Chapter 29
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
KELLAN
I’m not having a great week. Or weeks, more accurately.
Year, if I’m being technical, since we’re a couple of days into January, and it’s been nothing but absolute shit.
And that’s putting it mildly. I still haven’t been able to shake seeing Rick at Christmas.
A couple days after that, I headed to our holiday tournament, where I completely bombed in spectacular fashion.
I spent more time in the penalty box than on the ice and came away with zero goals to show for all my fouls.
I got an earful from Coach about that, so now I’m on his shit list, too.
And for as much as I missed having other people in the apartment with me, I feel like I’m suffocating now that Coop and Dutch are back, which has never been the case before. It’s like, for the first time, I’m keeping a secret, and it’s clouding every interaction that I have with them.
I’ve been sulking in my room since our first full practice earlier today, where, largely due to me playing like crap, Dutch, Coop, and I looked like we’d never been a line before.
Definitely not a first line at one of the best hockey programs in the country.
Classes won’t start for another week, and I can’t imagine adding school back on top of everything.
Like he could feel me thinking about him, Dutch appears in my doorway. “Hey, man. You got a minute?”
I stop throwing my puck at the ceiling. “What’s up?”
He leans against my doorframe. “Are you doing okay? I feel like we’ve been off since I got back.” Kind of him not to ask me what’s crawled up my ass.
“I’ve just got a lot going on.” We all do, so that’s no excuse. But I don’t know how to start picking apart my feelings. And, I don’t know that I want to, anyway. I’m so fucking close, and I just need to finish this year strong and get picked up. Everything else is a distraction.
Instead of accepting my non-answer, he walks into my room and sits down on the bed next to me.
At least we have fulls instead of the twins that dorms have, but we still look awkward as hell trying to both find comfortable positions.
I settle for moving a little farther down toward the end, my back still against the wall.
“How was your Christmas?” he asks.
I let out an angry sigh. I need to start opening up the release valve on my emotions, or I’m going to blow up at an inopportune time. “Well, my step-dad showed back up after nine months without a word. So you tell me?”
Dutch winces. “That’s rough, man. Are you doing okay?”
I’m trying to think of it as a positive.
With Rick back, he should be working. Should being the operative word.
But that means that I can probably quit my job and focus on hockey again, which would be the one bright spot, especially as we’re heading into the back half of the season.
“Same shit different year. He’s done this before, just never for so long.
It’s usually a few days or weeks. But, if he’s back, I’m hoping that I can go back to focusing on hockey again. ”
“That’d be helpful for you, I’m sure,” Dutch says, but there’s something in his eyes, like he knows there’s more and that I’m not saying it. He’s too perceptive for his own good.
“It’s something,” I agree without giving more.
He looks at me, and when I don’t say anything else, he breaks the silence. “You know that you can talk to me, right? About anything? I consider you my best friend, man. And you don’t have to feel the same, but I don’t want you to think you have to go at things alone.”
“I don’t–”
He cuts me off. “I’m not an idiot, Kellan.
Your mood’s been all over the place for months.
And usually, that only happens with relationship woes.
So what gives? Is it a professor or something?
Like, why all the secrecy?” He throws his hand to his face, eyes wide.
“Please tell me it’s not Dane’s little sister, dude.
Is that why you’ve been acting so squirrelly? ”
“You’ve really been giving this a lot of thought,” I smirk. “I didn’t realize that you cared so much.”
He holds his hand up to his hoodie-clad chest. “I’m a natural nurturer. Everyone says so.”
I scoff. “With arms that could choke a bear out.”
He laughs. “Those things aren’t mutually exclusive.” I try not to shrink under the weight of the look he gives me. “But don’t make me wring the truth out of you with them.”
I’m not embarrassed by Wells. Not by a longshot.
But I know that once it’s out in the open, I can’t take it back.
And to Wells’ stupid credit, he knew that.
I was the one pretending like it wasn’t a big deal, all while doing nothing to actually make that true.
Finally, I acquiesce under his intense stare.
Dutch really could choke me out without breaking a sweat.
“I was hooking up with someone,” I say, circling around the truth, “but it’s over now.
