I turned on my heel and dodged the crowd, studiously ignoring the reporters, and headed for the locker room.
Once there, I took in the boisterous team, accepting and giving a few back slaps. At my locker, I nodded at Jax. “Good game, man.”
“Playoffs, baby.” He smacked my ass for good measure, and I grinned at his antics.
“You know it.” I shrugged off my clothes, confident in this space of guys, something I refused to ever take for granted. From the moment I'd come out while at Montview Academy for the college summer workshop I assisted in, my team had been phenomenal.
It wasn't the case for other guys in pro sports. Minnesota Eagles were fucking epic, though. And this moment right here, ass slaps, even more than the qualifying game, were the reason I'd stayed with them, not pursuing the tempting offers my agent waved in front of me, and hoping like hell I wasn’t traded.
Once undressed, I headed to the shower.
I stepped into the cubicle, waited till I could hear Jax’s shower running, and then went in for my stealth attack. I extended my arm, shampoo in my grip, and squeezed gently. Just enough to not give away the extra liquid I was adding to his head.
I was a pro at this shit and could literally do it without looking. My accuracy was always pretty much spot on. I waited until I heard the shift in the water spray, the change indicating Jax was rinsing.
Smirking, I extended once again and squeezed the life out of the bottle. Satisfied, I quickly rinsed off, wanting to be done before—
“You fucker.”
Laughter burst from me.
“Pearce, I swear to God…”
“What’s wrong, Jax?” I hollered. “You run out of shampoo? Need to borrow some?”
I heard extra chuckles around me.
“You’re an asshole, Pearce.”
“Ilikeassholes, Jax. There’s a difference.”
He snorted loudly, and I figured it was enough to distract him so it was safe for me to make a run for it.
Clean, or as fresh as I could get in my haste to get away from Jax and as quickly as possible to Eddie, I dressed, receiving a few smirks from my teammates.
“You do know Jax is going to sulk the rest of the night, right?” Ollie shot me a smirk and a raised brow.
I grinned in response. “He’s lucky I went easy with low-key shampoo after what he did to me last week.” The guy had filled my socks with glitter. That shit went everywhere. Likeeverywhere! It was a good job I hadn’t hooked up. Trying to explain why I had glitter in the crack of my ass would have been awkward.
Ollie chuckled. “Considering you cellophaned his car the week before, were you surprised?”
The memory, of doing just that and how much of the damn stuff it had taken to layer it on nice and thick, amused me to no end. Pranks were fucking fun and hilarious. I lived for this shit. Since Jayden had left the Eagles, it had taken a while for someone to bite and play pranks as hard as I did. Jax was proving to be a fun competitor. Though Cassius was my usual go-to guy.
I had been taking it super easy on Jax, though. I hadn’t wanted to scare him off. But with today’s win and us having a place in the tournament, it was time to bring my A game.
“You heading out with Phelps and his kid?”
I nodded. “Yeah. They flew in for the game this afternoon and will head back tomorrow.”
“That girl of his still determined to rule the world?”
I chuckled. “Yup. Starting with ruling me, I think.” My teammates had thought my and Eddie’s friendship was a little out there a few years back. Not only were there more than ten years between us, but he was a single dad, an ex-professional basketball player, plus he lived in Chicago.
But we'd just clicked. He made me laugh and was easy to be around. And when I'd come out not long after meeting him, he was a sounding board I appreciated, since he'd come out as bi a year after his retirement, not long after splitting with his wife.
Sure, our lives seemed a world apart, and ignoring the fact he was hot as sin and I was straight-up in love with the man, I'd made my peace once he'd started dating Wankface Wayne.
Well, sort of, or as much as I could since the realtor wasn’t good enough for Eddie.
