Chapter 49
DENALI
THE CORRUPTED FILE
It took another four days for Zariah to finalize her paperwork with the studio.
She got to talk to Winter Arkapaw herself, and Zariah paced in her kitchen, throwing me excited glances in the dips of the conversation.
They had her take an official portrait for her studio badge and I snapped a shot of her up against her door, beaming for the camera.
Zariah was thrilled and I did my best not to fall apart.
I tried. I really did.
There was a group conference with the co-executive producer.
He explained that the nine-month contract was just a formality.
The medical drama was already in its eleventh season.
If the new PAs wanted a consistent paycheck, all they had to do was finish their duties and be pleasant to be around.
Most of their PAs stuck around for three years.
Three years.
Three years.
I came up with a bullshit excuse, taking a moment by myself in Zariah’s bedroom. Hands clasped together, I drew in long breaths, forcing myself to calm down. To walk back in, I had to practically stitch the grin on my face—to pretend like everything was okay.
I was excited for Zariah in a long-term excitement kind of way. This was the best thing for her future, and I knew she wanted to go.
But in the here and now, I was fucking miserable.
While she was busy, I threw myself into everything I could because I didn’t want to be alone in her dorm.
I found things to do. Cleo called for volunteers to help set up before the slideshow and I quickly added my name to the list. It was scheduled during one of Zariah’s classes, and I wanted to get back in Cleo’s good graces.
It was a win-win. Cleo and I already had a private conversation, but I could tell she was still keeping an eye on me.
The slideshow doubled as a potluck, and I arrived with a big tray of choclava. Some of the guys were bringing in chairs while Montoya sat behind the podium, configuring the speaker system.
His face lit up when he saw me. “Captain!”
I slid the tray on the table then made my way over. This was even better, I’d been trying to catch a word with him alone. “Hey.”
He dropped his voice to a whisper. “My mom sent another book, I put it in your locker.”
“Thanks.” I cleared my throat. “So the—uh—timeline for the surprise has changed.”
“What do you mean?”
“I kind of need to get better at stuff by May. Instead of Christmas.”
Montoya’s eyebrows shot up. “Uh…”
“Does your mom have any other recommendations? Like stuff for kindergarteners or something?”
“I can ask?” He chewed his lip. “Denali, I don’t think you can—”
“No, I’m going to do it. I’ll figure it out—” My words stumbled to a stop when Elijah walked in, boxes of napkins under his arms. I clapped Montoya on the back. “Thanks, kid. I’ll talk to you later.”
My special surprise for Zariah needed to stay a surprise which meant Elijah couldn’t find out about it. I was careful to keep him out of the loop. I grabbed one of the boxes of napkins from Elijah and we set up the remaining tables together.
“Wow, I wonder whose choclava that is.” Elijah snorted. “Are you trying to get into my sister’s pants or something?”
“Zariah helped me make it.”
“No, she didn’t.” He punched me on the shoulder. “Dumbass, don’t lie to me.”
I grinned. “She sat on the kitchen counter. She was moral support.”
“Moral support,” he taunted, grinning. “Shut up.”
Elijah and I shot the shit, getting the stuff ready, while more of the guys filtered in with their dishes. I watched them out of the corner of my eye. Some went up to Montoya and started messing with him about the slideshow.
“Kid’s Toy.” Pickles nudged him aside, inspecting the laptop. “Are you sure you’re ready for the responsibility?”
“We need a playmobil laptop?” Charlie smiled. “Do they have training wheels for this?”
Cleo walked inside, her heels clicking against the tile, and the guys disappeared, heading off to stack things. When her phone rang, she left, and I watched my team circle Montoya again. He flamed bright red, shrinking to the laptop.
That wasn’t nearly as bad as the bullying I’d gotten in Colorado. I mean, that was the afterschool special stuff they warn you about. Especially after Zariah left, then it became way more physical.
For a couple of seconds, I struggled with how I thought about Montoya’s treatment. Because what he was dealing with wasn’t comparable to what I experienced in high school. Nobody punched Montoya, nobody kicked him down.
But the longer I stared at Montoya, the longer I thought about our team’s dynamics. Bear was leaving for Boston in a few weeks, and June was graduating in May. There went two of Montoya’s few friends.
And what would happen when Zariah and I left?
Why was I waiting for this to get worse just to do something about it?
“Hey?” I raised my voice. “We’re done with Kid’s Toy. That nickname’s finished.”
