Chapter 6
JAMIE
“Come on,” Felix whines. “Add me!”
“You don’t even know them,” Carter says.
“Well, I can get to know them,” Felix pushes, “if you add me to the group chat!”
We’re sitting in our living room, hanging out.
Tuck posted something in the group chat that’s still active with me, Sebastian, Carter, and our former roommates who graduated last year: Hudson Voss, Tuck McCoy, Rhys Callahan, and Lane Larsen.
We laughed at it. Then Felix started hounding us to add him.
He’s just fanboying over the prospect of being in a group chat with four standout rookies who are making waves in the NHL this season.
“We’ll put it up to a vote,” Sebastian says. Felix looks perplexed as Sebastian holds up his camera and snaps a photo of him.
I grin, looking at the activity in the chat. Felix keeps prattling on, asking Sebastian what he’s talking about.
“The verdict is in,” Sebastian announces, holding the screen of his phone toward Felix to read it and weep.
What Felix sees in the group chat he so wishes to be a part of is Sebastian posting his picture, putting his hypothetical membership up for a vote, followed by a rapid succession of thumbs-down emojis from our four former teammates.
“This is cruel,” Felix pouts. “Imagine how my game could improve if I had access to the brains of four NHL players. You’re sabotaging my career.”
I chuckle. “Trust me, dude, you’re not missing out on advanced hockey analysis. Most of the chat is just Hudson and Tuck bickering like an old married couple.”
“They miss each other,” Carter says.
“Felix and Veikko remind me a lot of them,” Sebastian comments.
“I’m pretty sure Veikko and I are never going to be an old married couple,” Felix says.
I’d have expected Veikko to chime in with hearty agreement, but when I glance at him, there’s a strange, unreadable expression on his face. I’d almost say it’s a slight look of disappointment … if that made any sense, which it doesn’t.
Felix still has a peeved expression on his face, but he drops it. The conversation drifts into us shooting the shit about random stuff while we play a round of a team-based first-person shooter game on the TV.
“Fuck!” Felix exclaims after a spurt of blood flies from his character’s head. His exclamation is met with a deep chuckle from the Finn on the other couch, and he grumbles, “Damn it, Veikko, can’t you kill someone else for a change?”
“Somehow, that does not sound as fun,” Veikko replies.
“Maybe that’s just how Veikko expresses his affection, Felix,” Sebastian says. “Like a boy who has a crush on a girl and doesn’t know what to do other than pull her hair.”
Veikko’s lips bunch up, his gaze ticking to Felix before quickly pulling away.
The big defenseman rises from the couch. “I have class to get to,” he announces. “Jamie, you, too, right?”
I nod, standing up. “Yeah, we’ll walk together. Catch you guys later.”
“I’ll join you,” Sebastian says. “I’m meeting Harper at the library to study together.”
Felix jumps to the seat vacated by Sebastian, next to Carter on the two-seater couch. “Perfect,” he says, “I’ll have time alone to wear down Carter into adding me to the chat.”
“Hudson would kick you out immediately even if I did.”
Sebastian, Veikko, and I pull on our winter jackets, sling our bookbags over our shoulders, and head out into the chilly winter afternoon. We join a steady stream of bundled-up students on the route to campus. It’s the time of day when afternoon classes are starting, like a pedestrian rush hour.
The frozen snow has become a permanent fixture of the landscape. The sun’s been too weak to melt any of it, even though it fell over a week ago. Jagged footprints are cut into its glistening surface. The masses of it piled along the cleared roads and sidewalks have turned a dirty, greyish-black.
It makes lawns harder to cut through and turns the narrow sidewalks into overcrowded, slow-moving conveyor belts. There’s no space to cut past slow walkers without stepping knee-deep into the snowbanks.
The crowd thins out when we get to campus and people start going their separate ways to various buildings. Still, the three of us decide to take a shortcut over the broad campus green. Our feet crunch into the glossy, hard surface of the snow as we traipse over it.
We’re talking about our game next week when I see her.
I trail off right in the middle of listing our upcoming opponent’s offensive weaknesses. Or maybe I was listing their defensive weaknesses. Or strengths. I can’t remember.
Carmen is stepping out of the administrative building, and right now, the only things I could list are all the things about her that make my heart patter.
