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Hehhey everyone, welcome to yet another week of the Hockey Hunk!

As a special surprise, this week there will be three chapters, so expect an extra bonus chapter on Wednesday in addition to the normal update on Friday!

That said, I'm so glad that the story is proceeding smoothly, and that so many new readers have also found The Hockey Hunk - and they have not found the almost 80 chapters that have to be covered not too daunting a task! Everyone is more than welcome.

That said, I hope you'll enjoy the read, leave a comment, and come back on Wednesday for the extra chapter!

Cheers,

G

*

It probably was quite the illuminating example of my current state of life that I woke up on that Tuesday morning to the sound of my dad coming from work, not leaving for work.

"RORY!" dad hollered. "HOW'RE YOU DOING, BUDDY!"

Off he went, my dad with his booming voice and coming from the front room of the house. It echoed along the short corridor past the sliding door of the utility room and into the lion's den where I was currently to be found, lying on my back on the couch with pillows propped under my bent from the knee leg, and a frilly blanket thrown over my prone body

I chuffed and my ears made meaningfully sharp flicks against my pillows. My muzzle had a poor post-night aftertaste that made me wince as soon as the stinky air coming out of my maw reached my nose. I snorted and yawned and swallowed and tried to get the ugly taste off my tongue, I rumbled and slapped my tail against the leather of the couch. A little twinge of pain reached from my leg, like a sharp paw squeezing very hard on my right ass cheek, before it dulled out and become more of a slow throb over the small of my back and my thigh.

I blinked a few times, trying to clear up my weary eyes and get used to the relative darkness in the den. The only light was coming from the doorway that was halfway open into the corridor beyond, for all the curtains were drawn. It didn't hinder me much, cat night vision would have been more than enough to get me out of the bed and to the wheelchair and to the light switch, but currently I really didn't feel like getting up just yet.

"Here, dad!" I called, my voice rough from the night still, as I scratched over my T-shirt covered chest with my good left paw.

I heard his steps and caught a whiff of dad's cologne much before the door was opened and dad's broad form filled the light silhouette of the doorway, cut there for a brief moment before dad hit the switch and blinded me momentarily. I squeezed my eyes open and rumbled quietly, and my paw slid over my chest and up my neck to cover my face loosely. Ugh. My paw smelled of balls after last night's scratching session. I made a quiet face under my paw.

"Hey, Rory," my dad spoke from the doorway, peering into the room and the mess I had turned it into. "How're you doing?"

I looked at dad between my splayed fingers and caught his shape there, double framed both with my fingers and the door. He was still wearing his overcoat, which more than indicated that he had only just returned home. He didn't have his old leather suitcase with him anymore, though, but what he surely had was a red and black plaid shirt which, if my memory served me right, was something he always wore to work almost every day. He was also wearing some black jeans and had his reading glasses on, probably for the sake of driving, I suspected. His thick mane was wavy and carefully groomed, just like my father liked it. It was still a far cry from some of the pictured I had seen of him from the 80's, when everything was big, and dad had probably gone through a whole can of manespray a day while going for some extra volume.

I stroked my paw over my own modest head furs and let it stay there while watching dad across the room, now able to actually see something again.

I breathed out slowly, so that it made my cheeks puff out briefly.

"Kinda just woke up, dad," I rumbled.

Dad snuffled.

"Sorry, did I wake you up?" dad rumbled in reply. "I can turn the lights off if you want."

I shook my head.

"Nah," I snorted to myself. "I've slept enough, I think."

I yawned for good show, and dad smiled in return.

"Then you must be hungry," dad flicked a friendly ear in my direction. "How about some...uhh...well, your mother would probably flog me for making you breakfast at midday but I wouldn't mind a couple of rashers myself."

Dad licked his lips and grinned, and made me smile as well, just a little. I shook my head again.

"You're right, dad," I said, "Mom would give you a proper talking for spoiling my appetite for dinner."

Dad's tail flicked against the doorframe.

