Chapter 27
DENALI
ANOTHER GIGANTIC FUCK-UP
I promised Zariah I’d give Montoya lessons twice a week and I planned to follow through on that promise. Montoya was the one who had to fuck up. Once he did that, I could wash my hands clean of it.
For our first ‘training’ session, I texted Montoya at eleven the night before we had to meet up at four in the morning. If he missed the text, or overslept, well, I tried, and it didn’t work out. That meant I fulfilled my end of the bargain, and Montoya wasn’t ready.
I knew he wasn’t. Him showing up late or not at all would prove that.
Except when I arrived ten minutes to four, there was Montoya, sitting on the curb.
“Shit,” I muttered.
His black hair was fuzzy from sleep and sweat. Blearily, he waved at me.
Fuck. Alright. So I couldn’t get rid of him that easily.
“We’ll work on the fundamentals today,” I said, shoving the key in the door. “We’ll see where you’re slipping up. Maybe if there’s less opposition on the ice, you won’t be afraid to go hard.”
“I’m not afraid of other players,” Montoya explained, an awkward pace away from me. “I just don’t want to hurt anybody.”
Yeah, he’d said that before. I still didn’t believe him. I jostled the door open and we headed inside, silent. The silence extended to the locker room. We shrugged on our gear and when we made it to the rink, I turned on the lights.
I pushed Montoya to work on his drills over and over again. Considering he’d been barred from game time, he was still fantastic on his skates. Better than fantastic, his talent was obvious. So what was the issue? Why couldn’t Montoya get over this?
My frustration was evident, rising to the surface every time he flinched away from me. We accomplished nothing. In fact, we could’ve done the same drills for our afternoon’s practice and gotten sleep. I tore off my skates in the locker room, muttering under my breath.
Where would this lead? What did Zariah want from me?
Did this mean I had to figure out how to fix Montoya? How was I supposed to do that? And, better question, what if I couldn’t solve his problem because nobody could? What would Zariah say then?
“I was—um—wondering what the workshop is about?” Montoya asked, his tone light. “Because—”
“I’m not at liberty to discuss that,” I interrupted. “You have to wait with everybody else to find out.”
“Oh.”
I tipped my chin towards the exit. “I’ll see you later, Montoya.”
“Okay,” he said quietly.
As soon as he was gone, I relaxed a little. I knew I had to leave my problem with him in the past. Our team was winning games now, at worst Montoya was just annoying.
Maybe that was why Zariah wanted me to train with him. If Montoya couldn’t get over this hurdle, maybe she wanted us to develop some kind of friendship instead. Was that why she pushed us together?
That was even worse. I couldn’t lie and pretend like I enjoyed having him around. I’d have to put effort into it.
Goddammit.
With a sigh, I opened my locker. I reached for my clothes and paused. A white envelope sat on my folded shirts.
Turning it over in my hands, I saw my name written in small, neat letters. If I would’ve felt the indent of the pen with my fingertips, I could’ve read her handwriting like Braille. It was the handwriting Hersch drilled into her when she wrote notes in the margins of her scripts.
Zariah.
What was the letter for? She could’ve slipped it under my bedroom door but clearly, she didn’t want Elijah to read it.
I searched for clues, but the envelope didn’t offer any.
What if it was bad? A letter of everything she had against me?
What if it was worse than that? Zariah telling me she changed her mind.
She didn’t see me like that, she never would, and I had to stop trying?
Oh, fuck it.
I tore the envelope open, digging the contents out. There were papers—multiple papers. They slid through my hands while I scanned the contents, hungry for what this meant.
They were news articles about…me?
I’d never read these before, I made a point not to. They always talked about my Michigan coaches and that pissed me off enough to avoid every mention of my name online.
Some of the articles were older, they detailed awards I’d won, or goals I’d scored against the odds. Winning Michigan games that should’ve thrown me to the draft, instead of shackling me to their program. The newer articles were about the Gladiators’ surprising wins.
I thumbed through them so fast, I didn’t realize there were sections completely blacked out. What was in here Zariah didn’t want me to see?
I held them up to the light, studying the hidden words. The realization coursed through me. Zariah blacked out every comment from my past coaches.
Every time the articles veered towards giving someone else credit for my work, Zariah effectively cut them out.
It would’ve been a small, tiny thing to anybody else, but Zariah knew I hated the comparisons between me and Michigan, me and the Michigan players, me and my past self. She did this because…she knew it’d make me feel good.
Zariah did this for me.
My breathing became unsteady, and I fumbled with the papers, carefully smoothing them out. Closing my eyes, I leaned against the cool metal of the top of the locker, a contrast to the warmth that’d spread over my body, heightening my senses.
I pressed the papers to my chest, to my heartbeat. Slowly, I exhaled.
“Is that from Zariah?” Montoya asked from behind me.
My stomach lurched, and I jerked around, flaming red. “Jesus fucking Christ!”
Montoya stumbled back. “Sorry!”
“I thought you left!”
“I—I forgot to grab my stuff from the shower—”
“Fuck! Go grab your shit!” I barked. Montoya staggered around the low benches, but I wasn’t done. “You don’t tell anybody about this. Do you understand? Not anybody!”
“I wouldn’t tell anybody, I don’t have anybody to tell—”
“Yeah, like you’re so good at keeping shit to yourself?” I demanded, biting back everything else I wanted to say. “You scared the fuck out of me!”
