Page 47 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 1

Seeing him made me seethe with rage, but I wasn’t fooling anyone. Rage was a thin veil covering the abyss of bitter pain that was hard to conceal and even harder to ignore. We saw very little of one another that night as well as on Friday. But each day that passed failed to do what the old adage promised. It only hurt more, not less.

It hurt more to live next to him.

It hurt more to eat my food.

It hurt to fail at hockey and I only had myself to blame for all of that.

While I did attend the lectures on Thursday and Friday, I was a ghost who haunted the amphitheaters rather than an attentive student. My professors droned on and on about things I couldn’t care less about and I wasted all of my energy on pretending I was fine. And when I did see Riley, I needed to put in twice as much effort in seeming alright.

He, for his part, seemed just fine. He would see me and that was acknowledgment enough.

I hated it.

I hated every goddamn tiny little bit of it. We acted like strangers after all this time. And I wondered if this was what he felt like after I’d left.

Time slowed down at last. It was all I had ever wanted, but not like this. It seemed to be grinding to a halt every so often. Nights were endless now that they were lonely and lectures lasted entire semesters. Even the time spent in the house where Riley was only a staircase and two doors away from me stretched out indefinitely. Showers after practice and the walks from the rink to our house all doubled or even tripled their lengths.

But I had nothing to enjoy. Nothing for my memory to soak up for those times that would come after. We already were in the after times. This was the rest of my life even if I hadn’t graduated.

It had been deeply stupid of me to imagine we would shake hands and part ways upon graduating. I should have known the pressure in the cooker would become critical far sooner.

But even so, as the week trudged on, I had one thing going for me even if I wasn’t aware of it. I had the consolation that neither of us had moved on. And while I ended up calling Jason Manning to reaffirm my eagerness to have him represent me when the time came, I still felt like I had at that moment when Riley had spilled all those words into my face.

I kept my head high and pushed on. Loneliness was going to shroud me either way. I might as well make something out of the rest of my life. And if I sounded like a brat, swearing never to play with another toy because the one I wanted was taken away, then so be it. But I wasn’t going to search for another human being who fit so well next to me. I wasn’t going to put myself through the insufferable torture of getting to know someone’s prickly sides just to make sure they complemented my prickly parts. Hell no. I’d had a real shot at it with Riley once before, and I’d thrown it away.

To have had the coda to our old relationship was a blessing enough.

I’d never expected this much at all.

And so my mind went back and forth. I was grateful and hateful. I was mad and glad. I was hopeful of the future and I detested the thought of it lacking Riley. And in all that time, I had to put up with courteous nods exchanged between us when we were in a crowd. I had to suffer through the awkward silences of all these guys who’d been betting on our relationship one day and shrugging at its demise the next. And the worst of all, I had to suffer through the nights when all I did was stare at the door and expect him to knock one last time.

Chapter Fifteen

RILEY

In a little less than two weeks following whatever the equivalent of a breakup was when we hadn’t actually been dating, nothing seemed any better. Although Caden apologized to me three million times and received the same answer each time, he still persisted. And I kept telling him he had done me a favor, but he felt responsible for my misery.

That was why he dragged me to a frat party on the first Saturday of April. We dressed in smart casual clothes and made our way to the frat house at the edge of campus. It was loud by the time we got there and promised to only get louder. And while I sensed a great deal of reluctance in Caden, who rarely did social occasions like this, I was secretly glad we came. It was good to pretend life was all normal again.

It was a blatant lie, mind you, but it was nice to fake a semblance of normalcy. Stiff as he was in this unnatural surrounding, Caden managed to bring us beer in plastic cups and frown upon discovering how cheap and crappy frat house beer from a keg was. It made me laugh, which was a novelty as of late.

“You know, I really didn’t think I was meddling,” Caden said.

“Jeez, dude, you really have to drop it.” I threw my arm over his shoulders in a friendly hug. “I told you…”

“I know,” he said. “I did you a favor and so on. But you have no idea what he looked like when he realized what I’d done. He was furious.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. “Water under the bridge, then,” I muttered numbly.

“Shit,” Caden said abruptly, looking at the door on the far side of the frat house. Cold washed over me when I realized Cam would probably come here, too. I looked over my shoulder and, for a moment, didn’t know why Caden had reacted the way he had. Then I saw him. Jonah Fucking Hamilton. But just as I turned back to Caden to roll my eyes, I spotted a twink freshman approaching us and laying eyes on Caden.

“You know him?” I asked discreetly.

“Er…” Caden ogled me with a guilty expression. “I don’t want to rub it in. It’s just that I’ve been, you know, seeing…”

I tapped his shoulder shortly. “Go for it, buddy.”

The freshman orbited us while keeping his eye on Caden until I stepped a little to the side. He then rounded on Caden with all of the interest your first year at college allowed you to express. Caden seemed to bask in the attention and I was genuinely happy for him.