"Not to mention the trans-fats," dad smirked.

I snuffled.

"How was school?" I asked.

Dad shrugged. That was another familiar gesture. Everything about dad was familiar, I realized. It was almost comfortable, that. Comforting.

"Still trying to teach the high school kids about alleles and Mendel and crossbreeding fruit flies," dad chuckled. "Not much luck yet, but you gotta have faith."

I chuckled.

"Yeah," I snuffled. "That's it."

Dad smacked his paws together, as if applauding my contribution to the conversation.

"Well, I'm gonna go and put my coat away and start on that breakfast for you, Rory," dad said, "Do you need any help getting up? Leg ok?"

I gave a look at the lump of a leg hidden under my covers, and then looked back to dad.

"I think I'll manage, dad" I replied.

"Great," dad sounded enthusiastic. "Do you want some eggs with that bacon?"

I shook my head.

"You know, I think I'll rather have some Corn Flakes," I said. "Not feeling like...trans fats at the moment."

"Fine by me," dad replied. "That means more for me, and I can tell your mom that you ate it!"

Dad made a hungry face and then turned around and started on his way along the corridor. I slumped my head against my pillow and breathed out deeply. I yawned so hard that my jaw made a crackling sound while I exposed my tonsils to the world. My tail smacked the side of the couch. I didn't know how long I had actually slept, but I knew that I didn't feel rested at all. My eyes felt heavy and the light in the room seemed intrusive to me. The bookshelves, the TV, dad's desk and the other items belonging to dad's man cave brought little satisfaction with their familiarity, even after camping out here for a week now. Dad's den was my makeshift sick room, considering that with my leg it would've been impossible and maybe even dangerous to try to climb the stairs up to my own room. I didn't mind, though. The couch was okay, and the bathroom along the corridor was nearby, and it was nice and quiet there for most of the day, being out of the way of most things. You only saw others if they decided to come for you, and even then it was mostly to ask if I needed anything.

That was fine with me.

"Shit," I muttered to myself.

My leg throbbed. I realized that my bladder was full. It wasn't a bursting out full feeling, not quite yet, but I believed that it had the potential to grow into that during the next fifteen minutes. That really meant that I should start trying to get out of the bed if I wanted to make it to the bathroom within that comfortable time limit.

I shucked the blanket away and gave a long look at my shorts-covered groin and my legs. My footpaws rested against the armrest on the end of the couch, and a pile of pillows made sure that I would not make unnecessary movements during the night. At least I didn't have many bandages left, just a simple one that went about my ass and somehow contributed to keeping my mutilated leg in one piece.

I winced quietly when my leg twitched with upon me manipulating it with my paws to get myself into a comfortable sitting position on the edge of the couch. I was careful not to put any weight on my right leg as I reached out for the wheelchair I had parked by the couch last night.

Now then, this was something I'd gotten surprisingly good at over the past week and a half, not that I felt much of a need to boast about such a horrible skill. The steel tubes felt cool against my palm as I turned it into position and then, with a manly grunt and the use of my good leg and my paws, I hauled myself into the wheelchair. The black leather welcomed me with a squishy sound upon the contact of my golden rear on the seat of the wheelchair. I hissed out the discomfort of putting my paws onto the metal supports and then unlocked the brakes.

I could hear dad singing something in the kitchen, through the wall to my left while I wheeled myself into the corridor and then made a turn to propel myself into the downstairs bathroom. It was small, and obviously not designed for any sort of handicapped access, just like the door to the den which always required a leg-tearing, painful jump when the wheels forced themselves over the high sill.

I clicked the lights on to the bathroom and tried to plan my next step. The one redeeming factor the room had was that it was so small that there was never a lack of a wall or something else to grab a hold onto, which meant that I could press one paw against the wall and one to the edge of the sink when I lifted myself up to stand on my good and then leaned against the wall. I was almost standing between the wall and the toilet seat, which made for an interesting angle of attack once I got my shorts down just enough to tug myself out of them and aim down.

