Page 25 of One Shot

“Who knew tipsy Laur was so bold!” Bren teases. “It could be worse, at least you remember everything. Honestly, Chip, it sounds like you might actually like him.”

“I don’t want to like anyone, let alone Lucas. I came here to focus on my future and get more experience in sports marketing and PR. Maybe to find myself again too. Not to date. I just want to be friends with him.”

I finish the last sip of Diet Coke before continuing to pick at my untouched food.

“You can definitely find yourself under him next time,” Jaylin blurts out.

“Shut up!” I retort back.

“Honestly, I haven’t seen Lucas with a girl since his freshman year. He isn’t a bad guy at all—people just expect him to be a ladies’ man as the captain of the hockey team,” Bren explains.

Even though other people have told me this before, it’s finally starting to sink in that Lucas is one of the good ones. A sense of relief washes over me, despite knowing I made him off-limits for myself.

“So, you like him, huh, good luck charm?” Jaylin teases.

“Don’t call me that! I . . . I don’t know. I don’t want to, but it’s going to be hard just staying friends with him. I don’t want to complicate anything. I need to get Tyler’s opinion. He’s known me so long and would have good advice. I’m going to meet him tomorrow for lunch anyway.”

“Oh, so Tyler isn’t in love with you?” Jaylin says, “This whole dynamic of the PR girls and team throws me off. Isn’t Suz into Lucas?”

“Absolutely not. They are like siblings! Suz would be appalled if she heard you say that. Lucas is wrong for Suz in every way possible,” Bren explains.

“And Tyler’s like a brother to me. I would never,” I respond at the same time.

“Good to know, good to know,” Jaylin says laughing.

I go back to bed and sleep on and off most of the day while watching Netflix. Maybe I do like Lucas. Bren claims he’s a good guy. I’m not used to good guys. I’m used to seeing a red flag and ignoring it. I apparently love chasing red. But if he is, then what am I afraid of? What would Nick say?

I leap out of bed, remembering his notebook. He wrote notes on all the Wyverns players too. I am desperate to know what he wrote about Lucas. Frantically opening the notebook and almost tearing a page, I thumb through it skimming every single word ensuring I don’t miss anything before finally finding Lucas’ name in my brother’s barely legible handwriting.

Great Guy. Going to go far.

He

Are you kidding me? He didn’t finish the notes. He wrote a paragraph about Blaine Mitchell but couldn’t finish two lines for Lucas? What the hell? Thanks for the help, Nick.

The next morning, I go to practice and take some pictures. Lucas tries to catch my eye, but I avoid his attempts for eye contact. I know once he looks at me, I’ll have a hard time not swooning.

I love watching him play hockey. You can tell by the way he effortlessly seems to dance across the ice, he’s in his element. I try focusing on taking pictures of other players before I have an entire memory card filled with just Lucas. Why couldn’t he just be a womanizer or a douchey jock? It might make my marketing efforts harder, but at least it would make my feelings disappear.

After about an hour of taking photos, I leave to meet Suz and Bren at Roast & Revelry. I’ve been waiting to share the idea of the fundraising event with them. Oh, and yell at them for not telling me about Nick’s jersey retirement.

Per usual, Bren has a six-person table with little actual table space available. She hands me an iced caramel macchiato, my favorite. We chitchat before getting into business. Suz mentions she went on a cute picnic date recently that went perfectly. That’s the second time that someone’s mentioned a picnic date recently, are they trendy right now?

I avoid any mention of Lucas, while Bren tries to jump straight to business.

We discuss the stories going out about the Sexy Seven online and hope to get some printed at a discounted price in various college hockey magazines.

“I took some great photos of the guys at practice today and plan to go back again tomorrow. We can use some for the articles if you’d like,” I offer.

“You take photos? Can I see some?” Suz asks excitedly.

“Sure. I haven’t edited anything yet.” I open my laptop to show her some of the photos.

“There are a lot of Lucas on here.” Suz notices. I didn’t think about how obvious that would be.

“Yeah, he’s one of my focuses.” I fumble to make an excuse. “Plus, I took some of him before practice the other day when I was just adjusting my camera settings and he was running some drills on his own.”

“Well, it’s great you are good with a camera. We’re going to need you. The photographer we’ve hired for the last three years for the calendar bailed on us.” Suz takes a sip of her drink as she slowly rolls her eyes in the most dramatic way imaginable.

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