Page 68 of What Are the Chances
I was making my morning protein shake when Grace walked into the kitchen. I wasn’t used to seeing her around the place at this time. Usually she was well gone by now.
“I didn’t realise you were still here.”
She yawned. “I need to be at the airport in just over an hour.”
That’s right. Levi had mentioned something about an out-of-town meet. I guess that meant she didn’t have a five-thirty a.m. practice for a change.
She ambled to the fridge, grabbing things for a smoothie. I’ll bet it was going to taste a hell of a lot better than the protein shake I was working on. Grace made the best smoothies.
Grace and I hadn’t spoken properly since we’d broken Levi. When I’d driven her home from Lastlings, her blood-alcohol-level had meant she’d forgotten about her vendetta. I wasn’t sure whether it had returned.
“Are we good, Hughesy?”
She halted, the knife in her hand going slack. Probably not the best time to ask.
“Yes.” She exhaled. “I’m sorry. I may have overreacted. I guess I just hate cheating.”
“I do too.”
Grace set the knife on the counter. “Why did you then? When Riley told me I almost didn’t believe her. I never would’ve guessed. Tripp maybe. Ryan, yeah. But you... you’re the most loyal person there is.”
Abandoning my protein shake, I leant against the counter. Taking a trip down this dark memory lane wasn’t something I enjoyed, but it also wasn’t something I could ignore. Especially not after the deal I’d struck with Riley.
“At the end of freshman year, the team threw a party for Levi and me. We’d been going through the draft process all year and were set to start training for the Combine as soon as school broke out.”
I’m not sure whether Levi had detailed the whole draft experience to Hughesy. She didn’t entirely get the hockey world yet, and it was a complex one. The Combineinvolved interviews, medical screenings and fitness tests over a four-day period. It was pretty intense stuff, and ultimately gave teams an insight of the prospects and their abilities.
“Whenever I spoke about the draft Riley kind of, I don’t know, checked out or something. It’s like she didn’t want to hear it.”
She’d gotten with me knowing full well I played hockey, but it was clear she didn’t love that part of my life, which was hard given it was practically my whole life. I’d spent my entire childhood wrestling with my dad about how much hockey meant to me. I hadn’t expected to spend the same energy convincing my girlfriend about it.
“There’d been constant attention around Levi and me during the season. It was a big deal and our friends were treating it that way. So when Riley didn’t show for the party, it fucking stung.”
I remembered that night clearly, calling her, searching the crowd for her. When my friends asked where she was, I’d grappled at a lie that I knew they saw through. Lying for your girlfriend to cover if she missed a family event was one thing, but that I couldn’t get past.
I sighed. “I’m sure you get it, Hughesy. You’ve seen what hockey means to Levi. It’s the same for me. I didn’t even need Riley to love the game, I just needed her to love it enough for me.”
I dragged a hand through my hair. My throat was starting to feel thick. I hadn’t allowed myself to feel these feelings in a long time. The disappointment. The frustration. I never asked Riley to come to every game or let me drone on about hockey for hours on end. All I wanted was for her to understand how much it meant to me, and to care about me enough to support it.
“When she didn’t show, I knew we were over. It’s like the countdown to the draft had been a countdown to our expiration date. So once it became clear she wasn’t coming, I got pretty fucking wasted.”
This was the part that made me feel nauseous.
“Then the captain of the girls’ hockey team started talking to me, and it was such a good feeling being able to talk hockey and have someone acknowledge all the work I’d put in.”
Grace held my focus steady, not wavering. Taking that as encouragement, I went on.
“I know none of those things are excuses. I’m not trying to justify it. What I did was wrong. I never have and never will forgive myself for it.” I picked up my protein shaker, needing something to do with my hands. “But that’s why it happened.”
It hadn’t been a spur of the moment thing, not merely an attractive girl giving me attention. It was a build-up of months of arguments and hostility, and that was the by-product.
Turning back to the counter, I untwisted the lid of my protein shake, though just as I was about to add a scoop of powder, Grace hugged me from behind. For someone so small she was incredibly strong. Her arms nearly crushed my torso as she squeezed me.
“Did you ever tell Riley any of that?”
I scoffed. “There wasn’t any point. The look on her face when she walked in...” Trailing off, I swallowed the knot of tension that had built in my throat. “There’s no coming back from that.”
“I – you should talk to her, Will.”
