NEW YEARS DAY CALLS FOR A TREAT: DOUBLE UPDATE 

(because i'm not mean enough to leave you hanging after whatever tf THIS is) (with love <3, I'm so so so so so sorry) 

also i feel like this weirdly doesn't fit all that great but i plotted everything out before writing and just missed things I needed to mention previously. 

HÅKON

Pick up hockey wrapped up and we went back to our day-to-day in Sweden, work out in the morning, fuck around in the afternoon, bother Isa and Leo, wander around looking for things to do, watching Rocket be so blissfully confused by all the Swedish being spoken around him. Isa and Leo are heading home for the weekend (I still haven't told my parents I'm home) just to work out some details and it's something Rocket and I have definitely been looking forward to. Nobody to come bother us and need us to do something, and, better yet, nobody in the next room over.

Isa and Leo shut the door on Friday night and it's like Milo and I haven't been alone with each other in years. They're only gone for two days, but Rocket and I haven't been alone, seriously alone, sober and alone, since Canada.

His hands are wild and I can definitely tell he's nervous. It doesn't matter all that much, I'm with him, that's all that matters.

He's got his hands knotted up in the front of the t-shirt I'm wearing, my back against the cool wall.

I burrow my face into his neck, sucking on his skin and giving him a quick bite as his breathing picks up, chest roaring next to mine.

"Fuck me," it doesn't register in my head at first.

"What?"

I stand straight again, looking at him. "You heard me."

"I did." I mumble. "You're not ready yet, there's things you have to-"

"I did them." His eyes don't break contact with mine, green green green and determined.

I clear my throat. "Oh."

"Like, all of it, we're good to go, we can just-"

"Milo." I stop him. "I need you to be honest with me."

He frowns, hands loosening from my shirt.

"Do you," I squeeze my eyes shut. "Do you wanna have sex with me or do you want to just not be a virgin. Those are two very different things."

He stays quiet. "Well, I, clearly it's both but it's not like-"

I sigh. "I'm not gonna fuck you just so you can have the comfort of having that behind you. I want it to matter."

"I do too and if we do this now it will! It's not like you're some random fucking guy I picked up just to have sex with!"

"Sometimes it feels like it!" I snap back. The second it's out of my mouth I regret it, but I needed to get it off my chest.

"What?"

Good god. "Every time I get you alone it's nonstop, okay? I don't know if you know this but I've been deliberately steering clear of you in this type of situation because of it!"

"You could've fucking told me! And why the hell aren't you, like, excited for this? Aren't you supposed to just like leap at this shit? Isn't that what guys do?"

"Rocket, please." I pinch the bridge of my nose. "Just, I don't want to have sex with you because you feel like it's some big fucking thing that you missed."

"It is!" He throws his hands up. "I'm twenty three years old!"

"That's not a big fucking deal!" I snap. "I'm twenty six and I should not have had sex before now. It's not a stupid little age thing, it's not like everyone hits eighteen and should suddenly be completely ready to go out and have sex. Frankly, the more you talk about it the more I'm convinced that you being a fucking virgin at age 23 is a good thing!"

"How is it a good thing? Like literally every fucking other conversation we have with the guys is full of sex jokes and I just have to sit there and pretend like I fucking understand-"

"That's why I don't wanna have sex with you yet!" I try to keep my voice down because lord I know I'm scary and always am but frankly I don't think he gets this and don't think he ever will. "You're not fucking using it in terms of us you're just trying to make it about you, over and over it's just like I need to understand the jokes and I don't want to be the only one that's not done it and I wanna know what it's like. If you had had sex before you'd know it's just another fucking thing and that it's supposed to be between the two fucking people and not for the benefit of just one!"

"Then let it be just another fucking thing if that's what you say it is!"

"No!" I respond. "Because most of the time it's another fucking thing but not first times and it's sure as hell not going to be another fucking thing with us because with the way our whole fucking lives are structured I'd be willing to bet we're only going to be able to have sex like maybe once or twice a month at most! It can be another fucking thing with couples like Steph and August and Greenie and Jackie because they can have sex literally every night and not worry about it because that's just how it works!"

"And why the god hell can we not be like that? Just because you're a guy doesn't-"

"It does!" I want to shake him. "It would be fucking different if we weren't athletes, or if one of us wasn't or if both of us weren't! But Milo you know both of us are constantly fucking exhausted and the timing and the fucking everything about work is going to toss it all up in the air for the foreseeable future! Yeah, we'll be able to sneak some shit in sometimes but it's not gonna be at all like normal people have it."

"Håkon I just want to fucking do it! I feel fucking invalid and stupidly stupidly innocent all the time-"

"You're acting like an incel." I grumble.

He immediately gets defensive. "I'm fucking not!"

"You are," I shrug. "What would it look like if you were going to be the top in the dynamic? It would look rape-y, that's what it would look like."

"But I'm not."

