But what I saw under his name left me gulping for air.
In the space that should have read “Ellie Brampton” was instead “ChelseaHamilton.”
No. That couldn’t be right. My anxiety was playing tricks on me. I closed my eyes tight and looked again.
But the offensive name was still clearly written there.
I felt TJ come up behind me and rub my back, but I whirled on him.
“Why?” I askeddesperately.
He looked back at me seemingly shocked that I wasn’t… happy?
“Babe, I know! It’s all out in the open now, and I don’t care that you changed your name. I really don’t. That’s not a big deal at all, a lot of people do that for… a bunch of reasons I suppose. But it doesn’t even matter… What’s that whole thing Shakespeare said, ‘A rose by any other name, yada yada?’ I love you! Even if your name was Poo!” he said with a smile and tried to reach to brush my hair behind my ear as he’d done countless times now, but I dodged his hand.
I couldn’t takeit.
I couldn’t take it even though he just declared his love for me in public.
Because now my name would be out in theopen.
For the first time in five years.
Now…
I was a mess of emotions and couldn’t think clearly.
Anger, hurt, love, sadness, and fear all mixed together to create an internal mess, causing me to hyperventilate and make me feel like I was going to pass out.
I started shaking, looking for an exit, and my vision blurred. I felt pain at the back of my throat from trying to hold back my emotions.
“Hey, hey, hey,” TJ anchored me, and he stepped closer to pull my head into his chest. “Don’t… don’t cry, babe. I don’t know why you’re crying? Everything’s okay! I was trying to show you that it doesn’t matter.”
I let him hold me because I felt like there was no fight left in me.
My body froze in the irony of him trying to comfort me when he ripped away a whole lot of comfort by writing that name.
“But it does, TJ,” I said before the crying really kicked in.
“What does? What do you mean?” he asked with wide eyes, clearly not gettingit.
“It does matter, TJ.”
I felt a hand reach out and touch my shoulder, causing me tojump.
I turned to see Sav’s concerned face, which felt like the dagger to my heart was being twisted further in. Because I needed to leave all of this behind me. I needed to leave everything behind me again. I could not come back to Detroit again.
I pushed away from TJ, not even daring to look at his face, and I ran.
49. TJ
She must’ve gotten over her fear of leavingalone.
Or that was just how much she didn’t want to see me.
As soon as she started running, I chased after her, but was stopped by Coach himself and some old timers looking to chat. I couldn’t necessarily leave them hanging and not expect to have negative repercussions.
I tried to focus on what they were saying but ended up scanning the stairs around the rink for her greendress.
