Page 267 of Faking the Goal

I frown. "You should."

"I care about what's happening to me. I just care about you too." Her voice quiets, and some of the firmness gives way to something more vulnerable. "You make me feel safe enough to tell you things I've never told anyone. I want you to feel like you can do that with me."

For a moment, I don't know what to say. I've spent most of my life learning how to handle things alone because confiding in someone has never seemed useful. It doesn't change the problem, and it doesn't make the decision easier. All it does is give someone else something to worry about.

Except that's exactly what Taylor used to believe.

I pushed her to trust me anyway. I asked her to stop shutting me out, to let me see the parts of her she kept hidden because she was afraid they would be too much. I told her she didn't have to deal with everything alone, and now I'm sitting here doing the same thing I asked her not to do.

She has a point, which is becoming an annoyingly common occurrence.

I turn my hand beneath hers and lace our fingers together. I take a slow breath, trying to figure out where to begin. I've never told anyone this before—not the whole story, anyway—but if I'm asking Taylor to trust me with the darkest parts of her life, then it's only fair I trust her with mine.

"My father wasn't always just... difficult," I begin quietly. "He controlled everything."

The words come slowly at first, but once I start, they don't stop.

My father raised me to believe that every mistake was a weakness waiting to be exposed and that anything less than perfection was an embarrassment. Nothing I did was ever enough unless it matched the future he had already chosen for me. My grades, my behavior, the way I spoke, the way I dressed—he controlled all of it, and whenever I pushed back, he reminded me that everything I had existed because he allowed it. Hockey was the only thing that ever felt entirely mine, which was probably why he hated it so much.

When my mother finally left him, she wanted nothing from him anymore. She was tired of being controlled and manipulated, tired of every kindness coming with a condition attached, so after the divorce, she cut him out of her life as much as she could.

For years, she managed without his money, even when things were difficult, because accepting anything from him meant giving him another way back in. Then she was diagnosed with cancer, and the medical bills began draining what little she had faster than any of us could keep up with. My sister was already studying in Paris by then, and between her tuition and my mother's treatment, there was no way I could cover everything on my own.

Taylor doesn't interrupt once. She simply listens while I tell her everything I'd spent years convincing myself I could carry alone.

Asking my father for help was the last thing I wanted to do, but watching my mother worry about whether she could afford the next round of treatment was worse. I convinced myself that even he wouldn't use something like her illness against me. For a while, he didn't. He paid the bills, covered my sister's education, and acted as though he was helping because we were still his family. I should have known better. I had spent so long away from him that I'd almost forgotten how carefully he stores every favor, waiting until it becomes useful enough to collect.

"...Now he's using the two people I would do anything for to drag me back into the life I escaped."

Silence settles between us.

Taylor's voice is barely above a whisper. "What do you mean?"

I swallow.

"My father called me after practice tonight," I say quietly. "He's been pressuring me to return to Japan after graduation and take my place in the family business. He doesn't want me pursuing professional hockey."

Taylor doesn't interrupt or rush me. She only keeps her hand wrapped around mine and waits.

Saying it aloud makes the situation feel even more suffocating, but I force myself to continue. "He knows I'm planning to enter the draft, so he gave me an ultimatum. If I choose hockey, he'll stop paying for my mother's medical expenses and my sister's education."

Her expression changes immediately, her concern sharpening into disbelief and anger. "He's using your mother and sister to force you to give up your future?"

"He calls it making me accept my responsibilities."

"That isn't responsibility, Ken-chan. That's manipulation."

A humorless breath slips out of me. "You're not the first person who would call it that."

"When does he want your answer?"

"By the end of the week."

"Shit." Her fingers tighten around mine as she studies my face. "How long have you been carrying this by yourself?"

"A few months, give or take."

Her eyes widen. "Months? And you haven't told your mom any of this?"