How I envied Peter and his apartment that had been rigged perfectly for these kind of things. He had wide doors and no sills and the bathroom, too, was more than well equipped to handle furs with limited ability to move. I knew the sinister reasons for this, of course, but still, I couldn't help but wish that I could have been visiting that sort of a facility and not standing there with my leg pressing against the suspicious-looking toilet brush holder and trying not to piss all over the floor or to collapse down onto my bad leg and send my femur back out of its socket.

And that was exactly why I wasn't there, with him, in his invalid apartment. He had told me that I could come, of course he did, what else could he have said, or would have said, but that exactly was why I had to tell him no. I couldn't put that man through having to nurse yet another fur. He had done it once, and I had done it to him a long time ago, but I did not think that he had any debt when it came to services like that. He wanted to do it, but that was exactly why I didn't want him to do it. I wanted to spare this from him, and even if that meant thrusting myself to the busy paws of my family, I still rather survived this inconvenience than had Peter worry about me every second.

It was that, and the genuine, and general need to get away, that had prompted me to load myself into a cab and drive myself here, and settle in.

It was a bit easier to not to think about it, now that I was physically out of town, so to speak.

I was done pissing and made the customary shake extra carefully. I didn't want to go out to have dad see a big wet spot on the front of my boxers. I wasn't quite far that gone yet, I thought to myself, as I went through the extra motions of washing my paws and getting back to the wheelchair.

I could smell the frying fat and bacon in the air now, once I was out of the chemically impregnated atmosphere of the bathroom and on my slow, wheeling way along the corridor. There was a door from the corridor into the kitchen, but it was too small for me to pass easily, and that's why I took the scenic route through our big living room and the much wider doorway that provided access into the kitchen.

"Hey there!" dad grinned from his place by the stove, where he stood happily frying his bacon while his tail danced the tango behind him.

"Hey," I rumbled.

"I put you a bowl over there," dad pointed the spatula to the small table on the corner of the kitchen. "Help yourself to the milk and the cereal."

"Thanks, dad."

I parked myself in front of the place that had been laid out for me and grabbed the box of Corn Flakes from the table. My ears flicked at the clatter they made clinking into the bowl. My stomach grumbled.

"You sure don't want some bacon?" dad quipped.

"Nah, I'm fine," I replied. "This will do."

I didn't want to tell dad that the Vicodin I had been taking for the leg had caused me to become constipated, and that I didn't think that eating greasy bacon was going to make that any better. Maybe the fiber from the cereal would help with that.

Dad hummed and rumbled to himself while he worked with his illicit snack. I poured milk from the plastic jug into my bowl and stirred. I still didn't feel much like eating, even if my stomach certainly did try to tell me that I should be putting in there right now. That wasn't new either.

"I may have to go by the supermarket to get some more milk," dad said. "That's all there is."

I gave a tired look at the jug that was about one quarter full now that I had splashed some of it into my bowl.

"Yeah."

I spooned some Corn flakes into my weary muzzle and chewed.

"Have to check the fridge if we need something else, too," dad continued his musings on that same, calm, rumbling tone. "Anything you need from the supermarket, Rory?"

"Nah," I spoke after I swallowed. "Can't think of anything, really."

Dad made a clatter when he opened the cabinet to take out a dish for his bacon.

"Okay. I'll go as soon as Justin comes home from school," dad said.

I snuffled, mostly to myself, and turned to look at dad. He was busy depositing the bacon from the frying pan to the awaiting plate on the kitchen counter. The metallic spatula scraped against the Teflon, making a sound that sounded like the impeding need to buy a new frying pan.

"Dad, I don't need anyone to be there on call for me," I said, as calmly as possible. "I'm okay."

Dad flicked his ears and made a mysterious sound.

"Well I'm sure it's no harm either, if you need him to fetch you something to drink, or something like that," dad mused.

