All We Need Is Daylight

Frank finds himself jarred awake way too early in the morning by the sound of Ray’s alarm, which would be a totally gnarly guitar riff under any circumstances other than it being an alarm clock. There’s no way to condition yourself to hate something quite as much as setting it as your alarm.

“Fucking hell,” Frank says, immediately grabbing a pillow and putting it over his head while Ray turns the alarm off. Frank rolls over, only to feel something sharp and painful digging into his ribcage, so he forces his eyes open to look down and sees a textbook wedged into the blankets. He groans, and realizes that he must have fallen asleep while trying to read it. He can actually remember resting his eyes just for a moment last night, a little break from studying, and now he’s here.

“Wake up!” Ray says, and throws something at Frank’s bed which lands at his feet, but Frank groans out with irritation anyway. He lifts up what he finds to be a shirt, and then throws it back at Ray, landing it on his head, making Frank throw his fist in the air with pride.

“Eat a dick,” is what Ray has to say in response.

Frank climbs out of bed, feeling very belittled at the fact that he has to literally climb out of his own goddamn bed. He’s also very reluctant to be awake, and he’s sure he’s going to fall asleep if he doesn’t get some coffee in his system sometime soon. Frank has a knack for being able to fall asleep anywhere, and sometimes, he doesn’t even try to. He can sleep in cars, on the bus, he one time fell asleep in a coffin. It was Halloween, it was a prop coffin, but his mom made fun of him for the next eight years anyway. She still makes fun of him about it.

Frank has his first class today with Ray, so Frank waits for him when he finishes changing. Frank gets dressed far quicker than Ray, who has managed to get his head stuck in his shirt because he tried to put his head through the sleeve. As soon as Ray does manage to get himself untangled from his shirt, and then of course spends another three minutes having to fix his hair because now it’s all messy, the two of them make their way to their class. They have about ten minutes to kill before the class actually starts, so Frank spends this extra time reading his textbook, of course. He’s still got a lot of reading to go, but now he’s armed with Pete’s notes, which he really hopes are straight from the professor’s lecture, because if they are, he might not even have to take notes, which will be a mercy.

Sometimes, the world is not on your side, but today, that doesn’t seem to be true. Frank can feel the clouds lifting and the sky above singing when he discovers that the professor’s lecture is almost word-for-word with the notebook Pete had given to him. Frank still underlines, highlights, and adds notes in the margins, but it’s still quite a load off his back.

Friday is the shortest day for Frank, as he only has two classes, which are both in the morning, leaving him free for the rest of the day. Thursday had been hell, as it’s the only day where he has four classes, two of which are two hours long. He had almost died, so it doesn’t help that it was his first day of class, which had given the impression of looming death. Today proves that his school life is not going to be nearly as hard on him as yesterday had been.

Because of that, Friday is not nearly as harrowing, Frank breezes through the first half of the day quite easily, even though he’s assigned even more work which is awful, but at least he’s got the rest of the day to himself, aside from the game, and then a whole weekend to get caught up.

After having totally forgotten about it, Frank only remembers the article Patrick wrote about him when Mikey brings it up at lunch.

“The article Patrick wrote about you was really good. A little inaccurate if you ask me, as he made you out to be some sort of angel, when we all know you’re a bit of a douche,” Mikey says, only to be shoved by Frank, who is really starting to get a hang of the whole male bonding thing, which mostly consists of calling each other names and hitting each other for saying something stupid.

“I completely forgot about it, actually,” Frank says.

“Dude,” Mikey says, shaking his head. “An article is literally written about you, and you just don’t fucking read it? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Forgetfulness?” Frank offers, but Mikey just rolls his eyes back at him. Frank’s read a dozen articles about him, one more isn’t something special, not really. He doesn’t really even want to read about himself. Frank gets annoyed by his own existence quite easily, but that’s probably because he lives through it, so he really doesn’t need people telling him about things that he’s done, or telling him who he is. But he does like Patrick, so he’ll support the dudes article even if he has had dozens of them written about him before.

“That is a dumbass move, man,” says Ray. Frank gets that it probably does seem that way, there is an actual article written about him that he hasn’t even read yet, so he isn’t offended.

“I don’t have a physical copy, but it’s all on the school’s site,” Mikey says. Frank nods, and gets out his phone. He ignores Ray and Mikey for a few minutes while he pulls up the article and reads it carefully.

