14. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
ROWAN
I get back to Hawthorne a little after eleven, and Stanley is the only person still downstairs.
The lamp behind the couch is on. A game is playing on the television with the volume low enough that I can barely hear it from the front door, and Stanley has his laptop open across his thighs while he eats cereal from a mixing bowl.
He looks over when I drop my keys in the dish. “Where the hell have you been?”
“Out.”
Stanley looks at the clock on the wall, then back at me. “That is technically true and tells me nothing fun.”
I keep walking toward the kitchen.
“Did you eat?”
“Yeah.”
“Where?”
I open the refrigerator and take out water. “Why are you interviewing me?”
“Because when the hell do you go out? And you’re being weird.”
“I’m getting water.”
“You came home at eleven on a Wednesday.”
I look down at myself. “So what?”
Stanley sets his spoon in the bowl. “You also look happy.”
I twist the cap off the bottle. “I look normal.”
“No.” He studies me from the couch. “You usually look like somebody has given you a reasonable amount of information and you’re processing it. Right now you look like you know something.”
I laugh.
That makes his eyes narrow. “See?”
“Go to bed, Stan.”
“Where were you?”
I drink half the water while he waits.
For one second, I consider telling him. The fact that nobody knows about me and G is becoming harder to maintain because I keep forgetting there is something I’m supposed to be hiding.
But Gianna made the decision for a reason.
She told Mara because Mara is hers. Lucy doesn’t know because Lucy is connected to Benson, and once Benson knows, Hawthorne knows.
Gianna said she wanted whatever this is to stay between us until it becomes something we actually understand.
And I agree with it. It’s easier to not get the entire team involved.
“Library,” I answer.
He stares at me. “At eleven?”
“Late study session.”
Stanley leans back slowly. “You’re lying.”
“I’m going upstairs.”
“Laurens.”
“Goodnight.”
I’m halfway to the stairs before he calls after me. “Was she hot?”
I laugh without turning around.
That is apparently all the confirmation Stanley needs that I was with somebody, because he starts shouting questions I ignore all the way to my room.
I close the door behind me, toss my phone onto the bed, and change.
The night comes back while I’m brushing my teeth.
The way she was sitting on the couch with her feet underneath my thigh, asking me ridiculous questions between bites of loaded fries.
How she wants to run things someday, something with events or youth hockey where she could build something and then watch people actually experience it.
I remember her asking about hockey and looking genuinely confused when I told her professional hockey had never been the center of whatever came next for me.
Mostly, I remember her saying she just wanted to know me.
Gianna asks questions the way most people breathe.
Some of them are ridiculous. Some of them are invasive enough that anybody else asking would probably irritate me.
She never seems to care whether there’s a graceful way into a conversation, either.
One minute she’s asking about my worst mistake in high school.
Five minutes later she wants to know if I’ve ever been in love.
I should find that exhausting. Instead, I keep thinking of things I didn’t tell her.
I get into bed and open my phone.
There’s already a message.
Gianna: Did you survive the drive home?
Me: Barely.
Gianna: Wow. Terrifying. Four whole minutes.
Me: Roads were dangerous.
Gianna: Probably all the women throwing themselves in front of your truck.
I smile.
Me: Exactly.
Three dots appear.
Gianna: Goodnight, row.
I look at the message longer than I need to.
Me: Night, G.
I put the phone on the charger.
For once, I fall asleep without opening anything about graduate school, jobs, hockey, or whatever comes after this place.
Thursday starts early. We lift before class, then skate at one. Bowling Green is tomorrow night, and Coach Fuller keeps the session short enough that nobody complains but hard enough that my legs feel it anyway.
The last few weeks have stripped some of the patience out of everybody.
We lost both games to Michigan State. Then we went to Ohio and came home with a loss and a tie. That is enough bad hockey clustered together that every mistake feels larger than it would have in November.
Nobody needs a speech about what Bowling Green means.
We need points.
That’s it.
Aspen is up in the stands during practice with her laptop open. She’s been around more lately, partly because Stanley has apparently decided she should live at the rink and partly because Fuller actually uses what she sends him now.
Halfway through a retrieval drill, I hear her voice from above the glass.
“Rowan.”
I look up.
She points two fingers toward her eyes, then toward my left shoulder.
Second look.
I nod.
Next rep, the puck goes behind me. I get the first scan before I turn, see Owens cutting low, then force myself to look again instead of deciding the play early. Their forechecker changes direction. I don’t. The pass goes up the middle and out clean.
Aspen doesn’t say anything.
