Page 30 of Your Kiss Is On My List

TREY

I have a hell of a time concentrating on my sports management class, but manage to make it through to lunch. I pull down my ball cap to hide from any Wildbeast hockey fans who might recognize me and sit in the corner of the cafeteria instead of going back to BMOC House. It’s not like I feel like eating anyway as I sit and stare at my plate of cold French fries.

And the thing is I’m not sure which part of last night was worse. Me losing my self-control in the face of her innocent come-on or her admitting she’s a virgin.

Fuck. Who am I kidding? It was her talk of lovemaking that was my undoing because I know I blew it with her. I could have had some patience and maybe we could have gone somewhere. Now she thinks I’m a pig who doesn’t care.

But I do.

Enough to deal with her being a virgin, to deal with her possibly falling in love, to deal with all that messiness, all when I’m supposed to be focused on hockey and making it to the Frozen Four championship and the NHL?

Yes. And no.

Fuck if there was ever a better example of bad timing.

Is that all it is, bad timing? Or is it bad choices?

My feelings for Dani run deep and long into my past and beyond acknowledging that I treasure her friendship and I find her attractive as fuck, I haven’t examined exactly where that all came from.

From palling around with her and Lou for years? Not likely because they were kids and as much a nuisance as anything.

What made us close was more than sharing a few Brady Bunch episodes and even more than that first kiss which was more emblematic of how I felt than the cause. It happened before that. I first started falling for Danielle after the bloody incident at the hockey game. Hers was the first face I really saw as they helped me off the ice that day. We were only kids, but it didn’t matter. She touched my heart then and helped save me.

My alarm goes off and a last glance at cold fries almost nauseates me, but I need to get to practice and then I need to find a way to patch things up with Dani because I want her in my life. She’s one of the best people I know and the last thing I need to do is lose her because of my overeager dick.

* * *

After running to the rink, I head straight to my locker. There are a few other guys including Nate already there, but I do no more than nod at them. I’m struggling to get my head out of my ass, to stop thinking of what the fuck I’m going to say to Dani to make things right between us, and get my focus back on hockey where it should be. Hell, how could I think it would be easier to concentrate on hockey if she wasn’t in the picture?

Ignoring the guys as they file into the locker room, I concentrate for all I’m worth on dressing, trying to shove Dani to the back of my mind. But I’m too unsettled with things wrong between us. I know I won’t feel right until we’re right again. Fuck.

“Let’s go,” I call over my shoulder, as I’m the first one out the door to get on the ice. Grumbles trail behind me and I don’t blame the guys. A couple of words is hardly what I’d call team leadership, and especially not at this time of year where we’re heading down the home stretch into the playoffs.

Coach stands at the gate to the rink which feels cavernous during practice, empty of the crowd that we always get at the games. I nod and take the ice, speeding off as he shouts at me to churn my legs faster. The cold air and the swooshing sound of the ice under my blades refresh me. My heart pounds as I near the net, but the spike of panic quickly fades as I round it, under control.

It happens every time, still, ten years and thousands of skates later, the reminder of the blood puddled around the goal from that deadly incident. But the memory, even when I allow myself to think about it, has lost its power to panic me, undo me. Because hockey is my destiny and not a meaningless game I played as a kid. Now it’s something worth fighting for, worth taking the risk for.

Shit, that sounds ridiculous, melodramatic. I know in my head that incident was a freak accident, that that kind of thing happens only very rarely. But my gut still isn’t totally convinced about that risk, and though I’m ninety percent there, that last ten percent can be a bitch. If I let it.

All the guys are on the ice now and we race around. I’m the rabbit no one can catch, the fastest in our league, maybe the fastest in the NCAA though I can’t be sure of that since I’ve never had a head-to-head race with a couple of the other fast guys. Not that Coach or my teammates aren’t convinced. They’re all pretty good for my ego when it comes to my speed, my biggest asset, but not my only one, I’m fond of reminding them.

I’ve worked hard on honing my wrist shot. Endless days on and off ice shooting at the corners of the net to improve my accuracy have paid off this season and I’m tied for leading scorer with our center, Bigby. Coach blows the whistle and my competitive juices start flowing as we line up for drills.

Later, sweaty and satisfied with the draining yet invigorating practice, we return to the locker room and my headspace gets taken up by Dani again, though now I feel more optimistic. It’s probably the endorphins talking, but I’ll take it.

“What’s wrong with you today?” Nate says as he lumbers by me in his pads.

“What are you talking about?”

“You’ve been somewhere else since you got here. You have shark eyes like you’re looking right through me.” I glance up and acknowledge him, acknowledge to myself that I have been preoccupied, but I’m reluctant to admit it to him. Can of fucking messy peas. I shrug and look away.

“Don’t give me that bullshit.” He takes the bench next to me, pushing Bigby to the end.

“Fuck you. I broke up with Dani.” Or she broke up with me. Not sure which since it doesn’t matter, does it? I heave a breath. “You fucking happy now?” It’s true and it’s not, but I can’t bring myself to explain the fine distinction to him, to clear up the earlier lie that we were together. As far as he and everyone but Lou knows, we were sleeping together. Lovers.

A fucking lie. Literally. But the break-up is true enough. Truer than it should be and it hurts like hell, like she shot a cannon through my gut.

“Shit. I’m sorry. That’s tough, man. Any chance of patching things up?” I shake my head and go about the mundane task of stripping off my sweaty hockey gear then I wrap a towel around myself. I need a shower bad, like it can help me wash away the ache that goes deeper than my muscle and bones.