35. Mason
MASON
With Alena’s fashion connection help, I’d gotten an early Saturday morning behind-the-scenes fashion house tour invite for my weekend away with Lilah.
We’d leave Friday evening and I’d skip the State Sports Gala.
If my choices were sitting in a room to have people clap about a game I’d already won and spending a night with Lilah, there was no competition.
Lilah would lose it, then tell me it was all too much, and then whisper to me how much she loved it all before she fell asleep in my arms.
I slowed my car to a crawl before I hit the bend in the driveway. My stomach knotted, a tangle of bile-churning clusters. My dad’s navy Bentley sat at the bottom of the stairs that led to the front door.
I’d been waiting to talk to him in person. I’d put off telling him so I didn’t have to deal with the lack of text response and silence until he was home next.
Getting out of the car, I ran through my speech on why this move would be better for me. The program was rebuilding and I’d be the center of that. A cornerstone in the relaunch, with teammates almost as good as the ones I had here.
My father stood in the foyer waiting for me, hands clasped behind his back, neutral expression. But the thick silence had my pulse throbbing in my throat. He’d been waiting for me. I wasn’t even sure what this meant.
Without a word, he walked down the hall toward his office. Every sharp step echoed through the air. An ominous cloud thickened the closer we got to the office.
The wingback chairs were there, but there was a glow that cast an orange and yellow light over everything, making the shadows harsher than usual. In the fireplace, the wood-fed fire blazed with hungry, flickering flames.
“We will announce you signing with Rhode Island at the sports gala this weekend.”
The gala I’d been planning on skipping. Everything was already booked for this weekend. All I needed to do was tell Lilah.
On the table between two of the three chairs sat a crystal decanter and two clear glasses, one already half full.
“I’m going away this weekend.” I stood at attention, keeping my shoulders straight.
He sipped from his glass and sucked through his teeth. “This is excellent. Do you want a glass now that your season is over?”
I braced for pushback but the offer of a drink caught me off guard. “No, thank you, sir.”
He poured into the other glass like I hadn’t said a word. With it more than half full, he handed it to me. “Alena had the tailor add an orange and black lining and pocket square to your suit for the gala.”
That froze me. “I’m not going to the gala.”
He nodded toward my glass. “Drink.”
I raised it to my lips, eyes and nose burning at the harshness of the liquor.
Wanting to get this over with, I gulped down as much as I could.
Battery acid would’ve been more mellow. The vodka clawed and slashed its way down my throat.
I drained the glass and held it out for him to take back.
“I’ve signed with Seattle. I’m going there next year. ”
My father made a noise of amusement.
I stopped waiting for him to take the glass back and set it down.
“You will go to the gala. You will accept your award with your new name. You will announce you are attending Rhode Island. We will take photos for the press.”
I will accept my new name. Not a question. Not a request. The name I hadn’t been good enough for until now. A bitter twist curled in my stomach.
“I can’t go. I have plans this weekend. And I’m not going to Rhode Island. I’m going to Seattle.”
He sank into his chair and tapped a contemplative finger in front of his mouth, then touched his nose. “I have done so much for you.” Profound disappointment reverberated in his quiet words.
I swallowed thickly, words lodging in my throat. Since his first visit, I’d always done everything he’d asked of me and pushed myself harder for the fleeting glimmers of his approval.
“The Seattle program is strong. I still plan on joining the draft after two years. This doesn’t change any of this.”
“You will forget this silliness and join Bair for his final season.”
“No, sir. I won’t. I’m going to Seattle.”
He cocked his head to the side, eyes burning with an intensity I’d never seen off the ice. Keeping his eyes on me, he stood in a fluid motion with only a slight dip in his left knee. And then he smiled. Muscles in his cheeks twitched as if this was the first time they’d ever been used.
For a second, I imagined he’d tell me he was proud of me for choosing my own path, even if it led to the same destination he’d envisioned. Then the smile turned blood-thirsty, harsh.
“Ah, so you’ve been coddled too much. Think you are your own man now.” He puffed up his chest and swung his arms beside him in a mock march before sneering. “This is not a negotiation.”
“I know it isn’t. You taught me never to go back on my word. I already signed a commitment letter.” A sharp exhale at the binding contract that I’d already signed. No matter what he said, I’d already signed on the dotted line.
He turned and picked up a stapled stack of papers from the polished wood desk and held them up to me. “These?” He stared at them like they were written in an alien language.
The logo at the top of the page burned the questions in my head to ash. University of Washington.
A trickle of ice-cold dread snaked down my spine as I stared at the papers. The papers I’d signed and left with Dane Larson. “Yes.”
“And what do you think that it means that I have them here?” he said with a dismissive almost-chuckle.
“It doesn’t change anything. I’ll sign them again.”
“Throw them in the fire.”
“No.”
He tilted his head and squinted at me. “All of this for a girl.”