Patrick makes Frank out to be some sort of Greek hero, which is a little bit of an overstatement if you ask him. It’s a lot of pressure, honestly. Patrick describes him as the savior of his high school team, and the whole article has this grossly optimistic perspective about Frank’s abilities being added to the team, which makes him feel very wary about all the responsibility on his shoulders. Nevertheless, he can’t deny that Patrick’s done a good job on it, and he makes a note to tell him as such when he next sees him.

Frank starts planning out the rest of the day, even while still sitting with Ray and Mikey in the dining hall. He decides that he’s going to multitask, because he’s got about four hours until the team have their pregame meeting and warmup before the actual game tonight. He settles on going to the gym, where he can read his textbook as well as workout on the treadmill for a little while, so he can kill two bird with one stone.

After lunch, Frank has Ray point him in the direction of the rec center, which is on the complete opposite side of the campus to the ice rink, but right next to the football field.

Until Frank makes the walk to the rec center, he hadn’t fully realized just how little pride this school has for their hockey team. The ice rink, compared to the football field, is a shack. He has to walk past the football field in order to get to the rec center, and the field has a larger capacity than the rink by at least a couple dozen thousand. Frank would estimate that the hockey rink can only seat about 2,000, whereas the football field can probably seat about 60,000. Much of this can be accredited to the fact that the ice rink is indoors, and hockey stadiums typically have much smaller capacities to begin with, but it’s a small rink even then. Frank has always been kind of jealous at the fact that other sports get so much more attention than hockey, football especially. Football just kind of pisses Frank off.

The field itself is immaculately kept, and welcoming, much to the contrary of the rink which is old, kind of dingy, with burnt out ceiling lights. Frank doesn’t spend too much time looking down at the football field, because it makes him feel bad when he remembers that this school has an amazing football team, and a shitty hockey team. Armstrong also have a really amazing baseball, gymnastics, soccer, tennis, lacrosse, and volleyball team. But luckily, their hockey team is somehow still better than their basketball team, which is more a judgment of their basketball team than it is of their hockey team.

When Frank makes it to the rec center, he finds that it is stunning as well, and it’s easily one of the largest buildings that Frank has ever been in. It’s an enormous, and gorgeous, three story building complete with pool, basketball court, a fucking rock climbing wall, and what seems like hundreds of thousands of different types of exercise equipment. There’s also a juice bar which makes Frank’s mouth water a little bit. Frank is a little intimidated to say the least.

He swipes his badge at the front of the building, and then makes his way through the terrifying building, getting caught up looking around everywhere. Most of the space is open, which is good, because if there were walls everywhere, he’s sure he’d get lost in a heartbeat.

Frank does his best not to make eye contact with anyone, even though it’s a large enough campus that no one is going to realize he’s new. There are quite a few people working out, or doing various other recreational things, because Frank does walk by a small group of people who are doing Wii bowling, but he decides not to think anything of it. College is weird, so far he’s walked past at least fifty people who are still wearing their pajamas.

Frank finds the gym, which has a long row of at least ten treadmills, maybe more because Frank’s never been good at math. He finds one for himself, throws his stuff next to it, and then grabs his textbook, and Pete’s notebook, putting them side by side on the top of the treadmill.

Frank spends most of two hours doing literally nothing but that, taking a few breaks to just sit down and of course, continue reading his textbook. The psychology textbook he’s studying is the only one that he doesn’t mind reading too much, as it’s the only one with interesting content. Not to say that Frank enjoys reading it, but it’s the only one that doesn’t put him to sleep. He really couldn’t give less of a shit about litmus paper, but reading about serial killers is kind of fascinating.

Frank makes it to chapter six, which is nearly all of the reading that he needs to do for the class to get caught up, when he notices that Pete’s chapter notes for this particular chapter are nowhere to be found. Frank puzzles his eyes together, and riffles through the notebook to see if the notes are somewhere else, but he still doesn’t see them. He thinks maybe the pages are stuck together, but that’s not the case either. He groans, realizing that he’s going to have to go talk to Pete about it. He could probably ask Ray too, but the problem is, Frank can’t read Ray’s handwriting. He doesn’t want to be rude about it, but honestly the guy could be writing Arabic and Frank wouldn’t know the difference. Mikey strikes him as the kind of guy who doesn’t write notes, and also doesn’t study the textbook, but still manages to get ninety percent on all of his assignments. He’s just that kind of person.

Luckily, Pete’s dorm is actually fairly close to the rec center, so Frank decides it’s not too much of an inconvenience to go ask him about it. Pete did say that he was free to bother him whenever he wanted.

