Page 15 of The Nanny Goal

He doesn’t answer that, which makes me feelgreat.“You will find better than me, Emery. And then you will forget me. It is for the best.”

CHAPTER4

EMERY

present day

I can’t believe I let my parents talk me into another Granger Road Trip that, for the first time in two years, has brought me into the same arena as Alexei Artyomov.

And we’ll be sitting with his dad!

His mom said she would give up her seat so the three of us could watch together—despite my vocal defence that I could buy a last-minute nosebleed ticket on the Ticketmaster app.

Or, you know, just loiter at a nearby coffee shop until the game was over.

Both fine options for me.

But every time I suggest we don’t need to sit together, I get guilty eyes from my mom. That look that says,you’re moving to Europe and we might never do this again.

It’s not like I’m going forever.

I am going to be gone for a while, though. Long enough that I’ve put my fledgling personal chef business in Minneapolis on hold. There’s no point in trying to hustle to get customers and build a reputation only to leave the city for three or six or more months. But once I had the acceptance letter from the Swiss culinary institute, I started packing and immediately put my social media marketing on pause.

And being honest aboutthatis what locked me into this collision course with my past mistakes. No sooner had the wordsMy calendar is suddenly very emptyleft my mouth than my mother got a gleam in her eye.

I couldn’t come up with a good excuse, and here we are.

Trepidation mounts as we move through the crowd looking for Alexei’s father.

“Mom, can you send my ticket to my phone?” I point at the team store just before the security gates. “I want to check out the jerseys.”

She laughs. “You always need to be defiant, don’t you? Are you going to wear Rusty’s number for his game against Camden?”

“Yes!” My eyes light up. “Exactly. I’ll meet you at the seats.”

Rusty is Russ Armstrong, one of the veteran players on this new Hamilton team. Years ago, he played in Minnesota with my oldest brother, Camden. Tonight, they’re playing against each other.

The NHL is a very small world in some ways. Too small.

As soon as she AirDrops the ticket to me, I zip away, losing myself in the surge of people who want the silly, plaid-wearing, bagpipe-playing mascot gear that you can only buy here. I’ve been in almost every arena in the league, and this is among the busiest stores.

Good for Hamilton, and good for my delaying tactic.

I make my way to the jersey section, but to my dismay, the Armstrong jerseys are all sold out.

Last summer Rusty was in a sports energy drink commercial that went super viral for how awkward he was in it, and the fact that he’s Scottish and the team aesthetics have a Scottish vibe…it’s a marketer’s dream.

And then the company, BioPunk, followed that up with a new product called SPUNK, and tapped him again to awkwardly endorse the sweet and tangy complete meal drink.

He’s now enjoying a fandom most bottom six forwards never see.

I love it for him, but it does mean I’m out of luck on the jersey plan.

Turning around, I run smack into Alexei. A cardboard cutout version of him, anyway. He’s staring solemnly at the camera, which means he’s making intense eye contact with me, too.

Getting eye fucked by cardboard is a new and unsettling experience.

“Hate you,” I whisper, even though it’s not really true.

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