Friendzone Hockey (Heartbreak Hockey #4)

Chapter 14

Chapter

Fourteen

THEN

Off-Season Three - August

Stacey

I t’s only August, but I’m counting down the days until the start of the hockey season. It’ll be my fourth season with the Wildcats and Dash’s third. My buddy-sleeping solution with Dash was a band-aid, at best, after his confession. The one where he told me he wanted to be with me, and I turned him down, even though it was the equivalent of driving spikes into my nails. Every time I look into his soul-filled eyes, I die just a little more. He’s trying to hide that look, but I see right through him. It hasn’t broken our friendship—so thank you for small mercies?—but this is definitely our fight era.

“Hey, Dashie? Could you do me a favor and dump the crumbs out of the toaster when you’re done?”

He’s at the kitchen island because he oddly pops up everywhere I am. Or I should say usually. When he doesn’t, I’m the one frantically texting outside the group chat to find out where the hell he is like the coward I am.

Dash looks up from his phone and stares at me like I’ve grown a second head. “I don’t care about crumbs in the toaster. If you care, you do it.”

Then he’s back to his phone while I grind my teeth. Fine. I’ll do it. I dump them all onto a plate and slide it in front of him.

“What are these? The crumbs of your affection for me?”

“That’s not … fuck,” I mutter under my breath. He’s trying to pull me into a senseless argument. I won’t let him. “That’s what happens when no one does it. They rot in the bottom.”

“Then I guess I have a lot in common with these crumbs—I’m rotting at the bottom.”

He doesn’t mean that, I know he doesn’t. There’s one thing Dash never doubts and that’s how much I love him. He’s being a fucking brat.

But great. Now all I can think about is Dash’s bottom. How round it is. How plump. I’ve seen it in the locker room. Naked. Wet. My breath hitches. I leave the room before I bend him over the counter and spank his belligerent ass while I fuck him.

Two days later, Hunter’s over for no fucking reason, taking apart the outlet in the kitchen. Hunter’s always dressed for a day at work on a construction site, in stone-washed blue jeans and a white tank top, all of his muscles on display. Dash’s ass is planted on the kitchen island, mowing down on a bowl of cereal, wearing what looks like Casey’s Wildcats hat.

“Oh, hey, Stace! Got Hunter over here to fix the outlet. Hope you don’t mind.”

He knows damn well I do mind.

“Victim of moisture,” Hunter grunts. “I’m replacing this outdated outlet with a GFCI outlet. All outlets in rooms with water should have ‘em,” he lectures.

Blah, blah, blah.

“Appreciate it,” I grit out. I’m forced to pull out my good graces, offering Hunter beer and dinner. He declines dinner.

“Sorry, gotta get home to my little lady. I haven’t been as attentive as I should be, and I’ve been hearing about it.”

Did I hear that right? Hunter has a girlfriend? All this time I’ve been jealous, and he’s into women.

“He’s into men too,” Dash informs me later when I’ve commented on what a lovely job Hunter did on our outlet.

Dammit. Just when I was starting to like Hunter.

“Yeah, and things aren’t going too well with her,” Dirk adds from the fridge where he’s fishing around for something.

I frown. “He’s into men?” I still can’t believe it.

“Yeah, he’s like Dad,” Dash says. “Into more than one gender.”

There’s a loud crash in the fridge, bottles clang and topple. “Trav’s into dudes?” Dirk says.

Dash lies back on the kitchen island like he’s a cat, bending his knees, placing his grimy feet on the counter too. Dash rarely wears shoes in the summer—despite my protests—they’re usually brown on the bottoms. “Yep.”

“I’ve never seen him with one,” he mutters.

I circle Dash’s ankle and tug. “Feet off the counter.”

“Yeah,” Dirk agrees. “No one needs your skanky-ass feet on the counter. Also, we need groceries, Stace. There’s nothing to eat.” He slams the fridge shut, empty-handed.

I’m in charge of that. Maybe I’ll make Dash come with me as punishment. Dash has his scowl turned on me long after Dirk’s gone. “Nothing? Hunter being here did nothing to you?”

We can’t go here again. We can’t. We never did talk about what he should replace journaling with. He needs something, an outlet.

“You’ve never even dated anyone else.”

