Page 25 of Burn Bright

She mimed tears with her fists, her lips rising. The smile surprised her, and she startled into a frown. I thought it was cute. She gave me a stiffer wave before she disappeared completely.

We didn’t stay in contact.

Despite really,reallywanting to, I never texted her. My move to New York was neverpart of the plan at the time. I didn’t think I’d follow her to MVU, and a friendship with Harriet didn’t feel genuine if it was miles away. But then I did move to New York, and…the frat party happened.

Twice now, my presence averted some sort of catastrophe in her life. Twice, I was able to get some bastard’s hands off her. That doesn’t always happen. Being at the right place, right time. Especially with me. I don’t really believe in destiny or fate, butI do believe there’s something about Harriet that makes me feel like I won’t fuck everything up.

All I really want is to be able to hold on to that feeling for a second longer.

5

BEN COBALT

I’m applying for a job.It’s not a great thing to tell my brothers on my way out the door. I already picture Beckett’s classic “what the fuck” face, and Tom’s double-blink like he can change the channel on me—to one that makes more sense.

So I just tell them I’m meeting with a friend. They know I have many. They also know my friendships are about as deep as a Neapolitan pizza.

“Don’t wait up for me!” I call out as I open the door.

“Wasn’t planning to,” Charlie deadpans.

“Duuude,” Tom groans like Charlie is beating a dead horse—that horse beingme.

It’s easy to tell myself,don’t let Charlie get under your skin.Harder to accomplish when he lives in my bloodstream. I escape into the hall and breathe out the smoke-cloud of aggravation in my chest, then I text my bodyguard to just meet me on the lobby level.

Waiting for the elevator, I punch the button a couple times, and my phone buzzes in my jeans’ pocket. I slip the cell out, my pulse skyrocketing. Is it her?

My heart jumps seeing the “H,” then the “a”but then plummets at the rest of the name.Haddock (Coach MVU).I stare at the screen, processing this brutal anticlimax. Disappointment has sufficiently smothered a brief millisecond of exhilaration. That’s what I get for getting excited over a fuckingphone call.

I answer it as the elevator opens on the twenty-first floor. “Hi, Coach.” I slip inside and hit the lobby button, vaguely listening to his pitch about trying out for the team. It’s his third attempt to recruit me.

Hockey. First time I remember really thinking,I could do this forever. I never want to leave the ice, I’d been seven. I wasn’t on an indoor rink. It’d been a freezing Christmas, and the lake had iced over at my family’s vacation home in the Smoky Mountains. Orange sun crested over the spruce-lined peaks, and I held a stick and flew toward the net. I wasn’t alone. Ryke Meadows and Maximoff Hale, my uncle and my cousin, were there, playing with me, and as I sucked the frigid air in my lungs, I just felt alive.

I played nearly every day that year. If I couldn’t get on the ice, I’d put on rollerblades and shoot pucks into a goal in the Meadows’ cul-de-sac. Then I played on a team, helped a group of boys win a dinky little trophy, but their elation waseverythingto me. I fed off the high of their happiness.

So I kept going. I played for my prep school throughout my adolescence. Then at sixteen, I played junior hockey to improve for college. When I was young, hockey had been a constant source of love. I could rely on it, depend on it.

The last few years, things started shifting in my head. It’s been a steady decline, the slow decaying of what I once enjoyed. My college experience with the sport didn’t help.

I warmed the bench more than my blades touched the ice. I was consistently told I wasn’t good enough and that “noteverything can get handed to you”—even if I thought I was at least the fourth-best on the team.

Coach Haddock, who I’m on the phone with now, likely found little footage of me playing back at Penn. He also admitted to contacting my old coach for a recommendation. Which, I gathered, my old coach told Haddock that I suck and not to waste his time on a “prick of a kid” like me.

Why would Haddock even want me on his team badly enough to call again? MVU is a D1 college. A good percentage of players end up being drafted for the NHL. He’s adreamcoach who could have his pick of a potential hockey prodigy.

I’m not that wonderkid, and MVU’s hockey team isn’t hurting for a win. They consistently advance to the playoffs in their division. So in the back of my head, I’m considering how he could just want fanfare.

The Cobalt to ride the bench and sell-out tickets.

Except, he’s only ever discussed my potential. He’s only ever beennice. So I have this desire to please him. I can’t shake it.

“If you’re worried about the publicity, we can do a private tryout,” he even tells me, further eliminating the notion he’s interested in my family’s notoriety. “It’ll just be me and Coach Zamora.”

That’s not the issue.“Can I think about it some more?” I ask, mostly to avoid hurting him with an axe to whatever idea he’s constructed in his mind. My mom would shake her head at me with the subtlest of smiles. “Let them down gently” is not a phrase in her guide to dealing with…anyone.

Both my parents are business-oriented—my mom in fashion; my dad in anything with a high profit margin. Cobalt Inc., our birthright, owns subsidiary companies that sell magnets, paints, ethically-sourced diamonds, video games, and more sectors than I can name. Though in another life, I wonder ifthey would’ve worked in academics and argued over old British literature and texts written in Middle English.

“Of course you can.” Haddock’s tone goes upbeat, which makes me feel good but also makes my stomach roil. Because…I’m not playing hockey. I can’t play anymore. “Season doesn’t start until late September. We’ve got plenty of time, Ben.”