7. Chapter Seven
Chapter Seven
Celeste
If there’s one place I never expected to end up again, it’s a hockey rink.
The smell hits first: sharp ice, rubber, sweat, and it pulls me straight back to being sixteen, lacing up skates with shaky fingers and dreaming too big for my own good.
I follow Elara Stevens down the narrow concrete hallway, clipboard tucked against her chest, dark copper ponytail swinging with every confident step.
Elara is everything I imagine a good athletic trainer should be: calm, sharp-eyed, endlessly observant. She moves as she belongs here, as the rink bends around her instead of the other way around.
“Keep close,” she tells me without looking back. “And don’t trip over the cords. They bite.”
I smile nervously. “Got it.”
This internship opportunity is part of my physical therapy program, sports medicine adjacent, hands-on, exactly the kind of experience I need.
Elara warned me the team had cleared out before letting me step inside.
Still, my heart is beating too fast as we step into the boys’ locker room area.
Not because of the space. But because of who our patient is.
Tate Jackson is sitting on a bench, jersey half peeled off, sweat-darkened hair curling at the nape of his neck. He’s laughing at something Parker says, head tipped back, completely at ease.
Until he sees me. A simple grin widens across his face, his sea-glass colored eyes somehow become brighter under these fluorescent lights of the locker room.
The moment stretches.
His smile fades into something softer. Slower. Like he’s checking to make sure I’m really here.
“Hey,” he says, standing a little straighter as Elara and I approach him.
“Hey,” I reply, suddenly hyperaware of my hands, my clothes, my breathing.
Elara glances between us, one perfectly shaped brow arching. “You two know each other?”
“The Retro Rooster,” Tate answers easily. “Best coffee in town.”
“And best kettle chips,” I add, earning a grin from him.
Elara hums, clearly filing the information to talk to me about it later. Her gaze drifts across the room, lingering just a second too long on Parker before she turns back to business.Interesting. I will also be saving that information away for later.
“Jackson, you took a puck to the shoulder last game. Sit,” Elara commands.
He obeys instantly, rolling his shoulder as she checks his range of motion.
I watch closely, instinct kicking in; posture, tension, compensations.
My brain lights up in a way it hasn’t since I stopped playing.
Going into PT was an easy choice for me, even though it requires more schooling than I can afford.
I love sports, and even if I can’t play anymore, I want to still be in the field somehow.
“Any pain?” Elara asks.
“Only emotional,” Tate says solemnly before his eyes flicker up to me.
I snort before I can stop myself.
He points at me with his left arm, amused. “See? She gets me.”
Elara smirks. “Ice packs don’t work on your personality, Jackson.” We both laugh at that, Elara just rolling her eyes at us, but the smirk is there on her face.
As she tapes his shoulder, she nods toward me. “Celeste’s shadowing with me for the PT track.”
Tate’s expression shifts, sharpening interest. “Physical therapy?”
I nod. “Yeah. Sports medicine focus.”
“That makes sense,” he says quietly.
The words settle deep in my chest.
Elara finishes up and moves on, leaving us in a pocket of quiet that feels too intimate for a locker room full of half-dressed hockey players.
“So,” Tate says, lowering his voice. “Guess I should be on my best behavior.”
I tilt my head. “That would be a first. Why start now?”
He laughs, then grows more serious. “I like seeing you here. You fit.”
Something warm unfurls in my chest, followed immediately by fear.
“I don’t usually mix worlds,” I admit. “It gets messy.”
“Messy doesn’t scare me,” he says softly. “Losing things does. Just asking for a solid chance here, Celeste.”
Before I can respond, Elara calls my name, and the moment slips away unfinished, unresolved.
The rest of the day, Elara keeps me busy.
We tape ankles, check swelling, and log notes. I absorb everything: the efficiency, the quiet authority, the way she reads bodies like a second language. By the time she dismisses me with a nod and a quick, “Good work today,” the rink has gone still.
Too still.
I make my way back toward the locker room from Elara’s office to grab my supply bag. The lights are dimmer now, the echoes of laughter and clatter long gone.
I don’t expect to see anyone.
I definitely don’t expect Tate to still be here.
He’s sitting on one of the benches, shirt discarded, forearms resting on his knees. His hair is damp, curls loosening as it dries, skin still flushed from practice. The space feels suddenly too small.
He must sense me because he looks up, with that stupid, easy smile on his face.
“Hey,” he says quietly, like he doesn’t want to break whatever fragile bubble we’ve wandered into.
“Hey,” I reply, heart kicking up a notch. “I thought everyone left.”
“Most of them did.” He shrugs. “I stuck around.”
Of course he did. Because he’s always waiting around for me.
