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"He will in about five minutes."

She sighs. She pulls a key card out of the box, and then another one, and writes something on her clipboard.

"Coach's orders were you room with Hale," she says. "All season."

"I know. Tell Coach I asked. Tell him it's because of the picture. Tell him it's so there aren't any more hallways." I hold out my hand. "He'll understand."

She looks at my hand. Then she puts the key card in it.

"Nine-twenty," she says. "With Sorel. I'll tell Adeyemi."

"Thank you, Beth."

"Rémy?"

I turn around.

"For what it's worth," Beth says, "I've been doing this job for twenty-two years. I've handed out a lot of keys." She takes off her reading glasses. "I've never seen that man look at anybody the way he looks at you."

I don't know what to say to that. I say thank you again, and I get in the elevator.

He's in the room when I get there. He's sitting on the edge of his bed by the door with his hands between his knees, the way he was sitting in Nashville in January, the night I read him rule ten.

My suitcase is on the luggage rack. It's open. Half my stuff's on the floor, the way it always is.

I start picking it up.

"What are you doing?" he says.

"Packing."

"We don't leave till tomorrow."

"I'm moving to Sorel's room." I shove a hoodie into the suitcase. "Nine-twenty. Beth gave me the key. Adeyemi's coming here."

He stands up. "Rémy⁠—"

"It's what you wanted. You said we need to stop. Not in hotels. Not at your place. Not anywhere." I pick up my charger from where it's plugged in behind the nightstand, the one he's tripped over all year. I wrap the cord around my hand. "So I'm making it easy. No more hallways. No more doors."

"That's not what I⁠—"

"It's exactly what you said. I was there."

I zip the suitcase. I stand up. He's between me and the door, and he doesn't move.

"Please," he says. "Just until the Final's over. Four games. Maybe fewer. Then we can⁠—"

"Then we can what?"

He doesn't answer.

"Then we can what, Owen? Then you'll tell everybody? Then you'll go in front of the cameras and say actually, it wasn't the ice machine?" I shake my head. "You said until the season's over in November. You said it again at Christmas. You said after the Final last week, in your apartment, about your knee. You're always going to have an after. There's always going to be a next thing to wait for."

"That's not fair."

"No," I say. "It's not."

I look at him. He looks so tired. He looks like he did in the chair in Phoenix, at three in the morning, with the ice bag on his knee. I want to put my hand on his chest. I want it so badly my palm hurts.