t—” Ryan started. His lips

still burned with Noah’s kisses.

“I’m just saying be careful, that’s

all.” Jacoby didn’t elaborate, he didn’t ask if Ryan was getting it

on with the guy, he didn’t want to know and Ryan didn’t offer up

the information. He did notice that his friend stopped dressing in

their room, though, preferring to take his clothes into the

bathroom, and in the locker room he stayed out of the showers until

Ryan was finished. But Ryan’s not interested in Jacoby, he’s not

into any of the guys on the team, he’s not even into Noah and he

really hasn’t seen the guy again, once or twice on campus and not

at any of the games and that’s just fine by him.

And then the accident. Who’d look twice at a

boy in a wheelchair? A boy who’s not even all that to look at

normally, but with the chair and the brace on his leg, no one wants

to be caught staring, no one wants to gawk. Sometimes his

mother can’t even look his way when she talks to him—in the van she

glances in the rearview mirror as she speaks but she’s staring at

the window out the back, she’s not seeing him. She’s not even

listening to his answers when she asks about Dante, she doesn’t

care. She’s simply trying to fill the gap between them that grows

wider by the moment, and he gets the feeling that he could tell her

he thinks Dante’s the hottest boy he’s ever met, he could say he’d

like to get with him and not just about the web site either, and

she’d simply smile and nod, “That’s good, dear. I’m glad you made a

friend.”

But he doesn’t say anything, and in the

quiet of his mind he hopes Dante becomes something more than a

friend, because he’s never really had a boy—Noah doesn’t count—and

Dante’s not just cute…with that wavy hair that falls back from his

face, that dusky skin, those big dark eyes, the girls weren’t the

only ones swooning over him at the rink. He’s probably not into

guys, Ryan thinks, but he felt something when they were

together, something he can’t put his finger on, can’t quite

describe, but it put a hope in his heart, anticipation that wasn’t

there before. For the first time since he woke up in pain in the

hospital weeks ago, he’s looking forward to tomorrow. He already

has an idea for Dante’s web site, and he’ll fill the camera up with

pictures of the boy, racing over the ice like the wind, dressed in

that skin-tight bodysuit…and he actually had the audacity to ask if

Ryan could still get it up.

How can he not like him for that

alone?

His mother drops him off at the rink the

next morning by 7:30, same as the day before. He suspects she’s all

too happy to be rid of him for a few hours—as long as he’s not

wheeling around the house or holed up in the den, she can pretend

that things are still the same, he’s still at college and he’s

still whole. When he does walk again and things do go back

to normal, he suspects that she’ll never mention the accident, as

if it didn’t happen at all.

But going to the rink gets him out of the

house, at any rate, and today she stands by the side of the van but

doesn’t try to help him, just watches silently as he wheels up the

ramp into the building. He wonders if he’ll get a chance to talk

with Dante much before she’ll be back to take him to therapy at

ten. He hopes so.

The doors he had so much trouble with

yesterday are propped open now—his mother’s doing, more than

likely. She probably called someone late last night, pulled the

whole “My son is handicapped” routine that got her the parking

sticker at the dmv, guilt-tripped someone into making sure the

doors stay open. She had a fit the day before when she discovered

he had to push through them himself. “You can’t be doing stuff like

that, Ryan,” she said in clipped tones that left no room for

argument. “A boy in your condition…” Like he’s pregnant, or

something.

Cautiously he wheels down to the landing,

watching the hockey team already in the middle of a warm-up skate

around the ice. Yesterday he got some great shots of the practice,

even a few of that new kid, number 15, Clovsky or whatever Jacoby

called him. He seriously considered cutting him out—probably would

have, too, if he hadn’t met Dante. He was in a better mood after

that, and he couldn’t stop thinking about the skater, still can’t,

he can close his eyes even now and see that hair, that smile. He

laid awake last night, stared at the ceiling in his darkened room,

watched Dante skate circles around his mind. Hopefully he’ll get to

at least say hi before he has to leave today—

Dante’s already here.

He’s slouched down in the last seat of the

first row, right at the front of the landing, where he sat

yesterday to talk with Ryan. Wearing sweats and that leather

jacket, the one with the skate shop logo on the back, sneakers

instead of blades, his wavy hair hidden beneath a dark blue bandana

and his feet propped up on the railing, head buried in the collar

of his jacket, cheek pressed against one shoulder, eyes closed.