Silence fell. A handful of the guys around Montoya glanced back at me.
Arvid frowned. “What’s up, Captain?”
“I don’t want to hear it again.”
“It’s a nickname?”
“Yeah, and the next person who says it is getting brought to Coach by me, personally.”
Everybody stopped moving, Montoya burned dark red, watching me with wide eyes. The door opened again with the last of the team and I motioned them inside.
“We call Fridge, Fridge,” Charlie pointed out. “And Buttons, Buttons. And Pickles, Pickles.”
“Kid’s Toy is the only nickname that we didn’t use for the interview at Houston Times,” I retorted, making sure my voice carried. “And we’re careful not to use it in front of Sémajuste and Cleo. Why? Because it’s not just a nickname—don’t treat me like a fucking idiot.”
A couple of them flinched and I could hear the door creak open, but my focus was entirely on the guys inching away from Montoya.
“I’ll make this easy to understand.” I pointed at Montoya.
“The next hockey player who wants to call him Kid’s Toy is getting scratched from the Gulf Coast lineup.
I’ll put you on that bench in fucking civic clothes.
Even if the crowd doesn’t know what you did, everybody will know that you fucked up. How’s that? Is that clear enough?”
Nods passed through the room, and I didn’t realize it was Bear at the door until he clapped me on the back. “Nice job, Captain.”
Surprise kept me rooted on the spot. I was pretty sure I’d never heard Bear compliment me. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard him compliment someone who wasn’t June.
He left to talk to Montoya, and the room relaxed a little, even if they threw me side-eyes. Everyone went back to getting ready for the slideshow as I saw who else had been standing at the door.
Zariah.
Her button-up striped shirt was tucked into her pants, her long curls held up with a bow. Any other day, I would’ve been occupied, thinking about how pretty she was but my heart thumped as she crossed the distance between us.
“Zariah, I didn’t think you—” I stopped myself, my voice low. “I didn’t say that for an audience, and—”
“You’re doing so good,” she murmured, reaching up to wrap a hand around the back of my neck, tugging me down.
“I didn’t think you were watching—”
Zariah captured me for a kiss and my breath caught in my throat. Her lips molded against mine as she tilted her head with me until we were moving together.
“Six feet apart!” Elijah barked. “It’s a potluck, I want to be able to eat! Don’t make me hurl!”
Zariah pulled away, laughing, but I was silent. As happy as I was that she arrived early, the ache inside was all too real when I saw her again.
I didn’t know how I could watch her leave.
It’d rip me apart.
Cleo brought in our coaches, trainers, and operating staff for the slideshow—the room was packed, the tables covered in food. Zariah fixed up our plates while I talked to my coaches, and when she returned, I set her on my lap to wrap my arms around her, pressing my cheek to her back.
How many more times would I get to do this?
Elijah nudged my chair with his sneaker, snickering. “You’re getting clingy, Denali.”
“I like clingy,” Zariah murmured.
Cleo motioned for Montoya to turn on the projector, and she clapped her hands together. “It’s my pleasure to announce that we are one week away from the Gulf Coast Championship!”
My team hollered in agreement, stuffing their faces.
“I’m so grateful to be part of the Gladiators,” she continued.
“Sémajuste, I want to thank you most of all. You believe in me, you never let me forget it, and it’s been the pleasure of a lifetime to be your PR director.
I don’t have to adhere to donors, a board, a line of bosses above me—I’ve had way more power here than I ever had with the Romans.
” She stopped herself, rubbing her hands together.
“I’m not drunk with power. A little—I’m a little drunk with power. ”
Sémajuste chuckled. “We love having you, Cleo.”
The Golden Girls theme played over the speakers, and everyone roared into laughter when the first picture flickered on the screen.
“What—?” Sémajuste’s mouth fell open. “Who gave you that?!”
It was a photo of a younger Sémajuste, smirking at the camera, trophy in hand. I’d always known him for his close-cut shave but in the picture, his dark curls were down to his shoulders showcasing a classic Jheri curl.
“Your daughter emailed me.” Cleo grinned. “Everybody say thank you to Danielle!”
More laughter followed as pictures flickered across the screen.
There was a video of Nick in a hockey helmet that was way too big for him.
He was hitting the ice with his stick overhead as his parents tried to stop him.
There was Fridge, maybe three years old, standing in a pair of adult-sized ice skates that dwarfed him.