At this point, I know when I get it right.
A month ago, the second look felt like something I had to manually insert into a sequence I’d done the same way for years.
Now it happens often enough that sometimes I don’t realize I’ve done it until the puck is already moving the other way. Not every time. Enough.
Coach blows the drill dead and resets us. “Again.”
By the time practice ends, I’m tired in the good way.
Not dead. Just used. We have video at six, so most of the guys shower and leave for a few hours.
I take longer than I need to because Tate is blocking half the room looking for a glove he swears somebody moved, even though it is eventually discovered underneath his own bag.
I get dressed, shove my wet stuff into my locker, and head down the hall. Donovan is coming toward me with a clipboard.
“Travel room’s locked after five,” he tells me.
“Got it.”
“Tell Blue.”
I ask, “Why me?”
“Because he doesn’t listen to me.”
I say, “He doesn’t listen to me either.”
Donovan keeps walking. “Tell him anyway.”
I smile and continue toward the exit. I make it past the equipment-room door. Maybe two steps. Then I stop, turn around, and go back.
Gianna is behind the counter with a plastic bin of blade guards in front of her and a sheet of paper taped beside it.
She has her hair twisted up out of her face.
She doesn’t look up immediately, so I lean on the doorway and wait.
She compares one number on a guard to something on the sheet, makes a mark, and reaches for the next.
A few seconds later, she feels me there and glances up. Her expression changes instantly.
“What’d you break?” she asks.
“Nothing.”
She looks at my hands, then down toward my skates like she expects to find damage anyway. “Then what do you need?”
I smile.
She studies my face. “Did you come down here just to see me?”
“Yeah.”
Gianna goes quiet.
It lasts long enough that I start smiling more.
Her eyes narrow, and she puts the blade guard down. “You saw me twelve hours ago.” Her smile starts despite her attempt to keep it under control. “That’s needy.”
“Maybe.”
She points at me. “Wow. No argument?”
“Not today.”
“Should I be concerned?”
I step farther into the room. “No.”
Gianna looks toward the hall behind me. Then back at me. There is something strange about the fact that we both check now.
I walk to the counter.
Gianna watches me come. “What are you doing?”
I stop on the other side. “Nothing.”
“You came in here for nothing?”
“Yeah.”
She smiles. “You’re terrible at this.”
“At what?”
“Pretending you don’t want something.”
“I’m not pretending.”
Her expression shifts. I lean over the counter and kiss her.
It was supposed to be quick. It isn’t. Gianna makes a surprised sound into my mouth, then hooks two fingers into the front of my shirt and pulls me closer.
My hand finds the side of her face. Hers slides around the back of my neck.
The counter between us becomes annoying almost immediately.
I pull back. She follows for half a second before stopping herself. That makes me smile.
She looks at my mouth. “You’re getting risky.”
“I kissed you.”
“In the wide open where anyone can walk past and see.”
“Sorry,” I whisper.
“You should be,” she teases, still holding my shirt.
I lean in and kiss her again. This one is slower. She relaxes into it enough that when I pull away, her eyes stay closed for a second.
Then she opens them. “Rowan.”
“Yeah?”
“You have film.”
I nod. “Six.”
She looks at the clock on the wall. “It’s almost five.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you wasting valuable Bowling Green preparation time in my equipment room?”
I look at her. “Wanted to see you.”
That gets her quiet again, and I’m starting to like doing that a little too much.
Her fingers loosen in my shirt, but instead of letting go, she smooths the fabric where she wrinkled it. “You’re making this very difficult for me.”
“What?” I ask, watching her fix my shirt.
“Being normal.”
I laugh and look toward the hall. “Are you coming tomorrow?”
“To Bowling Green?”
“Yeah.”
She shakes her head. “I have class and work. Also, I’m apparently responsible for forty-eight children now, so my glamorous equipment-travel career has been temporarily suspended.”
“Saturday?”
“No.”
“That sucks.”
Gianna looks at me for a second. “You want me there?”
The answer is easy. “Yeah.”
Her face does that soft thing again, then she ruins it herself. “Aw. You’re going to miss me.”
“I’m leaving.” I step back. “Bye, G.”
“Bye, Laurens.”
I get to the doorway.
She says, “Good luck tomorrow.”
I turn. “Thanks.”
“And Saturday,” she adds. “And please win at least one because everyone at Hawthorne is starting to get depressing.”
“We’ll work on it.”
“Great.”
I leave. I’m still smiling when I get halfway down the hall. Then I remember Bowling Green’s forecheck and spend the walk to my truck thinking about hockey again.
