Chapter Nine
Nine
Kian
I completely bombed. I miscalculated my plan for Scarlett to go on a date, and now, it’s only made her miserable. We’ve been texting since then, but I can tell she’s not very confident in my abilities. I need a new plan.
But right now, that’s on hold because my best friend is back in town.
“This is a picture of me with Eli and Sage in Toronto,” I say, swiping through my camera roll. “Oh! This one is me and my best friend, NHL legend, Lukas Preston. This is Summer and me putting shaving cream in your hand when you were aslee—”
“Okay, I’ve seen enough, Kian. And Luke is not your best friend,” Aiden says.
“Luke? Are you sure you’re allowed to call him that?” I laugh. “You’re just jealous Summer’s dad likes me more than you.”
It’s only been a few days since Aiden’s been home, and somehow everything feels lighter.
Our former captain now plays for the Toronto Thunder, but he’s back for a few weeks to heal a calf strain before the season starts.
Summer’s never been happier now that he’s here, and seeing them hug at the airport only pulled at a fraying thread in my chest.
“Can you guys focus on the game?” Cole shouts from his spot on the floor.
Now that Aiden’s here, everyone has come out of their hobbit holes.
Especially after we surprised him with the hot tub we won from a Slink Drink competition.
It’s got the ad he did for them in freshman year plastered all over it.
He won’t ever admit it, but he did those ads to pay for my tuition the year I had to fly to Japan when my dad passed.
After practice this morning, I headed to my first Advanced Statistics class with Dr. Dunn.
We thought we got lucky because he didn’t show up, but his TA took over and handed us assignments due next class.
I texted a picture of it to Summer, who sent me a laughing emoji. And Scarlett, who said, You got this!
Now I’m trying to take a break and hang out with the guys, but my mind feels lost somewhere else. I think about Kiyomi and my mom, how I haven’t seen either of them in so long.
I can’t take care of you too. A part of me feels like screaming, You don’t have to anymore! Let me prove it.
Suddenly, I can’t focus on the game. The reminder of that night four years ago makes it heavy to sit here and act normal. Without a word, I pass my remote to Sebastian to head upstairs.
I don’t know what it is, either the way Aiden said my name or that Cole picked New York as his team, but suddenly a deep pit of longing settles in my gut.
This happens to me more than I’d like to admit.
Sometimes it’s smelling my dad’s cologne on the street and searching the crowd as if he’ll show up.
Or breaking his old mug that I brought back with me but not having the time or space to cry about it.
Because despite my life stopping all those years ago, I still have to practice, still have to study, still have to smile.
“Where are you going?” Sebastian calls, pausing the game.
“I need to make a call.”
“You said you’d play. You can’t bail—”
“Press play, Seb,” Aiden cuts in, nodding for me to go ahead.
He knows. He’s known since that first Frozen Four, when champagne soaked my phone until it died, and I ended up hunched over a grimy rink payphone like a kid stranded at the mall.
I could’ve just stayed with the team, let the night carry on with drunken singing, but the thought of not calling him and letting one of the biggest moments of my life pass without just a hint of his voice burned worse than any loss.
It had only been weeks since the funeral, but I was already good at pretending it hadn’t happened.
The cancer. The hospital bed. The silence afterward.
Easier to pretend that he’d just stepped out.
So when the voicemail beeped, I told him everything.
How we won. How it felt like everything and nothing all at once.
How I knew none of it would’ve happened without him sending me here.
It was the I love you, Dad at the end of the call that Aiden had overheard.
He didn’t ask, just wrapped his arms around me and held on like he could keep me from hurting.
I guess he knew what I’d been going through.
I felt kind of ungrateful letting myself behave this way when I knew he had it worse.
So much worse than any of us could imagine, losing both of his parents when he was thirteen.
But he didn’t let me think that way. He told me he’d bench me for the season if I ever compared my grief to his.
It’s been four years since then, and he’s never once asked me about it. He just lets me slip away when I need to. And tonight, like always, he gives me an out.
When I’m in my room, I skim through my vinyls, skipping over the obvious one staring at me. But I haven’t played “Over the Rainbow” in years, and I won’t start now.
I lie on my bed, my thumb hovering over Kiyomi’s name on my phone.
