One Year Later…
2. Théo
I had exiled myself from Toronto.
The word felt dramatic but it was accurate. I hadn’t left so much as fled—from the rink where I’d trained since I was twelve, from the apartment I could no longer afford, from the coaches and teammates and federation officials who all wanted something from me that I no longer had to give. The city had become a pressure cooker and I was the thing inside it, slowly being crushed.
Everyone knew everyone in Toronto skating circles. Everyone talked. Every failure was catalogued, every absence noted, every rumour passed along with false sympathy and genuine curiosity. I couldn’t get coffee without running into someone who wanted to know when I was coming back, what my plans were, whether the whispers were true. The weight of their attention was suffocating.
So I called my brother.
Avery and I weren’t close. Ten months apart in age, a lifetime apart in everything else. He’d chosen hockey, I’d chosen figure skating—we’d both chosen to stop pretending we had anything in common beyond genetics. But he was in Chicago, starting his second year in the pros with the Frost, far from everyone who knew me, and he said yes when I asked if I could crash for a while. I didn’t let myself think too hard about what it would cost me.
He picked me up from the airport in his ridiculous tricked out black Jeep with teal rims to match the Frost colours. Sometimes I couldn’t believe we were related. He had EDM blasting from the speakers, his colourfully tattooed arm hanging out the window as he waited in the loading zone, drawing looks from the airport cops trying to wave him along.
He spotted me and killed the engine, hopping out to help me load my two large suitcases into the trunk. It was all I had brought with me from Toronto. Everything else—my books, my camera equipment, my trophies—I’d left behind in my childhood bedroom. I didn’t care if my mom dumped the lot of it. Let the city dump swallow it whole.
Avery pulled me into an awkward hug, all sharp angles and back pats. He wasn’t a hugger. Never had been. Shied away from emotions like they were contagious.
“How was the flight, Mathéo?”
“Théo,” I corrected automatically. “And it wasn’t bad.”
He looked sheepish. “Sorry, old habit.”
This was already getting off to a great start.
He studied me for a beat too long, his dark eyes searching my face for cracks. I kept my expression neutral. Gave him nothing.
“Cool.” He clapped me on the shoulder and climbed back into the driver’s seat. “Let’s get out of here before they tow my car.”
The EDM roared back to life as we merged into traffic. I stared out the window at the unfamiliar skyline—Chicago’s jagged teeth rising against a pale blue sky.
It felt like being ejected from Eden. Not that Toronto had ever been paradise—it was grey and cold, more purgatory than promised land. It was where I had fallen into temptation. Where I shattered. And it was still the only home I’d ever known.
Chicago looked nothing like home.
Maybe that was the point.
???
Avery’s apartment screamed bachelor bad. IKEA furniture everywhere—a black sectional that took up half the living room, a glass coffee table already collecting rings from sweating beer bottles, a giant TV mounted on the wall like a shrine. The guest bedroom was even worse: just a mattress on the floor, no frame, no dresser, not even curtains on the windows.
“I know, I know.” Avery rubbed the back of his neck, sheepish. “We can hit up IKEA tomorrow. Pick out some actual furniture for you.”
He was still on his rookie contract, so while he made a lot of money for a 22 year old—more than most people our age could dream of—he wasn’t wealthy. Not yet. The signing bonus had gone toward the Jeep and this apartment in a decent neighbourhood, close enough to the practice facility that he could roll out of bed an hour before ice time.
Avery and I had actually played little league hockey together, back when we were small enough that the ten month age gap didn’t matter. That changed. He shot up to 6’1”—broad shoulders, powerful legs, the kind of frame that ate up the ice in effortless strides. I topped out at 5’8” on a good day. I’d always blamed mom’s body not having enough time to recover before growing another whole person. Probably not scientifically accurate but if someone had to take the blame, it should be the kid who got all the human growth hormones.
My frame was narrower. Leaner. Built for different things.
I gave up hockey for figure skating when I was seven. Late, by competitive standards—most kids started at four or five. But I’d been begging to quit since I was old enough to notice the girls on the other side of the rink, spinning in their pretty dresses while I was stuck slamming into boards with the pee wee league.
By the time Avery was eight, scouts were already talking about his hockey potential. Coaches pulled my parents aside after games, voices low and serious, discussing development programs and travel teams. Meanwhile, I was learning crossovers and three-turns at the local rink, trying to ignore the whispers from other hockey parents. Isn’t that Avery Beaubien’s brother? The one who does… you know. Figure skating.
Avery dropped my suitcases in the empty guest room with a thud. “It’s not much but it’s yours as long as you need it.”
I looked around at the bare walls, the naked mattress, the single window overlooking the parking lot.