Now he began the search for a fork and a knife, from the familiar drawer that was the second from the top, next to the cabinet where we held the home bread-making machine that had been a well-meaning gift from mom's s aunt about 20 years ago.

"I can get my own drinks," I said. "It's good for me, too, dad, the doctor said that I should try to carefully exercise myself a bit, even if I'm not allowed to walk yet because of the risk of dislocating my hip again."

"Well then you can just take it as an opportunity to spend some time with your brother!" dad smiled, now happily in possession of the utensils he needed.

I chuckled aloud.

"You know that as soon as he comes home he'll go upstairs and sits on his computer all day," I said. "I only see him for dinner."

Dad sauntered over to the kitchen table and settled down to sit opposite to me. The scent rising from his plate made my maw water a little despite my mellow state.

"Then maybe you could ask him if he wanted to do something, and you wouldn't have to spend all day sitting on your computer, Rory," dad smirked.

I snuffled.

"Yeah, maybe," I stirred my bowl lazily.

Dad chewed loudly, and didn't miss any opportunities to purr out his pleasure at the snack he had made for himself.

"You sure you slept alright?"

My eyes rose from the nondescript surface of the table to dad, whose blue eyes were looking at me carefully. Our eyes met, and I felt slightly odd. We weren't much for eye contact, not like that. I flicked an ear at him.

"Why?" I asked.

"You don't look too good, Rory," dad said.

I snuffled and put my spoon down from my left paw that I had been using for eating clumsily, and looked at dad again.

"It's the drugs," I said. "They make me a bit tired."

"I know," dad replied. "I took Vicodin after I had that gallstone removed and I was drowsy for a week. Remember that?"

I shrugged.

"I was already at Taylor back then," I said.

Dad snapped his fingers.

"Right!" he grinned. "That's right...and Justin was little..."

"I did come to see you at the hospital," I mused.

"Oh, you did," dad smiled. "Glad you did, too. It gets lonely in those places."

"Don't I know," I rumbled.

Dad smiled still.

"But who am I to speak about that," he spoke. He had a small bit of bacon hanging from between his front teeth. "I'm sure you saw all too many hospitals with that friend of yours."

My stomach clenched, both from the mention of Peter, and the mention of the word '"friend". My paw squeezed around my spoon firmly. I was all too aware that all too recently I had been all too active in reducing the number of furs around me who wanted to call me a friend.

"Yeah," I breathed.

Dad rubbed the side of his muzzle.

"He looked okay to me," dad said. "Is he okay?"

My neck furs bristled quietly. I wondered why dad was suddenly all so curious. I shuddered at the possibility of dad wanting to give me fatherly advice about relationships, or...well, anything in general. He didn't know half of it, and to have him meddle with my personal life was more than unwelcome. I didn't want anyone else to become intimately involved in the mess that was me, least of them, dad, or other family members. They didn't need that kind of a thing.

I took a deep breath and wondered how to put it exactly. I wasn't really meeting dad's eyes when I spoke.

"He's sad," I said. "Really sad."

Dad nodded.

"Well it's not so long since...uh..."

"Since George passed away," I filled in. "About seven, eight months ago."

"That's right," dad nodded. "Not long at all."

"Not at all," I said.

We ate in silence for a long while.

"It's always hard to watch," dad said suddenly, after our long pause.

I gave him a quick look. Dad looked back.

"To watch suffering," he said.

I breathed out quietly. I had no idea how things had taken such a gloomy turn so suddenly. We'd gone from talking about breakfast to talking about hospitals and sickness, and all in the space of a couple of minutes, and using my Vicodin use as a bridge. It seemed strange. Peter's sadness could not be cured with that kind of drugs...not with any drugs, I thought. Neither was mine cured in that manner. I found no comfort in the pills. the drowsiness that was the side effect of their pain numbing function only made my head feel heavy and hard to concentrate on happyhappy thoughts, rather than the gloomy ideas that surfaced whenever I wasn't careful enough.

It was all too easy to start thinking about Victor.

About everything.

