Page 26 of Crazy Pucking Love
I dug in my toe, bringing myself to a stop. Dane slowly approached, his hands shoved into the pockets of his puffy blue coat, a slouched gray beanie on his head so that only the dark ends of his hair stuck out.
This, and that guy right there—I already felt way better. Yes, I’d overdone it on the caffeine, but I couldn’t pinpoint the restless feeling I’d had all day. For the first week, I thought this college thing would be fairly easy. Once the assignments piled up during week two, though, and as my hours slept spread thinner and thinner over several days, it hit me what exactly I’d jumped into.
I doubted another six months of high school would’ve properly prepared me, but for the first time since I’d decided on this track for my future, I questioned if it was what I really wanted.
“The spinning thing is impressive,” Dane said, his words coming out on a white puff of air.
“You do one now.” I made a circle with my finger, like otherwise he wouldn’t know what spinning entailed.
He shook his head. “Nah. I’ll leave the fancy stuff to you.”
“Oh, come on. I’ll show you how—it can’t be that different from hockey.”
“The things you talk me into,” he muttered. I demonstrated, crossing one ankle over the other and folding my arms in tight before dragging out a toe in a wide circle and bringing myself to a stop.
Dane attempted a couple of spins. Then he stumbled slightly, growled, and charged at me.
“Wait! That’s not a spi—”
He looped his arm around my waist, and spun us both—but instead of a figure-skating-type spin, it was an aggressive one, like he just got the puck and was going to break for the other goal.
I elbowed him to make my getaway, and we sprinted across the ice after nothing, but the metaphorical thrown gauntlet meant we both gave it our all. Once we reached the other side, I doubled over, trying to catch my breath. “This is…hardly…fair. You’re used to skating more than I am.”
“What would be a fair competition, then?” Dane lifted his arms. “Bring it on.”
I wheezed a laugh, still struggling to fully fill my lungs with oxygen, then gripped his coat and used it to pull myself upright again. His cocky expression faded when our gazes met, another emotion taking its place.
Desire rose, and I wanted to close the distance between our mouths and kiss him with reckless abandon, the way he kissed me that first night we met.
He let out a shallow exhale and pulled back. “Megan…”
“Please don’t say it. I already heard the speech.”
“There are other things going on, too, and I just…I really like being friends with you, and I don’t want to do anything that’d mess—”
I held up a hand and he stopped. My heart throbbed, and I hated that I suddenly understood the expression ‘so close, yet so far away.’
…
Dane opened the car door for me and even extended a hand to help me out. To our credit, we did a remarkable job of rushing back into the friend zone, only a minute or so of strained awkwardness as we’d left the rink.
“You know, I recently changed my major,” Dane said. “I started in management and leadership, because…well, it was the easy degree the team’s academic advisor recommended. But now he’s no longer here, and I’m rethinking a few things. So I switched to Kinesiology…”
At my confused look, he said, “Most people know it by exercise science. That’s why I have to take calculus and anatomy and biology, and I feel like I’m drowning, too. I wish I would’ve decided on a better backup earlier, but I’m halfway through my junior year and making the change, so if you decide you want to switch, you can. Nothing’s set in stone.”
During my earlier freak-out, his words would’ve been exactly what I wanted to hear. Now…? I knew he had a point about not wanting to mess up our friendship because it meant a lot to me, too. I needed us to be okay.
Still, the sting of rejection lingered, eerily familiar to the abandoned sensation I’d experienced way too often in my life. I pushed through it, telling myself there was no reason to feel lonely. Dane and I were friends. We’d continue to be friends, and I should be flattered that he cared so much about preserving that relationship. Somewhere inside, I did.
I nodded, forcing myself to focus on this conversation here and now, not that moment on the ice. “True. And with my dad’s company as an option, it’s not like I’ll end up without a job. I know I could easily get one there.”
“I’m sure your dad would be happy to work with you.”
I frowned at him, confused.
“Sorry, is that not something you want? Is he pushing you to work there? Is that why you had a…well, it wasn’t so much a freak-out, as a hyper-explosion of words.”
“My dad died a couple of years ago,” I said, and as usual, saying it aloud brought up the ghost of grief that’d taken over my life for a while. “He and my mom were in a plane crash. I thought you knew.”