Frank packs his things together again, and makes his way the short distance to Pete’s dorm. Frank had kept the treadmill on a fairly low speed, so he’s not all that sweaty, but when the cold air outside greets him, he still finds it very pleasant.

Frank enters the dorm, and then makes his way through the twisted hallways, nearly getting himself lost. He probably would get lost if there weren’t numbers everywhere guiding him through the building. This is the sort of building that it’s clear was once a lot smaller but has since been expanded upon. He can tell because the carpeting is not the same throughout, and the layout definitely doesn’t suggest a lot of forethought.

At last, Frank sees Pete’s room, with the sign that says Neverland on the door. Frank knocks on the door, but no one responds, and he groans when he hears the music playing from inside. Pete can’t even hear him. He knocks again, waits a minute, and then again. It seems clear that Pete’s not going to open the door, even though Frank is sure he’s inside, because someone is playing music, and for some reason, Patrick doesn’t strike him as an Anthrax fan.

Frank considers for a moment. Pete could be naked. Frank’s already pretty much seen that, the locker room isn’t that big. Pete could be masturbating. That would be weird though considering its two in the afternoon on a gameday. Pete could be dancing really enthusiastically, and quite embarrassingly. It’s doubtful that that would bother Pete that much. There’s not much else that could go wrong, though, so he shrugs, and he opens the door.

What Frank sees was not on the list of things he thought he might see when he opened the door. He’d actually say that it’s the last thing in the entire world he would have expected to see on the opposite side of this door. Frank would have been less shocked if he’d opened the door and seen a goat eating a mattress.

What he instead sees, is Pete, completely clothed, thank god, on his bed, and Patrick’s there too. Except, when Frank opens the door, they’re kissing. Pete is kissing Patrick, and not any of those pansy ass Disney Channel kisses either, like this is what you’d call a full on make out.

Time seems to slow down for a few moments, as all parties wig the fuck out. Frank, in the span of about two seconds, reconsiders all of his life choices, but mostly his decision to enter this room despite no one having said “come in.” Frank feels like an idiot, and a colossal asshole for just walking in and fucking up everything in his entire world probably.

Pete has a panic attack on top of a seizure on top of a heart attack on top of cardiac arrest. Patrick has a feeling not quite of fear or of embarrassment, but rather of dread and something like disappointment.

“Fuck!” Frank shouts, and Pete only has a second to react as Frank averts his gaze and tries to rush out of the room, but Pete stops him, leaping from the bed, and pulling Frank into the room by the arm, before he’s slamming the door closed and then standing against it, not giving Frank the opportunity to leave.

“Frank,” Pete says frantically, looking at him with extreme concern. He’s not angry, but rather something a lot more like terrified. He looks petrified, the same look you’d expect to see in the eyes of a character in a horror movie. Not the kind of look you’d expect a heterosexual to have if they were caught kissing someone, but that’s probably because Pete was kissing a dude and there are different rules for that sort of thing.

“Pete, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Patrick, I’m so sorry. I knocked, I- the music was loud, you didn’t hear me, I shouldn’t have… I’m so fucking sorry,” he says, averting his eyes for some reason, even though they’re not kissing anymore, and are in fact several feet away from each other now. Patrick’s still on the bed, and Frank is standing right next to Pete in front of the door, wishing with all of his heart that he were anywhere but here right now. Pete turns the volume down on the music, but he doesn’t turn it off, because he’s wary of someone possibly eavesdropping.

“Frank, you can’t tell anyone,” Pete says, hurriedly, intent to get Frank to promise that much because it’s the most important thing in the world for him to promise that. This is a horrifying situation that leaves Pete running through every single scenario in the world, because there are so many different ways this can go. Frank might be an asshole and tell everyone, which would likely force Pete to quit the team. Frank might blackmail him, forcing Pete to pay for Frank’s silence. Frank might disown him but agree to keep his secret. And the least likely of all the routes this may take, Frank might choose to forget he saw anything and continue to treat Pete like a human being.

Pete tries to get Frank to look at him, but Frank is doing his best not to make eye contact with either of them. Frank glances over at Patrick who’s red as a beet and he looks embarrassed, but not as much terrified as Pete looks.

“I wouldn’t, I won’t, I’m just, I’m so sorry,” Frank says. Pete thinks that Frank’s words are too good to be true.

“You have to promise,” Pete says, “Promise you won’t tell. The guys, they wouldn’t understand, I’m captain, I can’t have them looking at me like I’m less because of… well, because of this.”

