“It’s not that simple?—”
“Itisthat simple!” I was close enough now that he had to look at me, close enough to see the conflict in his eyes. “I told you I know we can’t be together. I get it. Professional boundaries, potential consequences, all of that. But I never said I was willing to lose you as my coach too.”
“You haven’t lost me as your coach.”
“Haven’t I? When’s the last time you corrected my stance during a drill? When’s the last time you showed me proper positioning instead of describing it? When’s the last time you coached me the way you were coaching me a month ago?”
He was quiet, and I could see him struggling with the truth of what I was saying.
“I need you,” I said, my voice cracking slightly. “I need my coach back. I need the person who believed I could make it to the NHL, who was helping me get there. I can’t do this without you.”
The anger in his expression softened into something that looked like pain. “I was trying to do the right thing.”
“The right thing would be finding a way to coach me without letting what happened between us ruin everything.” I felt tears threatening and fought them back. “I’m losing everything, Nils. The coaching that was making me better, the friendship we had, the person who understood my game better than anyone else.”
“I never meant for that to happen.”
“But it did happen. And you need to fix it.”
For a long moment, we looked at each other. I could see the war happening behind his eyes—guilt and professional obligation battling against something that looked like genuine care.
“I’m sorry,” he said finally. “You’re right. I let my guilt about crossing professional boundaries affect my coaching, and that wasn’t fair to you.”
“So what do we do about it?”
“I don’t know.”
“We have to figure something out. I can’t keep playing like this, and you can’t keep avoiding me like I’m going to attack you the moment we’re alone.”
“I don’t think you’re going to attack me.”
“Then why won’t you get near me during training?”
He was quiet for another long moment, and when he spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper. “Because I don’t trust myself around you.”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Every time I’m close to you, every time we have physical contact during coaching, I remember what it felt like to kiss you. And that makes it very difficult to maintain professional focus.”
“So you’d rather ruin my game than deal with being attracted to me?”
“I’d rather not compromise either of our positions any further than I already have.”
“What if I told you that avoiding me is compromising my position more than anything else you could do?”
“Adan—”
“I’m serious. I need you to coach me. Really coach me. And if that means you have to deal with being attracted to me while you do it, then that’s what you have to do.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Why not?”
“Because—” He stopped, running his hands through his hair in frustration. “Because I care about you too much to risk destroying your future over my own feelings.”
The words hung in the air between us, more honest than anything he’d said since I’d arrived.
“You care about me,” I said.
