Page 86 of Practice Makes Perfect
Mike’s eyebrows rise. “With hockey? I can help with?—”
“No, I mean…” I exhale, realizing I’m desperate to talk to someone. “There’s this girl.”
Mike leans forward, his beer forgotten. “Hold up.Lincoln Garciais having girl troubles? The guy whose phone number is passed around like currency?”
“That’s exaggerating,” I mutter, though he’s not entirely wrong. “And yes, I’m having… issues.”
“Who is she?”
I hesitate for half a second. “Em. Lea’s dorm mate.”
Recognition flashes across Mike’s face. “Shit, she’shot as firedude.”
“Yeah…”
“So what’s the problem? She turn you down?”
I let out a laugh that sounds more like a strangled cough. “Not exactly.”
And then, like a dam breaking, everything pours out of me.
Our meeting at the 7-11. The arrangement. The lessons. The night at my place when she bolted. The game. Her past with that Derek asshole. How scared she is. How I’ve been teaching her about intimacy, supposedly without emotional attachment.
Once I start talking, I can’t stop.
“The thing is,” I admit, staring down at my beer, “I think I was already into her before we even made this deal. And it might be mutual as well. And now, every hour we spend together just makes it harder to pretend I’m not, even though I committed to helping her.”
“So you like her,” Mike says simply. “What’s the big deal?”
“The big deal is we agreed to no feelings.” I resist the urge to crush my beer can.
“Rules are made to be broken.” He shrugs. “Especially stupid ones.”
“It’s not stupid,” I protest. “She needed something slow and uncomplicated to help her move past her trauma. And I can’t handle a relationship right now.”
“Why not?”
I gesture vaguely all around me. “Look at my life, man. I’m juggling being captain?—”
“Co-captain,” he corrects with a smirk.
“—maintaining my GPA, dealing with Coach’s bullshit, managing my mom’s bullshit, and now I’m supposed to be some girl’s boyfriend?”
“Some girl?” Mike repeats, his tone skeptical. “The way you’re talking about her, she doesn’t sound like just ‘some girl.’”
He’s right, and we both know it. Em is… special. Different from any other hookup I’ve had. The way she looks at me sometimes—like she’s seeing something nobody else has noticed—makes my chest ache, and even beyond the sex (and we haven’t even fucked yet!) I find myself wanting to hang with her.
“The other night,” I continue, “I just showed up at her place because I missed her. Not for a lesson, not for anything specific. I just wanted to see her face.”
“That sounds dangerously close to boyfriend behavior,” Mike observes, then reaches up to put his palm on my forehead. “Yeah, you’ve got a fever for her…”
I slap his hand away, then sigh. “I know, and it scares the shit out of me. And tonight, during our lesson, I could see it in her eyes. She’s falling for me too.”
“And that’s… bad?”
“Yes! I mean, no! I mean…” I drag a hand down my face. “I can’t be her first real relationship. I’d screw it up and she’d get hurt worse than she already has been.”
“You’re going to be the first person she sleeps with,” Mike points out bluntly. “That’s already pretty big.”