Friday is travel. Class in the morning. Forty-minute skate before lunch. Food at the rink. Bus by early afternoon.
Bowling Green isn’t far enough to justify flying, so the trip is all road.
Stanley complains about the bus temperature for the first forty minutes, Blue tells him nobody else is cold, and Stanley spends the next ten minutes trying to prove that the vent above his seat is stronger than everyone else’s. Percy puts headphones on. I sleep.
We get to the hotel in time to drop our bags and eat before leaving for the rink.
The building is smaller than most of the Big Ten barns we play in, which somehow makes it louder. Noise gets trapped closer to the ice. Every hit sounds bigger. Every whistle gets followed by somebody leaning over the glass and telling us exactly what they think of Camden University.
We should handle it.
We don’t.
Friday night is one of those games where nothing is catastrophically wrong, and the result is still wrong.
Bowling Green scores first. Mackey gets us even. They go up again in the second. Marsh ties it. Then we give them one more.
3-2.
We lose.
Five minutes into the locker room, Benson starts talking about tomorrow. Where they’re beating us. What needs to change. Stanley is already pulling clips on his phone before we get out of our gear. Nobody is interested in feeling sorry for ourselves anymore. We’ve done enough of that.
Back at the hotel, Mackey showers first. I’m sitting on the edge of the bed with one sock on when my phone buzzes.
Gianna: I have decided Bowling Green is a stupid name.
I smile.
Me: That’s your analysis?
Gianna: Yes. Very thorough.
Me: Thanks.
Gianna: Also, you looked good.
I stare at that.
Me: Hockey?
The answer comes immediately.
Gianna: Unfortunately, yes.
I laugh.
Mackey comes out of the bathroom rubbing a towel over his hair. “What did I miss?”
“Nothing.”
He looks at my phone. Then at me. I put it down beside my leg.
Mackey grins. “That’s not the group chat?”
I shake my head.
My phone buzzes again. I pick up my phone, and Mackey laughs.
Gianna: You okay?
I think about the answer. I’m pissed. I’m tired. I’m also not interested in having a twenty-minute conversation about a loss we can do something about tomorrow.
Me: Yeah.
Gianna: Win tomorrow.
Me: Yeah.
Gianna: It’s okay to not be okay.
I stare at that.
Gianna: Goodnight.
Me: Night.
Mackey is still looking at me. He laughs and gets into bed.
Saturday is better before the puck even drops.
Warmups feel sharper. The room is louder.
Benson is talking more. Blue looks like he wants to hit somebody through the boards, which is useful as long as he chooses the right somebody.
Coach changes two things in our breakout.
There’s no speech today. No dramatic reset. We just play.
Stanley scores first. Benson gets the next one. Golding makes it three-one before the second ends. They get one back early in the third, and for about four minutes the building starts believing again. Then Owens scores. Stanley gets another late.
5-2.
That’s what the room sounds like when we remember who we are. Not screaming. Relief first. Then noise.
Blue throws a towel at Stanley because Stanley keeps taking credit for fixing the entire team by scoring twice. Percy is sitting in his stall drinking something from a bottle while three guys tell him about saves he obviously remembers making.
Benson looks happier than he has in two weeks. So do I.
It doesn’t erase Friday. It doesn’t erase Ohio State or Michigan State. It’s one win, but we needed one.
On the bus home, my phone buzzes before we’re ten minutes out of Bowling Green.
Gianna: THAT’S MORE LIKE IT!
I smile.
Me: Caps lock.
Gianna: Five goals deserve caps lock.
Me: Yeah.
Gianna: Stanley is going to be unbearable.
I look across the aisle.
Stanley is currently explaining his second goal to Blue.
Me: Already is.
Gianna: Rowan?
Me: What?
Gianna: You’re coming over tomorrow, right?
I read that twice. Then I look out the window.
The bus is dark except for phone screens and the overhead lights near the front. Guys are tired enough that the volume has finally dropped. We won. Tomorrow is Sunday. We don’t have anything mandatory until later in the day.
A week ago, I would have assumed Gianna meant Hawthorne. Now I know she means her apartment.
Me: Yeah.
Three dots.
Gianna: Okay :)
I stare at the smiley face.
Then another message comes through.
Gianna: Lucy will be home though, so behave.
I smile.
Me: You behave.
Gianna: Impossible.
I put the phone down on my leg.
For the rest of the ride, I think about Sunday more than Bowling Green.
That probably says enough on its own.