Asleep. Waiting for me, Ryan thinks, and that makes him grin

foolishly. He’s glad his friend’s eyes are shut, so he

doesn’t see how goofy he makes him. He winces when the wheels of

his chair squeak as he comes closer.

Dante stirs, stretching awake. “Hey,” he

murmurs, his voice low. “I didn’t know how early you’d get

here.”

With a nod at the hockey team below, Ryan

tells him, “Practice starts at 7:30. I’m running a little late.” He

positions himself at the end of the row beside Dante and wonders if

the boy can hear the pounding of his heart. I didn’t know how

early you’d get here…was he really waiting for him? Ryan

doesn’t dare believe that. He hopes he sounds nonchalant when he

asks, “So what are you doing here?”

Dante answers with a question of his own.

“You have to leave at what, ten?” When Ryan nods, he shrugs, a

gesture that settles him further down into the seat. “I didn’t

think I’d get a chance to talk to you before then,” he explains. “I

don’t know. If you want me to leave—”

“No, that’s okay.” Ryan shakes his

head for emphasis and then, because the sudden intimacy between

them makes him nervous, he says, “I didn’t think you had to race

again until this weekend.”

“I don’t, but I need the practice.”

Dante looks at him in a way no one else seems to be able to, looks

at the chair he’s in as if it’s nothing to be ashamed of, looks at

the brace on his leg with nothing more than a cursory glance, looks

at his face and not some spot just to the left of his shoulder,

looks him in the eye—that’s what Ryan thinks he likes most

about his new friend. The fact that he can look him in the eye when

he talks to him, it makes him feel human again.

Dante reaches out, touches the brace that

encircles Ryan’s lower leg. “How are you feeling this morning?” he

asks.

Ryan’s all too aware of that hand hovering

above his leg—he can almost feel it through the worn jeans he

wears. “Fine,” he whispers as he watches Dante’s fingers trace down

one of the cool metal bars of his brace. There are two such bars,

one on either side of his leg, thick, ugly things that he hates.

They’re attached to his knee and ankle with hard rubber grips to

keep his leg immobile—when Ashlin’s skate cut into him, it sliced

through his muscle easily, tore the ligaments in both legs, and

shattered the bone of his right calf into a million tiny pieces.

He’s had three surgeries to reconstruct the lower part of his leg

and the doctors assure him that as it heals, there are cosmetic

procedures they can do to smooth out the bumpy ridges, cover over

the red, angry skin. He’s not so sure, though—he’s seen the naked

flesh and it hurts his heart just to look at it. He doesn’t think

he’ll ever wear shorts again.

But last night he didn’t dream of the

accident, he didn’t relive the pain, he didn’t toss and turn in his

sleep and when he woke up, he was too distracted to notice his

legs. For the first time in weeks, he had other things on his mind,

like this boy sitting beside him, so unabashedly touching his

brace. “Better, actually,” he tells Dante, and it’s the truth. He

feels a lot better than he did this time yesterday. “It

doesn’t hurt so much today.”

“Does it usually?” Dante wants to

know.

His fingers trail up the brace, circle

around the hinge at the top that connects the two pieces of metal,

his thumb brushing against Ryan’s knee almost absently. Watching

that hand, feeling the faint press of flesh through the thin denim,

Ryan thinks about the way it felt when Noah touched him in places

just inches from where Dante’s hand is now, and he doesn’t remember

quite what it is they’re talking about here. “Does it what?” he

asks. His voice is thick and soft, like cotton candy.

Dante laughs. “Does it usually hurt?” he

asks, and then he looks up at Ryan and grins. “You’re not paying

any attention to me.”

Oh no, Ryan thinks, you have my

undivided attention, I swear. But he doesn’t say that, he

can’t, and when Dante laughs again, Ryan simply smiles back.

“So you gonna take my picture today?” Dante asks.

Ryan digs into his backpack, grateful for

something to do. Extracting the digital camera, he says, “I dumped

the memory last night so it’s ready to go. Do you think you’ll get

out on the ice before I have to leave?”

“Are you coming back?” Dante keeps

doing that, asking him something when he asks first, as if his

answers depend on whatever Ryan has to say. It’s a heady thought,

that Dante’s planning his responses around Ryan’s, he likes that.

