52. What If Im Going To the Gynecologist?
”You”re staying with me tonight.”I have to follow Lily to the parking lot in order to talk to her. She shakes her head in front of me, but keeps walking. We”ve been back in Salt Lake City for three days now, and since I dropped her off at her house, I”ve barely seen her. Fuck, last night, I had what was probably the best game I”ve had in years. The only thing I wanted was to pull her tight to my body to celebrate, but she just gave me a weak ”good game” and the kind of smile you give to a stranger you pass at the grocery store.
I”d take it personally if she weren”t being like this to everyone. So many people around the team have asked me what”s wrong with her that I”m sick of fielding the question. Coach called me into his office this morning to ask if Lily and I had broken up. Hell, Kayden skated down to the end of the ice where Milo and I were working with our goaltending coach to threaten me if I”d done something to her. Fucking Kayden Bouchard, the man who is my best friend, not hers. So, as much as I hate being the domineering asshole, I”m going to do whatever it takes to snap her out of this. For her sake, and so the laundry staff doesn”t start washing my jock straps in hot sauce.
”I mean it,” I tell her. ”Go home and get whatever you need. Then come to my house. Get enough for a few days. We”ll worry about getting more when we come back from the road trip.”
”I”m not moving in with you.” She still doesn”t turn around. And now she”s walking even faster to her car.
God damn it.I jog to close the distance and still catch up to her only as she slips the key into her car door. ”What”s going on? Talk to me, Jams.”
”Nothing. And don”t call me that.”
”Bullshit.” I press my hand against the door so she can”t open it. If I”m going to act like a jerk, I might as well go all the way. ”Things were good at my parents’ house. They were great. So what”s different now? What changed between me and you?”
She looks around the parking lot and finally at me. Her jaw is clenched so tight I can almost hear her teeth grind as she blows out a breath through her pursed lips, and damn if seeing those lips this close doesn”t trigger feelings I really don”t need to deal with right now on top of all this. ”We”re in the real world now, Brant. Things just got carried too far over the break. It was… fun, but we”re back in reality now.”
”Fun?” I give her a chance to say something more, but she doesn”t. ”I introduced you to my parents. I told practically everyone we met that I love you. You gave me…” Heat rises in my cheeks as I remember our Christmas morning. ”And you want me to believe that was just you having fun?”
”There are too many reasons this won”t work.”
”Name them,” I challenge her.
She takes a step and runs a hand over her pulled back hair. ”I have some place to be. I”m not going home.”
”Name them.” I can”t believe we”re really doing this in the parking lot outside the arena after a practice. After what I wanted to be the beginning of a life with her.
”My job.” She holds out a finger, counting as she goes. ”My entire career. Your career—you don”t need the distraction. That I hate this fucking city and can”t wait to leave it forever. Isn”t that enough?”
”None of those reasons are new. We”re working through all of them. It”s your mom.” She looks away. ”The only thing that”s changed is that fucking text you got.” Looking back, I see now that”s when she started to distance herself from me. I thought she needed space to recenter herself, and I gave it to her. I don”t know how I would react if one of my parents abandoned me because of who I am and then tried to contact me out of the blue, so I had nothing to gauge her reaction against. I still don”t.
”That text didn”t change anything. It just reminded me of the way things are always going to be. I”m sorry, Brant. I really am. But you”ll be fine.”
I wait for her to look at me. It seems like the sun might set before she does, but finally her eyes meet mine, and I nod. ”You”re right. I will be fine.” I take the keys from the door where she left them, walk around to the other side, and unlock that door. ”So, where are we going?”
”What?”
”Wherever you”re going, I”m going with you. You said you”re not going home, so where are we going?” I pull the door open and sit down. The glovebox door drops, bashing my left knee, and I think of muttering a few curses at the old car. But I latch it shut, pull my other leg in, and close the door.
”Brant.”
It might be childish, but I pretend I can”t hear her. She folds her arms across her chest and then put her hands on her hips a moment later. I”m literally a pro at seeing what”s going on around me. Watching her in the side of my eye is a hell of a lot more interesting than watching some cocky forward who thinks he can make a power move around the net and catch me napping, so I can do this all day. I try to keep my expression blank, but it doesn”t take long before a smile creeps across my lips. And when I slot the key into the ignition and press the door unlock button to urge her into the car, I”m fully grinning.
Lily yanks the door open and slides behind the steering wheel with a huff. I keep my hand over the glovebox door in case it gets any ideas. ”I wasn”t lying. I”m not going home.”
”I believed you. I”m going with you.”
”Why are you making this so difficult?” She grips the top of the steering wheel and straightens her arms. The sun catches the tiny blond hairs on her forearms that are invisible otherwise, and I want to tease my finger along the ends of them to watch goosebumps rise along her skin.
”I”m making this incredibly easy. I don”t give a shit about any of those reasons we can”t be together, so I”m throwing them all out the window.” I press the button to roll down the window, but since she hasn”t turned the key in the ignition, it just makes a weak click. So much for dramatic effect. ”Might as well drive. I wouldn”t want us to be late.”
