Chapter Twenty-Four
The kitchen smells intoxicating: rich plum tomatoes conducting an olfactory symphony with green bell peppers and onions while ground bison meat provides the bass notes that regular beef could never achieve.
Petra stirs the Bolognese, and watching her, I realize I’ve been doing it wrong my entire life.
“I’ll admit,” she says, eyebrow cocked like a loaded weapon, “when you insisted on bison instead of regular beef, I thought you were just trying to prove something.”
I smirk, my hands dusted with the semolina flour we used to make fresh fusilli. “Would I ever lead you astray?”
She laughs, shaking her head before tasting the sauce directly from the stirring spoon.
“So yummy,” she says.
“That good, huh?”
“The bison gives it this—” she pauses, searching for words, “—depth. It’s richer but not overpowering.” She taps my chest with the spoon, leaving what will definitely be a sauce stain. Luckily, I’m wearing an apron.
This is what I love. Cooking together, watching the way she moves through my kitchen like she’s always belonged here, like we’re performing some elaborate domestic ballet where all hamstrings are safe from injury.
The pasta water starts its aggressive bubbling as the fresh fusilli surrenders to the boiling heat. We’ve achieved peak domesticity: homemade pasta, exotic meat choices, synchronized kitchen movements. If someone had told me six months ago I’d be here, I’d have…well, not believed them.
“You should start a restaurant,” Petra muses, giving the sauce one final swirl like she’s casting a spell.
I scoff because if anyone knows his culinary limits, it’s me. “Yeah, because that’s exactly what I need—more stress, late nights, and flour all over my face.”
I drain the pasta then toss it straight into the Bolognese. The sauce clings to every spiral. Fresh parsley and Parmigiano Reggiano complete the dish, giving it that extra visual and flavorful flair.
We sit at my new Chippendale dining table—one of Claire’s additions—and Petra takes the first bite. The sound she makes says it all.
“My God,” she murmurs. “This is obscene.”
Then I take a bite from the bowl in front of me. The tomatoes sing; the meat provides percussion; the texture hits every note. “Not bad, huh?” I say, mouth half-full.
“Understatement of the century,” she shoots back.
We eat with the unhurried pace of people who have nowhere else to be, Chianti lubricating the conversation as it drifts from ballet politics to hockey economics.
Then Petra sighs, setting down her fork. She swirls her wine like it holds answers.
“I still can’t believe Claire is moving here soon,” she says.
I force myself to keep chewing even though the pasta has suddenly developed the texture of guilt.
Petra continues, oblivious to my internal crisis management.
“I remember when I first moved to New York. It was terrifying. But she’s stronger than I was at eighteen.
She’s actually doing it—taking the leap, following her dream, just like I did.
” Her smile goes wistful and soft at the edges. “I’m so proud of her.”
I stare at my plate like it might offer an escape route. The pasta stares back, unhelpful.
She has no idea. No idea that Claire’s acceptance letter is fiction, that Petra’s entire reason for staying in New York is built on a foundation of sisterly deception.
That she passed up a principal position—the ballet equivalent of the Stanley Cup—for a lie, told with love, but still a lie.
And it’s not my truth to tell, but keeping it feels like swallowing glass with every word I don’t say.
“You okay?” Petra asks.
I force a smile that probably looks like I’m in pain. “Yeah. Just thinking.”
“That’s dangerous,” she says, grinning.
I chuckle, but it comes out wrong, forced.
What happens when she finds out? Will she blame Claire for the betrayal? Will she resent losing Saint Petersburg? Will she blame me for knowing and choosing silence? The questions circle in my mind.
Maybe I should tell her now. Just get it into the open. Put an end to the secrets.
Petra reaches across the table, squeezing my hand. “I just feel like things are finally coming together. Claire’s coming here. I have you.”
“Yeah. Everything’s…falling into place,” I say.
After dinner, we migrate to the couch with our wine, the city providing its nightly light show through my apartment’s large windows. Petra leans close to me.
“You ever think about the future?” she murmurs. “Like what you want after hockey?”
I glance down at her. “Sometimes.”
She looks up, eyes expecting more. “And?”
I exhale, rubbing my face like I might find answers in the friction. “Well, I think about it but don’t really know if I see anything specific. I guess I don’t like thinking too far ahead.”
“That’s such a hockey player answer.” Her smile softens. “I’m so happy you’re back on the ice, doing what you love, playing better than ever.”
I hold her gaze, searching for words that won’t ruin everything.
I want to tell her about Claire, about the lie, about the ticking time bomb we’re all sitting on.
But how do you destroy someone’s happiness when they’re looking at you like you’re part of the solution?
Instead, I kiss her like I’m trying to stop time through lip contact alone.
She nestles into me, melting into the moment, fingers finding my hair with the familiarity of someone who knows exactly where I’m sensitive.
We move together without hurry, like we have forever, like tomorrow isn’t lurking with its inevitable revelations.
I lift her with the power that comes from ballet-enhanced strength—turns out grand pliés are good for more than just hamstring repair—carrying her toward the bedroom.
She pulls my shirt over my head, fingertips tracing my body. Her touch finds scars from hockey, new muscle definition from ballet, the places where I’m still becoming whoever I’m becoming.
The sheets are cool beneath us, but her skin is warm.
My lips travel down her collarbone on a journey south, and when she gasps my name, it sounds like absolution.
For a while, nothing else exists. Not the looming lockout.
Not the trade rumors. Not the secret that’s eating me alive from the inside.
Just this—two bodies trying to say things words can’t capture.
Just us, pretending tomorrow isn’t coming with its invoices for today’s happiness.
The pasta was perfect. The wine was excellent. The evening was everything it should be. Except for the part where it’s all built on a foundation that’s about to crack, and I’m just here, holding her in the dark, pretending I don’t hear the crackling of everything about to fall apart.