Page 27 of Center Ice

She glanced at me. “My parents?”

I nodded.

“They’ve been married for thirty-five years. I know they’ve had their problems over the years, but they always work them out together.”

I knew that was how relationships were supposed to work, and the guys on the team were examples of that. Olli and Emma came back from near ruin because they chose to fight for each other. Then again, Brandon’s first wife left without a second glance at her twin boys. But he was with Sydney now. They were happy.

For how long, was the question.

“I want to believe,” I admitted after a long silence.

“In love?” she asked.

“Yeah.” I lay down so we were both looking up at the bluish-purple sky. “I want to believe it’s real and everyone can have it in their life, but it’s such a fleeting emotion.”

“Sometimes it is, but sometimes it can withstand the test of time.”

“How do you tell the difference?”

She let out a long breath. “I’m not exactly sure.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because I’ve never been in love.”

I rose up on my elbows to stare at her. “You’re here arguing the existence of love, and you’ve never felt it?”

She laughed. “I can still believe it’s real.”

Sure, it was called faith. I knew that, but it blew my mind that she wholeheartedly believed in something she hadn’t ever experienced.

“Honestly, I have to hold onto that hope. Otherwise, what’s the point? Life can’t just be about the mundane. Sure, you can be happy traveling or even with your job, but at the end of the day, don’t you want to come home to the one person you can be entirely yourself with? The person you can be-one hundred percent honest with. That you know, without a doubt, will always support you and want your happiness more than their own?”

“Of course, I want all of that.” It sounded like a dream or an ideal. I couldn’t wrap my head around that kind of relationship existing.

“Then don’t settle until you have it.”

“Who said anything about settling?” I asked.

“Living a life without love is settling, even if you think it doesn't exist. I promise you, it does.”

I huffed out a laugh. “Sure, easy to say but it’s harder to prove.”

She nodded. “I know. There’s no way of convincing you until it happens.”

That was true. I wanted to be proven wrong. I wanted to have a relationship with the woman I loved. I wanted to spend my life with someone by my side. I just didn’t know if that could happen. I’d watched the guys on the team fall in love and get married, one after another. I knew their girlfriends and wives. I knew how happy they were, but there was always that question in the back of my mind. When would something bad happen that broke them? When would one or both of them decide they’d had enough and split up?

“I think it's something worth searching and fighting for,” she said after a moment.

I tilted my head enough to watch her. The sun was entirely above the horizon, lighting her face with a warm glow.

“I want to believe that too,” I admitted.

“Maybe someday,” she replied.

I nodded.

We lay there for a while longer until she stood and stretched. “I’ve got a busy day ahead, so I need to get back and get ready.”