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Chapter 13

Tenley

W hy doesn't she look surprised? Why isn't Liv gasping, choking on her latte, or screaming in horror? Why is she just sitting there calmly, sipping her matcha, and acting like what I just confessed isn't the most heinous act against nature that ever existed?

“Tenley, honey, there is a fine line between love and hate and an even finer line between lust and hate. You two were destined to see each other naked,” Liv says, and I nearly choke on my caramel latte.

“Shh!” I hiss and my eyes dart around the small patio at the Laurel Canyon Store. Their resident cat gives me the hairy eyeball but other than that no one seems to be paying attention to us.

Liv leans forward, utter amusement dancing in her big brown eyes. “Right. Gotta keep it on the down-low that you’re sleeping with your husband.”

“I am not sleeping with him,” I reply quickly. I sip my latte. “I’m just… messing around with him for lack of anything better to do. And because it messes with his head.”

“How so?”

I push my sunglasses up into my hair as the sun slips behind a cloud. "He's such a rule follower. Always so uptight and regimented. When I tease him and give him stupid dares, I bring him out of his shell. He hates it and I love that he hates it because I hate him."

Liv makes a face. “Hate is a strong word. What on earth has Nash done to you to make you hate him?”

I bite my bottom lip for a second. "Where to begin? He's a hockey player."

“So are all the men in our family.”

"Yes, but it's not their entire personality," I counter and fiddle with the lid on my latte. "Look, Nash is the kind of guy who… he couldn't handle someone like me. I'm a lot. I know that and I won't let someone make me feel like I'm defective because I'm passionate and opinionated and… a lot."

“Has Nash actually done that?”

I shrug. “Once. Sort of. A long time ago, when Tate was a rookie.”

“Do tell,” Live leans in. “I’m dying to know what triggered this blood feud.”

“It was the first Quake charity event and Tate invited me to it and even though I was still in high school, Mom and Dad let me go,” I say, remembering how excited I was to go to L.A. because I had already applied to UCLA and knew it was the city I wanted to move to. “I stayed with Tate and he took me as his plus one to this casino night hosted by the Quake and…”

Nope. I can't give Liv the gritty details of who was Nash's plus one and why it triggered my hatred of Nash Westwood. It's rooted in something so dark that I buried it deep down in my soul, where it's been rotting since I was fourteen years old. "That weekend I realized he was the type of guy who would never think highly of me, so I decided to never think highly of him. And I mean, it wasn't hard. Everything about him makes me itch. He's all about rules, codes, and regimes. He's uptight and uninteresting."

"I don't know… mutual masturbation is kind of interesting," Liv counters. "Is his dirty talk hockey-oriented too? Does he dirty talk you with 'Hey baby let me stick it in your five hole.' Does he call you his teammate and fist-bump you when it's over?"

I burst out laughing and it brings me instant relief. I've been tense ever since that masturbation session with Nash because neither of us has talked about it. It's made everything weirder. But thankfully they won game four and the team is back in Seattle tied up at two games each. They play tonight. Liv invited me over to watch it but I made other plans, so I popped by for a coffee instead. I needed to confess what we’d done to someone.

“You’re ridiculous, you know that?” I sputter when I’m done laughing uncontrollably.

Liv finishes her Matcha and leans over to pet the resident cat, who is named Bobby McGee, in keeping with Laurel Canyon’s hippie roots. He stretches out on the concrete ledge near our table so Liv can caress even more of him. “Ten, I’m sorry if you came to me expecting me to tell you it’s a mistake or you should stop fooling around with Nash. I’m a romantic, remember? And this thing between the two of you feels like it’s supposed to happen.”

“Ugh.” I let out an angry puff of air. “I should have called your mom. She gets me.”

"My mom, who tried and failed to be just bed buddies with my dad?" She arches a dark eyebrow.

“Our family is full of gooey, useless romantics,” I announce. “I have no idea how I’m related to any of you.”

We both stand up as Bobby meows his discontent at Liv leaving. She gives him one last scratch under his chin. As we walk towards the tiny parking lot, she gives me one of her big hugs that I love. “You sure you don’t want me to drive you back up to your place?”