“It’s fine, I get it, I understand, your secret is safe with me,” Frank assures, and he wants to leave as soon as humanly possible so that he can go wallow away under his blankets and cringe to himself for his sheer idiocy.

“Yeah?” Pete asks, in sheer disbelief. Frank may be lying to him, but his mannerisms do not suggest that. He looks genuinely apologetic, which is the best Pete can hope for in this situation. Really, he’s not angry with Frank, because Pete tends to be a very nonconfrontational person, and he has difficulty putting the blame on anyone, even when they probably deserve it. Frank clearly made a mistake, if you can even call it that, as he did presumably knock like he said he did, and it’s not Frank’s fault that he walked in on the two of them. Pete isn’t angry with him for that, he’s just terrified that his secret is going to leak, because that’s the last thing in the world that he could ever want.

“Yes,” Frank nods, and then says, “I should leave. I’m sorry, again. Sorry. Fuck, I’m just really, really, sorry.” Frank can’t leave fast enough. Being here only makes him feel further more uncomfortable and embarrassed for his intrusion. He’s such a fucking dumbass.

Pete nods, he mumbles something like “it’s okay,” but he still looks so fucking scared when Frank makes his way for the door, and Frank hates to leave him like this, so uncertain of Frank keeping his word. Frank just wants to leave the situation, get far away from it.

Little does Pete know just how much Frank empathizes with him. Frank stops in the doorway, turns and then forces himself to make eye contact with Pete.

“Pete, I-” he starts but his words taper off, He’s almost tempted to tell Pete his own secret. He almost tells Pete that he’s gay, because now he knows he can trust Pete with that knowledge. He won’t tell anyone that, not when Frank knows the same of him. Pete probably won’t even judge him for being gay, because they have that in common.

But Frank doesn’t say that, what he does instead say is, “please don’t be scared, I promise, on my life, on my mother’s life, I won’t tell anyone. I swear it.”

Pete nods, and he looks a little less worried at that, but it doesn’t completely erase his nerves. It’s the best Frank can do. Frank can’t help but put himself in Pete’s shoes, and he knows that he’d be absolutely terrified of someone sharing his own secret if he were Pete. It would keep him awake at night, haunt even his waking moments. Frank doesn’t want to force Pete through that. He wants Pete to understand that he won’t tell anyone, and he wishes there were a way to make it explicitly clear, give Pete an unbreakable promise, but he can’t do that, so he settles for the best that he can do.

“I’m so sorry, again. So, so sorry,” Frank says, directing his words at Patrick this time, who doesn’t seem eager to say anything at all to him right now. Patrick doesn’t look necessarily mad either, but Frank feels as though both of them should be.

The difference between Patrick and the other two is that Patrick isn’t worried about keeping it a secret. Patrick’s not on the hockey team, though, so he doesn’t have nearly the same stakes in keeping it a secret. No, Patrick isn’t worried about people knowing he’s gay, or technically bisexual, he’s worried about what Pete will do if they know that he’s gay.

Frank leaves their room, and closes the door behind him, feeling different. He hurries away from it, not even wanting to have to think about the discussion Pete and Patrick are probably having now. Frank completely forgets about the notes that he was going to ask Pete for, and instead determines to get far away from here.

It takes Frank all of about five minutes to realize what this means. Pete’s gay, or at the very least, Pete likes boys. Pete likes boys. He likes boys. Pete’s a hockey player. A hockey player who likes boys. This is like discovering a new species. This has never happened before. Or at least, the last time that it did happen, that guy was murdered.

Still, it’s impossible to name a gay hockey player in the NHL, simply because there are none. And there have never been any. Zero. Absolute none.

Yet here Frank is, walking hastily through the cold weather, ten minutes after finding out that he’s not alone. There’s another gay hockey player out there. The two of them may not be in the NHL, but it’s one of his teammates. A gay hockey player who he plays with every night.

Frank’s sure that there have to be at least a couple, possibly dozens of gay hockey players in history, but none of them have ever come out publicly. Never. It’s just never happened. Despite the fact that Pete’s not even really out, Frank’s never actually seen any proof that there are gay hockey players. He’s never heard about any, except for a Swedish hockey player who was murdered because he was gay. Honestly, Frank would much rather there weren’t any gay hockey players at all then have to live with the knowledge that the one person who was got killed for it.

Now Frank’s found a real, flesh and blood guy, someone he’d probably even consider a friend, and he’s gay. It’s monumental, it’s a discovery akin to penicillin or electricity.

