I watched the first four episodes of “Heated Rivalry” on HBO and got so invested in Scott Hunter and Kip’s arc that I downloaded Game Changer. Call me a walking cliche, fine — or am I someone who just really want to see folks end up with a happy ending?

And did I zoom through Game Changer like a closeted hockey star zoned in on hitting the fuck? Sorry, I mean the puck! And did I say, “Hey you know, what’s going on with Shane and Ilya then?” and then promptly downloaded Heated Rivalry next to see what’s up? Damn pucking straight I did.

Sorry, I have zero knowledge of hockey and have no other puns left in me.

Anyway, episode 3 of the HBO show focused on Scott Hunter and Kip and was a bottle episode of sorts. For me, it was a refreshing departure from Shane and Ilya’s weirdly toxic years-long situationship, and I decided I couldn’t wait for the future episodes — I just needed to know what happened next. So I will focus my review on both books, with some references to the show, though I won’t spoil it (Seriously, just go watch the show. Or read the books!)

Game Changer: a U-Haul lesbian man

Game Changer is the first book in Rachel Reid’s gay hockey series, and it opens on Scott Hunter, the closeted captain of the Manhattan pro hockey team, who is in a bit of a scoring slump on the ice. He chances upon a smoothie store, buys a yummy drink from the cute juice bar barista Kip, and then gets his groove back at his game later the same day. So he decides to return to the store to get another juice to keep the magic — and the serious flirting — going.

Kip is an out gay man, who apparently everyone thinks is super handsome but seems to be the only gay man in New York who does not own a mirror since he thinks he’s not all that. He’s living with his parents, trying to apply for various jobs, trying to see what’s up — when a handsome dude, who is basically the man version of a U-Haul lesbian, invites him into his life. Except that guy happens to be super famous who can’t be in public with Kip because he’s closeted.

I think the actor playing Scott in the TV show did an amazing job of straddling the line of portraying open-faced vulnerability towards Kip while also having his walls so fully up in his everyday life — it would be easy to have both sides appear out of place within a single character, but the actor Francois Arnaud really melded them into a believable, sympathetic human. Picturing him helped a lot when reading Game Changer and understanding the difficulty he had in stepping out into the sunshine (as one TV show character would put it).

Heated Rivalry: being closeted is so over

Heated Rivalry follows Scott Hunter’s younger hockey peers, Canadian Shane Hollander and Russian Ilya Rozanov, who play for rival teams. Their first meeting comes before they are even drafted into the pro hockey league — Montreal for Shane and Boston for Ilya — when Shane catches feelings for Ilya while they work out at the gym. Then a brief dalliance post-shower turns into a years-long fuck-fest happening only in secret hotels rooms or “investment property” that has a tinge of toxicity to it.

In the hockey world, these two young wunderkinds are pitted as each other’s nemesis — there is a marketing element to it that both young stars allow to be played up. Some of it translates to hate-sex behind closed doors, but there is also an element of shame involved, whereby Shane doesn’t quite know — or like — why he’s continuously drawn to Ilya, while the seemingly stoic Russian appears to play down his own true feelings for his on-and-off lover.

I kept wondering how Heated Rivalry would salvage that honestly troubling sexual dynamic into something remotely healthy, but I think Reid achieves it when she has them both play on the same team (har har) at some All-Star Game, thus showing how much more dynamic and seamless both players can be when they are working to the same goal.

Yes, there’s a lot of steamy sex in both books — though some of it gets a bit repetitive (sorry!!) — but I think there’s also such an undercurrent of sadness throughout it. I personally find it so early 2000s to be confused or ashamed about sexuality. Worse still is to have to be defined by it simply because you are a public commodity. It’s stunning to me that in like 2013-2017, or even today, male athletes would still feel fear about coming out — especially if they are so integral to the sport, as Shane and Ilya are. Who cares what happens in the bedroom as long as they keep playing ball/puck? (Also, feel free to release the sex tape, because based on the reception of the TV show, whoo boy, that could be another income stream for athletes.)

So yes, fear of how they are perceived is part of the reason, but another is the self-hatred they have internalized after years in the locker room of hearing homophobic slang and insults being thrown around. There are definitely things to be said about why there are so few out men athletes today, as opposed to women — same as how we could write an entire thesis about why conservative families sometimes might be “okay” with their lesbian daughter shacking up with a woman but be more “morally” opposed to their gay son living with a man.

But I’m not here to analyze that. Simply put, I’m grateful that I grew up in an environment in which my sexuality is a non-issue, where I’m able to not feel it as a burden but as just another facet of my multi-mirrored self, and where I honestly don’t give a fuck if others will perceive me negatively because of it. What a joy and privilege to feel that freedom — to not even have it defined as “freedom” because it just is for me — and my heart ached for the Scott Hunters, Shane Hollanders and Ilya Rozanovs of the world while reading both these books.

My friend tells me Shane and Ilya are out in the third book, so maybe I’ll be happier to read that. We shall see!