Page 29 of My Last Dance

Colt, who’d really started to grow on me because of how well he treated my best friend, rearranged it so we’d all meet at a pond for outdoor skating for a surprise birthday party for Mer.

Patrick drove Ali and I over to the designated party location, and we all sat there in shock for a second. The boys made it look like a little winter wonderland. Construction lights, which were plugged into JP’s old pickup truck, illuminated the boys while they cleaned snow off a portion of the frozen pond. Off to the side of the pond, a large bonfire was already burning, a boombox was blasting top hits, and Colt had set up multiple camping chairs and a table, which held smores stuff, a large thermos, and styrofoam cups.

After lacing up our skates, we glided onto the rough ice. With the snow lightly falling and the daylight slowly fading, it was a beautiful scene. This pond was pretty secluded, guarded by tall pine trees reaching up into the sky, with only a couple of lit up cabins dotting the shoreline.

Colt brought old hockey sticks for all of us, and after flying around the ice freely for a couple minutes, the boys started a pick-up game.

At one point, JP passed me the puck, and I had an open lane to the net.

Skating fast, I quickly made my way to the net, but when I was about five feet away, Kappy shot past me and turned backwards, playing defense.

“Where ya gonna go, Viper?” he teased with a wicked grin.

I tried to stickhandle past him, but my stickhandling skills were very poor, so he easily stripped the puck from me with a laugh.

“All Swedish, no Finnish!” He cackled at his own joke.

“You couldn’t just let me get it?” I complained. “You get goals all the time!”

He laughed harder as he easily flicked the puck into the net. “Andthatis how you score, Viper.”

His teasing frustrated me so much that I dropped my stick and tried to shove him.

“She dropped her stick!” JP shouted.

“Oh man! You know what that means!” Colt hollered.

“Guys, stop,” Mer said, but even she was laughing.

After doing an over-the-top celly, Kappy swarmed up to me, his edges cutting deep into the pond ice. “You wanna go?” He wagged his eyebrows and dropped his own stick.

“Okay, you don’t need to—” The rest of my sentence was cut off by a strangled cry. Kappy grabbed me up and sped to the side of the pond. He dumped the both of us into the snowbank.

“Ugh! Dick!” I cried, scrambling away from him and brushing the cold snow off my face. “That wasmean.”

“You’re way too fun to mess with,” he said, then stayed in the snowbank making a snow angel.

Halfway through the next game, pain started radiating up my shins, making it feel like my bones were splintering into a million pieces. I tried ignoring it for as long as I could, because I was actually having normal teenage fun for once, but a nagging voice in the back of my head yelled that I was being irresponsible.

“You good?” Patrick asked as I skated past him toward the edge of the pond.

Faking a smile, I nodded.

“I’ll quit with you,” he said, moving to skate beside me.

‘No, I’m good.” I pushed at his chest. “You’re having fun, stay.” I smiled.

Patrick looked at war with himself. He grew up in both sports—figure skating and hockey—and while his older brothers went the hockey route, he stuck to Ice dance with me. But sometimes I’d catch him watching hockey with a wistful look on his face, making me wonder if he had regrets.

“I’m good, promise. Go show those hockey boys what you’re made of,” I said with a smirk.

Balancing on the edge of the rink, I took off one skate at a time, then immediately shoved each frozen foot into an Ugg boot.

Making my way to the bonfire, I poured myself some hot chocolate before grabbing a blanket and sitting to watch everyone.

After a couple minutes, Kappy stole a puck and stick-handled his way to the edge of the rink toward me. He was dressed in two pairs of sweatpants, a hoodie, and a puffer coat, with a USA Hockey beanie pulled low over his forehead. He was completely bundled up, just like the rest of us, but he still managed to look effortlessly cool, which didn’t make sense and didn’t seem fair.

He came to a stop at the edge of the rink and leaned his chin on the butt of his stick. His troublemaker eyes scanned my face. “Truce?” His warm breath hung in the air in front of him.

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