Page 4

CHAPTER

FOUR

Jett

I am fully convinced music stopped being good after 2006.

I take that back. Noah Kahan is a lyrical genius, but this damn mumble rap that the kids go bananas for gives me a fucking headache. I lean my elbows on the steering wheel of Big Buck as I wait for the ice to clear while some rapper yells about big stepping or something along those lines. Trash music, in my opinion. Why don’t kids listen to Snoop Dogg or Eminem? Hell, put on some Tupac! Now, that’s rap. Not this crap. But the kids love it, all of them smiling and excited as they gather their sticks and water bottles.

I let everyone have the day off, so the whole place is empty of the regular chatter from the people who usually gather for coffee and snacks while they wait for their kids. The front desk is shut down, and even the gym is closed. Coach Liam made this a closed practice for his 16U team, so it’s just him and the players. I wanted to cancel the practice, but the boys have a tournament up in Cleveland this weekend, and I couldn’t let them down. I wish I hadn’t had to leave Phillip’s memorial early, but I had no choice. I owed it to the team.

“Boys, make sure you have all your stuff. We will not leave a mess!”

I look up from where I’m sitting on the Ice Thistle’s Zamboni, which is painted like the view of the mountains, including a huge buck that Phillip is convinced he saw. Hence, the name Big Buck. A wave of grief hits me as I watch the boys gather their stuff, Coach Liam smacking each boy on the head the way Phillip used to do to me.

I grin when I notice Liam’s adult daughter and his co-coach, Chelsea, passing out Gatorades and orange slices in little baggies. That was Bea’s and Hazel’s job when I was a teen. They always had snacks.

Probably the reason why I am a snackaholic.

I’m lost in thoughts of the past when Liam calls out to me. “Thanks again, JT!”

I wave at him and then to the boys as they thank me too. When Liam throws his arm around his daughter, I shake my head. Liam and I are the same age, and while I was tearing up the ice, he was raising his daughter at just sixteen. There isn’t much to do in Thistlebrook if you don’t like hockey or mountains, so there were a lot of teen pregnancies back in my day. Kids nowadays may have shit taste in music, but at least they’re smarter than we were when it comes to sex.

Once the ice is cleared, I fire up Big Buck and start onto the ice. The scrape of the brushes, the water sloshing, eases my grief-stricken heart. Phillip would be the one doing this if he were here. He was our Zamboni guy, but now that job is mine. I could hire someone, but I’m pretty sure Phillip will haunt me if I let anyone else drive Big Buck. As I take my first turn, I think back to the last person to show up at his funeral.

How the sun played off her hair.

How her dress clung to her body.

How I know damn well I saw ink on her inner thighs.

While I was at the memorial, I found myself watching her as she sat by the windows in the kitchen. She had a blanket across her legs, so I didn’t get to confirm what I thought I saw, but knowing her, she wasn’t cold. No, her blanket obsession is to keep her safe from things she doesn’t want to feel. She has done that since we started skating together, and when I saw the blanket, a wave of nostalgia hit me hard.

I wonder if she still has that Goofy Movie blanket Bea got her?

I wonder what she would have said if I’d gone up to her.

Would we have fallen back into easy conversation like when we were kids, or would it have been awkward? I don’t know, but damn it, I wish I had given myself the chance to find out. I wonder if she’s staying long—though, I highly doubt it. She hasn’t set foot back in this town once since she left.

After we won in Salt Lake City, she moved to Colorado to train with past Olympic skaters. I only was able to watch her on TV until social media hit the world, and then I was able to watch her on MySpace. I never made it into her top ten, probably because she didn’t even know I had a MySpace, and I never had the balls to ask her to be friends when Facebook hit. No, it was when Instagram came around that I was truly able to watch her from afar like the creep I am.

As I take another turn, I hear my phone sound in my pocket. I know by the notification tone that it’s from my group chat with the three ladies who raised me. There are two reasons I shouldn’t look at my phone. First, I’m driving a Zamboni. And second, I’m sure it has something to do with the ice princess.

Which is why I pull out my phone.

