Chapter 28
Molly
This is the day I’ve been dreading, the day Kyle and his team leave for Canada for a whole month. This is a really important part of the season for them and going to a country like Canada for an entire month would be at the centre of a lot of hockey players’ dreams, especially whilst they’re still in university. But Kyle doesn’t seem all that happy about going, as he crouches down on his bedroom floor, stuffing yet another pair of brand new shoes into his suitcase and glancing up at me with a frown. I’m going to miss him, so god damn much I feel nauseous, but I can’t tell him that, I don’t want him feeling guilty or focusing on me whilst he’s there. His team need him to be on the ball and I want him to know that I’ll be here, waiting for him when he gets back, like I always am.
Kyle stands up, hands landing on either side of my face. “I don’t want to go,” he shakes his blonde head, bright eyes darkening with sadness. “I don’t want to leave you for a whole month Mol, it’s so shit.”
I want to make him feel better, but it’s harder than usual to stretch my face into a smile. “You have to go Ky, this is really important for you, you’ll be back before you know it.”
He huffs a loud sigh and drops his hands from my face. “Yeah, I know.” He takes my fingers in his, threading our hands together and leading me down the stairs into his living room, where the rest of the guys gather with their bags. Nick and Lewis throw me a nod as they pass, leaving through the front door and packing their suitcases into the car that’s parked waiting for them out front. Sean has Callie in a tight hug, whispering things into her ear as he holds her in his arms. I can tell he doesn’t want to go to Canada either, leaving Callie and his unborn baby to fend for themselves for a month. The thing is with Sean, I know for a fact that if Callie so much as felt a tiny twinge in her stomach, he’d be on the first flight back, no hesitation. And anyway, he doesn’t need to worry about her and his baby girl, I'm here to look after them while he’s away and I'll do a damn good job of catering to Callie’s every need…like I always have. That girl has always been a princess, even before she met Sean.
“Better go man,” Sean murmurs, gesturing at Kyle, who’s face looks like it’s melting as he frowns so deeply. Sean drops one last long kiss to Callie’s lips, before bending down to cradle her stomach, talking through her bellybutton to his unborn daughter.
Kyle’s eyes find mine, solemn and dark. “I erm…better, go then.” He grips the nape of his neck, checking over his shoulder. Sean leaves through the front door and Callie trudges up the stairs with the face of a grieving widow.
I nod, tears threatening to escape, but I sniff them back. “Ok, I guess I’ll see you in a month then.”
“Yeah…” he scratches his head, uncertain gaze lifting to mine. “We’ll still talk though, right? I can call you can’t I? I won’t bother you everyday but, I can like, I can just call you…sometimes, or I—”
I grab his handsome face, sealing our lips in a kiss. “You can call me everyday, all day, everyday if you want to.”
Kyle’s face lights up, jaw relaxing and grin making my heart ache. “Ok,” he lets out a relieved breath. “Great, I’ll call you everyday then.” I hold out my pinky for him and he flashes me a toothy grin. “Promise?” Kyle crashes into me, his body cocooning mine in it’s warmth, his cinnamon smell and his strong arms around me. “I promise baby.” He buries his face into the crevice of my neck and inhales deeply, drinking up every last drop before he has to leave. The sound of an impatient car horn makes us jump apart, my heart thudding in my chest, both from the shock of the sound and also what it means. He has to go, right now. “I’ll miss you, please don’t get bored and start seeing someone else while I'm away.” He whispers, forehead pressing into mine.
I close my eyes, halting the tears that want to fall. “I would never do that to you,” another beep of the horn. “You better go, they’re getting impatient out there.”
Kyle nods, swallowing hard and running a hand down his gorgeous face. “Ok, I’ll call you when we get there.” His lips land on mine for a beat, the taste of his tongue sweeping across my lower lip.
As he heads for the front door, suitcase dragging behind him, I'm suddenly reminded of his last words. He asked me not to get bored of him,…as if I could ever do that. He has no idea how I feel about him and that’s what makes him all the more fucking addictive. He’s so sweet, caring, nurturing, everything a girl could ever want and yet he continues to see himself as someone who is vanilla, boring and forgettable, when he’s anything but. “Hey, by the way,” I say, stopping him just as he steps over the threshold of the front door, peeping back around to look at me. “I could never get bored of you…like, ever.”
