“How about you? I assume you’ll be there at Christmas?” Tate asks as the waitress comes by and takes our drink order. Three iced teas and one chocolate milk.
“Yeah. We have a game on the twenty-sixth and a road trip starting the twenty-eighth, but the Bay is only two hours away… and I can’t think of a reason not to go home,” I say, and Mallory looks concerned because my tone is laced with dread. Even I can hear it. Tate raises his eyebrows. “Don’t get me wrong, I love my family. The entire Motley Crew, but…”
Tate smirks. “They never leave you alone now that you’re on the local team?”
My shoulders sag. “It’s fucking nuts. They never miss a home game, and someone is always showing up at my place uninvited. Harlow and Shelby use my place as a crash pad for Portland girls’ weekends, Dad swings by when he has to do business in Portland, Mom will show up unannounced with groceries because she thinks I don’t eat.”
“Don’t you have a meal plan service?”
“Don’t we all?”
“God, what hell it must be to be so loved.” Mallory reaches for the warm bread the server brought when she took our drink orders and winks at me so I know she’s teasing.
“I know. I sound like a brat.” I sigh and run a hand through my hair, which is freshly cut and styled—perk of being back in Los Angeles for our first game since the trade is I get to squeeze in a visit with my old hairdresser.
“Hey! Sorry we’re late,” Tenley says as she rushes towards the table. Tate’s sister is, as always, a bold, bright ball of energy. “Nash had to repark the car because apparently I didn’t do it right.”
She rolls her eyes, and her husband, another of my former Quake teammates, walks up behind her and pulls out her chair next to Mallory.
“She’s hangry. Ignore her.” Nash leans over the table, and we clasp hands. “Good to see you, Grady!”
“Yeah, kisses.” Tenley blows me an air kiss.
“To be fair, Ten, you were like a foot off the curb,” Liv says as she walks up behind me and wraps her arms around my shoulders for a hug. “Miss you, my favorite redheaded male cousin.”
“I’m your only redheaded male cousin.”
She kisses my cheek. Her boyfriend walks up and claps my shoulder before circling the table to take the second-to-last available seat. He looks at that last empty seat at our long table and his dirty blond brows furrow. “You didn’t carpool with Landon?”
He stares at me, and I shake my head. “Was I supposed to?”
Crew’s brow gets tighter. “I mean, I just figured…”
“Landon texted me and bailed,” Nash pipes in.
All the guys instantly look disappointed. I’m not, though. As soon as Tate invited me to this former teammates' dinner and told me he was inviting Landon, I was dreading it. Mainly because I knew it would be nearly impossible to keep the fact that Landon and I haven’t talked in months from these guys if we were all at the same table. On the ice, it’s slightly easier because everyone is busy with their own jobs. But I know Coach is noticing. Management and owners probably have too. After all, they picked us together for this trade because of how great we were together on the Quake.
“I heard Angie ghosted him,” Tenley whispers. “Carly, Pattison’s wife, says she packed up and left Maine in the middle of the night. He doesn’t even know where she is.”
“She’s in Pasadena,” I mumble and open a menu, hoping the server comes back and interrupts us. “He knows that. She didn’t leave in the middle of the night. I was still living with them when she moved out.”
All the women are listening intently, and all the guys look confused. “It wasn’t exactly ghosting, but yeah, you could say he was blindsided.”
“I wish he’d come tonight. I know all about bad breakups,” Crew says right before the server comes back with half the table’s drinks and starts taking orders for the other half.
I don’t say anything, but Crew has a lot more in common with Landon than just a bad break-up. Crew is bisexual as well, and his marriage blew up because his ex tried to weaponize that. Crew and I have fooled around—after his relationship was over, not during it. A fact that no one at this table knows. But yeah, Landon could probably benefit from a heart-to-heart with his old captain. Because ever since Angie took off on that unplanned California trip and never came back, Landon’s been playing like shit. He’s on our fourth line now.
The topic changes as we discuss the menu and then move on to family stuff. It’s a fun night that ends with me giving Dylan shoulder rides around the parking lot before everyone gets in their cars and drives home, and I walk along the boardwalk to the hotel.
I’m feeling melancholy. Being back in Los Angeles is weird. Everything is so familiar but yet I feel like a stranger. Emotions are warring in my head about walking into that arena as an opponent and not a local player. I know the Quake will run some promo video during the game on a TV timeout. Landon was with them for almost ten years, and I was a big part of the Cup win, so they’ll make what’s essentially a highlight reel and play it on the jumbotron as a thank you. It’s gonna be really awkward to wave and smile from the fucking bench, which is where I’ll be sitting because Coach Larue will give the start to Michaels, which he does more than not nowadays.
The hotel we’re in is covered in Christmas decorations, which are festive but do nothing for my mood. I wasn’t kidding with my cousins. My fantasy holiday this year would be staying home, alone, with a pint of ice cream and a bunch of romcoms on Netflix. But I can’t.
Coach Choochinsky is in the lobby, admiring one of the four enormous decorated Christmas trees. He sees me and walks with me toward the elevator. “You turning in for the night?”
I nod. “Yeah was just having dinner with family.”
He smirks. “You can do that on just about every road trip, lucky bastard.”
