15
Hockey Players Are So Weird
Kylie
“Hockey players are so weird,” I tell Paige, who’s lying on my bed scrolling. Tessa is at her desk with her headphones on, ignoring both of us, or pretending to.
Paige laughs. “No, they’re hot.”
“Hot-headed,” I say, thinking about the video Nash sent me.
He sent it so fast I’m convinced he keeps every clip of his fights in an album on his phone.
It was him and some guy in a different jersey spinning in circles on skates, punching each other, and I could literally see the referee standing right there, letting them go at it.
The next morning, I check my phone while I get ready for class, and there’s only the group chat, and I feel something I haven’t felt in weeks, which is calm.
It’s the first morning I’ve woken up without seeing Evan kiss that girl or hoping to hear from him.
Declan is blocked, so whatever that was isn’t my problem anymore.
And I have girlfriends who pop in just to say hi, and that feels so good because I’ve never really had it.
My ten o’clock is the class I actually love, a first-year seminar on the history of protest movements.
There are thirty of us around a giant table, taught by a woman named Dr. Nakamoto who’s about five feet tall, terrifying, and never once says the answer out loud.
Today, a guy named Elias spends ten minutes arguing that a boycott isn’t really a protest because it doesn’t involve risk.
Dr. Nakamoto lets him finish and then says, “Who wants to correct him?” and four hands go up, including mine.
I get to talk for two minutes, and she writes something down.
When it’s over, Elias leans across the table and says, “Okay, that was actually good,” and I thank him.
I walk out with my bag over my shoulder and a coffee I don’t need, into one of those days that’s warm in the sun and cold in the shade.
I take the long way across the quad because I want to.
That’s when I see Evan across the quad with the girl from the party.
He’s holding her hand, smiling while she talks, and they look happy.
My heart plummets. I take a deep breath and let it shake all the way back out.
And then, for the very first time, I’m okay.
We had three years together, and as crazy as it sounds, it felt like forever.
Seeing him now is like seeing somebody I used to know.
It hits me, right there on the path, that he was never the one.
He doesn’t see me, and I’m grateful. I don’t want his pity, and he doesn’t need to feel bad for moving on, because I am too.
I meet the girls for lunch, Paige and Kenzie and Bianca, and Paige talks the whole time about Koda. On the walk back to Corvin, my phone buzzes.
Evan: Did we ever return the wagon?
I slow down. Something swims in my gut. Did he see me or is this just a coincidence? We’ve always done this, knew we were thinking of each other and reaching out. It was always unexplainable while it happened, but this one is putting me through the roof. I wonder if he saw me.
But he’s asking about the wagon. We borrowed his neighbor’s wagon in August to haul my bins to the car, and I have no idea if it ever went back.
“Who is it?” Paige asks when she sees the look on my face. She glances at my phone and makes a sound when she sees his name. “Tell him to leave you alone.”
“I did.”
Kenzie looks over. “Who is it?”
“Her ex,” Paige says.
“He’s just asking something random,” I say.
“Don’t text back,” Paige scoffs. “Block him.”
“I saw them earlier,” I say quietly. “Him and the girl I caught him kissing at the welcome party. They were holding hands.”
“What the fuck?” Paige shouts.
Kenzie’s eyes go wide. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I don’t know.” I shrug. “When I saw them, I didn’t really care. For a second I was shocked, and then two seconds later I was like, it’s whatever. He should move on. We’re completely done.”
Paige stops walking. “Wait. Are you serious?”
I nod.
“I’m sorry,” Kenzie says.
I offer a small smile. “It’s okay.”
Paige tugs me closer.
“I’m serious,” I say, laughing. “I’m okay.”
We go up to their floor, and I hang out in Paige and Kenzie’s room, doing homework and talking about nothing, and by the time I get back to my room, it’s almost ten.
I shower and do my whole nighttime routine and fall into bed with my phone.
Tessa is in her bed, scrolling too. I have two missed calls from Paige.
Paige: Kylie!!
Paige: Hello?
I open the thread and start typing, and then somebody starts pounding on our door. Not knocking. Pounding. I jump so badly my phone falls.
Tessa sits straight up in bed. Her back is flat against the wall, her knees are pulled up, and she’s gone the color of paper. She isn’t looking at the door. She’s looking at the chain that locks it.
It comes again, three more, fast. I cross the room with my heart going and open the door.
It’s Paige. Her hair is coming out of its clip, and she’s breathing like she ran here. “You need to come with me.”
“What?” I ask, confused.
“You need to come with me right now.”
“Paige, it’s fucking bedtime. What happened?”
“Koda called me.”
My whole body comes back down, because this is about Koda. Something happened, and she needs to talk. “Okay. What happened with Koda?”
“No.” Paige shakes her head. “Not like that. He called me about Nash.”
Behind me, Tessa’s bedsprings creak.
“What about Nash?”
“He didn’t say.” Paige has a hand on the doorframe, and she isn’t laughing, and Paige is always laughing. “He called from outside somewhere. He said, Is Kylie with you? and I said no, and he said, Go get her.”
“Get me for what?”
“He said Nash won’t calm the fuck down.”
I grab my jacket off the chair and shove my feet into the first shoes I find. When I turn around, Tessa hasn’t moved. She’s still against the wall with her knees up and her phone in both hands.
“Tess,” I say. “Put the chain on after me. It’s okay. I have to go.”
She nods, and I feel bad for leaving her like this because she’s clearly scared.
I hear the chain slide into place, and then I follow Paige down the stairs.