Unsportsmanlike Conduct

Cherry Pickers P. II

Throughout dinner, his parents make avid conversation with his brothers and his boyfriend. Tye, bless his heart, attempts to bring Moss into the conversation several times, but sees firsthand how dismissive his family is of him.

"You boys work so hard out there, especially with some of the unlucky injuries that have happened to the team this season. It seems like each of your ice times keep increasing every game," his mom says observantly.

"It's funny you say that," Tye responds. "Moss has told me that he's been having to work overtime everyday for the past month or so. That's kind of like the office equivalent to extra time on ice."

His mom finishes chewing her last bite before replying, "Yeah, I guess it is. So is there any word on that young defenseman from the AHL coming up to play with the Boulders soon?"

Tye gives Moss a look of disbelief at the families blatant lack of interest in the eldest Kettler boy.

Moss responds with a shrug before continuing to eat his omelet in silence.

-

After dinner, their mom graciously ends up doing the dishes, but does not let the family scatter off to their rooms just yet. Instead, she tells them to head to the family room and pick out a nice movie for them to watch together.

Eli picks out some action comedy as everyone gets comfortable on the couch and in the chairs around the room. Tye and Moss squeeze into the loveseat which, thankfully, no one questions. His dad sits in the recliner and Eli takes up half of their couch with his giant body spread out over it. Shane sits upright on the other side of the couch and their mom lifts up Eli's head so she can sit behind him with his head in her lap.

Tye grabs Moss' hand under the blanket they are sharing which puts him in a much better mood than he was in after dinner.

They discreetly text each other with their phones in their laps and the screen brightness down as low as possible to the point where they can just barely read what they are saying to each other. Nevertheless, they exchange jokes back and forth making their shoulders shake with laughter as they try to remain inconspicuous to the others in the room.

Tye>:)<3

Shane's gonna strangle E if he asks 1 more dumb question during this movie

To: Tye>:)<3

That'd be a good distraction for us to make our escape though **man shrugging emoji**

His dad and Eli end up falling asleep midway through the movie, so his mom finally allows them to head to bed. They set up the basement for Tye to sleep in, but Moss texts him to come up to his room once he's sure that everyone is asleep or locked away in their rooms for the night.

As soon as the door closes behind him, Tye immediately jumps into a whisper rant about how terribly Moss' family treats him. He heatedly retells conversations that he had with each family member and expresses his disgust toward every instance that occurred from the car ride to Moss' parents house to the movie that they didn't even finish.

Moss silently directs his protective boyfriend to lay down on his childhood bed and proceeds to undress him since he is still in his game day suit. As he does this, Tye continues to ramble angrily about the glaring disrespect Moss receives from his parents and brothers.

Tye concludes his tirade by stating that they will be leaving first thing tomorrow morning before anyone wakes up so they can have a nice breakfast together, just the two of them.

His game day suit jacket and pants are now hanging from the closet door and his dress shirt is folded neatly and sitting on the desk next to the bed. After putting Tye's clothes away, Moss had crawled back on top of him while he waited patiently for him to stop talking.

Smiling down at his now red-cheeked boyfriend, Moss gives him a kiss before pulling back and noticing a spot on his collarbone which he pokes at.

"Oh, yeah," Tye says, suddenly no longer looking like he wants to commit a murder. "The boys saw the hickey you left on me from last night and had a field day ragging me for it."

Tye is smiling, but a cold chill runs down Moss' spine as he begins to panic. It must show on his face because Tye sits up quickly, his grip tightening on Moss' waist while he asks what's wrong.

"Did my brothers see?" His voice shakes as he speaks. "Do you think they know about us?"

"No offense, sweets, but you brothers aren't very bright. At least not as bright as you," Tye responds soothingly, now rubbing his hands up and down Moss' thighs warming them.

Moss doesn't say anything, but takes a shuddery breath so Tye continues, "They were also teasing me about the hickey, but it didn't seem like they put any pieces together."

Moss relaxes at that and lays fully on top of Tye with his head on his chest.

Tye pulls the comforter up to cover them both.

"Maybe we can talk about telling our families soon so we can avoid panic attacks like this in the future," he suggests softly.

Moss lets out another shaky breath before nodding his head against Tye's chest, "Maybe we can start with your family first?"

There's a pause before Tye answers, rubbing a hand down Moss' back, "Sure. We can do that, MoMo."

-

The next day, they stick to Tye's plan and sneak out of the house early after ordering an Uber to pick them up. They leave a note behind saying they enjoyed dinner last night, but they needed to leave so Tye can ask the coach about something at the hotel and Moss can get back to work at his apartment.

Contrary to the note that they left, they instead go to a diner for breakfast.

Having a significantly better time with just the two of them, Moss is finally able to reveal a piece of information that he originally was going to tell Tye at the restaurant that they were supposed to eat at last night.

"My boss approved my request to work two weeks remotely in April."

Tye wants so badly to kiss his boyfriend in the crowded diner, but settles for hooking his ankle around the smaller man's instead and beams at him.

"I'll start looking into flights from Detroit to Denver as soon as we finish up here," he promises, feeling much happier now than he has in the last twelve hours.