When Ryan doesn’t reply immediately, Dante adds, “I mean, after

your therapy. How long does that take anyway?”

“About an hour.” Filled with torture,

too, the therapist smiling like an evil clown in a funhouse,

pushing him through another set of sit-ups, another leg-lift,

another painful squeeze of his knees. He hates therapy, hates the

fact that he needs it, hates the way they all tell him he’s doing

good and he can’t see any difference, he’s still in this damn

chair, isn’t he? What kind of an improvement is that? He can’t

walk, isn’t strong enough yet to even try to walk, and by

the time his session is over he’ll hurt so bad, in so many places,

that he won’t even notice the tears that fill his eyes and spill

down his cheeks. He’ll go home, lie down, bury his face in his

pillow and he’ll be in no mood to come back here, he doesn’t want

Dante to see him like that. Lowering his voice, he whispers, “No, I

don’t think I can…I mean—”

“I understand.” He glances up at Dante

and sees that he does understand, somehow, incredibly, he

knows what Ryan’s going through, and it makes Ryan fall that much

harder. If I wasn’t in this wheelchair, he thinks, but he

stems that before it goes any further because what exactly

would he do then? He’d leave the rink right after practice

and never even know someone like Dante exists in this world, in

this city, here, with him. And if he somehow did meet the

boy, he’d never in a million years gather up the courage to

approach him. His whole experience with guys is summed up in a few

heated moments at a party, grasping hands and hot lips, that’s

it.

Dante stands, shrugs out of his jacket,

tosses it to the seat beside him. He has a sweatshirt on

underneath, Crosskeys Skate Club written across the front,

the shirttails of a flannel shirt hanging down to cover his butt.

When he pulls the sweatshirt off, the flannel shirt comes up with

it and the t-shirt beneath that, exposing a smooth stomach, dusky

skin, the band of his underwear above sweatpants that hang a little

too low on his hips. With a guilty start, Ryan looks away. Below

them a practice game has started and he sees number 15 go for a

goal, Jacoby on assist. A familiar ache opens in his chest—that

should be him out on the ice, him bearing down on the

goalie, him sinking the shot. His throat closes up as the

puck sails effortlessly into the net.

Tugging down his shirts, Dante flops back

into his seat, his sweatshirt balled up in his lap. “Look at this,”

he says, and when Ryan obeys, he pulls the sleeve of his shirt up

over one slim arm. Ryan sees tanned skin marred by a thin scar that

runs the length of Dante’s forearm, from the base of his thumb to

the crook of his elbow. Tracing the scar with one finger, Dante

tells him, “Semi-finals last year, I got tangled up with Dietrich

in the final stretch. Those blades are sharp, you know?” Ryan

nods—he knows.

Tentatively, he touches the scar, Dante’s

skin warm beneath his…will his legs heal this completely? Will this

pain that rattles his bones narrow down to something as simple as

this? A scar, a memory, a battle story told to another skater down

the road? He hopes so.

His finger almost glows next to Dante’s dark

flesh, he’s that pale. Self-conscious, he curls his hand into a

fist to hide his ragged nails, but he can still feel Dante on his

fingertips, softer than a boy has a right to be. I want you,

he thinks, and he’s not sure what all that would entail but he sure

as hell would like to find out. Desire shoots through him, as

poignant as the loss he feels when he looks at the players on the

ice, and he has to turn away before Dante sees that need, that

want, in his eyes. “I wasn’t in a wheelchair,” Dante tells him,

“but I had a cast on for weeks, and I had some therapy, too, but

not much. My mom’s insurance wouldn’t cover more than a few

visits.”

Ryan doesn’t know what to say. I’m

sorry doesn’t seem to cut it, and he’s afraid if he opens his

mouth then other words will tumble out, words to describe the

images in his mind, the emotions swirling through him, the memory

of another’s hands on his body, another’s lips on his mouth. The

silence grows between them, cloying like thick perfume.

Suddenly Dante laughs. “They didn’t retire

my number, though,” he says, nodding at Ryan’s jersey hanging above

the goal box. “They just gave it to someone else, and I had to buy

a new cover when I came back.”

