Page 35 of SlapShot Sweetheart

“A slapshot?” he chuckled emotionally, and she could hear the devastation in his voice. “Sure, would it make you feel better? Would it fix whatever this is between us?”

“No,” she whispered, hating that her voice warbled at that moment as she heard his soft groan as he breathed her name.

“Aimee,mon âme sœur,this is killing me. Can we please talk? I’ll say it in whatever language you want, but please let me see you.”

“Not now,” she mumbled, dashing away her tears as Éclair and Donut climbed into her lap, meowing for attention. “The cats want to be played with, and I’m feeling pretty awful. Maybe I’m coming down with something, or maybe I just need some space. I just don’t want to be around anyone.”

“Not even me?”

And she couldn’t answer him.

“Aimee, I’m not giving up,” he hissed, and she could hear the frustration and tears in his voice as he gritted out the words to her. “You can be mad. You can push me away, but not forever. Get this out of your ‘ead and your ‘eart – and I want to see you at the game on Friday.C’est vrai?”

“Theo…”

“Non! Mais non!I will ‘ave the ticket waiting and I want to see you. We’re going to talk about whatever is wrong.”

“You can’t push me around.”

“I’m not pushing you,mon âme sœur– I’mbeggingyou,” he whispered painfully. “Don’t do this to us, to me… please?” He grew silent, and she could hear his shaky breath, feeling like a heel.

“I’m afraid to make things worse,” she whispered, her voice choked with emotion. “We’re supposed to be just friends.”

“Then be my friend,” he interrupted. “Friends talk. They see each other and lift the other person when they are down. I want to see you, to talk to you.”

“What if this is a mistake?”

“It’s not. It can’t be.”

“Theo…”

“Aimee, I am asking you to please come to the game. If you don’t want to go, I understand, but then I will be at your place after the game so we can talk. Your ‘ouse, my ‘ouse, the locker room, I don’t care – but we are going to work this out.”

“Should I start dropping my ‘h’s,” she chuckled tearfully.

“No, you’re perfect.”

“Ha! Far from that…”

“You are to me,” he whispered. “I’ll see you on Friday.”

Aimee was still feeling disheartened on Friday morning when she got Theo’s text. The game was a little earlier in the afternoon, which meant that she would need to be heading downtown on the cusp of rush hour. This would be like taking all of her anxiety driving, her nerves, her broken heart, and throwing it into a blender to make a slurry – which is what her intestines felt like. If she wasn’t so absolutely starving from lack of eating and so desperate for comfort food, she would have skipped Madeline’s completely.

She was ‘jonesing’ for an éclair in the world’s worst way possible – hoping the sugary fix would solve all of the world’s problems. Pushing open the door, for a moment she hoped that Theo was standing there at the counter, but he wasn’t. Just some older man who was hovering and picking over the glass counter full of a variety of doughnuts. It nearly took him twenty minutes to finally pick out his selection before leaving.

Madeline and Aimee exchanged a pointed look that spoke volumes.

“What can I get you,chère?”

“Whatever you have that is loaded with chocolate, sugar, stuffed with cream, and can block out all the ills of the world,” Aimee began dramatically – and then paused. “I forgot, you speak French… don’t you?”

“Some, yes. Why? I don’t speak it as often so I’m a little slower than my brother or my sisters, but what did you need?”

“I have a friend who keeps saying a few things – and I don’t know what it means.”

“A ‘friend’, eh? Someone we both know, I suppose?” Madeline began with a pointed smile and nodded. “I can try. What is it?”

“It sounds like ‘Mom I’m sure,’ but I googled it and couldn’t come up with… why are you making that face?”

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