“Is that the real problem? Okay, what if I date someone, then would you consider it?”

“No. I’m never considering it, Dash. End of fucking discussion.”

At least, for now, he’s got anger on his side, protecting him. It’s something I can’t protect him from.

His glower could wilt flowers. “Tell me you don’t feel the same. C’mon, lie to my face some more.”

The problem is, he’s in my face and just like always, being with Dash is like careening down the ice at full speed—I’m definitely about to hit the boards.

It’d be so easy to press my lips to his, pull him against my body, make him what he should be.

Mine.

I let myself slide a hand against his hot cheek. Hot tears drizzle down his face—crying plus fierce Dash is my absolute kryptonite. I run a thumb over his tears and then over his bottom lip.

“I love you so much, it kills me that I can’t be with you.”

“But you can!”

I shake my head, stepping away. “I told you, it’s inappropriate. Your dad?—”

He grabs my wrist, tugging me back. “Don’t you fucking dare with my dad. What was all that ‘you’re your own man’ bullshit, hmm?”

“I am, but I agree with him. I’m too much of a safety net for you. Don’t make me be a monster like Robin was. Please. ” The agony of the many moments of wanting him strains my voice. Can’t he see how hard this is for me? Can’t he see that I’d only do this if I had a good reason?

Whatever Dash was gonna say next is trapped in his throat. “I can’t believe you’d ever think you could be him, Stace,” he whispers.

“If I took advantage of our situation, I would be.”

“You’re not—ugh! It’s infuriating that you won’t budge on this. That you won’t even consider?—”

“It’s never happening, Dash.” I tighten my jaw, letting those words cut through the air. And cut they do, right into him.

He breaks.

Chest heaving.

Can’t catch his breath.

Body shaking.

It’s like watching all the hope inside him die. As if someone’s racing around his body, snuffing it out and this is the physical reaction.

“Ripping,” he chokes out. “What’s h-happening? Ri-Ripping.”

He clutches his T-shirt, twisting his hand into the cotton as if he’s contemplating ripping out his own heart. Dash drops to the floor.

I go too. My back hits the side of the island, and I pull him to me, even though I’m not sure I should.

“No. No! I hate you, I fucking hate you,” he screams. He lashes out, punching with those brutal hockey fists of his, landing a nice crack to my cheekbone. But I know how to take hit after hit. I let him get it out, beating my face, my chest, screaming in my face.

I refuse to let him go. I won’t. He’s gonna know that despite all this, I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.

He exhausts the anger, breaking down further, chest swelling with violent breaths that must be threatening to implode him from the inside. Sure looks that way. He rubs at his angry red eyes, face glistening with wet.

My left ass cheek loses feeling, lactic acid burns my arms, but I hold my ground.

Eventually, it’s just him crying brokenly into my chest. “Please, Stace. D-Don’t do this. Y-You’re wrong, you know? You’ve got this one wrong,” he says in a watery voice. “This is a huge mistake.”

I don’t say anything. How many more times can I tell him no? The silence does it for me.

His lip trembles. “You said goodbye, Stace.”

The reality washes over me. I did. I don’t plan on going anywhere, but I still said goodbye.

W e spend two of the longest days of my life not talking. I need to buy groceries for the house, but I can’t leave my room. Frankly, I’m almost ready to become a monster for him. Who fucking cares about my integrity if keeping my integrity means pain for him? The look on his face haunts me. The terrible heartbreak. He wasn’t the only one. My soul left my body, and when it returned, half was missing.

He’s got the other half.

Dash storms into my room on the third day. “Well?” he says.

“Well what?” My body’s a limp bag of bones, reduced to the useless heap it usually is after a hockey practice. Only, there’s been no hockey practice, just me crying my guts out until all my limbs have hollowed out, leaving me with nothing but a rising sense of dread.

I don’t have the strength to refuse him again. If he’s here to beg me, I might cave.

“I get it, fine. I’ll give it up. You won’t date me, but someone will.”

A tendril of jealousy slithers and curls in my chest. Someone will. It won’t get to be me.

“You think you’re ready to start dating people?” I don’t like it, but if he’s ready, he should. Then he’ll have something to compare his affection for me to. He’ll know if his feelings for me actually exist, or if I’m just the safest thing for him to latch onto.

You’ll know, too, a little voice whispers.