The laughter breaks the tension that

envelops them and Ryan laughs, too. “I saw the crowd go wild when

they announced your name.” He nudges Dante playfully, grinning when

his friend giggles and squirms away. “You can’t tell me they don’t

love you.”

“Okay, okay, they do!” Dante cries. He

catches Ryan’s arm when he tries to elbow him again, and his hands

burn through Ryan’s shirt sleeve, he holds his breath, don’t let

go, he prays. To his surprise, Dante doesn’t—instead he

smoothes down the fabric that’s bunched along Ryan’s arm, his touch

gentle. He watches his own fingers as they flatten out Ryan’s

sleeve, and with a slight frown he says, “The crowd does, anyway.

The girls, yeah, they’re cool, too.” Ryan feels a stab of jealousy

at that, the girls, of course they’d love a boy like Dante.

Softly Dante admits, “But I’m not so sure about the rest of the

team.”

“Why not?” Ryan can’t imagine anyone

not falling for Dante’s bright eyes, his quick smile, his vibrant

personality. He’s only known him one day and he’s already

gone.

But Dante shrugs. He releases Ryan’s arm,

sinks down in his seat, bites his lower lip and looks away. Ryan

doesn’t think he’ll answer, or if he does it’ll be with another

question—for some reason this bothers him, Ryan can see it in the

set of his jaw, the hunch of his shoulders, and he wants to take

the question back, he wants to return to the laughter and the

smiles and the touching, he liked that, Dante’s hand on his arm. He

wonders what he can say or do to get back to that.

“That’s not entirely true,” Dante

tells him with a wry grin. “I’m lying. The team’s great. It’s just

Wil who hates me.”

“Wil?” Ryan leans over and whispers

loudly, “Who’d hate someone like you?”

That brings a smile to Dante’s face,

and when he turns, his eyes shine and Ryan can almost believe he

sees a reflection of his own emotions in those brown depths. “You

remember yesterday?” Dante asks. Ryan nods, and his friend

continues. “Wil Dietrich, he’s the one dq’ed for knocking me off

the ice. I thought they’d call him on cross-tracking in the second

lap but then he ran me into the boards.”

Ryan remembers the crash—his heart leapt in

his chest, memories of pain flooded his mind, he saw his own

accident, his own body crushed into the boards, a deadly déjà

vu that almost made him choke in anger and grief as Dante went

down. But he barely landed on the ice before he was up again,

scrambling to get back in the race, shaking off the fall as if it

were nothing, the way Ryan had done a dozen times before. He saw

Dietrich’s hand on Dante’s hip, it was a deliberate push, and the

crowd booed when the other skater crossed the finish line first. He

doesn’t know much about speedskating, but he was pretty sure any

referee worth his zebra stripes would have to call on that one.

And he was right. “He pushed you,” Ryan

says. Dante’s smile fades, and his gaze drops to Ryan’s hand

gripping the arm of his wheelchair. “I saw it from here,

Dante.”

“That’s short track,” Dante murmurs,

but he doesn’t sound too convinced. “Happens all the

time.”

Ryan doesn’t buy it. “What’s his problem

with you anyway?” he wants to know. At Dante’s slight shrug, anger

soars in him, blinding him. “Dammit, you’re the best skater the

club has—I’ve seen you on the ice, you’re amazing. The crowd thinks

so, I think so…” Dante looks up at that, and Ryan turns away

from those dark eyes that search his. Careful, he warns

himself. He doesn’t want to scare off his new friend. “All I’m

saying is you’re good. You know you’re good, everyone knows

it. What, he hates you because you’re better than he is? How old is

he anyway? Two?”

For a few moments, neither of them speaks.

Ryan holds onto his anger, it’s a comfortable emotion for him now,

he feels at home in the hate and the pain. His hands are balled

into unconscious fists and if he wasn’t in this chair, he’d ask

that Dietrich kid just what the hell his problem is—he’s not one

for fighting but he’s a hockey player, for Christ’s sake,

he’s good with his fists and quick on his feet and just let him get

that bastard out on the ice, he’ll show him…only you’re not

getting out there any time soon, he reminds himself, his anger

turning into helpless rage. You’re stuck in this chair whether

you like it or not, and you can’t go picking fights with some guy

you don’t even know just because he doesn’t like Dante. How old are

you?

