Journal Entry
Kyle
I don’t even know why I opened this notebook again. Maybe because if I don’t put this somewhere, I’m going to say something I can’t take back. Or hit something that can’t hit me back. Or skate until I puke just so the noise in my chest has somewhere to go.
I can’t talk to anyone. Not Cole. Not Beau. Not fucking Cooper. And definitely not her.
So, it’s this. Ink and paper, like carving the truth out of my ribs by force.
Today hurt in a way I didn’t know a person could hurt without bleeding.
I saw her walk into the rink, and it was like the whole goddamn building tilted. Everyone else noticed the cameras, the PR setup, the schedule. I felt her before she even looked up or breathed in my direction. It hit me right in the chest—a punch of recognition so sharp my lungs forgot how to work.
And then she didn’t look at me.
I scored the cleanest shot I’ve taken in weeks—perfect angle, perfect sound, the kind of shot guys chase for entire seasons.
Everyone else saw it and cheered, but she didn’t look up or even give me one second of something real.
And that shouldn’t matter, but it does. It matters so much that I don’t know where to put it without choking on it.
It lands like a fist straight under my sternum every time I think about it.
I skated harder than I have all season because it was the only way to keep my face calm.
Every stride was a dare not to break in front of people who would never understand what it means to want someone this much.
Every breath burned like the cold was chewing through me.
Nothing helped or touched the place where it hurt.
But then she did look at me.
And it was worse because the look wasn’t empty. It wasn’t cold. It was everything she was trying to pretend she didn’t feel. Longing. Fear. Want. The kind of emotion that steals breath and people who aren’t careful. It destroyed me.
I walked over after practice, and the world shrank to a single point around her.
Standing that close… I swear to God, every part of me tilted toward her like I’m built on a hinge and she’s the axis.
One inch closer and I would’ve kissed her again.
I would’ve thrown every promise and PR guideline straight into the fire just to hear her say my name like she did outside her door.
She stepped back because she wanted me too much.
Do you know what that does to a person? When you want someone who wants you back but is terrified you’re the thing that’ll break them? It feels like someone reaching for you with shaking hands and choosing to burn alone instead. I can’t breathe around that.
When she said she’d fall into something she couldn’t climb out of, it hit like a blade. Because I'm already drowning. Already hers in every way you’re not supposed to be someone’s when they’re pretending you aren’t.
And I have to pretend this is fake.
Pretend I’m not counting down the days until the gala like it’s either salvation or execution. Pretend I didn’t hear the break in her voice when she told me she can’t have me look at her like we’re something. But we are something. God help me, we are.
I told her she’d look better in blue. It wasn’t a line, but the closest I could get to saying I haven’t gone five minutes without thinking about her since that kiss. That her not telling me how she was really doing sat under my skin like a bruise no one else can see.
And she walked away because it is going to cost her more than me because the world judges her differently. Harder. Crueler. And I hate it in a way that sits low and hot under my skin, like a storm I can’t outrun.
I’m trying to respect the lines she needs and not be the reason she gets hurt.
Trying not to become the angry kid who ended up in therapy for not knowing what to do with emotions this big.
But today, I felt every demon in my chest sit up and turn its head because every time she walks away, something loud and dangerous burns inside me.
It scared me tonight—how close I got to breaking. How easy it would’ve been to let it out sideways at someone who didn’t deserve it. So, I grabbed this stupid notebook like a lifeline and am sitting on the floor like I’m eighteen again, trying not to shatter something important.
I don’t know how to want someone this much and not ruin their life. I don’t know how to stand beside her on Saturday and pretend it’s fake when her eyes tell me it never was. I don’t know how to breathe around her and not break.
I just know that it hurts in places I don’t have names for and in ways I don’t know how to survive.
I think I’m in love with her. And I think it’s going to ruin me.
~ Kyle