Chapter 12 Neve
TWELVE
NEVE
“Ilove the metallic cups.” The words come out of my mouth and I’m not lying.
I bring the huge drink to my lips, the lime bumping my mouth as I gulp down Diet Coke and sweet, dark rum.
The burn down my throat is exactly what I need, and thankfully, Cynthia and her “friend,” Tasia—the one who was allegedly in some sort of shallow relationship with Sylvan—are each drinking from their own cups so there’s no room for post-murder judgment here.
No one has left flowers around Sky, either.
Jackson didn’t go here. If anything, he was a predator on campus. The lack of a memorial makes me feel good, which in turn makes me feel like a devil, but less reminders of that day, the better.
It’s Friday night and the arena is packed.
Tasia—with her long, jet-black hair and big green eyes, could be a model—said it’s even more chaotic when the Dragons play Queens, but apparently, the Lynxes are a bitter rival of theirs so the tension is thick.
Since Hamilton isn’t a far drive, there are plenty of blue and white jerseys in support of our enemy, but for the most part, the stadium is filled with red and black.
Tasia is wearing one of the latter, and the surname “Connor” is etched on the back of hers.
Sylvan is a right winger and, thanks to her jersey, I know his number is 13.
My stomach twists as she spins to greet some other girls behind her and her hair whips in my directions, forcing me to inhale her spice-laden perfume.
I take another drink.
I don’t know how she and I ended up beside one another with Cyn on my other side, but I want to trade seats.
It would be weird though if I just straight up moved, and normally I wouldn’t care but I want info from her, so I gulp down another swallow, then turn to Cynthia, my manicured nails tapping against the metal of the cup with “Drayton Dragons” etched across it in black.
“These are good seats.”
“Happens if you get here early,” Cyn says with a wink, eyeing her vodka cran like she, too, wants to dive into it.
She has no idea Will came by our apartment. Not the faintest clue that Sylvan Connor barged in after him and broke his nose.
Nor does she know that I’m meeting two of the players who are set to be on the ice in five minutes—according to the countdown on the jumbotron—after the game.
Or that Sylvan has sent me multiple texts, including one yesterday reminding me Faust had something for me so I needed to be here, but another this morning, too.
S.C.
Be alone half an hour after we win.
What an arrogant asshole.
Half an hour. Extremely specific for a boy who won’t tell me who gave him my cell number.
I still haven’t worked out if I’m going to do as he said, or if I’ll simply leave with Cynthia and Tas, as she told me to call her.
I see why Sylvan would’ve messed with her. She’s absolutely stunning, and while she’s giggling with the girls behind us now, she’s very knowledgeable about the game and the players without sounding like an obsessive fan.
According to Cynthia, Tas seems to have no idea Sylvan had been around any sort of dead body this week.
And as far as the details, Cynthia and I both confirmed there was no mention of them anywhere: Not in the physical paper the school still put out, not online, not in the news, not even on social media.
I scrolled through my account—mainly used for posting about books and philosophy before I got too busy with school, rarely with my face—and found nothing.
Nothing except the fact an incident occurred on campus in the form of the alert email I never read, and Jackson’s name written obituary-style discussing his death, but not the circumstances around it.
Cynthia hasn’t told Tasia, but thanks to some careful questioning during her favorite class, Cyn found out that Tas and Sylvan were no longer dating, and Tas found he was too focused on hockey to do more than commit to fucking a girl here and there.
No warnings, though. No trash talking. Either Tas was scared to do so, or she’s still into him, as evidenced by her jersey.
Cynthia leans into me as hip-hop pumps from the speakers throughout the arena, more people taking their seats, the ice empty and already cleared by the Zamboni.
Thankfully, Cynthia is by the exit, we’re three rows from the home team’s bench, and everyone on our row seems to be here so we don’t need to get up and let people by anymore.
“Have you talked any more to Nolan?” Cynthia asks, her voice in my ear. Tas is still catching up with the girls behind us, and besides that, the noise in the stadium is deafening. My physical anxiety prickles and I wonder if I should bring earplugs the next time I come to a game.
What next time? I chide myself. I’m only here because I have to be and because Cynthia, conveniently, said she invited Tas to sit with her and I should be there to hear anything about Sylvan when he ended up on the ice.
“He’s calmed down about the no lawyer situation since I haven’t been called in,” I tell my friend. “But he’s on standby. Ready to be at our place at any moment. His words.” I smile and tip my drink back, wondering if I’ll get another before the game even starts.
But if there’s any chance I’ll meet with Sylvan and Faust, maybe I should stay sober.
“He’s too much,” Cyn says with distaste. “But he seems to be good at his job. If he tells you to hire someone again, maybe you should listen.”
I nod once but say nothing.
The five-minute countdown passes too quickly and soon enough, we’re rising for “O Canada.” The woman belting out the words on the carpet rolled out over the ice is good, but as I stand there with everyone else in the arena, my mind is on how loud Tas squealed when they announced Sylvan in the starting lineup.
She wasn’t the only one.
