Page 42 of Lose You Twice

“Obviously that’s a big part of it.” I pull out my lunch of a granola bar and quickly unwrap it as we walk toward the dorms, with Harlow being done for the day, and the athletics building being farther down the same row.

“He won’t make it harder for you,” she says, readjusting her bag on her shoulder. “He wouldn’t ever do something that could hurt you.”

“I know.” And I do know that. Kai would cut off his own hand before he intentionally made my life harder. The problem is, Kai not trying to hurt me has never meant I didn’t get hurt.

He didn’t intentionally hurt me when he left for college. He didn’t mean to hurt me when the calls got shorter and fewer in between. We were both so consumed by our own struggles at the time that we didn’t have the brain capacity to notice something was going wrong with us. By the time the calls stopped happening, it took me a while to notice, but then it hurt.

I love Harlow, deeply. She’s my best friend, and I’d never discount the trauma she experienced in high school, but not talking to her for periods of time never made my heart physically ache the way it did with Kai.

Losing her brother was a whole different level of loss. He knew me better than anyone, including her. There were things I talked about with him that I didn’t with Harlow. We had plans—future plans. He’d go to college, and we’d make it work for a year before I joined him at PCU. Whatever came after that, he always had a plan. NHL, a house, a family, us. Always us together.

Funny how that worked out. Sometimes we can make the best plans, with the best intentions, and they still end up shattered on the ground like broken glass. You can try to salvage those plans and piece them back together yourself, but they never look quite the same.

Harlow shifts closer. “He doesn’t know, right?”

“That I applied? No.”

“Are you going to tell him?”

I shrug. “If I end up getting the job, yes. If I don’t, I don’t think there’s any point in making him nervous about it.”

She makes a face.

“What?” I ask.

“I’m deciding whether to interfere.” She sighs. “But we’re not kids anymore, and this is an adult situation between two adults, so I won’t say anything until you give me permission.”

“How mature of you.” I pin her with a glare. “Sounds fake.”

“It is, but I’m trying.” Harlow grins, reaching out and squeezing my arm gently. “You deserve the job if you want it. You know that, right?”

Want is a complicated word.

I want tuition paid. I want my mom to sleep. I want my siblings to have full lunch accounts and new shoes that aren’t falling apart and a house they can come home to. I don’t know if I want to work around hockey. I definitely don’t know if I want to work around Kai, but I need the job.

“Yeah,” I say. “I know.”

Harlow doesn’t look convinced, but she lets me go.

At 2:17, I stand outside the athletics building and consider leaving.

Not seriously.

Just for a second.

The building is all glass and concrete, with Pacific Coast banners hanging high above the entrance and students walking in and out like they belong here.

I check my email again.

2:30.

Letting out a shaky breath, I put my phone away as I head inside.

The student working the front desk points me down a hallway, the familiar smell of rubber and cleaner mixed with the cool air bringing back a sense of familiarity that I haven’t felt in a long time.

I spent most of my teenage years in arenas and rinks because of Kai.

Tournaments. Practices. Games. Waiting in stands with bad hot chocolate and cold feet. Watching Kai skate like he had somewhere to put every feeling he didn’t know how to say.