“Won’t know unless I try,” he snaps. It sounds more like a threat. Or like maybe he wants me to stop him.

“Fine.” I’m not sure I’ve ever been angry at him. Annoyed, maybe. This is a first for me. It’s too much anger for this room. I need to get out of here, but if I am, I’m taking him with me. “Now get your fucking ass in the car. You’re coming with me to get groceries.”

“Well, you sure as hell weren’t going without me.” He reveals my keys, jiggling them. “But for the record, I hate you right now. I hate you so fucking much.”

Maybe he’s trying to punish me with his presence. Never gonna work. I can’t be with Dash like he wants me to be, but he’s more than welcome to be with me wherever I go.

In fact, I fucking insist.

I asked to see Travis, but I’m the one who feels like I’ve been called to the principal’s office. Travis’s fingers tap across his laptop at lightning speed. I have to give the guy props. He’s from the generation that didn’t grow up with computers, and while he’s slow to bring in some pieces of technology, he’s taken to others quickly. The whole restaurant runs on iPads and screens versus the much older “chit” system we had for a short while at the beginning of my career at The Wicklow.

Travis beckons me with a hand, and I close the door behind me. “Everything, okay?” he asks.

“I think so. We haven’t talked about Dash in a while.”

He frowns. “Do we need to? Thought he was looking forward to the season?”

“He is. He’s also looking forward to dating,” I tell him, leaving out that the someone he wants to date is me.

The air in the room changes from summer to frigid winter. “So soon after the trial?”

There’s a whole hockey season and part of an off-season of space in time away from the trial, but I guess to a parent, it might as well be yesterday. I don’t call him on it. The way he is with Dash is as adorable as he ever gets.

I nod.

“That’s not happening. I’ll have a chat with him.”

Fuck. I guess I know Travis well enough by now that I knew it was a possibility, but I feel like I just told on Dash, which was so not my intent. I wanted—fuck me—I was hoping his response might indicate that I’m overreacting about the whole thing. Maybe Dash and I wouldn’t be the worst thing. But it’s more like Dash’s tears broke me down again.

Travis makes things clear in my brain: Dash is off limits.

“Already did,” I try, hoping to save Dash that lecture.

Travis hums. Once the man makes up his mind, there’s no changing it.

When Dash finds me in the kitchen at home later that night, doom scrolling, it’s clear he’s worked himself into a fury.

“You told him.”

“I—”

“You only threw me under the bus, though. Thanks for that, Alderchuck. Don’t worry, I didn’t dare let him know it was you. With how pissed he was, he would have moved me outta here so fast, and despite how much I hate you right now, I still don’t want to leave.”

I shouldn’t feel so much relief, but I do. If he stays, I can make it up to him. Eventually.

“I wasn’t throwing you under the bus. You know I’d never do that. I was concerned.”

If humans could breathe fire, that’s what he’d be doing, but I’ll take his anger over his heartbreak any day. I’d let him burn me alive if it would make him feel better. “I’d like it if you stopped going to my dad about shit.”

“You know I can’t do that.” It’s the one thing I can’t do for him.

“Then your loyalty is with him first and me second.”

“Not true. It’s because you’re first that I went to him. Do you think I liked having to do that? I don’t have all the answers. Sometimes I need a damn adult too.” My voice is a trembling thing I don’t recognize, and my fist smashes the table, trying to release even just a thimble-full of the emotions pent up inside of me from years of pining after Dash without end. There are other emotions too. Ones I never let see the light of day because I need to be the rational one. The one with his head together. Everyone expects it, looks to me for guidance, but who do I get to look to?

Dash takes a step back. “I’m sorry, you’re right. I didn’t look at it that way.” He races off to his room and for once I don’t follow. I’m empty. I’ve got nothing left to give until I fill up.

Two nights later, Dash joins me on the couch. Saddles right up to my side and puts his arms around me. “I’m a jerk, can you forgive me?”

“Call yourself a jerk again, and I’m telling your dad on you.”

He laughs. It’s instant healing.

“And there’s nothing to forgive, sweetheart.”

“Do you think things can go back to normal?” he says. “Forget I said anything to you?”

I’ll never be able to forget what he said to me. Or what I said to him. “I plan on things going back to normal.”

And they do.