Love advice with Canadians: the clueless leading the clueless who is in love with clueless.

Patrick answers his phone by reflex, but he can't pry open his eyes, so he has no idea who he's talking to. Or not talking, exactly, because all he can manage is a sort of groan. OR: the one where Tazer and Kaner have a baby via Stanley Cup

When Canadian figure skater Jeff Skinner wrecked his knee, he never could have imagined that he'd end up helping pay his way through college as a live-in babysitter for Eric Staal's three-year-old son, Joey.

"Does it change you, being turned?" Patrick asks. "I mean, obviously the physical stuff, but does it change who you are?" Erica takes off her helmet, then leans forward to rest her elbows on her knees. "It depends on how much the physical stuff makes you who you are, I guess."

"Penis doodles are encouraged on all homework. Awful innuendos are allowed. Extra credit if you can get me to laugh at them. And don't hit on me unless you're legal, 'cause I got crazy shit for that last time." (or, what Patrick Kane would be like as a sex ed instructor)

GOOD WORK, YOUNG HAWK, the oak tree outside his building booms once the season’s over, and Patrick smiles sleepily in its direction. He's never been sure how the trees of Chicago know about hockey—trees hear a lot, but it's not like he's ever stopped in a public park to ask one about it.

Sidney is starting to get a reputation amongst the Pens for being the go-to guy for free childcare. Or, five times Sidney babysat and one time someone babysat for him.

By the fourth time Crosby has hung up on him, Alex has to admit that this has gone from funny to, frankly, a little hurtful.

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

By the fourth time Crosby has hung up on him, Alex has to admit that this has gone from funny to, frankly, a little hurtful.

In which Sidney Crosby goes for a walk one day, and somehow most of the NHL ends up worshipping a defaced Winnipegian brick. It's all Jonny Toews' fault.

Jonathan Toews is a certified, bonafide, pedigreed geek. Luckily he's their geek, so it works out okay.

Patrick had a letter written on his wrist when he was born, small and even in black pen-print. Well, technically it started to show up a day after he was born, like a bruise that takes time to settle in. Patrick doesn’t remember, obviously, but his parents will tell him whenever he asks, how small it was and how it just... faded in, a little ‘J’.

Geno will always love his country. Even if it doesn't always love him back.

Sidney’s wedding day doesn’t go quite as he’d planned. When he’d bothered to imagine it at all, he’d thought of a nice June wedding in Nova Scotia, outdoors with the sun streaming down. He hadn’t imagined this hurried affair on the tarmac on a rainy and unseasonably cool day in early September, a month after his twenty-fifth birthday.

He promised Oshie he would make the fucking audition tape, so he did. And against all fucking odds, he got a callback from a woman who sounded like even she couldn’t believe she was making the call. Because that’s Jonny’s life now. or, a Bachelor AU, where film star Patrick Kane is going on 88 Dates and Jonny goes on more than a few of them.

Author's summary: Pat's relationship with the media has been fraught since she was drafted, second round, home to Buffalo. Her relationship with her new Captain, when she eventually winds up in Chicago a couple of years later, doesn't start off a whole lot better. But by the time she's flying back from Biel, she's willing to admit that she had missed their thing just a little, weird as he's always been around her.

It really shouldn't be any surprise to anyone that Geno Malkin decides to visit Jurassic World to see the dinosaurs (after all, there's a reason there's an entire tumblr dedicated to pictures of him with animals). But when things go wrong and Geno ends up stranded, it's up to Sidney Crosby to put together a team to rescue his boyfri--er, teammate.

Patrick had a letter written on his wrist when he was born, small and even in black pen-print. Well, technically it started to show up a day after he was born, like a bruise that takes time to settle in. Patrick doesn’t remember, obviously, but his parents will tell him whenever he asks, how small it was and how it just... faded in, a little ‘J’.

Jack has everything he's always wanted. Sort of.