Frank’s never considered what it would be like to think about something like this, because he was sure it would never happen. This is insane. Pete is a real, honest to god hockey player, who’s gay. He can hardly believe it. He’s not even sure he’s not dreaming this.

Frank is just so astounded, and honestly, pretty damn excited about this all, that he can barely contain his own thoughts. This means so many things to him. It means that he has a potential confidant. Two, even, when he includes Patrick. Pete is an actual human being that Frank knows, who’s a hockey player and likes boys. This is the best news ever. Frank’s still deeply embarrassed about walking in on them, but he’s also so uninhibitedly excited that he’s not the only one, that he almost forgets about it. This is a shot at living for Frank, a tiny little speck of the life he wants.

Frank’s brain is spiraling, thinking a million thoughts a minute. He’s so busy thinking that he doesn’t even realize where he’s going until he enters the ice rink. He’d thought he was going back to his dorm, but then he looks around and sees that he’s here, instead. He never decided to come here, he just wanted to go home, but he supposes that he did come home, in a way.

He can hear the sound of a practice going on in the rink, and Frank walks over to look down at the ice to see that the girl’s hockey team is practicing. Frank had almost forgotten that there was a girl’s hockey team, but the trophy case at the front of the rink is a very prominent reminder of them. They’re infinitely better than the men’s team. They’re not the best team in their division, not by a long shot, but they’ve actually won. They’ve only won once, but when you consider that the women’s division is only fifteen years old, that’s a fairly big deal.

The women’s team has a different coach, he can see the balding man looking and shouting praise and critique at his players, a little more politely than Gerard does, but everyone’s got their own coaching techniques. Frank’s walked past the coach’s office every time he’s gone to the locker room, but never actually seen him before. This school doesn’t, however, have a figure skating team, which is almost a relief to Frank. He doesn’t have to think about how much he wants it if he isn’t constantly reminded about it.

Frank stands at the top of the rows of seats, leaning against a pillar, just watching them practice for five or so minutes. He envies them, they work a lot better together than the men’s team does.

The girls have one mind, and it’s clear to see. One girl passes a puck to an empty spot where another will be by the time it gets there, a juvenile tactic that the men’s team doesn’t seem to get. They don’t get a lot of things. Civility, for one.

“Hey, Frank?” Gerard’s voice comes from behind him, and Frank turns to look at him. Gerard’s looking fucking gorgeous as usual, the dick. “What are you doing here? You don’t need to be here for another two hours or so?”

“I, uh,” Frank shrugs, because he honestly doesn’t know why he’s here himself. His feet took him here, he didn’t consciously make the decision. “I just wound up here, kind of by accident.”

“Okay?” Gerard says, noticing the odd look on Frank’s face, “you alright?”

“What?” Frank asks, and then realizes that he must look as conflicted about so many different things as he feels. Then he remembers that he’s not alone, and that there’s a glimmer of hope in Frank’s future.

Frank knows he’s getting ahead of himself, knows that it’s wishful thinking, but he can’t help but to wonder if the rest of the guys might understand. If it’s not just one of them, but two, maybe they’ll have to. They’ll be forced to accept the two of them, since Frank and Pete are two of the best players on the team, and the team is already low on numbers to begin with. They can’t afford to let go of them. Maybe the guys would grow to be okay with it, it might take a little while, but Frank thinks it’s a possibility.

Of course, Frank doesn’t have plans to tell the team anytime soon. He doesn’t want to risk it. He may never do it at all, but the idea of it, just the very thought of it, makes him feel something warm inside of him. It would be so amazing, probably the best feeling in the entire world, to just be a gay hockey player and have no one care. He doesn’t need constant approval or reassurance, he just wants everyone to not care at all. The same way you don’t care if your friend is straight, Frank wants people to think of him being gay the same way they think of him now with the assumption that he’s straight. Just a normal thing, as normal as the color of your hair.

Pete shines a ray of hope on Frank. Frank has been completely alone, for eighteen years, he has felt like a complete outcast. He’s felt like he’s the only person in the entire world. He’s the only gay hockey player he’s ever known. Now, it’s like a whole new world has opened up. There’s a world just beyond the horizon, where Frank can see himself actually being accepted by another hockey player for his sexuality. Even if it’s just one person, just Pete, that’s more than Frank will have ever had. No one knows his secret in the entire world, for someone on his own team to know, it sounds like a dream.

Frank smiles wildly, for the first time since going into Pete’s room, and he says, “You know what, Gerard? I’m absolutely fantastic!”