A picture of Bear appeared, and he had to be seven or eight, screaming at the camera, his mouth twisted in anger.
“Whew,” Nick sighed. “Good to know you’ve always been pleasant to be around!”
Zariah laughed, reaching back to stroke my hair. “Oh my god!”
It was a shot of Elijah and Zariah at their local rink. The twins were only kids, both with short-cropped curls and their tongues sticking out. If Elijah wasn’t a little stockier, it would’ve been hard to tell them apart.
Nick glanced back. “Elijah, which one’s you?”
“Haha, haha,” Elijah deadpanned. “So fucking funny.”
Photos from our summer filtered through the baby pictures as Kokomo from the Muppets melted out Golden Girls.
Everybody elbowed each other, pointing at the screen.
There was our team going out to dinner, toasting beers at the camera, us on the ice.
Elijah pretending to fall asleep during our past coach’s meetings.
Those pictures were nice, and I was glad to see them, but my insides warmed when they moved on to our actual hockey season.
I nestled into Zariah. You could see the distance between her and me gradually disappear in the photos.
We went from having no pictures together to Zariah and I being in every picture together.
There was the two of us playing video games at June and Bear’s place during one of Elijah’s therapy appointments. The food bank volunteer trip we did as a team, I could see Zariah and me laughing in the background. In the later photos on the bus, you could see us holding hands.
Jesus.
How could I be so happy and so sad at the same time?
I didn’t know there were all these different combinations of things to feel until Zariah taught me. I was devastated to watch her leave but I was so grateful she decided to be in my life in the first place.
Montoya clicked to the next picture and my teammates craned their necks to make sure I knew I had center stage. It was a picture of me playing hockey with my older brothers. They always made me the goalie, I could barely move in the excessive padding.
“That’s not Denali’s picture,” Sémajuste laughed.
Cleo shook her head. “That’s Denali.”
“No, no, I saw the other one.” Sémajuste took a long drink of his soda, chuckling. “You guys can’t make fun of my Jheri curl and ignore Denali’s mullet!”
I froze. Zariah stiffened in my lap.
The room roared with laughter and half of my team demanded to know if I truly had a mullet. Their voices faded together, and my blood ran cold.
“Denali?” Sémajuste called. “Did you ask Cleo to delete the hockey camp picture?”
“No,” I finally said because Zariah was silent. “That’s—uh—an old picture and—”
I stuttered, fumbling for an explanation. Was the photo still on Cleo’s laptop? I tightened my grip around Zariah. Not only was it a picture of the two of us—everybody had just seen what Zariah looked like when she was younger.
Everybody would know.
Elijah would know.
My eyes flickered to him, and icy fingers crept up my spine at the look on his face.
Elijah stared at me, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. With each passing second, his eyebrows seemed to deepen into his face, sinking in with his frown. “Mullet?” he repeated. “You never told me…”
The rest of the team was laughing, and Zariah shifted, laying against me to try and relax. “You know kids,” she said, a little too high-pitched. “They love whacking their hair off with scissors.”
Except Elijah didn’t look like he believed that. His eyes watched me, not Zariah.
Me.
“Put up the photo,” Sémajuste encouraged.
“It’s a corrupted file,” Cloe managed. “It—uh—doesn’t—”
The room was chanting for the mullet picture, cackling with laughter. Fists hit the desks in unison. Everybody wanted to see it.
My gaze landed on Montoya, frozen at the computer. We stared at each other in the darkness. As slow as I could, I gave a small shake of my head—crossing my fingers that he understood.
The kid dropped his gaze and my stomach lurched.
Fuck.
Zariah kept talking to Elijah, but he wouldn’t stop staring at me, peering at me like he had me under a microscope. The demands filled the room, my team urging Montoya to find the picture.
His hand left the keyboard, I could see him fiddle with one of the monitors.
The screen went blue.
The laughter died. Fridge sat up. “What happened?”
“Ki—” Pickles stopped himself. “Montoya, what happened?”
Montoya stammered through an excuse—he said the monitor gave out—and Cleo went to investigate, wiggling cords until she announced that she’d have to call maintenance. Disappointment was heavy in the air, but I could handle that.
Coach sighed in defeat, chuckling. “Cleo, that was fantastic, thank you.”
I agreed and gave false promises that I’d search for the photo, keeping my focus on Cleo, because I could feel his eyes on me.
Elijah never stopped staring.
And I didn’t know what to say to him.