The 'what if everyone played hockey instead' AU

The Line in the Sand (DA:I; Gen) - For ME! Metamorphosis (DA:I; Iron Bull; Dorian) - For Me!! the sound of your breath in the cold (YOI; Yuuri/Victor) - For Me! Calendar Boy (GW; 1x2) - For Me! Worst Weekend Ever (DCU/BtVS; Tim/Kon) Exclusive (MCU; gen) you would take the breath from my throat (Leverage; OT3) Gimme Love (Leverage; OT3) Bluebird (ST; K/S) a natural progression (Hockey; Sid/Geno) any time you're needing me (Hockey/Check PLease!; Bitty/Jack) how does a penguin build his house? (Hockey; Sid/Geno) royally flushed (YJ; Artemis/Wally) You and Your Stupid Face (DCU; Tim/Roy) Quote the Matrix (DCU; Tim/Jason) I Need a Good Tentacle Joke (YJ; Kaldur/Kon) Sister Knows Best (DCU; Tim/Jason) - croc Road Rage Robin (DCU; gen) these lines of lightning (DCU; Tim/Jason) TV taught me how to feel (YJ; Artemis/M'gann) Soliloquy (DCU; gen) Partners (DCU/YJ; Tim/Roy)

Ninety percent of everyone's problems could be solved by a robot that just texted NO to hockey players on a regular basis. Unfortunately, Sidney didn't have a robot.

On the government's classified mutant register—and on the NHL's records—Sidney is listed as Sidney Patrick Crosby, Nova Scotia, Canada: Class Two. Death visions, skin contact required.

“Geno? Are you okay? Physically,” Sid asks, which is good, because Zhenya doesn’t think he can put into words how he’s feeling emotionally. He imagines saying, The person I’ve loved for ten years finally took me to bed last night, but it turns out he didn’t want to, and now I can read his mind. No, thank you. “Feel fine,” Zhenya answers. “Even head feel fine.” And suddenly he realizes how fucking odd that is: he was concussed, and the room is brightly lit – he should be hiding under a blanket right now. He narrows his eyes and asks, “Sid, why head feel fine? What happen to concussion?” Sid takes a halting step closer to the bed and says, “Our bond, it’s—it’s a healing bond.” “Holy mother of God,” Zhenya breathes. So. They’re definitely not breaking the bond, then.

It's Sid's job as captain to match up the subs on his team with suitable Doms. It doesn't take long to figure out that the only Dom he would trust Jamie Benn's particular needs to is himself.

Jonathan Toews is the billet brother Patrick never had. Or wanted. (A Sentinel AU in which the most far-fetched thing is Jonathan Toews going 24th in the draft.)

“What kind of pleasure do you want to offer the Lover?” Sid asks. People usually want sex, of course, but not always – Sid’s had supplicants who just wanted to make out, or cuddle, or flirt… and one memorable supplicant who wanted to give him a massage, which was awesome. She confessed to Sid afterward that she’d gone in intending to have sex, but “when I saw those muscles, I was like, damn, I need to get my hands all over that!”

Sid didn’t introduce himself in the hallway, and he certainly doesn’t assume that people know who he is. So it would only be polite to thank Malkin again, this time more personally. He could write him a letter. An email? No, a letter.

He saw the horn poking out from the pony's head, golden and straight and somehow delicate-looking despite the empty tuna can hanging off of it. The unicorn horn. "The fuck," Sidney said out loud, his eye skipping from the horn over the greyish-white body to the graceful gold-toned hooves.

RainyForecast)

Magnitogorsk doesn’t hold much for him. He stares down the barrel of his future there: toiling away at a factory job, living and dying streets away from where he was born. He rubs the water-smoothed stone in his pocket, and thinks of the thunder of the waves. He knows that staying here will kill some essential part of himself. And so, he leaves. For PatriciaKoiFish, I hope very much that you like it :)

Hilary is okay with having a rep if it means NHL stars bring her Cheetos.

When Sid goes down during the game against Capitals he knows the verdict long before the doctors tell him. With the rest of his career at stake, as well as the potential of a healthy life after retirement, he’s running out of options. When Sergei Gonchar reaches out with a questionable offer, Sid has a difficult time refusing.

