He lets the silence hang, then, “Okay. But next time, we handle it together.”
I nod, even though he can’t see me. “Next time.”
We don’t say goodbye. I just listen to the sound of him breathing until the line goes dead.
I go back to the kitchen table, phone still lighting up every five seconds. I pick it up, scroll through the messages, the comments, the ocean of reaction.
There are some good ones. “You’re a legend, Rosen.” “Steelhawks for life.” “Fuck the haters.” There are bad ones, too, but I skip past them. I know better than to let the poison in.
After a while, I close out of all of it. I walk to the bedroom, sit on the edge of the bed, and pick up the book from the nightstand.
The Borges. The one Darius gave me.
The ticket stub is still there, marking the page. I open it, but I don’t read. I just hold the book, press it to my chest, and close my eyes.
The city outside is still moving, still awake, still hungry. The notifications keep coming, a steady drumbeat of the world refusing to let me forget who I am.
But for the first time in a long time, I don’t mind the noise.
Because this time, it’s my story.
And I get to decide how it ends.
OCEANS
The next morning, it’s like a bomb went off in my pocket.
The team group chat is at 412 unread, the Steelhawks' official Twitter is trending for the first time since the shooting, and my phone is vibrating so hard it skitters across the nightstand and thuds onto the carpet.
I don’t move.
I lie there, staring at the cracks in my ceiling, feeling the ice pack I should’ve swapped out three hours ago leaking cold sweat down my neck.
The only thing louder than my phone is the sound of my own pulse, a drumbeat of dread that makes it impossible to breathe, let alone function.
I finally roll over, check the group chat. It’s a full-on meltdown.
O’Doul: "what the fuck is happening"
Raz: "is this for real or is someone fucking with us"
Tommy: "ash just broke the internet"
And then, in a cascade, dozens of teammates, ex-teammates, even a few from rival teams, dropping in with the same question: "You okay, D?"
I stare at the screen, thumbs hovering, but I can’t bring myself to type anything. I keep scrolling, letting the avalanche bury me, until I see Ash’s name at the bottom, no message, just the little avatar, unread, as if he’s not even in his own story.
The real show is in the PR channel.
Five new threads, all variations of "contain," "monitor," "official response." The PR manager has scheduled a Zoom for noon, mandatory for all first-stringers.
Coach Vasquez is already in the thread, all-caps, demanding that no one talk to media until further notice.
I shower in under three minutes, dress in what passes for business casual, which is really just my cleanest compression shirt under a black windbreaker and drive to the practice facility with both hands glued to the wheel.
I don’t turn on the radio. I don’t need to hear the city talk about me like I’m a car crash they can’t look away from.
The parking lot is ringed with vans, TV logos on every panel, reporters clustering in small knots by the entrance, their cameras trained on the glass doors like they expect a perp walk.
