He's beautiful out there.
Not in the way people usually mean when they talk about athletes. Beautiful in the way an equation is beautiful when it solves cleanly.
I think about margin notes.
I think about I don't think I can stop.
I understand him differently after this. More completely.
The rink is the key to Theo that the library and the park and the lake house couldn't fully give me.
After practice, he finds me in the stands. His face is flushed from exertion.
Beckett waves again as he heads toward the locker room. Theo climbs the stands and sits beside me.
I look at him with his hair damp and his breathing still slightly elevated, and it makes me warm on the inside. This is the version of him that exists when the control goes.
"You came," he says.
"You told me to."
"You could've said no."
"I could have." I pull my jacket tighter. "But I wanted to see."
He watches me.
I continue, "You're good. How long have you been playing?"
"Since I was six."
"That's a long time."
"Yeah." He leans back against the seat behind him, stretching his legs out. "It's the only thing I've ever been consistent at."
We sit in comfortable silence for a moment, watching the Zamboni make its slow rounds across the ice.
"Is Cody a good player?" I ask.
He chuckles, and the sound is so unexpected that I turn to look at him.
"He's decent," Theo says. "Good hands. Weak defensive game. Gets in his own head too much."
"That sounds like him."
"Yeah." He glances at me. "You've never watched him play?"
"I did sometimes, but I was usually with Maeve and Elena and Penelope, so…” I shrug. "He stopped inviting me, and I always assumed hockey was separate from me. Like I wasn't allowed in that part of his life."
"You're allowed in mine."
I meet his eyes, and they’re focused on me. The simplicity of his words makes my chest tighten. Somehow things are looser now between us. Not as tight. Not as full of tension.
But I look away because that reminds of the little rift between us.
"Can I ask you something?" I say after a moment.
"Shoot."
