9. Olivia #2
The spark guttered out completely.
My feet slowed without permission, dragging against concrete like my body knew better than to rush back into the noise and chaos waiting at the stadium.
The street stretched quiet around me—midday lull between lunch and rush hour, storefronts dark or half-empty. Normal people living normal lives while mine threatened to collapse again.
Marsha's voice played on loop through my head. Your father is being released.
Five words. That was all it took to shatter everything I'd built.
I pressed my arms tighter across my stomach, trying to hold the pieces together through sheer will.
What would I even say if he showed up? If he found me walking down this street, or leaving work, or fumbling with my apartment keys in the dark?
The scenarios built themselves without my consent—vivid and terrible.
You ruined my life.
No. Too weak. He'd laugh. Tell me I was always dramatic, always making things about myself.
Stay away from me or I'll call the cops.
Except cops hadn't stopped him before. A restraining order was just paper. Easy to ignore when you'd already decided consequences didn't apply to you.
I'm not afraid of you anymore.
The lie caught in my throat even imagining it. Because I was terrified. Had been terrified my whole childhood. Still woke gasping some nights from dreams where his hands found my mother's throat again, or mine, or—
My breath stuttered. Stopped.
The world narrowed to the sudden absence of air in my lungs, the vice grip around my ribs, the dizzy static creeping into my vision.
Not here.
Not now.
I forced myself to stop walking. Lean against the nearest brick wall. Count.
Five in. Hold. Five out.
Five in. Hold. Five out.
The panic retreated inch by inch, reluctant and vicious.
I opened my eyes—when had I closed them?—and scanned the street. Empty. Normal. Daylight bright and ordinary.
You're safe.
He doesn't know where you are.
You're in public. It's daytime. There are people around.
But the words felt hollow even as I thought them.
Because darkness didn't matter to men like him. Witnesses didn't matter. Rules didn't matter.
I'd learned that lesson young and hard.
My hands still shook when I pushed off the wall and forced myself to keep walking.
The stadium rose ahead, solid and real.
I focused on that. On the weight of my phone in my pocket. On the sound of distant traffic.
On anything except the truth screaming beneath my skin.
I didn't feel safe. Not here. Not anywhere. Not anymore.
The arena swallowed sound whole.
I climbed the stands slowly, boots echoing against the concrete steps, until I found a spot halfway up—high enough to see everything, low enough that I didn't feel exposed. The cold bit through my jacket immediately, sharp and clean, carrying the smell of ice and old sweat.
Empty seats stretched in every direction. No crowd. No noise except the distant scrape of skates and the occasional shout from down on the ice.
Pre-game practice.
I pulled my knees up, wrapping my arms around them, and watched.
The team moved in patterns I didn't understand—drills maybe, or warm-ups.
Bodies cutting across the ice with speed that looked reckless until you realized how controlled it actually was.
Stop. Pivot. Sprint. The puck appeared and disappeared, passed between players like some secret language I'd never learned.
I tried to focus on the movement. The rhythm. Anything except the spiral my thoughts kept trying to drag me into.
Your father is being released.
My fingers dug into my shins.
Focus on the ice. Just watch. Don't think.
A door opened near the bench. Someone new stepped out—taller than the others, moving with that same deliberate silence he carried everywhere. Black practice jersey. Hair tied back.
Rhys.
My breath caught.
He didn't rush onto the ice like the younger players. Didn't showboat or joke around. He simply glided forward with an efficiency that made everything look easy—controlled, silent, lethal grace wrapped in athletic competence.
The team shifted without seeming to notice they were doing it. Made space. Adjusted their patterns. Like they felt his presence the same way I did—gravitational, unavoidable.
He called something I couldn't hear. Two players immediately changed direction. His eyes stayed narrow, focused, scanning the ice with the kind of attention that missed nothing. Pure concentration. No wasted energy. Every movement intentional.
I'd seen him intimidating. Seen him distant and unreadable. But watching him here—in his element, doing what he'd built his entire life around—
Something in my chest settled. Steadied. The panic that'd been clawing at my ribs all day retreated just enough that I could breathe properly again. My heart still raced, but differently now. Not fear.
Something worse.
I hated it immediately.
Stop it.
I pressed my forehead against my knees, closing my eyes against the sight of him skating another drill with that precise, devastating control.
He's older. By what—fifteen years? More?
He's technically your boss. Or close enough.
He's not interested. Not in you. Not in anyone, probably.
You don't get to have crushes. You don't get to feel safe around men just because they happen to be competent at sports.
This is stupid and dangerous, and you know better.
But when I opened my eyes again, my gaze found him anyway.
Tracking his movement across the ice. The way he corrected a player's form with just a gesture. The quiet authority he carried without ever raising his voice.
The way my pulse skipped every time he moved.
I was so screwed.
The cold seeped deeper, but I didn't move. Couldn't make myself leave when sitting here—watching him, watching the team, existing in this frozen cathedral of echoing space—felt like the first calm I'd had since Marsha knocked on my door.
Even if that calm came wrapped in feelings I absolutely could not afford to have.
Just a few more minutes.
Then, back to work. Back to reality. Back to pretending you're fine.
But right now—
Right now I let myself watch him skate, and pretended the warmth spreading through my chest meant nothing at all.