Chapter 26: Patty IV--Tell Me You Love Me

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Chapter 26: Patty IV—Tell Me You Love Me

"Patrick," Michele whispered as he held onto her damp, limp body, "I have to go. I promised Coco that I would have brunch with her. I’ll be late."

"What time?" Patrick asked her, kissing her throat, not letting her wriggle free from him.

"Eleven," Michele said, biting his bottom lip a bit.

"You still have a few minutes," Patrick said.

Michele sighed and cupped his face in her hands. Patrick looked into her pale eyes. She was inscrutable sometimes. He never could read what she was thinking, or feeling. He only knew what she said to him or how she made him feel.

"Patrick," she whispered, "I really have to get dressed."

Patrick grinned. "No you don’t," he said. "Start a new trend."

Michele dropped her hands from his face and laughed, tilting her chin back. Patrick nuzzled back into her exposed neck. "You smell like roses today," he murmured. "It’s beautiful."

"Mmhmm," Michele said, wrapping her arms around his neck. "I thought you would like it."

Patrick relaxed and rolled over to his side. "I do," he said. He leaned back and closed his tired eyes as Michele slid off the bed. He loved to close his eyes and just listen to her movement around the room. He loved guessing what she was doing, and where she was. He could hear the rustle of her clothes as she scooped them off the floor, and the padding of her bare feet on the carpet. He could even smell the fading scent of roses as she disappeared into the bathroom, running a shower.

Patrick yawned. Was it still morning? He was so tired. It was those damn gift baskets, he was still trying to burn off all those calories. He was feeling so sluggish. It was good to be home.

Hartley had called for a skate at noon, Patrick had decided that he would go to that. Any extraneous movement on his part would probably be the best route to go by. He wasn’t shedding excess weight as fast as he used to as a boy.

Patrick must have dozed off, because when he opened his eyes, Michele was freshly showered, pink and slightly warm, and kissing him on the forehead. "Goodbye," she whispered.

Patrick grinned and snatched her around her waist. "Who said you can go?"

"Oooh," Michele gasped, slapping lightly at him, "Stop it! You’re being childish."

Patrick laughed and hugged her tightly to him, breathing in the clean, soapy scent of her. He slid his hands up the back of her shirt, tickling her ribs. Michele flinched and then struggled, laughing as well. Her hair fell out of its clip and it tickled his face as he leaned back on the bed, taking her on top of him. "Tell Coco you have a headache! Come on, I haven’t seen you in days!"

Michele relaxed, and smiled. Patrick’s heart beat a step faster when he felt her face on his cheek, kissing him lightly. "Patrick," she whispered into his ear, "Later, my love. You need a nap."

"Alright," Patrick said with a sigh. "Give Coco my love."

Michele smiled and slid off his body, smoothing her skirt around her knees. "Tell me you love me first," she said.

Without her body touching his, Patrick felt cold, and he threw his arm out and grabbed the comforter, flopping it over his body. "I love you more than my own life," he said.

Michele crossed her arms and sighed, narrowing her eyes. "Ooooh, you’re good," she snapped. "Coco can wait a little more, she’s always late anyway!"

Patrick couldn’t stop laughing at the angry, almost steely set to Michele’s mouth as she slipped her shirt up and over her head, and onto the carpet. Goosebumps prickled all over his skin as Michele ripped the comforter off him with the pity of a pirate. "Come here you basterd," she said.

The house was empty when Patrick came home after practice. Just as well, Patrick thought to himself, Hartley who had been less than amused by the roadtrip, had ran the whole team through intense skating drills. Every muscle in his body was tightened into twitching knots and his bones felt like lead weights. Squealing children and the noise of the house were not what he wanted to hear right now. This time he really wanted to sleep.

Tell me you love me.

Patrick who had been on the verge of falling asleep sat up when he heard the memory of that voice.

Tell me you love me.

He closed his eyes, and he couldn’t block the memory from his mind. His smell, his voice, and above all the feel of him. It had always been night, so Patrick rarely saw more than a glimpse of Mario whenever he hissed into his ear, "Tell me you love me first, and then I’ll let you go."

Those roadtrips in 1985 and 1986 were a lump of nightmares for Patrick. Nightmares and anger. He woke every morning lusting for a shower, for a stone to scrape off all feeling from his skin. He yearned for the practice ice were he could forget the world and just stop pucks, where all he had to think was in terms of cutting down angles. He didn’t like the locker room. He was no longer comfortable around teammates, he didn’t trust them. Were they all looking at him? Did they all know? He couldn’t bear to be touched, and he didn’t want to look at anyone in the shower. It was a nagging fear that was beginning in him that if he looked at any one of his teammates in that shower, or in the locker room, that it would mean that he was also being dirty.

