Page 72 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 1

Two out of the three times a week, he came to our sessions straight from practice. The first time, he’d flung his jockstrap at me which both horrified me out of my mind and turned me on to a painful level. Since then, he was sharing his jockstrap less and minding to pack the textbook on top of his clothes more.

Over the course of the past two weeks, I noticed a little difference in him. Whenever he came to me straight from the rink, there was something like wildfire in his eyes. There was elation in the way he walked and spoke and there was heat coming off his body long after he should have cooled down. The third time, when hours had passed between a game and tutoring, he was a lot more subdued. Maybe even a little awkward.

I wasn’t sure which I preferred. The slight awkwardness about his behavior matched my permanent state of being. The fiery interest in everything I said when he was fresh off the ice, however, put me into the center of his world for that one hour in the evening. Just the way he looked at me after practice felt like he was seeing the most interesting spectacle in the world.

Now, he glanced at me, his cheeks rosy from the cold, and the same sparks glimmered in his eyes. “We’re playing against the Breakers next week. You should come and watch.”

“I don’t think that’s your best idea,” I said, running out of excuses.

“But you should,” he insisted. “Have you ever seen a hockey game?”

“No.” The word dropped from my lips incredulously. When would I have seen one? I mean, sure, there was a rink on campus, but that was like asking the devil if he’d ever gone to a Sunday mass.

“Then you have no idea if you’d like it or not,” he said.

I snorted. “Guess how many times I was told that about trying to date a girl.” I didn’t need to have dated a guy or slept with a guy to know they were my only interest. I knew Sawyer was bi because I’d seen him unashamedly being torn apart by those twins. He couldn’t exactly relate to this feeling, and good for him. But I knew where my interests were.

He cringed, his brow splitting with a frown. “I don’t care for bigots. But this is different.”

He had a point, except I really didn’t care for hockey. “Do you want me to watch the game or you?” I asked bluntly.

He chuckled at that. “You got me. I’m not a sexy winger, so I get fewer eyes and have to source all who might agree to watch me play.”

“I knew it.” After a moment, smiles spread across both our faces, and the oddest fuzziness filled my chest. I was silent, trying to push those weird feelings aside, as we left campus behind and sought the metro line to the outskirts of town and the mall Sawyer had insisted on.

When we boarded the train, it was blissfully void of the crowds. Unlike his hockey game, I was dreadfully sure. I sat by the window and Sawyer sat across the aisle from me. An odd sensation that it was a missed opportunity filled me out of nowhere. It took active mental gymnastics to come to the realization that I had been expecting a fuller train. In such a case, Sawyer might have had to sit next to me. And in such cases, our legs might touch in passing. And in such cases…

I stopped myself right there.

Just because he was tutoring me on how to appear more attractive, there was nothing to indicate he would see me that way. After all, we never met on Friday nights. He liked to have those for himself, if I remembered correctly.

And that’s perfectly fine and normal and I have no problem with it. It was a practiced line I repeated to myself whenever I caught myself thinking about Sawyer keeping his Friday evenings to himself. Or sharing them with whoever he wished.

He was just here to teach me things. And when he praised my figure or my pose or something I said, it meant nothing. He was merely encouraging me so that I could score a guy when we took this to some bar.

Sawyer was restless on the train. He took his jacket off and fanned his face, then ran a hand through his hair. I liked the way it arched over his brow and closed around his face. Every facet of his entire appearance was meticulously curated, I was certain. He wore his expressions and his look like he wore his boots and his nose piercing.

He hopped up and grabbed the railing high above his head with both hands, crossing his legs at his ankles, and lifted himself in a chin-up.

I observed him, thrown back into my younger years when boys around me did acts like this for nothing else than that they were bored. Sawyer’s hoodie lifted as he lowered himself and an inch of bare skin on his steely abdomen flashed me and squeezed air out of my lungs.

How exactly the motion of an object that was Sawyer’s body affected the crushing forces on my chest was a mystery to me. There was more at play here than merely physics.

I looked without looking, equally enthralled in this boyish act as I was annoyed that a grown man could not sit still. I was as attracted to those moments when his skin bared as I was appalled at his lack of care for public property and his image in the micro-society that those few people on the train constituted.

And yet, I watched him, biting my lip against smiling, and pretending that there weren’t flutters descending from my stomach right into my groin. Every bit of me tingled with acute interest.

Then I remembered to breathe, too.

Sawyer dropped from the railing and onto his feet, then dusted his hands against one another. “That feels better.”

“Better how? You just wasted energy.” This was the best I could do to cover up the fact that I had grown thirsty while looking at his body and that pointless display of his strength.

“I’m sore all over,” he said as he dropped into the seat next to me.

“And this helped?” There was genuine, scientific curiosity in my voice.

Sawyer nodded. “It stretched my muscles and warmed me up.”