Page 9

She huffs and scoots closer, putting her hands on my shoulders. Her thumbs press in lightly, warm and firm. It’s definitely not her intention, but a shiver runs down my skin. I clench my jaw, not willing to let out anything to stop what she’s about to do.

“You stretch your traps and scalenes like a normal person. Here—tilt your head, gently.”

I let her guide me, moving my head to the side. Her hands are still on me, steady and sure, and I’m hyper-aware of every point of contact.

“L-like this?”

“Yeah.” Her voice is quieter now, more focused. “Better. Hold it for thirty seconds.”

She’d looks up at me from under thick, dark lashes. In movies, the hero gently pulls the heroine’s glasses off just to see her better. I don’t need to. Sadie’s frames barely register in my subconscious, despite being covered with sparkles.Her glasses are a part of her.

“Sh-should I c-c-count?” I’m being a smartass.

Her eyes flash as she shoots me a warning look, but her hands don’t move.

“Stretch, ólaffson. Or I’m adding burpees.”

I groan—pro athlete or not, does anyone like burpees?—but I’m grinning, and I don’t move, not for anything. Thirty seconds have never moved this fast. Or been this good.

Sadie helps me stretch out each side of my neck.

She tilts my head, holds it in place, her eyes darting away every time they connect with mine.

It’s over long before I’m ready. Sadie grabs her headphones and checks her phone before tucking both into the side pocket of her bright…

damn, what color is that again. Not red, not purple.

Bleikur . The right word, but the wrong language.

I just had the color in my brain not even ten minutes ago. Now it’s gone.

“Pink,” I say aloud. She quirks a brow at me and I blush again. The one time I don’t stumble over my words and it’s that. Great. “I-I could-could-couldn’t think of the…the w-word.”

“I hate when that happens.” Her fingers twist thick strands of her hair into a braid.

I watch, mesmerized. She didn’t just start at the bottom, but wove in strands from the top of her head, too.

It looks more complicated than strapping on my pads, and I remember Spags cursing up a blue streak when he lost a bet with Vic and had to take a turn in goal during a practice last season.

And not just because all the guys took cup shots.

He was fine after.

I checked.

“Sometimes I make up a word that kinda fits.” She secures the end with her scrunchie.

“The other day I needed scissors and couldn’t think of the word.

I literally acted it out with my hands. Greg was laughing so hard he couldn’t get them for me.

” She tips her head to the side. “Sorry, that was insensitive of me. I’m sure it’s harder when there are two languages in your head. ”

It feels like there’s something stuck in my throat. I can’t swallow right. My heart is pounding and there’s water rushing in my ears. I point at her shoelace.

“C-can I h-h-hel—help tie y-your shoe?”

“My what?” She looks down. “Oh. I didn’t even notice.”

I don’t wait for her to answer. I kneel in front of her and take the strands in my hands. They’re tiny. Delicate. I pull just enough that her shoe sits snug on her foot. Only about an eighth of the strength it takes to lace up my skates.

Sadie isn’t tiny like Tristan, but she’s smaller than me. She has natural curves where I have game-honed muscle. I need to be careful with her. Always. I make two loops and knot them together. Bunny ears. The same way I taught my sister during the summer before she started compulsory school.

I double knot the laces, checking that each side is the same length, that they’re nice and snug, anything to prolong the moment. It’s selfish of me. She has places to go. Other people to see. I can’t just waste her time here staring at her shoes.

Ertu algjor hálfviti ? Say goodbye , my brain demands. Let. Her. Leave.

“I c-c-can h-help.” I say the words to her shoes.

Tegieu !

Her brows pull together and her head tips to the side, but her smile doesn’t falter. She drops her gaze down to where I’m still crouched by her feet.

“You already did.” She wiggles the toe of her shoe. “See?”

She’s so cute I forget to be embarrassed at my lack of clarity.

“I c-can help. W-w-with the m-math.”

“Oh.”

Her mouth curves into a perfect little circle before she sinks her front teeth into the cushion of her bottom lip.

The temperature in the gym has jumped ten degrees.

I drop my eyes to stare at the smooth golden skin of her shin.

Her legs are so… long. I want to wrap my hand around the back of her ankle. I can’t.

“I d-d-don’t talk well, b-but I…I….I can do..do m-math.”

“Ragnar,”

“I…I m-might not h-have a m-master’s degree, but I d-did take some c-c-college-level classes.” I did a lot of independent study as a child.

That’s the thing about being recruited to the league training programs as young as I was. I was pretty much left to my own devices. Sure, I stayed with a host family. They drove me to practice and kept me fed and sheltered, but I was mostly on my own.

Learning a new language was hard. Harder when I missed frequent classes for tournaments and training camps.

Hardest when words stopped coming right.

It started with long pauses between words before I could ask a question.

The words sticking in my seized up throat.

Then I repeated words. Syllables. Single sounds.