”What if I”m going to the gynecologist?” she asks.
I shrug. ”I”ll help you into the stirrups.”
”You are the biggest asshole.”
”You don”t know that, but if you”re a good girl, I”ll let you explore and find out.”
”And disgusting too.” She starts the car and pulls out of the parking lot without another word.
She still hasn”t said a word to me by the time we turn onto 400 East, but the way she glares at me every time we”re on a straight road or at a red light is all the interaction I need. ”You could have just said we”re going to Bridges. Dropping something off?”
”Asshole,” it”s not much louder than a breath, but hearing it makes me laugh. ”I talked to Michael yesterday,” she says. ”He was really strange on the phone. He kept insisting nothing was wrong, but something obviously was. I thought it would be more difficult for him to deny it when I”m looking him in the eye.”
”You”re very hard to deny when you”re looking me in the eye.”
She pulls over to the curb, and before the car is even in park, she turns to look at me. I see the slightest little copper swirls as the sun glints in her brown irises. ”I want us to break up.”
”Nope,” I pop the word. ”Sorry, Jams, I guess it”s not as difficult as I thought. Maybe you don”t believe this right now, but you deserve better than you”ve ever had before. And I”m going to be that for you.” I get out and walk around to her side. When she”s out of the car, I take her hand. She doesn”t yank away or even argue. She just wraps her fingers around mine and doesn”t let go, even when we get to the door.
Michael is sitting behind the desk when he waves us in. I almost don”t recognize him in the dark blue suit he”s wearing. He looks like he hasn”t slept in a week. ”Are you two here to see Chloe? She hasn”t stopped talking about her trip to Toronto.” He smiles. It looks like it”s been even more than a week since he last did that. ”She”s not here, though. She”s at the library with some friends. Claims she wants to study for a science test coming up after break, but I”m pretty sure she just wants to use their internet. I had to limit her wifi here at the house because she binged Korean shows and watched TikTok videos all day.”
”K-dramas,” A cute flush sweeps over Lily”s face. ”I might be the cause of that. Sorry.”
Michael rolls a shoulder. ”From what I”ve seen, it”s nothing inappropriate. But it shouldn”t be all the time. As a teenager, though, it”s her job to disagree. Since she”s on break, she should be allowed to do whatever she wants, she told me.” The way he whips his head from side to side as he says it forces me to stifle a laugh. It”s an almost perfect impression. ”Sorry you came all this way just for her to not be here.”
”It”s not like it”s that far.” Lily sits on a chair opposite Michael, and I follow her lead. ”Besides, I wanted to talk to you if you have a minute.”
Michael looks at his computer screen, clicks something, and then puts his hands behind his head as he pushes his chair back a couple of feet from the desk. It makes him look even more weary than he already did. ”I can take a break. It”s not like I”m getting anywhere anyway. So what can I do for you?”
”You can tell me what”s wrong,” Lily answers.
He draws in his lower lip and bites the left side. ”Nothing you two need to worry about.”
”So tell us, and we can stop worrying then.” I lean forward and rest my elbows on my knees. If someone is giving Chloe a hard time, I will absolutely ruin them. I don”t care if they”re under eighteen or not. My mind flashes to the first time I was here. To that boy who was being a smart ass to Chloe. Roland or Ronan or something like that. I can picture him, but I just can”t recall his name.
”We”re a small non-profit, and what we do isn”t exactly popular with some people.”
”You give unhoused kids a place to stay,” Lily interrupts. ”How could anyone not support that?”
Michael gives Lily a look that tells her she knows exactly why some people don”t support what they do. ”We give unhoused LGBTQ children a place to stay.”
Roman. That was that jerk”s name.
”But this doesn”t have anything to do with that,” Michael continues. ”Not directly. You”ve probably noticed that this area is gentrifying. When this was just an abandoned house, the owner gave us a great lease as long as we could make our own repairs. That deal worked well for everyone for the last few years.”
”But?” I ask.
”But some developers have come along and made offers on this property. The landlord is a nice man, and he”s never once balked at helping us. But it doesn”t make sense to turn down offers that will give him multiple times more money than he would ever get from a lifetime of collecting rent from us.”
”Couldn”t he cut you some kind of deal?” Lily asks. ”Raise your rent a little, or let you buy the house at a discount? There”s probably some tax deduction he could get for doing that, right?”
Michael shakes his head. ”It”s nowhere near what he would get for selling it outright. We have some money set aside for repairs and improvements. We could use it, but it”s less than a third of what we would need. And even if we did that, it wouldn”t leave us money to make any essential repairs that might come up afterward. The best chance we have now is finding a new home. Someplace close to schools, with neighbors who won”t object to a dozen unhoused queer kids living next door, and in an area that won”t interest developers for the next decade or two. Should be easy, right?” He forces a humorless chuckle.
”I”m sorry.” It”s inadequate, but I don”t know what else to say. Michael looks heartbroken, and Lily looks like she could cry. I rub my thumb across the back of it.
”We”ll be fine. We don”t have a lot of support, but the support we have is very loyal. It will work out. Somehow.”