Malkin’s table stays until closing time, still lingering over that bottle of Beluga when Sid comes out of the kitchen to start his nightly closing routine. He goes through the same checklist of jobs he does every night after the kitchen closes but before the bar does, tries to keep his mind on the tasks at hand, but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t notice Malkin’s gaze tracking his movements, if he pretended that he can’t feel the heat of Malkin’s eyes on him as he moves around behind the bar. Sid tells himself to keep his head down, but when he does look up, just to test his theory, Malkin doesn’t even bother to look away, just holds Sid’s gaze, direct and unblinking with just the tiniest hint of a smile. The thing is, Sid’s notoriously bad at this stuff. He’s never had any working gaydar that he’s aware of, and he’s been wrong – very wrong – about this kind of thing probably more often, in his life, than he’s been right. So he assures himself this is just another one of those occasions where he’s definitely reading something incorrectly, imagining things, because there’s no way the captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins is, whatever – checking him out. That would be ridiculous.

AU: Sidney Crosby is a foster kid growing up in Nova Scotia. Geno Malkin is a Russian transplant. They play hockey. And also have sex. I claim to know very little about the junior hockey league and even less about Canadian Childrens Aid Services.

“We were playing a pickup game on a rink in my hometown and I high sticked him in the face and knocked his front tooth out. I thought he was going to be so angry but he looked at me like he wanted to hold out his bloody tooth to me and propose.”

The first time Nicke sees a mature pair of player wings in person—not pre-downs, not rookie wings, but a full wingspan—it's the April before the draft, and he's in a dressing room in Latvia, trying not to be star-struck by his own teammates. Or: The NHL gives you wings.

Beau was willing to bet that a lot of people's weird superstitions started out like his. Something that had been a dumb bet or stupid competition in college or Juniors, but then fuck if they didn't score that night. So it became a thing, and since enough of them have weird fucking things they'd rather not get chirped about, it just becomes normal. All that said, Beau probably could have braced himself a little better for the inevitable, which was Flower pausing in his rapid-fire and unintelligible conversation with Tanger to grin like the cat that had caught the canary and ask, in the most delighted tone possible, "Sunshine, are you wearing panties?"

"It can't get any worse," said Nicklas Backstrom in an interview before the first round of the 2018 playoffs. He should have known to be careful of the jinx something like that could bring, but now it's there, and Nicke and the team are determined to get rid of it by any means necessary.

"Being a star athlete changes you." And just when you think you're done, you become the face of an expansion team. Playing a winter sport in a desert. OR A (Dragon)Flower in the Desert

This started with @whoacanada‘s wholly addictive NHL Bitty fics - one of which was an AU where Bitty didn’t go to the Seattle Schooners but the Pittsburgh Penguins. I hadn’t actually intended to write anything because (1) I don’t really write much these days and (2) I have weird, twitchy feelings about RPF (parts of which are completely hypocritical given I have read RPF before). If I had to attribute blame, though, it’s because of @itsybittle whose original reply was the one that made think of an actual story and sequence of events rather than just funny tags. In any case, here is a story about Eric Bittle and the Pittsburgh Penguins. I’m hoping you enjoy it and that none of the ‘you’ here involves anybody actually in this incredibly fictional (and no doubt out of character) depiction of real people (if it does, I apologise pre-emptively and would like to wish you luck in game 6!). PS. @itsybittle, hope you enjoy ;) PPS. yes, some of the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins mentioned are completely made up.

Eric Bittle becomes the first openly gay professional hockey player when he's signed by the Seattle Schooners after graduating from Samwell. A series of stories that chronicle how he manages newfound fame, judgment, and a secret relationship with his former college captain.

[8:03 am] is it considered unpatriotic to lose your virginity to a russian hockey captain? asking for a friend

Shadows are falling and I've been here all day It's too hot to sleep and time is running away Feel like my soul has turned into steel I've still got the scars that the sun didn't let me heal There's not even room enough to be anywhere It's not dark yet, but it's getting there - Bob Dylan

Nolan’s body has never been his friend.