I couldn’t stop breathing hard, mind racing. This was another gigantic fuck-up. When Zariah heard about this, about me yelling at Montoya, she'd get so mad at me. I couldn't handle that again. There went my progress with her—shit, shit, shit.
"Montoya!"
His sneakers squealed and he halted in front of the archway.
"I'm sorry," I bit out. I had no doubt everything I said to him would get back to Zariah, I had to tread carefully. "I'm sorry.” I forced the words out. “I’m sorry that I…yelled at you."
My tone was all wrong. I couldn’t stop bristling—I was pissed that he ruined my moment with the first letter Zariah had given me in five years. I tried to ease up on the glare, but it was impossible. I was too tense. Too aggravated.
Montoya swallowed. “Um…it’s okay.”
Neither of us moved and I clenched my jaw. “No. You’re my teammate. I shouldn’t speak to you like that.”
"I should've said something when I came back…” He twisted his hands. “Sorry, I didn't know when to…"
As much as I hated to admit it, Montoya had a point. I would've been flustered whenever he stumbled upon me with the letter. I mean, he shouldn’t have asked who it was from when it clearly wasn’t any of his fucking business, but I would’ve jumped him regardless.
And that was an issue I had to resolve.
Goddammit—this was excruciating. I squeezed my eyes shut. "Yeah, it's from Zariah. It's important. It’s not for everybody else to hear about. It's..." I frowned, mumbling to myself. "What's the word—it's...?"
"Sacred?" Montoya suggested. My eyes snapped to him and he flinched. “Sorry.”
“Yeah,” I finally said. “It’s sacred.”
“I won’t tell anybody,” he assured me.
I didn’t believe him. I shifted, watching him, trying to think of how I could convince him that no one else could know about this. Maybe if he knew how important this was to me, he wouldn’t fuck around with it.
"Zariah censored every comment from my old coaches," I explained, my voice clipped. "I don’t even go to that fucking school anymore and they still shove their name into every—” I stopped myself, breathing deeply. “I know it’s stupid, but—"
Montoya’s voice was quiet. "I don't think it’s stupid."
I didn’t care what he thought but I studied him anyway. “Really?”
“Yeah. I don’t think so.”
A beat passed. I shook my head. “It is stupid. I shouldn’t let them dictate my life like that—I shouldn’t give a shit, but I do, and I can’t shake it. That’s why Zariah—that’s why she did this.”
His nod was quick. “She wanted you to decide.”
I frowned. “Decide?”
“Well—um—she could’ve read them out loud to you but instead she printed them.” He gave a small shrug, a flush creeping up his neck. “I think it’s…nice. Zariah gave you the choice. So you could still say no?”
I didn’t think of it like that. My eyes darted to the papers, to the censored sections. Zariah could’ve texted this to me or told me herself. Instead, she slipped them into my locker. If I really didn’t want to read the articles, the moment I saw what they were, I could’ve tossed them in the trash.
She let me decide what I was comfortable with…
Something unwound inside me, softening its blunt edges until I could breathe properly. There was meaning behind this gift, and having someone else acknowledge that, acknowledge that Zariah put time and consideration into the gift for me, felt good—even if it was Montoya.
“Can I get my stuff?” Montoya blurted out.
I nodded without tearing my eyes off of the papers. “Go.”
He disappeared into the showers, grabbing his things, dropping something, rushing through apologies, all while he hurried to leave.
Before he could bolt, I stopped him. "Montoya, you want to do this? Train with me?"
He jerked back, probably waiting for me to yell at him again. "Um, I'll be here at four tomorrow—"
"No, fuck that.” I waved that away. “We're not doing another session at four in the morning.”
“We’re not?”
“No. You're going to be here at noon on Mondays and Thursdays, and—uh—some designated time on Tuesdays, I don't know when yet. I have to move stuff around."
His eyes widened. “Really?”
"Yeah. Really."
He didn’t look like he believed me, but he perked up anyway. "I've got time from six pm to eight pm—"
"I don't," I interjected. "That’s my time to go grocery shopping."
"Oh. Next Tuesday—?"
"I go grocery shopping then too."
Montoya was puzzled and I cleared my throat, thinking through my schedule. That wasn't the only thing I did on Tuesdays but that was something private nobody needed to know about. God, I needed to stop doing it, but I already paid the hundred-dollar parking fee.
"I'll text you what time you’ll come tomorrow," I decided, changing the topic. "We have a deal?"
Montoya nodded again and I dismissed him to leave. Except this time, he lingered by the archway. "Captain?"
"What?"
"Do you want me to tell Zariah about this?"
“About what?”
“About you…helping me?” He chewed his bottom lip. "It won't be a lie, and she—"
"No."
I recognized the subtle message. Montoya wanted to know if he was supposed to hit a quota in dropping my name. Of course Zariah would ask about this, but I didn’t want her to think I was pushing him to hype me up.
Yet, as fast as I interrupted him, I was weirdly touched that he offered. He didn't have to. Obviously, I was doing this for Zariah, and if Montoya wanted to, he could've used that to his advantage. Hell, he could’ve dangled her approval over me. Instead, he was being very...nice.
I folded my arms over my chest. "Thanks, but no. I don't need you to play me up for her. I've got to prove myself to Zariah on my own."