8. Mason #2
He wanted to be assured of my progress, make sure I wasn’t slacking off. All I could hope was that Bair wasn’t about to step out here. My hand had been pieced together. A head-to-head against him, damaging all the painstaking progress I’d made, would ruin my season.
“What do you need me to do?” My gut churned with a sick twist, sweat already prickling my skin.
The corners of my father’s lips turned up and he nodded. “Punch turn, double punch with an ice touch.”
I flexed my fingers in the brace, suddenly regretting my hour in the gym with Zoe. It was a drill I’d done thousands of times before, rough for my first one back on the ice, but not impossible. I tore at the Velcro cage around my hand, preparing to grab the stick.
He stopped me. “No, with your left.”
Shock hit me like a slap shot. “Sir—”
“With your left.” A sharp nod. No further discussion.
I took my stick in my left hand, getting that sinking feeling all over again.
My right hand would be my pivot, skimming across the ice.
The drill was primarily footwork, but I’d have to maintain my balance and keep my knees close to the ice on the tight turns, supporting my weight and speed or I’d fall… onto my hand.
“Gloves?”
“You will ensure you don’t need them.”
“How many goals?”
He tipped over the bucket. “How many will satisfy me?”
Bile brushed the back of my throat. There were at least fifty pucks spilled out onto the ice. Even with an open net, shooting with my left would fuck up my accuracy. I gritted my teeth and held the stick.
Of the first twenty shots, I made half. Each time, I went back to the center line to drag another around the back of the net, then pivoted to swing my shot into the goal. Sweat pooled in my skates by the thirtieth shot.
Behind the net, I swapped my feet, inside then out, thigh muscles close to fatigue by the time the back of the net was a black mass of pucks.
Hot, slicing pain pulsed along my fingers. I leaned to my right to skim my hand across the ice, made it to the center line and shot off another.
Another puck sailed across the line between the metal bars and a hiccup of relief flashed through my brain. I hunched over, resting my arms against my legs, struggling to stay upright. Bright, streaking waves of terrible heat pierced the skin along my hand.
The smooth, monotonous drone of Dad’s skates on ice was barely audible over my lung-burning, gasping breaths.
“Finished?”
My sides screamed in fiery agony after the fortieth goal-to-center line run of the drill. My knees were close to giving out. The skin on my knuckles was shredded, blood dotting my flesh.
Six more pucks sat at his feet.
“No.” Through the blinding sweat, I swept a puck out from the line and took it behind the net before coming around the back and repeating the task.
An invisible driving force bore down on me to prove to him I’d fucked up but wasn’t a fuckup. His faith in me hadn’t been misplaced.
I could do this.
I repeated it again and again. Smears of my blood were chopped up by my skates on each return pass.
The final puck sailed across the ice and landed in the back of the net.
He skated closer and gripped my sweat-drenched neck as waves of boiling bile crested at the back of my throat.
“I do these things because I know you can handle them, but your mental weakness continues to get you in trouble.” He tapped a finger on the side of my head.
“Fighting over a girl. Stupidity. Remember this. Do not lose focus again.”
“I won’t, sir.”
He made a noise of acknowledgment, released his hold on me and left the ice with both hands clasped behind his back.
I stayed locked in place, muscles screaming for relief, my heartbeat pounding in my hand until the staccato march of his skates disappeared into the locker room.
Once the doors closed behind him, I collapsed to my knees. A fine spray of vomit shot out all over the ice.
Keeping my right hand protected against my chest, I panted, trying to catch my breath when my heart pounded in my chest so hard that I thought I’d bruise a rib. I wiped my mouth with my left hand and got to my skates after three tries.
Even after this, I didn’t regret breaking my hand on that piece of trash’s face.
It took two tries to get into the car in the deserted parking lot.
I downed three painkillers stashed in the armrest before I could even raise my left hand to drive home.
My right hand was a useless, swollen, but no-longer-bleeding appendage after I’d wrapped it up in the trainers’ room and put the brace back on.
When I pulled up to the front gates of the house, my grip was so shaky on the wheel that my hands slipped. Then my headlights flashed over a figure walking down the driveway. I jerked the wheel from my drift to the right back to the center of the gravel drive.
Lilah’s hand shot up and she covered her eyes. She wore dark jeans and a green oversized sweatshirt.
A war raged inside my head. Concern battled with the bitter taste of betrayal and loss. Maybe it was because I was so tired and in pain. Maybe it was because I needed to see if she was okay. Or maybe it was because I was as weak and pathetic as my father thought.
I slowed down and stopped a little farther up from where she was walking to roll down my window. “Everything okay?” The cooler fall air rushed into the car. I’d been so wrecked I hadn’t even put the windows down on the drive home.
“Fine.” She tugged down the sleeves of the Verona High sweatshirt over her hands. She swam in the thing. The question was thrust into my head like a live grenade—was it Rye’s sweatshirt? One of those “my girlfriend stole my hoodie” things?
“Why are you walking out here?”
Her gaze locked onto the stone wall surrounding the property. “A trial run.”
“For?”
She seemed to wrestle with herself. Her mouth opened and closed twice before she said, whisper-soft, “I’m back at school the day after tomorrow.”
No one had told me. Not that they’d have to, but it felt like something I should know. “Two weeks is enough time?”
She shrugged. “I don’t have vomit-inducing headaches every time I sit up or walk into a brightly lit room. I’ve been building up for the twenty-five-minute walk. I can’t fall behind this term.”
There were so many things I wanted to say to her. The words locked in my throat.
“What happened to your hand?” She peered at where my hand rested on the steering wheel so I could turn toward her.
“Hit it on something stupid.” More than stupid. Brain-blisteringly disgusting was more like it.
“Oh.” She stood on the side of the gravel drive with her arms wrapped around herself. “Thanks for bringing me my work and—”
“Gave me an excuse to skip last period.” I tried to brush it off, but I’d had to tell Paige to back off when she’d offered to bring it.
“Well, thanks anyway.”
I made a noncommittal sound. If my arms and legs were working right, I’d get out and walk with her, but at this point, I’d be lucky if I made it up the front steps. Then there was the hoodie she had on. Her boyfriend’s.
“I need to finish this up, so I can make some dinner.” She tugged at the sleeves again and stepped back onto the grass.
Why hadn’t she wanted me? Didn’t she feel a tenth of what I’d felt for her? “See you soon, Lilah.”
Her head snapped in my direction, eyes searching my face.
I rolled up the window, not sure what the hell any of this meant. Why did I still want her? Still care about her? I should’ve washed my hands of it, burned her memories and moved on, but I couldn’t. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to.