NanaB: She’s not married, no kids, no boyfriend.

Mom: Who?

NanaH: Keep up, Maggie. Fable Winthrop. Mom did recon.

Mom: Ooh, how was her vibe?

NanaB: Jesus, Maggie, put your crystals away and step away from the ABC flash cards. Her vibe was she just lost her grandfather.

NanaH: She didn’t even like him all that much.

NanaB: True, but she loves Kitty.

NanaH: No lies. What did she say?

NanaB: She says she isn’t staying, but I’m sure that’ll change once Kitty asks her to.

That perks my interest. I didn’t expect her to stay, but I wouldn’t think Kitty would ask her to. She’s always supported Fable’s need to be away. Always gone to see her instead of asking her to come here.

As I take the next turn, realizing I can do this in my sleep, another text comes through.

NanaB: So, if she stays, we’ll need to get our boy to shave and not be so grumpy.

NanaH: And be nice.

Mom: My boy is a peach; she’d be lucky to have him.

Jesus.

Me: Not shaving, not being nice, and grumpy is my middle name.

NanaB: Told you, Maggie. He was meant to be Jett Grumpypants Cook.

Mom: No, his name is beautiful.

Mom continues to type, so I tuck my phone in my pocket with a smirk on my face. The women drive me nuts, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Thoughts of the ice princess swim in my head as I finish the ice. If she does stay, what would that mean? Would I see her? Maybe I can ask her to dinner? Or coffee? No, not coffee. That’s for people who want to see if they like someone. I know I like her. Or, I like the girl I knew. I don’t know a damn thing about Fable Winthrop now, except that she’s sexy as fuck.

But still, I’d need more than a coffee date.

After parking and cleaning Big Buck, I make sure the rink is in good shape and closed up before I head to my office to finish some paperwork that could wait till Monday, but I’ll do it now since I don’t want to head to my apartment yet.

I lived with the girls for a long time, but when Phillip offered to turn three offices into a loft apartment and let me live there for free so someone would always be on the property, I couldn’t pass it up. I haven’t felt this inexplicable emptiness before, so I decide to work a bit.

Once I’m in my office that’s decorated in muted greens and browns, I sit back in my big chair as I move my eyes to where my gold medal sits. Pride washes over me, but just as quickly as it comes, the shame of not making it in the NHL takes its place.

I wish everything hadn’t happened the way it did, but as my hippie mom would tell me, things happen for a reason.

I swallow as I wake up my computer, just as an alert comes over my phone for the back door on the west rink side. I bring in my brows as I click it, standing up since I know I locked that damn door this morning. When the camera comes on, I see an aerial view of the west rink, just as the ice princess enters the bench area. She leans on the boards, her skates hanging over her shoulder, as she looks around, a small smile pulling at her lips. God, she’s stunning. Her face has always been round, but where it was once fresh and sweet, now it’s hardened a bit, with fine lines around her eyes and along her forehead. Her lips are thick, the bottom one a bit bigger than the top, and her cheeks rosy. She leans back and reaches for her sweatshirt, pulling it over her head before pushing off her pants. I sit down, watching as she puts on her skates with quick efficiency.

I would feel like a huge creep, but I did this when I was younger too, so maybe this is my normal?

I don’t think that’ll hold up in court.

I refocus on the screen of my phone as she hits the ice. She has on a pair of short shorts and a leotard. Even through her white tights, I can see the dark black ink that covers the tops of her thighs. I was right, and now I need to know what the tattoos are. She does some stretches, and I’m in awe as she moves. Each time she bends, a new roll appears, and I squeeze my fists together with the need to touch her. She goes back to the bench, grabbing her phone, and then music fills the rink.

“Torn,” Natalie Imbruglia.

God, she’s still obsessed with that song? A smirk pulls at my lips as she does a lap, skating like she was born to. She may have aged, but on the ice, she looks just like her younger self. She does some simple little moves, a twirl here and there, but mostly, she just skates. The grief, anger, and annoyance that plagued her features earlier are gone. Replaced by pure solace only the ice can bring her.

My ice princess is home.