I move closer, stopping at a careful distance away. This feels different than the diner. More exposed. More real.
“You were good today,” he says. “With Elara. You looked like you belonged here.”
The words catch me off guard. “I did?”
“Yeah,” he says easily. “I think PT makes a lot of sense for you.”
I swallow. “It does. It just reminds me how fast life can change or how one thing can change your path.”
His gaze softens. “You don’t talk about that much, about hockey, I guess.”
“I don’t talk about a lot of things.” Gosh, if only he knew all that I hold tight for my chest, he would run for the hills.
“I know,” he says. “I’m not asking you to, at least not yet.” He gives me that boyish grin, that I swear makes my legs go weak.
That’s the problem. Cause if he doesn’t get bored, he'll start asking questions which will reveal answers that no man in their early twenties wants to take on.
Silence stretches between us, heavy but not uncomfortable. He stands, slow and deliberate, like he’s giving me time to step back.
Instead, I don’t.
“You okay?” he asks quietly.
I nod. “Yeah. Just… overwhelmed.”
He reaches out, stopping just short of touching me. “Can I?”
I nod again, barely breathing.
His hand settles at my waist, warm, steady, grounding in a way that makes my butterflies soar inside me.
“I like you,” he says simply. “I don’t need you to say it back. I just wanted you to know.”
My throat tightens. “Tate…”
“I know,” he murmurs. “You don’t date, but hear me out for a second.”
He’s close enough now that I can smell soap and ice and something that’s just him.
“I’m not asking you to let me in fully,” he adds.
“Just… don’t shut the door on me yet. I know I don't know much about you, but there is something deep inside of me that is nagging me to figure you out. I’m not Shakespeare, but it just feels like we're supposed to meet. I have been coming to the diner for the last three years, and from the first day we locked eyes, I just wanted to know who you are, what makes you tick, but you shut me down every time. Now we’re seniors, our time is limited. Just give me a chance, Celeste.”
For a moment, I let myself rest there in the quiet, in the honesty, in the terrifying comfort of his presence.
Then I step back.
Not because I want to.
Because I’m scared of how much I don’t.
“I should go,” I say softly.
He nods, disappointment flickering but never turning sharp. “Yeah. Okay.”
At the door, I pause, hand on the knob.
“Thank you,” I say. “For today. For… seeing me.”
His smile is small, sincere. “Anytime.”
As I walk out into the cold night air, my heart feels dangerously full.
Because if this is what it feels like to let someone get close, even just a little, I don’t know how I’m supposed to survive when he finally learns the rest of the truth.
The apartment is quiet when I get home, the kind of quiet that hums instead of settles. My cheeks still feel warm, my chest still light, like I’m carrying something fragile and glowing just beneath my ribs.
I hang my coat by the door, toes kicking off my shoes without thinking.
“Thank you again, Suzie,” I whisper to her “No worries, Love. He was tired, so I figured I would just bring him back here and get him into bed.” She gives me a quick kiss on the cheek and tells me there is dinner in the fridge for me, before leaving to go back to her own apartment.
Rowen’s door is cracked open, a sliver of warm light spilling into the hallway. I push it wider with my hip and step inside, my heart softening instantly.
He’s asleep on his back, curls splayed across his pillow, one arm thrown above his head like he fought sleep and lost. His stuffed dinosaur is tucked under his chin, well-loved and missing an eye. The quiet beep of his monitor is steady, reassuring.
I breathe out.
I move closer, careful not to wake him, and check the numbers out of habit more than worry. They’re good. Stable. Right where they should be.
Relief doesn’t crash over me anymore, it settles. Familiar. Constant.
I smooth a curl away from his forehead, my thumb lingering just long enough to feel the warmth of his skin. He shifts, mumbling something incoherent, and my mouth curves into a smile I don’t even try to stop.
“Hey, Ro,” I whisper, even though he can’t hear me. “Momma’s home.”
This, this, is the gravity that always pulls me back.
Not in a way that hurts. In a way that reminds me of who I am.
I sit on the edge of his bed, careful, the mattress creaking softly under my weight. The glow in my chest dims into something steadier, less dizzy but more real. Love without fantasy. Happiness without illusion.
I think of Tate, of the way his hand hovered, the way he waited. The way he looked at me like I was something worth knowing, not fixing.
Wanting him feels like standing at the edge of something beautiful and terrifying all at the same damn time.
I glance back at Rowen, at the rise and fall of his chest, the quiet miracle of him existing in my life at all.
“I can want things,” I whisper to the room, more reminder than permission. “I just can’t forget what matters.”
Rowen sighs in his sleep, one small hand curling into the blanket, and my heart settles completely.
Cloud nine can wait.
This warm, ordinary, extraordinary love, this is home.