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bigbrotherlouis · 7 months

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i would love to hear more about mcstrome 🫡

realistically i'm sure it's the age-old story of two kids end up in the same place and become best friends because of proximity and then once they leave being in each others' presence and grow up into adults that friendship fades away but there's still fondness there.

however fictionally? alexa play ribs by lorde

you are fifteen years old. you are fifteen years old and you have been drafted to a new team in a new city in a new country. you are the youngest person on your team and you are probably the best person on your team and you are eight hours from home, granted special exception to be drafted a year early into the OHL and you are proving yourself against boys two, three, four years older than you, but despite it all your team finishes almost dead last. you are rookie of the year.

you are sixteen years old. you are sixteen years old, and the second best player in the draft, the draft that should've been yours but wasn't, is coming to your team. you know him. you meet him in the summer and you're already friends, fast friends, and you've been dreaming about being teammates again. he talks fast and he's fiercely loyal and he keeps up with you on the ice and he reminds you of home. he is not your best friend yet but he will be. he invites you home during the summers and asks if you want to play street hockey with him. you come and you sit on the sidelines, already conscious of the worth of your body enough that you know this is not something you should be participating in. he doesn't care, though, captain of a team, yelling at mitch marner who is an awful goalie and keeps letting in goals, and winning that summer. you go to the beach together, pale and stretched out on the sand, and now you are best friends.

you are seventeen years old. you are seventeen years old and they have just named you the captain of your team. you're wearing the letter with pride but people are talking about you like you're the second coming of hockey jesus. they've been talking about you for a while now, but this feels like more. this feels heavy. you break your hand in a fight in november because you are, after all, still a teenage boy. you sit out and watch as your best friend lights up the ice. he is the best person out there when you're on the bench and it shows in the stats and the points. he can tell you all the stats and the points because he's good at remembering those. he says he can remember every single play he's ever made and honestly? you kind of believe him. the haunting specter of the draft covers your entire year, looming in the corners of your vision, colouring every interaction. you are good, and he is good, and there is no chance of being drafted together, no matter how much you secretly hope. the calendar is a countdown clock towards your end, but you make him promise you will stay best friends because you don't really know what you will do without him.

you are eighteen years old. you are eighteen years old and edmonton has already made your jersey even though the draft hasn't happened yet. the graveyard of first overalls and rumors of a curse after gretzky left. you're the next gretzky and you're the next coming of hockey jesus and the entire city is waiting for your salvation. he goes third. phoenix, which is the literal opposite of edmonton. you hang off of him the entire weekend before, realising that this is the crescendo. you will never be otters together again. there's little chance you'll even be teammates again, so you cling tight even as you're so breathlessly excited for the moment your name get called first. you trip off the stage in a jersey that doesn't quite fit right but has your name on the back, and quietly ask if you can watch this next pick before you go backstage. you twine yourselves in a hug when he follows behind and it feels awfully like a goodbye.

now.

you are eighteen years old. you are eighteen years old and your best friend is drafted number one overall. you always knew he was better. you always knew he was made for more, so it doesn't hurt. you're happy to follow in his footsteps because you are his best friend and nothing will ever change that. besides, third is still a good number. amazing, even. they send you back to erie but you expected that. no one makes it to the show unless they are exceptional or a team is desperate, and edmonton is both. he scores his first nhl point in his third game and you are named captain of the otters. life is good. he breaks his collarbone less than a month in, shattering his rookie dreams. he comes home to you, in erie, because no one else understands him like you do. no one knows how to manage him when he's broken and angry, but you have patience and a lot of love and loyalty. you lie in your big bed and take up most of the mattress, two grown boys in the dark, and you don't kiss him. you could, but you don't.

