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“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to being back with them.”

“And your life, I’d imagine.”

Caleb was silent as he drove. Aaron wasn’t sure what it meant that he wasn’t even stealing occasional glances at him.

At a red light, Caleb faced Aaron. “I like life here too—with you. These glimpses of us being a couple.” Caleb’s pained expression wasn’t lost on Aaron.

“How do we make that work? After a handful of get-togethers that we haven’t really called dates, can we make a commitment to a relationship?”

“We’re both going to be off soon. You’ll have summer break and my season will be over—we’ll have time.” The cars behind them honked since Caleb missed the green light. As he returned his focus to the road, he continued to talk. “It’ll be a time to settle into a routine and go on all the dates we want.”

“A routine that’ll be broken as soon as soon as fall starts.” Aaron wasn’t trying to be cynical, just realistic as he looked at Caleb while trying not to look or sound defeated.

Caleb opened his mouth and then closed it.

“What?”

“Nothing.” Caleb tried to shrug it off.

“The last thing we should do at this point is hide things from each other.”

“I was going to suggest that you could take a year off because I could easily support the both of us.”

“That’s not going to happen.” He sounded more defensive than he meant to. “I realize we’ll never be equal, in a lot of ways. But not only do I want to contribute to any relationship I’m in, I also love my job.”

“I know. That’s why I didn’t want to say it.”

The problem was that he thought it. Aaron didn’t want to be a kept man, or a house husband, or whatever.

They were quiet as they continued to the rink. When they arrived, Caleb parked. Aaron put his hand on Caleb’s shoulder and felt the tension quickly release.

“Sorry.” Caleb’s voice was low even though they were still in the car. “I know we need a serious talk. Pam gave me my marching orders on that.”

Aaron nodded. “I got that too.”

“We’ve got to do this thing. We’ll talk after, okay? Either your place or mine so we’re in private.”

Aaron agreed. “Are you going to say anything to the kids about going to New York?”

“Of course. It’s in the news.”

“And you don’t want to just… disappear.”

“No. I couldn’t do that to the kids.”

Caleb squeezed Aaron’s knee before they got out of the SUV and grabbed skates and Caleb’s other gear from the back. It tugged on Aaron’s heart to see his skates jumbled up with Caleb’s. He wanted that for his life more than he cared to admit—even to himself.

The ninety minutes of practice dragged on. Caleb was an ace at talking with the kids about his upcoming return to New York, and he promised to come back in the summer to work with the team for a couple of weeks. Caleb even firmly, but gently, addressed the picture when one of the players asked about it.

“That’s not a topic for here, and neither Coach Aaron or myself will discuss it. So please respect that.”

There were a couple murmurs of disappointment, but no one pressed. Aaron braced for Ian’s questions, but he said nothing. He committed Caleb’s words to memory so he could use them if necessary.

Once practice wrapped, Caleb took Aaron back to the school parking lot to get his car and then meet him at Aaron’s place. He wasn’t sure it was the best plan since it was where so much had happened yesterday, but it was closer to the school so they’d start the talk sooner here.

Once they were inside, they stood, not even removing their jackets.

“I don’t know what to do,” Aaron finally said.