He nods like I gave him an assignment he intends to ace, then steps onto the rubber mat that leads to the gate.He doesn’t look back.He doesn’t have to.I feel him settle into the space he promised like a big, breathing, stubborn lighthouse.
Finn moves first, handing me a water bottle, eyes asking Are you okay without making me prove it.
“Better,” I say, and the corner of his mouth lifts, relief loosening his shoulders.
Kael pushes off the bench, whistling the rookies into formation.His gaze passes over me, sticks for a second, speaks in a language nobody else here hears:If you want.
“I know,” I whisper, and I don’t even realize I said it out loud until Finn’s hand brushes mine in a quiet,Me too.
The whistle blows.Bodies move.I set my clipboard on the cart and pull the bottom drawer open.My phone sits there where I left it, black glass reflecting my face in a too-bright room.I don’t pick it up.I don’t need to.The buzzing can wait.
“Hydrate,” I call out to a rookie who’s already trying to skip water in favor of heroics.“You cramp, I bench you in front of your mom Friday.”
He groans, grabs a bottle, and shoots me a grin.The arena breathes.So do I.
On the ice, Atlas takes his spot on the far lane, where I can see him every time I look up.He doesn’t wave.He doesn’t nod.He just exists there, heavy and certain, exactly where I asked him to be.
Finn skates past the glass and taps it twice with his stick—hello, I’m here—before sliding into drill position.Kael blows the whistle and the whole machine starts to move under his hand.
I stand at the boards and let the world be big again.The fear is still there.The texts are still there.The past is patient.But right now, I am upright.Right now, I am not alone in a hallway.Right now, I have three men learning how to hold a storm without trying to control it.
Better counts.
I wrap a wrist.I check a blade.I laugh at a terrible joke.I don’t look at my phone.When my hands start to tremble, I look up.Atlas is there, not moving, not asking, not pushing.
I’m not fine.
But the ground holds.
And for today, that is enough.
Chapter 27: Finn
The rink is loud enoughto pass for normal—steel on ice, whistles snapping, the staccato thud of pucks hitting glass—so I pretend normal is an option.I can do that.I’ve been doing that since I was a kid.Smile.Skate.Score.Make the room believe you.
But normal is a costume.
