Page 23 of Pucked Up

In the sudden silence between us, I imagined the possibilities—some violent and some tender. I could almost see them flickering in the air like sparks from the dying fire: Micah's hands on my throat, my mouth on his chest, his weight pinning me down, and my name on his tongue.

He nodded once, a sharp jerk of his chin. Turning, he moved past me toward the opposite side of the room, close enough that I caught his scent—wood smoke and sweat. He didn't look back to check whether I followed.

He didn't need to.

I grabbed the sole remaining candle, a stubby thing with wax dripping down its sides like frozen tears. The flame wavered as I moved.

Micah's sleeping area occupied the far side of the cabin's main room, separated from the living space by nothing more than an imaginary line—territory marked by use rather than walls.

A single framed jersey hung above the bed—faded blue. A wooden trunk doubled as a nightstand, its surface empty save for a dog-eared paperback and a half-empty glass of water. No photos. No trophies. Nothing to suggest the man who'd become infamous for violence had a life beyond it.

The bed drew most of my attention. Modest in size, barely large enough for Micah's frame alone, covered in a patchwork of navy and gray blankets that looked worn with use rather than age. It wasn't made for sharing, but neither was the guest room bed.

The cold was sharper where the fire's dying heat barely reached. My breath frosted in front of my face as I set the candle on the trunk, wax spilling over onto the wooden surface and hardening instantly.

Micah stood at the foot of the bed, hands flexing at his sides. "Left or right?"

"Doesn't matter."

He followed up with decisive and efficient movements. stripping off his jeans and kicking off his boots. His body filled the space it occupied completely. He lay down on the side farthest from the dying embers, facing the wall, his back a barrier between us.

I hesitated, then shed my hoodie, shivering as the cold air sliced through my thin t-shirt. The bed creaked as I lowered myself onto it, keeping a careful distance from Micah's warmth. I tugged the blankets over us, feeling their weight trap the little heat between our bodies.

We lay there, rigid and separate, two men occupying the same space but inhabiting different worlds. My shoulder blade pressed against the mattress's edge, my body teetering on the precipice of falling.

The candle flickered, casting dancing shadows across the low ceiling—a light show for haunted insomniacs.

"You're still shivering," Micah said.

I was. My teeth nearly rattled. "I'll warm up," I lied.

A beat passed, then another.

"Take this." Micah shifted and peeled off his thermal shirt in one fluid motion, passing it back to me without turning. The muscles of his bare back rippled in the candlelight, and I couldn't look away.

I took the shirt, fingers brushing his. It was still warm from his body, and I pulled it on without thinking, surrounding myself with his scent and heat.

"Thanks."

Micah grunted. Time stretched and warped in the darkness. Minutes might have been hours; seconds might have been years. The storm outside had settled into a steady assault, the windno longer howling but whispering against the windows like someone trying to get in.

I lay perfectly still, aware of every inch of space between us. They might have been miles or millimeters. My body had stopped shivering, warmed by Micah's shirt and the cocoon of blankets.

His breathing was deep and even. It wasn't the rhythm of sleep; it was more controlled than that. I counted the seconds between each inhale and exhale.

Inhale. One, two, three, four. Exhale. One, two, three, four, five. Inhale. One, two, three, four.

Without conscious thought, my breathing began to match his. We weren't only sharing a bed but also the air surrounding us. It was one of the most intimate things I'd ever experienced—more intimate than the kiss that still haunted the corners of my mind and more intimate than the way he'd looked at me across the ice before driving me into the boards.

I tried to disrupt the pattern—breathing faster—to reclaim some small piece of myself. My body betrayed me, falling back into sync with his as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

A memory surfaced—visiting my grandmother in hospice. Seventeen years old, watching her chest rise and fall, each breath a negotiation with the universe. I'd found myself matching her rhythm without meaning to, as if I could keep her in this world through synchronicity alone. As if my lungs could teach hers how to survive.

It hadn't worked.

"I thought about you," Micah said suddenly, his voice soft and quiet. "When they took me off the ice. When they showed me the replay."

I swallowed hard as I listened to his confession.

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