“She’s very organized and structured,” my mother says sweetly. “You need someone like that.”
I glare at her before tapping out a response, fully aware of her eyes on me.
How about I pick you up instead? Seven thirty?
Sounds great! I’ll drop you my address!
I throw my phone on the couch, not bothering to look at it.
“Happy?” I ask, venom dripping from my voice.
“Yes,” she says triumphantly. “Now, if you’re done moping, I need help in the den. I’m redoing the cabinets and they could use a new coat of paint.” Her voice softens as she says, “Brittany says you’re rather good at painting, and you’re much taller than I am.”
A part of me wonders if I’ve slipped into a hallucination or something. Not only is my motherpainting something,but when the hell did she talk to Britt? Since when has she evenlikedBritt?
“Yeah, I guess I’m okay,” I say as she smiles.
“Good.” The softness that was just there is gone. “Then come on. No one likes a dawdler.”
And just like that, it’s back to the same old bullshit.
Thankfully, once I get into the den, she leaves me alone with several buckets and pans of paints. My knee still hurts like hell, so I take my brace off, which helps alleviate the pain a little bit. The cabinets aren’t superhigh up, and I can reach them without having to stand on my tip toes or a stool—which could go very wrong.
I dip my brush into the paint, the chemical smell almost soothing. On the first stroke, I let out a deep sigh at the color that crosses the wall. Vance’s favorite color is dark blue. It’s also the color of his eyes. Vast, like the trenches in an ocean.
I don’t want to think about him, but I can’t help it. He’s the reason I’m here in the first place.
I can’t exactly tell my mother I don’t want to go on a date because I just got out of a six-year long situationship with an asshole who broke my knee because I broke up with him.
Don’t be dramatic, Alex. It was an accident…
I watch the blue fade when the paint runs out, and I dip the brush back into the tray. Deep blue stains the bristles, changing their pale color, coloring wherever it touches. Another swish of paint on the white cabinets.
Thing is, I know it wasn’t an accident. We both know it wasn’t an accident.
When I’d signed Vance’s NDA, I agreed that I’d never talk about what we did behind closed doors. At the time, it sounded great. I didn’t need anyone to know about my kinks or what Vance and I were doing because I didn’t want a relationship and we both wanted to keep things between us and not let it affect the game.
Jordan asked me point blank what happened, and I lied to him.
I’ve lied to a lot of people about what happened out there, and that was okay because no one needed to know the details about us. I mean… it was my fault.
All of it was my fault.
But when Mack asked me for the truth, I wanted to tell him. So fucking badly, I wanted to get it off my chest, but I couldn’t. I can’t handle that kind of fucking judgment. Not from him. Not if I want to get better and get back out on the ice where I belong.
I let Vance Harding take too much, and I am not going to let him take this from me, too.
The paint thins, fading from dark blue to white as I run out of paint again. I queue up my Spotify and blast some music, getting lost in the motions as I paint, stroke after stroke, until it’s well past ten pm and I realize I’ve painted all the cabinets and I feel slightly better. Not one hundred percent, but…
I turn around in the space, nearly jumping as I see my mom in the doorway, in her terry cloth robe and with rollers in her hair.
“I didn’t expect you to finish that fast,” she says.
I shrug as I clean up the mess I made, not looking at her directly.
“Yeah, well, I kinda hyper-fixated, I guess. Usually happens when I paint.”
She looks at me for a moment, her gaze full of something I recognize all too well. Guilt.
