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Needle meets flesh and his fingers tighten against mine.

I don’t watch Tony, my eyes are glued to Axel’s: brilliant, pure, true.

I have to ask, because no man, especially not a man I’m not sleeping with, has ever made a gesture like this. Proof that I’m here. That I exist.

“You’re sure this isn’t another fuck-up?”

“Yeah,” he says, looking down at Tony filling in the ink, “I’m fucking positive.”

The pucks clatteracross the ice, slamming into the players’ sticks and the boards. The scoreboard says 1-1. I spot Twyler is sitting in the stands. She’s in a Wittmore jersey, the number 15 on the back and Cain stitched over it. Half the reason Twyler switched from training the hockey team to basketball was so that she could sit in the stands and support her boyfriend without their positions being a conflict.

“Get it together, Wittmore!” she shouts, making room for me to get to the seat she saved for me.

“Hey,” I say, nodding to the score, “how did that happen?”

“Lucky shot.” She frowns. “The Badgers had been dominating the whole first period, but their forward got a breakaway and Axel couldn’t get his hands on it.”

I look down at the net, Axel suited up in his pads and gloves. He’s alert and watching the play down at the other end of the ice. It’s impossible to see his face with the helmet on, but I know he’s pissed. Not at the team, at himself for missing that goal.

The puck ricochets off the boards, and the players shift directions, gliding across the ice with complete ease. Watching them, I understand a little better how they’re all so confident. The simple feat of being able to skate and handle the stick and puck is physically impressive.

The whistle blows, and the lines change, one group of guys going on the ice, while another goes off. I feel Twyler staring at me.

“You got your ear pierced,” she says, touching the shell of my ear. “When did this happen?”

I pull back and give her a face. It’s still tender. “Yesterday.”

“Did you go to Jasmine at Permanent Record?”

I nod.

“She’s great. Tony, too. You should have told me you were going, I need to get a touch up on one of my tatts.”

“Sorry.” I give her a small smile and a white lie. “It was a spontaneous decision.”

The only reason I was at the tattoo and piercing parlor was because Axel took me there to help me get out of my head. After watching him get the ‘T’ on his hip, something courageous lit in my chest, and I decided to do something too. Albeit, something much less permanent.

Down on the ice, the referee drops the puck for the face-off and the guys fight for possession. Wittmore loses and someone nearby shouts, “Stop him!” as the forward makes it into shooting range. Jefferson makes a play for it, but the puck slides past him, right into the forward’s path. He rears back, slapping the hard disc with the edge of his stick and it sails through the air.

I tense, every muscle in my body tight, as the puck slings through the air. My only thought is how does anyone stop that? Yet Axel is there, snatching the disc out of the air.

“He did it!” I shout, both shocked and not. I don’t get a chance to breathe before he responds quickly, hurling the puck back on the ice. His aim is true, and the puck lands right at the tip of Reid’s stick. He’s in perfect position, passing the puck to Reese up near the goal. Twyler jumps to her feet. “Go get it, Cain. Take the shot!”

Reese moves with unbridled power, taking a hard slapshot that sails past the other team’s goalie and into the back of the net. The light flips on and the buzzer sounds. “He did it!” I shout, jumping to give Twyler a hug. Down on the ice, Reese looks up at her and grins, and my heart clenches.

Somehow my friend is living my best life. I wait for the wave of jealousy, but it’s impossible. She didn’t chase it. Love found her. Well, I guess Reese found her in that coffee shop and fate did the rest. It just makes me wonder if I’ve been doing it all wrong.

The second the buzzer sounds for intermission, and the organizers start up some game on the ice for the fans. I watch the guys skate off the ice–no, I watch Axel.

“Oh, I got you something,” Twyler says, reaching for her bag. She pulls a Wittmore hockey jersey out and holds it up with the back facing me. The name Rakestraw is stitched across the top with the number 01.

I stare at the jersey, then up at Twyler’s smiling face, and ask, “What the heck is this for?”

“For you to wear. You know,” she gives me a look, “since you’re dating.”

My heart stutters. “We’re not dating.”

She gives me a ‘duh’ look. “I know, but Brent and CJ don’t. Shanna definitely got the message she and Reese were done when I started wearing his clothes.”