” Before he can ask, I add, “And no, it’s not Dane’s little sister. She’s a freshman, dude.”
“Then why all the cloak and dagger?”
I press my lips together, trying to find the right words. They’re so easy to say, in the abstract. So why is it so hard to say them out loud? “It’s complicated.”
Dutch taps at his temple. “I’d like to think that I can keep up.”
“It’s over now, so I don’t know that it matters,” I lie.
Wells has changed everything, and I can’t imagine I’ll stop thinking about him anytime soon.
But I don’t even know if I’m bi or gay for Wells or what is actually going on inside my head and heart.
Is there a reason to dredge this all up and change anything, when really, it doesn’t matter?
Wells and I need to be done. We’re sexually electric and emotionally combustible.
It’s a recipe for disaster–which we’ve already proven. Multiple times.
Dutch stands up from the bed. “All right, keep your secrets.” When he reaches the doorway, he turns around.
“But I’m here if you want to talk, okay?
And not just because you’ve been playing like a hormonal teenager whose balls just dropped,” he says at the same time he throws the hockey puck at me, which he’d grabbed at some point while we were talking.
It hits me in the chest, and I let out an, “oomph,” that makes him laugh.
“We tried kid gloves, and now you get tough love. Remember, this was your choice O’Reilly.” With Dutch, I know that it’s not a threat, but a promise.
I look down at my watch at the same time he disappears into the hallway. Shit. I need to leave soon, or I’m going to be late for my shift at the bar tonight. Another glorious MonGay at Mulligan’s, where I hope to god that I don’t run into Wells.
In five minutes, I’m out the door and walking through the freezing cold. I’m trying to put on my bulky black gloves when my phone rings.
“Hey, Mom,” I say when I connect the call. We haven’t talked much–at all, really–since Rick came back. More than anything, I just want to get this conversation over with. It’s perfectly time-boxed with the ten-minute walk to the bar, at which point I’ll have to hang up.
“Hi, honey. I wanted to check in. Haven’t heard much from you.” I know that my mom’s smart enough to know why. She’s being willfully delusional.
But, we both play this game. “Between the away tournament and practice starting up again, it’s been busy,” I lament.
“Did you do anything fun for New Year’s Eve?” she asks as I pick up the pace, hoping I can cut our call time down by at least a few minutes.
“I went out with the team.” I know that’s what she wants to hear, but the reality is that I picked up an over-time shift at the impound lot.
“That sounds fun. You boys work so hard, I’m sure it was great to let off some steam.”
“Yeah, it was a good night.” I think about me sitting alone in the small on-site trailer with a space heater, as I watched game tapes featuring our upcoming opponents and ate an entire Domino’s pizza. Okay fine… I ate two Domino’s pizzas. But they were the small ones.
“So… I hate asking, but I didn’t see the direct deposit in my account on the first of the month. I just wasn’t sure if I was missing something or…” Her words trail off at the same time my stomach sinks.
I clear my throat. “I figured that since Rick was back now, he’d be paying his half of the rent.”
She’s quiet for long seconds, but I can hear her breathing through the phone.
“And he will. Soon. It’s just, you know how it goes,” she excuses, like she always does.
“He just got back and it’s been the holidays, so he’s figuring out his employment situation.
Next month, for sure, we should be in a better position. ”
There is nothing on this earth that makes anger whip through me with the force of a hurricane like Rick–especially when my mom is making excuses for him.
I’m trying my best to keep my voice even, but I know she can hear frustration in my tone.
“So, basically, he’s just looking for a free place to stay? Is that how it is?”
“Kellan,” she pleads. “He missed the boys.”
I bite back my scoff. Talking about Rick with my mom is always a delicate dance, but I’m all out of fucks to give these days.
I will never understand how she will move heaven and earth for her sons, but when it comes to boyfriends, she accepts the bare minimum.
“So much that he didn’t communicate with them for nine months?
Or send money to take care of them? It seems pretty easy to miss someone when you’re taking no responsibility for their well-being. ”
“I know that Rick has his issues, but he’s the boys’ father, Kellan. I don’t think it’s fair to keep him away from them.” There’s anguish in my mom’s voice, and more than a little embarrassment.