Page 32 of On Thin Ice

“Would Gavin—Coach Blackburn—be okay with that?” Finn heard the waver in Jacob’s voice.

“Didn’t Coach Boffertobring you on as a coach at the beginning of the year?”

Jacob was quiet for so long that Finn almost wondered if he’d fallen asleep. Some people could do that in a sauna. Not Finn, but maybe Jacob was built that way.

“Yeah. I said no. For good reasons, but . . .”

“But?”

Jacob sighed. “Finn, I know we agreed I’d do this, and I do think I can help but . . .”

“You can’t keep starting to give me a goddamn reason and then sayingbutwithout finishing,” Finn objected.

“I know. I’m sorry.” Jacob took a deep breath. “I don’t talk about this—well, except with Moira and my brother, I guess. But, I don’t know if I can go back on the ice.”

“Not medically,” Finn clarified.

“Not medically,” Jacob agreed.

Finn looked over at him, right in the eyes. He wasn’t surprised to see Jacob looking back at him. “I’m sorry. I had no idea. I wouldn’t have—”

“No, that’s not why I told you,” Jacob said. “I told you because . . .well, because I think this might be good for me, but it’s not gonna be easy and you might have to be patient. I guess if you can tolerate my hip and the way it locks up, you can deal with this bullshit too.”

“I can,” Finn reassured him.

“I’dliketo come to practice. And to games. But . . .but it’s hard. I’ll get there, but it sucks in the meantime.”

“That why you stayed on the wall during the fundraiser? Staring at me?”

Jacob chuckled. “Uh, yeah. Number one for sure, number two . . .you’d grown up.”

“Oh, that’s what you decided, huh? That I was all grown-up and fair game?”

“Uh. No. Yes.” Jacob went bright red, and Finn knew it wasn’t entirely due to the steam.

Finn decided to let him off the hook. “I can be patient. At least if we’re working together here, like this.”

“You need more though,” Jacob objected.

Finn tamped down his outraged ego, as Jacob made a face and kept going. “Not like that. Not like it sounded. I mean to really help you, Ishouldbe at practices. At games. It’s what you meant. It’s what you wanted.”

It was, but how selfish and demanding would Finn be if he told Jacob to just get over it? People liked to say that to him, sometimes. That he should begratefulthat his dad was Morgan Reynolds and surely it was easy to just change his perspective. Like Finn hadn’t tried to do that a hundred times already. Athousand.

“Yeah, but I can work at your speed,” Finn said. “It’s way better than nothing. Way better than the way I’ve been playing.”

Jacob nodded. He didn’t look one-hundred-percent convinced and unfortunately it wasn’t as easy to persuade him as it was about Finn’s attraction. All that would’ve taken was a few blunt words and maybe a picture, post-jerkoff session.

But this was trickier.

“Trust me,” Finn said, and Jacob nodded again.

“What if you just came to practice? Didn’t come out on the ice?” The moment the question was out of his mouth Finn wanted to take it back—it made him sound so freaking desperate for even the barest scrap of Jacob’s attention. But he didn’t. Because heneededevery single goddam scrap.

Jacob frowned but didn’t immediately dismiss the idea, not like Finn had imagined he might. “You think your coach would be okay with that?”

“I can ask, but I can’t imagine Coach B would be mad about it.”

“Alright. No promises. But I’ll try to do it this week. And let me be the one to ask, okay?”

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