"Yeah, it's hard," I said, finally.

Dad nodded his broad head up and down in understanding, and did not speak more about that topic. I was grateful for that.

"Oh!" that was dad again.

"Oh?" my ears perked moderately.

Dad was grinning.

"Mrs. Wilberforce was asking me about you today at the teacher's lounge," dad said.

I snuffled. My recollection of the bespectacled middle-aged German Shepherd English teacher was a fair one. I didn't challenge her boring bullshit teaching meant for those who struggled to write their names down on the paper, and in exchange she gave me the straight A's I deserved based on my work.

"I didn't realize she was still working," I mused. "We used to joke that she's so old that she came to the US on the Titanic."

Dad chuckled roughly, probably in a way he would not want to be caught laughing by the aforementioned woman. He was still grinning even after his whiskers stopped wobbling from the laughter.

"You know that joke's been going on ever since the movie came out," dad said, "that's what Letitia says. Your generation didn't invent it, surely."

My brow quirked, and I stopped mid-chew on another muzzleful of unappealing soggy cereal.

"Letitia?"

Dad licked his lips.

"That's her name," he said. "Mrs. Letitia Wilberforce. Didn't you know? And she's only 55, by the way."

I snuffled.

"Schoolkids try not to think about their teachers as real furs with real lives and personalities," dad mused. "Or with feelings."

I smirked.

"If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die?" I let it rip.

Dad chuckled.

"I bet she'd be impressed by that," he said. "That's from...wait...uh...Hamlet's way too easy for showing off, so I'd think..."

Dad rubbed his chin and made a thoughtful face.

"...so let's say...Othello?"

I snuffled.

"The Merchant of Venice, Act III, Scene I," I hammered.

"Bravo," dad smiled.

"We did a whole term of Shakespeare in Taylor," I mused. "I remember bits and pieces."

"Heheh," dad said.

"What was she asking about me then?"

Dad played with a piece of bacon on his plate and let his ears flick amiably.

"Oh, just asking how you were doing," he said, "I've been talking about how you had an accident and needed some time off at home, so everyone's been asking how you were doing. Told her that you're recovering well."

"Yeah."

"She did ask if you had already settled down with anyone," dad spoke almost flippantly.

I made a face. That kind of questions never led anywhere good, I knew as much. I knew it too well.

"Oh?" I mused, not lifting my eyes from my bowl.

"Yeeeeeah," dad sounded almost lazily as he spoke now, "citing that since all the girls were always hanging out with you and talking with you and you seemed to be always at the center of their attention."

I chuckled darkly at this statement, and looked up to dad.

"Guess she isn't familiar with the concept of a fag hag," I snorted.

Dad looked decisively uncomfortable for a moment, and I think he deserved it, for as long as it lasted, though it didn't for more than few seconds, before his face relaxed again, and he was smiling.

"I guess so," dad said.

"Yep."

The cereals started to become inedible in their milky pond. I wondered whether I should just chuck it down the drain and have something else altogether. Some toast, maybe.

"Damn," dad said. "It's raining."

I looked at the window adorned by the flower-pattered curtains, above the sink. Streaks of water had already appeared on it, and I realized that the sky had taken a darker hue. I wondered whether it would be thundering.

"So it seems," I rumbled.

Dad scratched his belly.

"I was supposed to clean one of the drainpipes over the garage before Justin came home, "dad explained. "Can't do that if it's raining."

I snuffled.

"Don't you have tests to mark or something like that?" I teased.

Dad shook his head.

"Not right now...hmm..."

A chiming sound echoed towards my ears. There was no mistaking to that. Dad's ears perked, too.

"Isn't that your phone?" he said.

I nodded.

Dad's paws slammed onto the tabletop as he made an effort of getting up to his footpaws.

"I'll go and get it for you," dad smiled.

"Thanks, dad," I said. "It's on top of the old speaker."

Dad stormed out of the kitchen, tail flapping along determinedly.

"Gotcha!" he said.

*

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