What was more infuriating was the attentions of Tremblay in the locker room and on the ice, anywhere. Mario kept putting his arm around Patrick’s shoulders and waist, always trying to pay special attention to him and favor him above the others. "Eat shit!" Patrick would often snarl at him, brushing Tremblay off. Tremblay would always redden, treating him even worse at night. "Just be nice!" Mario would often say to Patrick,
"And I will treat you better."

It didn’t matter to Patrick. He didn’t want any part of Tremblay or his "kindness". He would never publicly show him any affection. And it wore him down night after night.

When he met Michele, it was like a blessing for him. She was a tiny, blond young woman, barely younger than him. He liked the temper he could see in her, and the spirit. She would laugh at him, laugh with him, go to his games and sometimes she would just hold him. A woman’s touch he craved more and more, and she seemed to understand that. He trusted her implicitly, and finally he had been brave enough to tell her what was happening between him and Tremblay. He had to tell someone, but he didn’t want to be judged. Michele didn’t judge him at all.

"Break his heart," Michele had said simply.

Patrick had no further explanation from her, and he didn’t ask for one. He saw the hurt in her eyes when he had told her what happened, and he didn’t want to hurt her more. This was something he would have to solve on his own. But Michele had given him an idea that he mulled over and germinated.

Break his heart.

Patrick knew he was too young, too skinny, to ever physically overpower Mario, and he didn’t have nearly enough status in the locker room. But every night Tremblay demanded that Patrick declare love to him, whether he meant the words or not. Patrick never said the phrase Mario wanted to hear, but Tremblay had shown himself vulnerable. That was the only spot Patrick knew he could attack. He would have to break his heart.

Patrick groaned a bit and finally he fell asleep.

When Patrick woke up again it was to the heavy slam of Jana’s little body hopping on top of him. He could smell the world on her. Soda, cotton candy, soil, and the warmth of the sun.

"Daddy!" Jana chirped. "Daddy! Daddy!"

Patrick growled like a dog, and kept his eyes closed.

"Doggy! Open you eyes!" Jana cried, and before Patrick could, the little girl was prying open his eyelids with her fingers.

Patrick squeezed her and sat up, tickling her. Jana laughed, trying to squirm free but there was no possibility of it.

"Where have you been?" Patrick said with a smile, "I was lonely all day."

Jana wrinkled her nose and sat up on the bed. Her hair was hanging out of a ponytail and snarled. "Nah-uh," she said, "You were sleeping!"

Patrick hugged her. "Of course I missed you!" he said. "You’re my only little girl."

Jana blushed and smiled through her teeth, "I know," she said. "That’s why I got you a new little girl! So you’re not lonely!"

Patrick frowned. "What?" he asked.

Jana leaned over and hefted a huge, fluffy pink teddy bear that was larger than her, onto Patrick. "There!" she said, "Her name is Suzette! I won her for you."

Patrick laughed. "How did you win this?"

Jana fluttered her left eye and sneezed. "I won her at Elitch’s, Alex took us there and I threw the ball at the bottles. Knocked them aaaallll down!"

"Wow," Patrick said. "Elitch’s? What time is it?"

"Dark," Jana said. "Mom said if you’re not out of bed by dinner then you won’t get any. I don’t want you to die of not eating."

"Thanks," Patrick said, and then he lifted the girl’s tiny face with one of his hands. "You’re red like a strawberry. Did you not have a hat? You’re burned!"

"I had a hat." Jana said rubbing her nose. "But it fell off on the big ride, and we couldn’t find it, and I didn’t want to get on it and then I did and then I threw up!"

A shot of anger suddenly boiled in Patrick’s body. Alex or Jonathen should have known better than to let her go out in the sun without a hat! She was burned now! And how dare they make her throw up on a ride. Patrick hugged Jana again. "How are you feeling now?"

"OK," Jana said. "We had ice cream and cotton candy and Alex got me a funnel cake to get the yucky taste out of my mouth. Oooo we saw the otters at the fishy place and the elephants at the zoo! You smell like flowers!"

Patrick calmed down considerably. He sighed and picked up the bear. "You really won this?" he asked.

"Yup," Jana said. "Alex missed on all his balls, heehee. And I got the bottles on the first try!"

"You should be a pitcher!" Patty said with a smile. "Now go on, tell your mommy that I’m coming down."

Jana nodded and planted a kiss on his cheek before hopping off the bed and running out of the room.

Patrick hung his legs over the side of the bed and hung his head in his hand, ruffling his hair. He could smell dinner and his stomach roared. He wondered if that girl, Cecile was back. Michele was keen to plant her little schemes on that girl. It didn’t surprise Patrick at all really. He had always known Michele to intensely dislike any female of righteous moral fiber. Haughty bitches, she always said of them, and Cecile was a nanny too. Michele hated nannies.

Cecile bothered Patrick. She was young and very pretty, that was indisputable. But there was an otherworldly glint in her green eyes. It looked like the eyes of an older soul trapped in a child’s body. There was something haunted and not right about her, and he didn’t know if he wanted to deal with that.

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