His eyes sparkle, tongue darting out to wet his lips, before he breathes a light laugh of relief and disappears from view, hauling the front door closed behind him.
Jesus, I'm going to miss that face.
Well, it turns out I didn’t need to worry too much about missing Kyle, I’ve spoken to him multiple times a day, everyday, since he went to Canada three weeks ago. We’ve had more phone sex than I would have thought was humanly possible, with both of our packed schedules plus the time difference, but somehow we’ve made it work. Kyle insisted on talking to me every day, even though I kept reminding him that his focus should be on his team whilst he’s there. But he’s adamant that keeping in regular contact with me is carrying him through the games, holding his laser focus and helping him to push through the days when he feels down in the dumps. He’s missing me, I know this because he tells me practically every time we hang up the phone, spamming me with messages about how he can’t wait to get home and devour me. The truth is I'm missing him too, much more than I’d care to admit out loud, but I know it's fucking obvious anyway, even when I try to hide it. Callie is kind of miserable too, missing Sean of course and the two of us are making the dorm feel like the depression ward of a mental hospital. I don’t blame Anais for staying with her parents for a couple of weeks, until the tsunami of sadness that’s drowning Callie and I retreats, bringing our boys back to us.
It’s almost 11pm when my phone starts to buzz underneath my pillow. With only three days to go until Kyle comes home, I’ve been staying up late, waiting for his phone calls.
“Hey you,” I whisper into the receiver, mindful to not wake Callie as she’s been a grumpy shit recently. But it’s not her fault, I know she doesn’t sleep well without her huge, hockey player sized hot water bottle wrapped around her.
“Hey baby, how was today?”
I shrug — even though he can’t see me — and turn onto my back. “It was ok I guess. I'm just getting really fucking anxious now about the qualifier race for regionals in two weeks. I don’t feel like I'm running my best, probably because I'm fucking horny all the time and I can’t concentrate on anything else.” My lips turn up into a smirk as I wait for him to respond. His laugh chimes through the phone, tugging at my heart. “I can help you with that in three days.” He sighs heavily. “I miss you Mol, I miss you so damn much, I can’t focus anymore. We lost the game today and I wish I could say it wasn’t my fault and I was playing my best, but I wasn’t. Almost four weeks without you now is draining the shit out of me. I just need to hold you, touch you, kiss you, anything but the torture of only being able to hear your voice through a fucking phone speaker.” “I know Ky, it’s shit and it’s affecting me too, but you’ll be home in three days and I have the weekend off training so…”
I can hear the smirk spread through Kyle’s voice when he coos, “So…?” “You can spend the weekend fucking me until neither of us can walk.” His breath stutters a little, sucking in a hard gulp of air. “Jesus Christ, ok…”
I laugh into my pillow, burying my face into his lingering smell. “I better go to bed now, gotta be up at six.”
“Ok, I’ll talk to you tomorrow then Barbie, I lo—”
My croaky gasp stops his words in their tracks and I think both of our hearts stop beating too. Was he just going to say what I think he was going to say? Fuck, my chest is closing in on me. The silence now stretching between us, as we both scramble for something to say, anything. “Night Mol,” Kyle finally whispers, his throat clearly strangling his voice. “Night.”
I hang up the phone and stuff my face into my hands. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” I kick my legs against the mattress, wishing I could just throw my heart off a balcony and watch it sink into a river. I don’t want this, I'm scared of it. I don’t want Kyle to love me and I don’t want to love him…but I think I do. No fuck that, I know I do and it’s causing a tightness in my chest, so heavy I think it might crush me before he even has chance to come home and stop it. Why can’t things just stay the way they are? The two of us having sex almost everyday, going to the movies, going to dinner and laughing with each other until we’re almost sick. Why does love have to come into it, when we’re both perfectly happy without it? Or maybe I'm fucking delusional and we’ve been in love this entire time. Maybe love is those little things, like rolling around almost pissing myself as he tickles me, or talking into the early hours of the morning because you just never get bored of being around each other.
Oh fuck this, I'm just going to pretend like nothing has changed between us. Like he didn’t almost say he loved me and that I don’t love him either, things can stay as they always have been and we can just forget about that little…slip up…right?