"But you're still fucking pressuring me into sex that I've said no to."

"I'm not pressuring you into it I'm just trying to figure out why you don't want to because so far you haven't said a personal reason but rather it's got to do with me and I want to know why."

"I have personal reasons too but the big one is that you need to get out of your own head about this."

He groans. "What the fuck does that mean?"

"Would you be asking like this if everyone else- fuck it, if just Steph was still a virgin too?"

"What?"

"Is this your fucking reputation or your attraction to me? Is this about being able to be one of the fucking guys or actually wanting me?"

His jaw sets. "So it's about you now?"

"Yes!" I snap. "Yes it's about me! You can't fuck me without me being involved, what you do with me is going to leave an emotional dent in me too!"

"That-"

"I'm not gonna let you emotionally wreck me by turning the hell around ten seconds after we finish and telling the first ten people in your phone because I fucking hate being public about anything and you fucking know that. I'd be fine if you told Steph because I get it, he's your best friend and you tell each other everything and that's just how that works but I don't think I could handle it if everyone knew. It's fine if you told him and then were just casual about it around everyone else but you're not a casual guy! You're fucking explosive and really really good with people and really public so it's gonna be common knowledge and I'm me. That's one of the spots where we actually need to talk about shit because I can't do this if you're going to just let anyone and everyone know."

"This is the internalized homophobia thing-"

I cut him off sharply in the middle of the sentence and can't stop myself from yelling. "It's not the fucking homophobia thing it's not the fucking media thing it's not the self hate thing it's my own fucking personal boundaries!" I holler. "You know damn well it would be the same type of response if I was with a girl!"

His shoulders raise up in frustration. "You're just gonna fucking assume that the first thing I'm gonna do is brag about this because I can tell you right now-"

"I know you better than that."

"You haven't even known me for a full year!" He yells back. "You probably don't even know my birthday off the top of your head-"

"August 18th."

"That's not the fucking point." He groans.

"August 18th and I know you like your coffee with cinnamon but it makes you tired and I know that sometimes you have panic attacks when there's a lot going on and when that happens you take a long cold shower and go for a run and I know when you're nervous you wring your hands and I know every single one of the tics you get when you're tired and I know you're allergic to cherries and things that are cherry flavored to a point where it makes your throat swell up and I know that your love language is time and you wish you could draw but you can't because you can't focus on it for long enough and I know you'd rather die than work an office job and I know the only reason that you're in the league right now is because when you were fourteen hockey was the one thing that reminded you of being home and I know that-"

"Okay! Fine! So what you know a lot about me but you still can't assume I'd do that to you."

"You're lying to yourself."

His jaw tics again. "I'm not. You just told me that you'd be uncomfortable if I told people so I won't."

"Rocket."

"So you don't trust me."

"No, I fucking trust you, I just know your personality and that-"

"You don't trust me."

"No I just-"

"You can say it, it's fine."

I narrow my eyes at him. "Fine. I don't. Not past that point. Happy?"

"No, frankly."

"So I don't trust you not to make a spectacle out of it and I don't think you actually want to have sex with me as an act in our relationship but rather as an act of your own personal status and I don't think you see me as a person as much as your pet basket-case and it drives me a little crazy."

He's clearly thrown off by this. "Pet basket case? You're kidding, right?"

"No. I'm not." I respond.

"You wanna explain that or what?"

"We're not arguing about that right now-"

"Well we're arguing and I'd rather have one big fucking argument than two big ones." He throws his hands up.

"Well, fine." I run a hand through my hair in preparation for something I didn't expect to explain today. "Ugh, there's no way I'm gonna get this out right."

"Then try, my feelings are already fucked so just go for it."

"Alright, yeah, fine," I shrug. "So you fucking cling to me like some barnacle all season because your best friend got busy all of a sudden even though I was clearly uncomfortable with how close you were but that's fine. That was good. That helped me. Now you fluctuate between acting like my boyfriend and acting like a fucking therapist and I hate it." I pull in a breath. I'm explaining this badly. "You don't fucking say anything about what you're feeling, ever. It's always everything about me and my own feelings and my own shit and at this point I think you're getting a bit of a power rush over whatever sense of success you got from getting me here in the first place."

"How could you say that-"

"I can because I feel like it's true!" I respond. "I wouldn't have said it if I didn't think that's what's happening! There's a thin line between proud boyfriend and egotistical therapist!"

"I'm not some fucking-"

"Then stop fucking acting like it!" I snap. "Do you care about my feelings or do you like the satisfaction that you've been able to help me out of the stupid rut I was in at the beginning of the season? Do you like me or the idea of me."

He doesn't respond to that. "Go brush your fucking teeth and go to bed, I need a moment."

"Good. Fine." I say. "Go have your little moment but don't bother trying to cuddle up to me when you get back." I spin on my heel and head for the bathroom, absolutely fuming.