Page 8 of The Last Kind of Kiss
Three years ago, and the accident is still fresh in my memory—a scar on my heart that was healing when I was with Lila, but that’s since been reopened.
Lila’s the only girl I’ve been with since Summit. I never…I never told her about my ex. The only people who know are Hayes and my closest teammates. It’s not something I like sharing with people.
Since Summit’s hometown was Boston, that’s where she was buried, meaning I can’t take a depressing stroll down to her grave and visit her whenever I want. The last time I visited her was before I regularly started seeing Lila.
I wish I could hold her ring right now. For a long while after she passed, it helped me cope with her death. It brought me a sliver of peace to know I still had a part of her with me. But it’s not here anymore. I left it at my family’s cabin up in Big Bear, hoping that the distance would force me to move on.
It didn’t.
A strained cry gurgles out of me, so thick with pain that I can feel it clog my throat. “What’s wrong with me?”
Hayes leans over the console and pulls me into a hug. “Nothing’s wrong with you,” he whispers under his breath. “Bri, you went through something nobody should ever have to go through. And if you’re adamant about keeping Lila in your life, then maybe you should tell her?—”
I recoil from him like I’ve just been burned. “No. I can’t tell her. I just can’t, okay?” The intensity in my voice surprises me as much as it scares me. If I tell her, Lila will feel betrayed that I kept this a secret from her. If I tell her, I can say goodbye to ever earning her forgiveness.
Even Hayes mirrors my own shock, and he turns his head toward the windshield, hypnotized by the consistent scrape of the wipers upon rain-beaten glass. “Then what are you going to do?” he asks.
“I don’t know,” I respond hollowly.
3
HOCKEY HEALS ALL WOUNDS
BRISTOL
Ibodycheck one of my teammates into the boards for the second time this practice. I rarely tend to get physical at all during games—that’s what my defensive men are for. I’m a pacifist, alright? And I know how strange that sounds coming from someone who plays a violent sport like hockey, but I’m stressed as fuck today.
Practice is the last place I want to be right now, but I have an obligation to this team, and that means I can’t take mental health days and rot in my bed while I ruminate on the stupid mistakes I’ve made in the past. So, the only way I’m going to make it through an hour and a half pretending like everything is okay is if I funnel that disappointment into pureblooded rage. Does that sound healthy? Not at all. But having Hayes toss me pity looks is already bad enough.
The impact from the pile-up of bodies lances through my shoulder, making me grit my teeth so hard I taste iron, and my body crumples against the plexiglass from overexertion.
Hayes skates over to me—tailed by unimpressed shouts from Coach—and he gives me, you guessed it, a fuckingpitylook.
“Roughhousing is usually more my speed,” he jokes,gesturing to his extensive record of penalties that are probably long enough to wrap around at least half the perimeter of Riverside.
It’s true. He’s the hothead of the team, and he isn’t even a defenseman. He’s pretty much rabid when he steps onto the ice. Smushes hockey players like they’re sad roly-poly corpses stuck to the tires of a plastic dump truck. This is out of character for me. Like, intervention levels of out of character. And I’ve been a part of two interventions already. I amnotgoing back there.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I hiss, fighting the inferno pulsing through the left side of my body as I peel myself off the plexiglass.
“Look at you like what?”
“Like I need to be admitted to the loony bin.” Indignation laces my tone, almost as sweltering as the heat taking me for a nasty spin.
Hayes holds his hands up in mock surrender. “Hey, your words. Not mine.”
A long, drawn-out groan leaks from my lips, and I make my way over to the bench with the last of the energy I can conjure, sitting down and shucking my gloves off in a very blatant display of frustration. This whole situation is fucked up. I thought I was going to make my modeling debut without any speed bumps, but here I am, trying to traverse the Mount Everest-sized one standing between me and a fortune-flooded season. And the girl still actively treading through my dreams haspolitelyproposed that I quit to make things easier for the both of us.
How am I supposed to respond to that? I didn’t just take this job for shits and giggles. It’s a great job—a job that was offered to me because of my successful career. Not everyone gets this opportunity. And then you ask me to pick between my career and my girl…fuck, she isn’t evenmygirl anymore.
Either way, I’m screwed. If I refuse her “proposal,” I’m lettingmy team down. If I refuse to quit, I’m letting her down. I can’t let her down, okay? I’ve already let enough people down in my lifetime. It’s a lose-lose situation. I’m the bad guy in either scenario.
I remove my helmet, swipe the water bottle next to me, and spray a generous stream into my mouth before saying (unconvincingly), “I’m fine.”
Hayes props his chin on the butt of his stick, nodding. “Right. So I shouldn’t be concerned about you bulldozing into our teammates?”
“It’s a part of the game,” I grumble, taking the bottle and squirting it down my back, giving my muscles a much-needed coolant. Ice-cold rivulets roll down my spine, dousing the last dregs of the fire burning through my body, and leaving nothing but blackened kindling in its disastrous wake. I breathe deeply for what feels like the first time this entire practice, and when I’m not distracting myself with what’s arguably the least important thing in my life right now, I’m confronted with the ever-present ache in my chest that reminds me what is—Lila.
“Bri, I know you don’t want to hear this, but…” Hayes trails off, choosing his words carefully, all while his face is still adorned with that pitiful expression that makes my insides boil.
