Page 66 of Practice Makes Perfect
“Yeah, I know our lesson is tomorrow, but I needed a friendly face.” Linc runs his hand through his hair, leaving it sticking up in adorable tufts. “I was at my apartment, but it’s hell being around Mike right now, and I want to avoid anything related to hockey tonight, so I thought…”
“What?” I say, softer than I intended.
“I was hoping to hang out for a couple hours?”
“Sure,” I say, letting him in and closing the door. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Linc looks like someone has fueled him up again, because he lets out a contented sigh of relief, puts his backpack on the floor, then sinks onto the couch. His knee bounces rapidly, his fingers drumming against his thigh—a level of fidgeting that even I, ADHD queen, find impressive.
“Are you OK?” I ask, taking a seat next to him but leaving enough space that we’re not touching. “You seem… not OK.”
“I’m fine,” he says automatically, then his shoulders drop even lower. “Actually, no, I’m not, but I don’t want to dump all my crap on you.”
“I mean, that’s what friends do,” I say, then mentally kick myself because we’re not exactlyjustfriends, are we?
We’re something in the undefined gray area between hookup buddies and… something else… that I’m trying very hard not to think about.
“How was your double shift?” he asks, clearly deflecting.
I decide to let him, launching into the story of how a five-year-old declared herself the “Queen of Dance” and refused to follow any choreography that wasn’t “royal enough.” So, there I was, trying to teach them a simple eight-count, and Queen Sophia was spinning in circles yelling ‘peasant moves’ at the other kids.”
Linc laughs, a genuine sound that brightens his eyes momentarily. “What did you do?”
“I promoted everyone to royal status and renamed the routine ‘The Court Dance.’ Suddenly my choreography was acceptable to Her Majesty.”
“Nice,” he says with a smile, but then goes quiet again, staring at the TV where my paused French film is waiting.
The silence stretches between us, thick and awkward. I fidget with a loose thread on my leggings, trying to think of something to say. It’s weird seeing him like this—normally he’s so confident, so in control—and this defeated version of Linc makes my chest ache.
“OK,” I say finally. “Are you going to tell me what’s actually wrong?”
He exhales slowly, his broad shoulders rising and falling. “Mike and I had a fight the night I saw you in Trenton and still aren’t speaking.” His hands clench into fists on his thighs. “And Coach is still on my case about getting Mike to step up as a leader, which is impossible when he won’t even speak to me.”
I nod, not interrupting.
“There’s going to be scouts at the game against Brown, and my mom is blowing up my phone about it, sending me links to articles about what scouts look for, texting me reminders to eatprotein…” He shakes his head. “And I’m barely sleeping, so my game is off, which means Coach is riding me even harder…”
“That’s a lot,” I say softly, picking up the conversation when he trails off.
“Yeah.” His voice is barely above a whisper.
I bite my lip, not really sure how to deal with that much shit all at once, so I gesture toward the TV. “Do you want to watch the rest of this with me?” I say. “I sometimes find when I’m overwhelmed that it’s good to just chill out and zone out, and it has English subtitles, which is good, since you don’t speak French.”
“Sure.”
I hit play, and the film resumes with a scene of the main characters sitting in a Parisian café, having an intense conversation about love and loss while accordion music plays softly in the background. It’s about the most French thing imaginable.
“So what’s happening?” Linc asks, his voice sounding more normal now.
“She’s telling him that she can’t be with him because she’s engaged to his brother, but she’s clearly in love with him and the brother is kind of a jerk who cheated on her with her best friend, but she feels obligated to stay because of some promise she made to her dying mother.”
“Ah, the classic ‘I’m engaged to your brother but secretly in love with you while my best friend is sleeping with my fiancé’ situation,” Linc says dryly.
I snort. “Happens to the best of us.”
He grins. “I know, right?”
We watch for a few more minutes until we reach my favorite scene—where the heroine finally decides to follow her heart, forsaking the cheating asshole whohappensto be rich and shacking up with the straight-talking andtotallynon-cheating brother. I sit up straighter, my exhaustion temporarily forgotten.