Once, when I was a bantam, a kid on the team bus ate a chocolate peanut butter Christmas tree and his throat and tongue swelled up fast. When things get stuck.

Words, syllables, sounds. It’s like my brain feels the way Tommy looked when he couldn’t gasp in air.

Math made sense. The numerals might have different names, but the concept was the same.

The rules still applied, and most of it was handed to me in writing, a pencil my way of giving a response.

When I got to the end of my education, I was doing mostly independent studies, anyway.

It was easy to add on courses from the local colleges.

Most of the teachers didn’t mind if I missed class, as long as I completed assignments on time.

It’s not like I had a social life to worry about, just travel for games.

“College l-level… classes.” I chance a quick glance up and accidentally meet her eyes. I stay. “I h-help some of…of…of the guys track their st-st-stats.”

“I don’t know,” she hedges and suddenly it hits me. I’m literally holding on to her. I’m keeping her here. In the gym. I’m just one player on her team, but we both know who will get the boot if she feels I’m crossing a line. And it won’t be me.

I push myself back, sitting hard on my ass. I can’t look at her. I can’t do this. Interact with people. I misread everything. I react wrong. I ruin everything,

“ Sorri .” I mumble the apology, my words reverting to my native tongue without conscious thought. “ Fyrirgefeu mér. ”

“Hey.” She’s kneeling in front of me, cool hands pressed to my overheated cheeks. “It’s okay. Let’s go back to English, though, okay?”

English. Right.

Got it.

…

“I—” deep breath. “I—”

The words won’t come. I swallow, feeling the stinging ache in my throat as if something lodged in my trachea.

“I—” didn’t mean to overstep. Make you uncomfortable. Push boundaries.

Her smile is patient, kind. Her thumbs stroking the coarse hair of my beard. For the first time, I regret not being clean-shaven.

“I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that sorri was an apology?” She searches my eyes, and I dip my chin in the barest nod. Her smile gets bigger. “I figured. You don’t have anything to be sorry for. Promise.”

“It’s not that I don’t appreciate the offer, or that I think you wouldn’t be a big help. You didn’t put me off or offend me or anything.” She looks away, biting into her lower lip again. “I just…”

This time she pauses. Cuts herself off in the middle of her sentence. It’s a Sadie I’m not used to seeing. Uncomfortable. Out of sync.

“It’s just that—” she drops her hands from my face and sinks down to sit on the grimy gym floor with me. Her fingers toy with the end of her thick plait of hair.

If I didn’t overstep, if it wasn’t the offer itself, then something else is bothering her. Something she doesn’t quite know how to express.

“Who-who h-has the st-stutter n-now?”I give her a crooked smile, trying to break the awkward tension that I know I caused.

It works.

She smiles.

“You-you d-don’t need to a-accept my o-offer,” I tell her. “It still st-stands.”

“I want to,” she laughs without an ounce of humor. “I do. I just can’t ask you to do that for me. You have more than enough on your plate. Pre-season starts soon, you’re navigating your return to the ice. I got myself into this… mess… and I can figure it out.”

The “I hope” is silent, but we both know it’s there.

The only reason I’m back on the ice at all is thanks to her time and effort. I tell her so, but she shakes her head.

“No, Rags, that was my job. And I got course credit.” Her words deflate me. I’m a tire with a slow leak, air slipping out molecule by molecule. “I can’t ask you for this. I should be able to handle it. I got straight A’s in high school. This shouldn’t be this hard.”

“E-everyone needs help…help s-sometimes,” I say. “I kn-know I d-d-do.”

“Yeah?” She sits back too. I try not to smile as she pretzels her legs.

It’s not quite the little kid criss-cross-tomato-sauce.

She pulls her bottom foot up too. It reminds me of the yoga she put me through all summer, trying to loosen up my hip and maintain my flexibility.

I’m not the tallest goalie in the league, I don’t have the largest wingspan, I don’t block the whole net when I drop into a butterfly, but I’m flexible.

I can correct course on a save with micro-seconds to spare.

Sadie might be even more flexible that I am.

“Y-you take my he-help on the word p-puzzles.”

Her snort seems to surprise even her.

I slow down. Determined not to repeat the sounds.

“Let m-me help y-you. Please.”

The hesitation makes my heart hurt.

“I don’t know if I can pay you or anything.” Sadie won’t meet my eyes. “I’m sorry.”

I didn’t ask her to pay me. When I tell her as much, she shakes her head.

“I pay my way, ólaffson.”

I know she does. Or at least I could have guessed. If I bring her an apple from the players’ lounge, she breaks her protein bar in half to share. But this is different. I don’t want her to pay me back. There’s nothing to pay. I have the skills to help her. I think. I don’t need any—

“Th-th-there’s something y-you can..can do f-for me.” The urge to slide my eyes away is almost overwhelming.

But I’m glad I don’t. I’m glad I keep my eyes pinned to her face. Otherwise, I’d have missed her smile.