In fact, it seemed like only Cynthia and I—along with Hamilton’s fans—kept our acknowledgment to a light applause.
But when Sylvan Connor skated out onto the rink from the hallway he’d been hiding in with the rest of the team, I saw the appeal.
Tall, fluid, he appeared more muscular in his padding, and that black and red jersey looked good on him, his blond hair curling out from under his black helmet.
I could’ve sworn he looked directly up at me and we locked eyes as Drake and Future pumped through the arena, but I scolded myself for thinking that. Every girl here probably imagined the same.
At the very least, one thing I know for certain is that Tas and Sylvan either were still fucking despite what she told Cyn, or he was so damn good at it, she couldn’t hate him for cutting it off, as loud as she screamed for number thirteen.
Faust was the last to come out, “Our team captain, Fausttttttt Darrrrliiiinggggg,” the MC announced, and the roar in the stands was insane.
Sylvan’s applause didn’t even come close.
I felt my heart pounding too hard in my chest as everyone sprang to their feet who wasn’t already on them, and even Lincoln’s blue-and-white fans were cheering for the dark-haired number thirty-three.
He didn’t look at anyone at all, so there was no fantasy inside my head that our eyes met. He seemed modest as he took his place in the lineup. Maybe even shy.
But now, anthem over, I remember how his chest felt beneath my fingers. How strong his arm was around my back. There was only force in his touch then.
I wonder what he thinks of Sylvan’s plan.
I wonder if he even knows about Sylvan’s plan.
After taking our seats and a hushed, awed quiet rolling through the crowd, it’s time for the puck drop.
Despite the reason I’m here—coercion—I feel giddy watching the center, Ryles, judging by the last name over the number 11 on his back, and a Lynx glare at one another with the ref to the side.
Growing up, Mom took us to every Hurricane’s game she could get tickets to in Raleigh.
Nolan, her, and me were always way high up in the nosebleeds but it didn’t matter.
Since we’d never had better—certainly never had this view—I was giddy to be there.
We won free T-shirts over the course of several years, and they felt like trophies.
I have no idea how much seats cost her back then, and I wonder briefly now if Marty takes her to games with better views.
He’s some C-level executive at a digital marketing company, and while he never wanted to use that money on either me or my brother—as he made clear from the outset, and Mom still fell head over heels for him—I hope he at least uses it on her.
They live in a nice house in Cary, and Mom only works part-time at a bookstore, so she must be treated decently.
Financially, at least. Marty is cold, aloof, but something about him had melted my independent, headstrong, tired mother.
Maybe it was the last one that caused her to fall into his arms. Doing everything solo for so many years raising us.
Or maybe it was the fact I was about to leave for college, and Nolan had left years before to NYC.
Maybe she was tired of being romantically alone and couldn’t bear the thought of being physically so.
Mostly, I don’t blame her.
I just wish we were closer, like we used to be, rather than a relationship consisting of sporadic texts exchanged month-to-month.
“Shit!” Cynthia hisses under her breath beside me and I blink, focusing again as I lean forward in my seat, my drink clutched in one hand.
As soon as the puck dropped, Drayton took possession, and now I watch as Ryles passes back to Faust, and number thirty-three casually slaps it to Sylvan, who hauls ass toward the goal.
But there are like three blue-and-white men in front of him, and I can barely watch as he gets closer, the Lynx’s goalie preparing himself, eyes like a hawk on the puck that this far from the opponent’s net, I can’t really see.
I forget my glasses constantly. Nolan always told me I’d look—and see—better with contacts anyway. But poking circles into my eyes doesn't appeal to me either.
The crowd is on their feet and I’m sure as hell not missing this. I stand, too, not having to press up on the tiptoes of my black heels. Yes, heels; I’d spent too many days in a row in Uggs and stretchy pants, and heels feel like armor to me.
I bring my hands to my chest, careful not to spill my drink on my white sweater with the popped collar, loose and comfortable over my leather pants.
I don’t even notice I’m holding my breath until Sylvan’s slapshot careens past three men, then slips past the goalie’s outstretched glove, cleanly into the net.
The response in the arena is instantaneous.
Everyone is screaming at the top of their lungs, and as Sylvan casually skates by the net and turns, his teammates coming to hug him, only Faust hanging behind—but his eyes seem connected to Sylvan’s—Tas turns to me and throws her arms around me, nearly catching me off balance.
But Cyn is behind me and she presses her hand to my back to keep me steady.
The roar in the stadium is insane and I find myself screaming along with everyone else. When Tas lets me go to put both fists in the air—her drink safely in the cupholder between us—I turn to Cyn and we hug each other, both of us squealing a little as we do.
“Less than two minutes in!” some man yells behind me, and fresh screams rise up to the rafters where jerseys and the Canadian flag are hanging.
After a moment, the face-off is set up again at center ice, and we all reluctantly return to our seats to watch.
My eyes are on Faust’s back, and I wonder if either he or Sylvan have a single thought in their head of Jackson’s corpse, or if it’s only me he seems to keep circling back around to haunt.