“He’s rare. Appreciate him.”
“I’m trying. It’s awful.”
He put his coffee on the hood of my car, then pulled mine out of my hand and set it beside his.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Hugging it out before you vibrate into traffic.”
“I don’t need a hug.”
“Yeah, you do.”
He grabbed me.
It was not graceful. We were both too big and too caffeinated and dressed in too many layers. My shoulder hit his chin. He swore. I laughed once, and then the laugh broke into something that was not crying exactly, because I had standards, but was close enough that Roman tightened his arms and pretended not to notice.
I hugged him back.
Hard.
He smelled like coffee and cold air and the terrible peppermint gum he chewed before practice. Familiar. Safe in a different way than Declan. Not consuming. Not secret. Just there. A friendship that had survived slumps, injuries, my worst moods, his divorce, two playoff exits, and the time I accidentally texted his ex-wife a meme about emotional constipation.
Roman thumped my back once. “I’ve got you.”
I closed my eyes. “I know.”
“I mean it.”
“I know.”
“If the room goes bad, you call me when counsel says you can.”
“Tessa said no hallway calls.”
“Then don’t call from the hallway, genius.”
I laughed into his shoulder. “Right.”
He released me and picked up both coffees, handing mine back like nothing had happened. His eyes were a little shiny, but if I mentioned it he would absolutely trip me during warmups.
We headed inside.
Practice passed in pieces.
Skates on. Tape. Noise. Whistles. Ice. My body knew what to do even when my head kept trying to sprint into the afternoon. I missed one drill rotation because I got stuck thinking about whether the ownership rep would sit at the head of the table or beside counsel. Benny chirped me. Roman smacked his stick against my pads as he skated by and said, “Here, not there.”
So I came back.
Not perfectly. Enough.
Declan barely looked at me unless coaching required it. When he did, his face gave nothing away. That helped and hurt. He corrected my positioning once in the same tone he used with everyone else. I nodded, adjusted, and swallowed the stupid ache that came with wanting him to touch the back of my neck and tell me where to put all the fear.
After practice, the hours dragged and vanished at the same time.
Shower. Food. Re-read statement. Lose phone. Find phone in hoodie pocket. Re-read statement again. Sit in stall for three minutes because the locker room lights felt too bright and the overlapping voices scratched under my skin. Tessa appeared at the door like a summoned judgment.
“Two thirty,” she said.
