Page 48 of Home Ice

I stretch my arm along the back of the booth and turn to him, my knee knocking against his. We gave up sitting opposite when the table kept getting between us. I don’t know what exactly the table was disrupting, but with it gone, it’s a lot easier to look at him. To touch him. To be overwhelmingly surrounded by Barrett and everything I’ve missed.

“I guess now is a bad time to tell you I wear glasses?”

His mouth drops. “No you fucking don’t.”

“No,” I admit. “I don’t. But I could.”

Barrett chokes back a laugh. “I mean, you are a real academic.”

“This is true. I study a lot.”

“I don’t want to know what you study, do I?”

“Hockey, obviously.” I throw him a duh look. “And blow jobs, fucking, threesomes⁠—”

“Do you have those often?”

“Eh …” I tilt my hand side to side. “During the season, hookups are usually quick and through apps. Over the summer is when I can have more fun. Lachie goes home, so it’s only me there, and I have a few people I can call. One couple is really good at, uh, sharing.”

“This summer sounds like it’s going to be a whole lot more boring than that.”

“I’m not sure boring is the right word for it.” Between Kasen, my parents, and Barrett, I’m on an emotional roller coaster. “Celibate, maybe.”

“We can go to Montreal together to hook up?”

At first, I think he means so that we can hook up together, and then my brain checks back in. To hook up … separately. This weird, slimy feeling creeps over me, like it did when he was talking about Trevor. All I could picture was him and Trevor in the locker room, in our hotel room, hanging back in the showers when the team had all left.

I assumed I just found it hot.

I’m not so sure that’s what this feeling is though.

“Sounds like a plan.” And that plan will be to make sure it never happens. Barrett can hook up with whoever he wants, but I’m a firm believer that two best friends do not need to see each other doing that. In fact, it’s probably a good thing he never told me about Trevor.

I don’t think shelling him at practice would have gone unnoticed.

He leans in, full lips teasingly tilted toward me. “Think if we go dancing with our shirts off that I can poll people on the prettiness of my nipples?”

“You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

“I’ll be hanging on to it at least for the summer. Can you blame me? You used to find me hot.”

“Used to?”

I’m not planning the words or how they fall out like that, but the implication hangs between us.

Yes, I used to find Barrett hot.

Regrettably, I still apparently do.

Our eyes connect, and I can read the heavy question in his gaze. Which makes it easier to ignore.

“Have you ever dated?”

“Very occasionally.” He’s still studying me but manages a half smile. “When you can’t make a relationship your priority, people lose interest fast.”

“Fuck them.”

“Fuck them, huh?” He shrugs. “I did. Well, some of them, anyway.”