you are nineteen years old. you are nineteen years old and he is named captain of his nhl team, also at nineteen. he is the youngest captain in history. thirteen days later, you score your first point. a month after that, arizona sends you packing back to erie. this time it hurts. you were doing your best and it wasn't bad and your best friend is captain of the oilers and you are playing with your high school team again. they make you captain for the second year in a row, but it's not the oilers and it's not the coyotes, so does it actually fucking matter? you are determined to prove everyone wrong and so you drag your team to the memorial cup. you win and it feels like a fuck you and it is maybe the best moment of your goddamn life. your phone is quiet. you haven't had any texts from edmonton for months.

you are twenty years old. you are twenty years old and this is finally your goddamn year. except-- you go pointless in two games and arizona decides that's not good enough. you've aged out of the otters so you pack your bag for tuscon instead. you spend your winter bouncing between the nhl and the ahl, sometimes so fast it makes you sick. winter in the desert feels weird, feels barren. you lie on your floor under the a/c and deliberately do not think of the time you almost kissed your ex-best friend. he's your ex-best friend because he's got a new one up there, draisaitl who also went third but the year before you. he can keep up with him, even better than you can, because he's not being bounced up and down. you wonder if draisaitl ever wants to kiss him. you wonder if draisaitl ever has.

you are twenty one years old. you are twenty one years old and you are a draft bust. they've been calling you that for years but now they're right. arizona trades you to chicago for practically nothing, which is embarrassing, but it's alright because you've got an old otter, brinksy, there on your team. you're nothing special, but you're nothing bad either. if only you hadn't touched the hem of hockey jesus as a teenager. if only you hadn't known what greatness tastes like. when you face off against edmonton, he won't meet your eye. he slides out of the centre dot and draisaitl steps in and wins the draw.

you are twenty three years old. you are twenty three years old and you have a girlfriend now, a pretty one, and it's-- good. your team makes it to the weird-ass playoffs in august, because there's a pandemic now, and you get trapped in a hotel in edmonton. your girlfriend tells you that she's pregnant right before you leave, like right before, and you can barely care about anything else. you barely care that he is two floors below you and the last message in your texts was a happy birthday! three years ago. unimaginably, you knock him out of the playoffs on his home ice. in the handshake line, he offers you his palm and his eyes skate over you like you're a stranger.

you are twenty five years old. you are twenty five years old, and on yet another new team. that's good, though, even if he will always be so much better. your fiance asks if she should send an letter to an edmonton address and you hesitate. you are no longer friends anymore. you haven't been for years and years, even if you lie when the press ask. but you loved him, once. you loved him so much that you were part of him and he was part of you, and the teenager on a shared bed in the dark will not let you forget that. you put his name down on an envelope.

so.

you are twenty five years old. you are twenty five years old and a wedding invitation arrives at your front door. you slide your fingernail under the flap and freeze when you see the faces on the front. there's a secret you will never tell anyone, not even on your deathbed, but you think of it now. it takes up so much space in your lungs that you can barely breathe. and it hurts. your girlfriend, who you love very much finds you shredding paper into a wastebasket and asks if everything is alright. you lie. you can't imagine not lying and so she doesn't catch you at it. you tell her that you've always wanted to go to manchester, england. you tell her that you should plan a trip for the summer, and you end up on a plane to a different continent while your ex-best friend is getting married back home.

you are sixteen years old. you are sixteen years old and flat on your back at the beach, listening to the water lap up on shore. beside you, he drops to the ground to stretch out too, his bare arm pressing up against your own. it dawns on you, as consuming and as present as gravity, that you are in love with him. it dawns on you that maybe you always be.

you're the only friend i need / sharing beds like little kids / we'll laugh until our ribs get tough / but that will never be enough

#you: can you tell me about mcstrome?#me: writes 1800 words in second person and hopes for the best #second favourite dstrome couple for REAL #ugh i miss them #the most hurty and star crossed lovers story #dylan strome #connor mcdavid #mcstrome #connordylan #hockey #hockey boys #2015 draft class #jes thank you for sending mcstrome anons my way:)))

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