“I’m sorry,” Ryan mutters when Dante

doesn’t say anything. His friend picks at the sleeve of Ryan’s

shirt and doesn’t respond. “I didn’t mean—”

“It’s okay,” Dante whispers. With a

sigh, he explains, “It doesn’t bother me much, I’m used to it. My

mom’s not exactly well off, you know? It’s just me and her, and

sometimes kids bully you just because you don’t wear what they

wear, or you don’t have the shoes they do, or you’re not cool

enough, you’re not smart enough, you’re not what they want you to

be.” The corner of his mouth pulls up in a halfhearted attempt at a

smile, and he laughs. “So I became fast enough, and then faster,

and one day I’m going to skate out of here, you’ll see. Olympic

gold, that’s where I’m headed. Just wait.”

Ryan wants to cover Dante’s hand with his,

stare deep into his eyes, tell him he believes that, he

knows it’ll happen, he feels it in his soul, this boy was

meant for so much more than this town, the projects where he lives,

the minimum wage job he holds to pay his skate club fees. But he

can’t find the words and he doesn’t dare touch his friend that

intimately, they just met, he has to keep reminding himself of

this. Another sigh and then Dante says, “I don’t care. He can get

his father to buy his way into the quarterfinals, but we’ll see

who’s the better skater—”

“Wait.” Ryan holds up one hand and

shakes his head, confused. “You said yesterday only two skaters

from each race advance to the quarters. You and that other

kid—”

“Wil’s father is the club

sponsor,” Dante tells him. Biting his lower lip, he rolls his eyes

and says, “Seems he threatened to pull his funding because he

thought it was a bad call. Wil finished second, that was his

argument.”

“So he’s going?” Ryan asks,

incredulous. “They didn’t bump you out—”

Dante shakes his head quickly. “Oh no,” he

says, “they can’t do that. They charge good money to people who

want to see me skate at the heats. And after yesterday’s crowd?

They can’t say I’m not going to race this weekend now, no way.”

That’s a relief. Ryan glances down at the

team still on the ice and wonders briefly if he should be taking

pictures of this, but he’s saving the camera for Dante. He wants

this web site to be the best out there, he wants it to help people

notice Dante, to help him towards that gold medal at the Winter

Games years from now. He doesn’t really care about the hockey

team’s site—he just wants his pictures off of there, that’s it. But

there’s a daydream playing out in his mind, Dante and him in his

makeshift bedroom at his parents’ house…he turns from the computer

to show Dante the page he’s designed, Dante’s eyes go wide, he says

he loves it, he loves it, and the next thing Ryan knows, the

boy’s in his lap, kissing him, his hands on his face and neck and

chest and his knees a sweet weight against his crotch. A wonderful

image, one he shouldn’t be thinking. They’re barely even friends

and he’s already hungry for something more.

Just to clarify, Ryan asks, “So you’re in

the quarterfinals?”

“Yeah.” Dante gives him a sunny grin.

“You coming to that? It’s this weekend, it’d be great if you could.

Take some pictures for my web site—how’s that coming along,

anyway?”

The web site. Is that the only reason

Dante wants him there? Ryan tells himself he shouldn’t be

disappointed, he did offer to do the site, but he’s having trouble

reading Dante—the boy skips from topic to topic, from skating to

his site to Ryan’s legs and back again. Sometimes he seems

interested in Ryan, sometimes he looks at him with a light in his

eyes that Ryan knows means what he hopes it means, it

must be the same dizzy nervousness spinning inside of him,

the same crush of emotion, has to. When he touches him,

there’s a spark that tickles Ryan’s skin, doesn’t Dante feel that?

When he looks his way, Ryan feels the rest of the world

eclipse—surely he sees that too? But then, sometimes, Ryan thinks

Dante’s just being friendly, this is just the way he is, chatty and

giggly and open, it’s nothing to get excited about. Tell that to

my body when he touches me, Ryan thinks. Tell that to my

heart.

“You’re coming, right?” Dante asks

again.

Who am I kidding? I’m like those girls

that come here just to see him—he is the only reason I’m here

today, right? Does it matter if Dante doesn’t feel the same?

At least I have something, Ryan tells himself. Dante

did show up early today just to talk to him after all.

Matching his friend’s smile, Ryan assures him, “I’m there.”