How the curly strands of her hair spilling from her beanie flutter in the breeze.
How bright and vivid the dab of pink that is her mouth looks across the expanse of stark white snow between us.
How a thin ray of sunlight clawing out from behind the clouds strikes her face at just the right angle to light up her rich, brown eyes.
“Oh, that explains it.” Sound filters past the beat of my bloodstream in my ears for the first time since Carmen stepped into my view.
“Huh?” I ask, turning my head to both sides, not sure whether Veikko or Sebastian made that comment. Or what they’re talking about.
Sebastian grins at me. “We were wondering why the hell you trailed off and suddenly went mute. Then we noticed your girlfriend.”
My cheeks are warm against the stinging wind that brushes past us. “She’s not my girlfriend.”
Sebastian snickers, and I can’t blame him. That exchange was something right out of middle school.
“Have you made any progress with her?” Veikko asks.
“Not really,” I sigh. It’s pathetic to even mention this, but I do. “Well, I did make her laugh again the other day.”
Excitement sparks in Sebastian’s eyes. “Really? How?”
I recount the tale of how I fell when we went for that outdoor run. Though I cut out most of the details of my ridiculous fall, just telling them I tripped.
Sebastian hums. “So, she gets a kick out of you falling down.”
When he puts it that way, it doesn’t seem as hopeful. “Seems so.”
“And this amusement at you falling down is the most promising opening you’ve had with her yet?” Veikko asks.
Sheesh. When he puts it that way, it really doesn’t seem hopeful.
“Seems so,” I repeat, more glumly this time.
Carmen’s still standing in front of the administrative building, looking at something on her phone.
She glances up as the three of us get closer to where she’s standing. Her eyes find me. My heart clenches.
“Well, if nothing else is working,” I hear Veikko say in a musing tone next to me.
Then, my eyes aren’t on Carmen anymore. Because Veikko sticks his leg out, my foot snags on it as I step forward, and once again in Carmen’s presence, I crash to the ground.
It feels like I fall through a panel of thin, weak glass when my frame crushes into the frosted surface of cold, week-old snow.
Somehow, I feel like if I look up and see Carmen laughing at me this time, it won’t feel quite as uplifting.
When I do lift my head, I see Carmen. But she’s not laughing. She’s marching across the snow, a fiery look in her eyes with her brow pinched tight and her lips a thin, hostile slash across her face.
“What the hell was that!” she demands, her strident voice sending a rattle of dread up my spine even though it’s not directed at me.
It’s directed at Veikko.
Veikko is usually unshakeable. I’ve never seen him look worried or concerned. But his eyes snap open at Carmen’s words, culpability radiating from him like he’s a schoolboy receiving a well-deserved reprimand.
“I, well, umm …” Veikko stammers, taken aback and looking guilty.
Carmen doesn’t let up. Thinking nothing of the fact that Veikko’s about three times bigger than her, she sets her features even harder and steps toward him, her shoulders square and her gaze sharp.
It’s like there’s a blaze of fire around her. She tilts her chin up, self-assurance and protectiveness pulsing off her in waves.
Protectiveness for … me?
“You tripped him!” Her brow lowers even more. “Are you trying to deny it?”
“No,” Veikko answers.
My jaw hangs open. I’m too focused on Carmen’s small, feisty form as she dresses down my gargantuan teammate to even think of getting up.
She straightens her tiny index finger and jabs it into Veikko’s massive slab of a chest. “Don’t do it again.”
Veikko blinks, dumbfounded. “I won’t.”
Carmen turns to me. Her expression softens. My chest softens, too.
“Jamie, are you okay?”
A smile crawls over my face. “Never better.”
That’s the truth. Carmen laughed when she saw me fall on my own—only after she knew I was okay. When she saw someone trip me, she was almost ready to rip their head off.
Maybe she just has a crusader’s mentality. Maybe it has nothing to do with me at all. But it does show she’s not totally indifferent to my existence.
Some of the fire seeps out of her eyes, along with some of the steel in her demeanor.
Carmen looks down with a curious expression at my stupid smile, then glances at Veikko and Sebastian.
She huffs. “Men,” she grumbles with a roll of her eyes, before turning around and walking off.
Sebastian nudges me when I get back to my feet. He wears a wry grin. “Maybe she doesn’t mind you after all.”