The icy trickle turned into barbed fingers that reached inside my chest. I shook them loose and straightened my shoulders, meeting his flaying gaze. “I’m doing this because Dane Larson made a good pitch.”
“Good pitch,” he said it, tasting the words in his mouth. “So that’s all it takes to sway your loyalty?”
“I’ve always done what you’ve wanted. Worked my ass off, leaving it all on the ice for you, practice after practice, game after game. I won a fucking state championship. All I’m saying is let me have these two years. I’ll go pro and be ready for the Cup.”
“You think being distracted by some girl will help you succeed.”
“This isn’t about Lilah.”
“Yes, Lilah Byrd, the gardener’s daughter. Ranked eighth in your class, is she not? Impressive girl.”
A primal fear skated across my heart.
I stared at him, hating that he’d done his homework.
“And the next time she has another pool party while you’re at an away game.”
“Ryker is her best friend. That’s all.”
“And if she makes a new best friend at college.”
“She would never—they’re only friends.”
“You don’t have friends,” he bit out, almost a snarl. “Only teammates and everyone else. Attachments make you weak. None of them matter.”
His dismissal stoked the building fires of rage in my skull. Attachments like family. Like me. Maybe even like Bair, but I wasn’t brave enough to have him confirm it. “Like my mom. Bair’s mom.”
He leveled his gaze at me. “And I would not have you make the same mistakes I did.”
Mistakes like Bair. Mistakes like me.
“I’m going to Seattle.” I marched to the study doors and reached for the door.
“With Dane Larson,” he spat, then dipped his chin, I thought in acceptance. But he met my eyes, and his burned with disgust. “You have until the end of this week to rethink your decision.”
“It’s already done.”
“We will see.”
When I left the room, an ominous cloud filled my chest, making it hard to breathe. I needed Lilah.
My father left not long after our meeting in his office, and I felt like I could breathe again. I’d reached out to Dane Larson about the commitment letter. He said they’d disappeared when he’d gotten back to Seattle and he didn’t know how but was couriering me another set.
While Larson worked on that, I worked on weaseling in more time with Lilah.
“How are you getting to Seattle this summer?” I trailed a finger along the inside of her knee, where she had them settled over my hips, stretched out on the pool house rug.
She had her back against the couch and looked up from her book. “I’d been planning on taking a bus. The scholarship covers living expenses, but I don’t know if I’ll have a chance to work part-time with my course load, so I need to be super frugal to start.”
“Flying makes the most sense.”
“Also, costs the most money.”
I rubbed my whole hand over her thigh and grabbed her, pulling her down on top of me.
She yelped and laughed but let herself sink into me. She smelled so good.
I buried my face against her neck and hugged her tighter, not wanting to let go.
“What’s going on?” Her breath tickled the side of my neck.
“I’ve never been happier about anything in my life than being with you.”
A happy, contented sigh escaped her lips.
It reached deep down inside my soul and coated it like a balm.
“When do you have to show up for training camp? You do that over the summer, right?” She lifted her head.
“Late August. When do you need to be there?”
“Initially, June, but I’ll let them know it’ll be August.”
“Why the change?”
“There was a summer program they offered me, but it starts in June, so I’ll turn down the spot.”
“Why?”
“I’d rather spend the summer with you than in lectures and labs. This way we’ll get June and July together before our hectic schedules start.”
“Don’t turn down that program because of me.” I never wanted Lilah to miss out on anything to do with her plans and dreams because of me. I’d change whatever I had to, and if it meant going to Seattle early, then I’d start packing my shit now.
“Says the guy who turned down a whole college for me? I can do it next summer.”
“I could—”
“Mason, you’re already coming across the country for me. We can have our time here. There will always be time for more classes, but this is our final summer before college. We should spend time just relaxing for once. When else will we get a chance like this to have no obligations?”
I squeezed her thigh. “You’re right.” Long days with no demands on our time and even longer nights with absolute demands to be met, like keeping my girlfriend sweaty and satisfied while I took her on a fashion tour of New York or whatever else she wanted.
As long as we were together, what we did didn’t matter.
“We’ll stay and soak up the last free summer we’ll have in a long time. ”
“You’re so agreeable.” Lilah lifted off my chest and straddled me with a knee on either side of my thighs. She finger-walked her way up my chest and looked at me, drowning me with her vulnerability. “I thought after graduation we’d never see each other again,” she whispered.
“You’re not getting rid of me that easily.” I closed my eyes, wrapped my hands around her wrist and kissed the inside of it. How could there be any choice other than Lilah? My hand shook.
“Is everything okay?” She ran her fingers through the hair by my ear.
“Now everything’s perfect.”
Prom. Graduation. Summer. Then the rest of our lives.
She’d given me the strength and determination to do what I’d never been able to do before. To make my own choices and choose what came next for me.
It would always be her.