"You shouldn't let him push you around," I say.
It comes out wrong, like a rebuke. I meant it to sound protective, but I hear criticism. She flinches and my chest tightens.
"Is that all?" Her voice is clipped, tight. "I'm working, Silas."
Shit. Scout is responding to me like I'm Enzo. I shouldn't be here, either.
I nod once and walk away because I don't know how to fix the raw thing in her expression. I don't know how to fix anything. It's obvious by now that I only know how to break things.
Scout looks broken enough already.
By the time I get back into the locker room, it's empty. I can hear the distant echoes of the announcer, getting ready to call us out onto the ice. I hurry to pull on my skates and curse myself. I already got distracted and the game hasn't even started yet. Not a good sign.
I make it out just as the announcer is calling me out onto the ice. "Anchoring the blue line for your Seattle Havoc, six-foot-eight of pure shutdown power. Give it up for #12, Silas Huxley!"
Once I'm on the ice, I feel steadier. With all the drama, I nearly forgot that we're playing a game against the Anaheim Voltage, a team that we usually have no trouble trouncing. The cold air bites sharp in my lungs. My skates bite into fresh ice. The puck ticks clean against my blade. Here, things make sense.
There's order. There’s control. There are rules that don't change.
For the first few minutes of the game, the Havoc look good. Our team captain, Alex Thorne, wins a clean faceoff. Beck hammers a perfect dump-in along the boards. Hunter pins a defenseman and forces a turnover. A Voltage player tries a tricky move to get around me, but I block him with my body, using my left shoulder to check him aggressively into the boards. Thorne seals the wall on defense. For just abreath, I almost believe we might actually be okay this season.
Then the wobble creeps in.
I always feel it first when the team starts to slide. It's like the ice tilts under my skates.
Kozlov, a vet who should know better, mishandles the puck on the blue line. It bounces out to center ice. Connor's stick is a beat too slow on a lift. Jett, our starting goalie, saves it at the last second. Everybody breathes, like we're saved.
But I don't. I file the mistakes away. They make little red marks on the map in my head.
I push my body harder to cover other players' gaps. I make faster crossovers. Stick in every passing lane. I clear the crease until my shoulder screams in protest. Hunter takes a stupid retaliatory penalty after a clean hit. Of course he does. Two minutes shorthanded.
I block a shot with my ribs and stay on my feet even though my breath disappears. We kill the penalty. My chest still burns.
The unraveling keeps coming. Grayson screams obscenities at a linesman and costs us a whistle. Jett tries to walk the puck through three defenders instead of just clearing it to safety. The bench swings from rage to silence and back again. Beck mutters curses under his breath like they might tilt the ice in our favor.
Hunter paces, jaw working, ready to snap at anyone who gets close. He’s a fucking hothead and even marrying his pretty little wife Juliet has only taken so much off the edge of his rage. Connor Li and Shane Villareal, two of our best rookies, watch Hunter and seem to shrink into themselves.
I catch sight of Enzo in the stands during a line change. He's shaking hands with sponsors, laughing too loud, playing to the crowd. I don't look directly at him, but I feel hispresence like a weight. The whistle blows and I can’t wait to get off the ice. Anything that takes me away from him is worth it.
I know I need to think about finding a replacement for him, but that’s low on my list. Too many other things to deal with at the moment.
Then I spot Hunter and Juliet near the tunnel.
They're not doing anything dramatic. Hunter's hand just rests at the small of her back, protective and easy. Juliet leans into him like it's the most natural thing in the world. They fit together like puzzle pieces, as though they were designed specifically for each other.
Something twists hard in my gut.
My brother doesn't know how fucking lucky he is. I'll never be soft enough, open enough, or good enough for someone to lean on like that. The thought sits heavy in my chest as I vault back over the boards for my next shift.
By the third period, the math in my head has already written the ending. Our possession is slipping. Scoring chances are bleeding away. We're going to lose.
And we do.
The buzzer makes it official. Three to one. Another loss to add to the pile.
The locker room mood is sour the second I step into it. Hunter slams his stick into the wall hard enough to crack the composite. Jett mutters to himself; he's always taken losses harder than anyone else on the team. Beck strips tape off his stick like he's skinning something. Grayson laughs too loud at nothing and no one joins him.
Then comes the silence, thick and suffocating. Normally, it's my friend. But not right now.
