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"I know, Coach."

He looks at me. Then he puts his hand on top of my wet head and leaves it there for a second.

"Do it again Monday," he says, and walks away.

My phone's in my stall. I pick it up. There are forty-one texts. Maman, twelve times, all capital letters. Papa, once: I watched. Hit him harder next time. Marc. Luc. Kowal's daughter Maya, from a number I don't know: THE SLIDE!!!!!

Nothing from Owen.

I sit there in my stall with my gear half off and look at his name at the top of the screen. The last message is still his. Sleep well. Big day. — O.

I type: Did you see?

My thumb's over the send button.

I send it.

The answer comes in less than ten seconds. Like he was holding his phone. Like he was waiting.

I saw. I saw everything. The laces. The spin. The stop. The slide.

Then, a second later:

You were beautiful, Rémy.

I read it over and over, sitting in my stall with the whole team screaming around me.

He said my name.

It's the first time in five days. I count it anyway. I'm always counting.

Chapter Thirty-One

OWEN

Pruitt's office is on the fourth floor of the practice facility, at the end of a long hallway lined with framed photos of every captain the team's ever had. Mine's the last one. I'm twenty-nine in it. It was taken the day I got the C. I'm not smiling in it. I remember the photographer asking me to, and I remember not knowing how.

It takes me four minutes to crutch down that hallway on Sunday morning. I count the photos as I go. Twenty-three captains. I played with four of them.

They're all waiting for me. Pruitt behind his desk. Nadia on the couch with her tablet, for once not looking at it. Priya in the chair by the window. Moretti standing, the way he always stands, arms folded, in the corner by the bookshelf.

"Sit down, Owen," Pruitt says. "Before you fall down."

I lower myself into the chair across from his desk. I lay the crutches on the floor. My leg sticks out straight in front of me in its long black brace, like a board somebody nailed on.

Nobody says anything. They're waiting for me.

I've been rehearsing this since last night. Since Rémy's text, and mine back. You were beautiful. I lay awake until four in the morning, with the Christmas lights on, working out what I was going to say and in what order. I had it perfect.

It's gone. All of it. I look at the four of them, and I can't remember a single word.

So I just start.

"The picture was us," I say.

Nadia's hand goes still on her tablet.

"Me and Rémy. In the doorway. Room 814. That was us." I look at Pruitt. "When you asked if there was anything to it, I lied to you. I said it was a mistake. It wasn't a mistake. It's the only thing I've ever done in my life that wasn't."