Chapter 30. In Which I’m Throttled Back into the Dark Ages, 380,000 Years After the Big Bang, When the Universe Remained
When I walk into the arena during afternoon study hours, I’m unsure if Luca will be on the ice. With only days until the Medal of Victory contest, he should be focusing on his project.
Apparently, though, he’d rather problem solve his slap shot, his form perfect as usual as he bends over in his tight fleece sweater and tighter leggings.
My stomach instinctively flutters, even though it has no right to. I’m here to apologize and offer to assist with his contest project as retribution.
It’s business. Nothing more.
I head down the walkway between the bleachers and approach the boards.
Luca doesn’t notice. It’s like he’s in a dreamscape whenever he’s on the ice, focused on nothing but the stick’s weight in his hands and the glide of his skates.
He attempts slap shot after slap shot, nearly identical except for a hair’s breadth of difference in technique, always with a straight backswing and follow-through.
His pucks fly through the air, fast and solid.
I watch closely as the toe of his stick hits the ice before reaching the puck. As the blade tilts up, the puck whirs into the net.
He’s testing out the spin. Would that really help?
Doubtful. Spin would do little in terms of its dynamics.
The puck is too heavy, and the flight times are too short for the Magnus effect to have much of an impact on its trajectory.
Either way, the fact that he’s chosen now to test out a new method when the contest is mere days away is unbelievable.
Unless.
Maybe this is his contest project.
Luca goes in for another windup, catching me out of the corner of his eye. His balance warps, and his stick tilts upward upon impact with the puck. The puck shoots into the air, bulleting over the goal and the shielding and landing in the stands ten feet to my left.
A sharp clang echoes through the arena.
Luca remains still as he looks at the puck, seemingly debating if he should go fetch it when doing so means having to pass by me.
“I’m just here to offer you help,” I call toward him. No fake smiles, no fake laughs. No fake anything. It should be foreign to me. I wait for the racing anxiety that occurs when I let my carefully curated image fall away.
But it doesn’t come.
Lately, I have had to remind myself to play the correct character around Luca. With someone as authentic as him, it’s hard not to just be yourself. Maybe my true colors were slipping through more than I already feared.
“Help with what?” Luca finally asks.
“Your project.”
“How did you know my slap shot was for the contest?”
“I didn’t.” I can’t help my smile. “Now I do.”
His own lip twitches, half annoyed, half playful.
I point toward the rink. “You’re hoping that whatever solution you come up with can help others with dislocation injuries, aren’t you? Are you applying Dr. Li’s research on biomechanical systems?”
“Why do you care, Rory? Why are you here?”
I take in a sharp breath. “I don’t want to focus on my project. I want to focus on helping you with yours. So that you win.”
Luca crosses his arms. “I don’t need pity.” His voice is flat now.
“It’s not pity,” I insist.
“You care about winning more than anything else. But now you want to give up your chances?”
I hesitate before nodding.
Luca analyzes me in a way I didn’t expect, especially when I’m finally telling him the truth. “No you don’t.”
“What? I do. It’s the right thing to do.”
“It’s written all over your face, Rory. You look like you’re about to be sick at the mere idea of helping me. No matter what your brain tells you is right.” He pauses. “And, in all honesty, I don’t need your help in order to win.”
I keep my posture straight and my confidence strong despite all the knives Luca is throwing at my heart. “Okay, I admit, this is hard for me. But I don’t want this to be hard. I mean that. Doesn’t that count for something?”
Luca sighs. He scuffs his blade against the ice.
Maybe it doesn’t.
But I want it to. I feel trapped, locked in place with no way out.
“I’m not sure how to stop being terrified of what my mom and dad will think.
” I shake my head. “Or the whole world. The people who see my face on posters and textbooks and advertisements and expect me to be the perfect role model for their kids. Or the losers who are waiting for me to make any tiny mistake so they can attack me just because I’m trans.
Admittedly, you have no idea what that’s like, either. ”
That seems to pull something out of Luca, because he looks back up at me, focusing hard on my eyes, then my lips. Listening.
“I can’t just snap my fingers and change the fact that I’m expected to be a winner, even if I don’t want to be,” I go on.
Admitting out loud that I don’t want to win revs up my fight-or-flight response, like Mom and Dad might burst through the doors and yell at me.
But I’m sick of lying to Luca. And to myself.
“My parents will be here on Monday, sitting in the audience at the contest, telling me that I’m not allowed to date or drink or show any vulnerability to anyone—”
“Wait,” Luca interrupts. “What do you mean you’re not allowed?”
“I’m not allowed to give in to distractions.
Things my parents think could hurt me or the company.
” I toss my hands. “And they’re right. Instead of preparing for the contest, I spent my time getting drunk at a party to impress you.
Instead of sleeping, I was thinking about all the mistakes I made with you.
How little you truly know me because—you said it yourself—I’m programmed.
And I’ve been so busy doing all those things I’m not supposed to that I didn’t stop myself before I caught feelings for you.
Even though all it brings is stress and problems and heartbreak and—” I gesture at him emptily.
It’s obvious that thoughts are zooming through Luca’s mind by how quickly his eyes race around my face, but his stern expression doesn’t give away what they are. “Are you really programmed? Or do you just think that you have to be?”
I don’t fully understand the question, yet a defensiveness lights within me from his judgmental tone alone. “Prince List almost fell apart because of my parents’ divorce. They still run it together, but it’s a nightmare. Heartbreak breaks success. I can’t bring that into our company, too.”
“How is that fair to you?”
“What do you mean?”
“With everything. Why does all the responsibility always fall on you? Why not the attorneys? The PR firm? Your parents? They’ve been allowed to screw up and recovered just fine. So, why can’t you?”
My mouth opens and shuts a few times. “I don’t know. It’s not fair. But it’s how it is.”
Luca nods slowly, like he finally believes just how much I wish things could be different. But he also doesn’t respond. It’s a suffocating silence. A painful one.
An answer.
At least, I assume, until Luca speaks again. “I think I know you, Rory.”
It throws me completely. “How?”
“You started to forget about Prince List. I could tell.”
My defensiveness comes roaring back, even though a part of me knows Luca is right. I’ve always wanted to complete The Plan for this very reason—to escape from Mom and Dad’s clutches.
“But you liked me before that,” I argue. “And I tried to make you like me here. I faked so much of who I was.”
Luca huffs as if I said something funny. “Right. By being a ‘canoe expert’ yet getting us lodged in seaweed every other second? Or by claiming you wanted to be my assistant on the ice despite the obvious fear in your eyes and nearly falling over and over?”
I scratch my temple in response.
“You’re not as good of an actor as you think, Rory.”
“Hey.”
“I always liked you because of who you are when you think I’m not watching,” Luca goes on. “And what you tried to hide when you knew I was.”
Luca has watched me from afar since freshman year. Way before I tried to make him fall in love with me.
This should fill me with reassurance, like maybe I can fix this. Us. But all I can do is stare back at him emptily. Because he didn’t say he likes me.
He said liked.
“I’ll see you at the contest,” Luca says.
Without another word, he continues his journey for his puck.