I think about calling her—telling her I’m coming anyway, that she doesn’t get to stop me this time.
But instead, I open my voicemail. There’s only one, which I’ve saved for four years now.
From a number I’ve been paying to keep alive just as long.
There’s some static, a quiet pause, and then, “Hi, son, I missed you again but I’m sure you’re busy studying.
I hope you’re having a good time there. We all do.
Even if leaving felt wrong, and the things your mother said to you hurt, just know she doesn’t mean it.
Just be patient with her, okay? She was always patient with you.
” When he pauses to sniffle, it makes me sniffle too.
“I don’t say it enough, but I love you, and I can’t wait for the day we attend your graduation. I’m so proud of you, Kian-chan.”
My mom didn’t want me to move to Hartford and attend Dalton. She wanted me close, but Dad knew I loved hockey and this was the school that could make it happen. A burning sensation heats the backs of my eyes when I replay the message again and again.
The feeling in my chest only gets worse. I promised myself a long time ago I’d delete the message. What was the point? It won’t bring him back, and it only makes me miss him more.
It’s walking at the edge of a black lake, heavy with every sorrow I’ve tried to outrun.
I tell myself I’ll stay dry, that I’ll keep my footing, until the ground gives way and I’m swallowed whole.
I’m under again, lungs burning with the weight of it.
Some days the water keeps its distance, rippling just beyond reach, and I almost believe that I’ll make it through dry.
But those days are fleeting. More often, as the years cruelly slip by, I catch myself gazing at the surface too long, the thought of sinking into its silence almost a comfort.
I close my eyes, trying to shut out the words and just listen to the low timber of his voice.
“…be patient with her…”
My bedroom door opens, and I immediately turn off my phone, tossing it on the bed beside me.
“Wanna hit the gym?” Dylan asks as he leans against my door, staring down at the floor.
He’s been doing that a lot lately. We all talked to him about the partying and the way he’s been avoiding whatever’s going on in his life, but it didn’t go over well.
Now it’s as if the guilt is getting to him.
I’m not happy with how he’s handling things, but I won’t blame him.
I know Dylan’s always had a reason for the things he does, and he just needs time before opening up. I’ll give him all the time he needs.
“Sure, but you gotta drop me off at the library later.”
Dylan nods, glancing over to my turntable playing Lord Huron. “You good?”
“Great.”
Dylan moves to my desk and sits in the chair, fiddling with my textbook and staring at the framed picture of all of us at the last Frozen Four.
“You’re really taking this graduation thing seriously, huh?” he says. “Your dad would be proud.”
There’s something heavy weighing on my throat. “I hope so.”
Dylan doesn’t say it, but he knows. He can probably read it on my face. “I never apologized to you. That night was—” He pauses. “I fucked up, and I feel like shit that I left the team like this.”
“I know. But Coach will get you back in. He has to.” That’s getting harder to believe, but I have to.
He nods, and there’s that look in his eyes. It’s the same one he had earlier, when we were discussing what to do to Yale’s mascot for our yearly prank ritual. Detached.
I grab my gym stuff and my laptop to follow him out of my room.
“What’s the explanation for that depressing-ass vinyl?” he asks as we descend the steps.
“The weather,” I mutter, staring at the dust collecting on the banister. We pass by the living room, where the guys are still playing NHL.
“Where are you headed?” Cole asks.
“Gym,” Dylan responds.
“I’m in,” Aiden says, and the guys follow.
“You’re injured. Summer’s going to kill us if she finds out we dragged you to the gym.”
He waves a dismissive hand. “She’s got class for two more hours, and I need something to fill the time.”
I can barely hold back a smile. The guy’s so in love, I’m convinced he’s been plotting ways to sneak into all her classes just so he doesn’t have to suffer through the hours of waiting for her to come home. There’s a warmth there that reminds me of brown eyes and soft hands on mine in the grass.
He opens the front door to the pouring rain and a single rumble of thunder. The gloomy sky casts a dark shadow over us as we head out. Dylan scoffs. “I bet Dale Thunderman couldn’t predict that.”
“The weatherman?”
He glances at me. “You know him?”
“Who doesn’t?”
Dylan shoves me to the other side of the car.