“You mean Crew’s place,” Liv corrects. Her boyfriend owns a big old house in Laurel Canyon.

“When was the last time you slept at our apartment?” I ask.

She flashes me a guilty smirk. “I still pay half the rent.”

“I know. I know,” I mumble.

“I’m not ready to live with him yet,” Liv confesses and giggles. “Even though I kind of live with him.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t get a new roommate or anything,” I reply. “And I’m not going to give the place up seeing as I’ll need it when I get divorced.”

“We’ll see about that…”

I point at her and narrow my eyes. “Olivia Garrison do not get any of your fairy tale ideas. This is, one hundred percent, without a shadow of a doubt, a nightmare not a fairy tale.”

“Mmm hmmm,” she says in that tone that screams ‘I don’t believe you for a hot second’.

“I’m going to leave now before I disown you.” I get into my car with a grumble but I air blow her a kiss as I drive out of the parking lot and make my way south on Laurel Canyon. When I hit Sunset Boulevard, instead of continuing south, I turn right and drive straight to the Home Depot.

One hour and forty-five minutes later I’m back at Nash’s loft with everything I need. I order Chipotle, change into my grubbier sweats, and tie my hair up in a knot before I start laying out the painting tarps. I open the first can of paint I bought and stare at the rich, yellow hue. The name is Dandelion Wish and it’s so great. A mustardy, deep golden color that will give this place the pop it needs and annoy the hell out of Nash. Win-win.

The Chipotle arrives and I turn on the game on his projector-style television that uses the stark gray wall next to the one I'm painting yellow. I eat and almost choke on my burrito with excitement as the Quake score only five minutes into the first period. Crew wins the face-off and gets it to Tate who passes back to Crew who does one of those fancy drop passes to Nash. But instead of taking a shot, which he could have done as there wasn't much traffic in front of him, Nash passed it back to Landon Casco. He's a defenseman and he was sitting just inside the blue line. No one was expecting it, so he's wide open and drives a slap shot, which sails right through the Winterhawk goalie's five-hole.

It’s Landon’s first goal since getting back on the team after recovering from cancer so even I jump up and down, alone in my living room, and tear up as he skates by the bench to bump gloves with his whole team. The hockey world wasn’t certain Landon would recover let alone play again so this is special.

“Aw Nash, that was a very human thing to do,” I whisper as they show his face, mouth guard dangling from the corner of his smiling lips. “For a robot.”

The game goes on, and the Quake are playing with extra fire after that. By the time I finish the first coat, the game is in the third, I'm exhausted and my arms are killing me. I bought an extra-long roller because the wall is so damn high but it's heavy as hell. I let out a puff of air and take a break to watch the end of the game. Seattle pulled their goalie with two minutes left because they're behind by two goals. My beast of a cousin, Grady, is standing on his head to keep the puck out of the net. He gets it done and the Quake win, 4-2. I clap and jump and then collapse on the sofa.

“Tenley! What the hell!”

I guess I nodded off because Nash’s voice startles me and I fall off the couch, hitting my butt on the concrete floor with a painful thud. I swear and search for him, blurry-eyed. I don’t see him anywhere. “Nash?”

“You painted?! My home?!”

It sounds like he’s in the kitchen part of the loft but I can see it clearly and he isn’t there. I stand slowly. “What the hell is happening?”

“I have a security camera, with voice features,” he explains. “You painted!”

“It’s not done, but yeah. I did.” I don’t see the camera but I motion to the wall with a giant flourish. “I live here too now and I can’t function in a place that looks like the inside of a coffin.”

“You’ll be lucky if you don’t end up in a coffin when I get back if that wall is still yellow.”

I glare toward the kitchen, my eyes scanning everything. Nash is a minimalist so there isn’t much clutter on the countertops, or anywhere. Then I see it. A little black cylinder looking thing on the top of his stainless steel fridge. A little fisheye lens and a blue flashing dot tell me I’m right. I walk toward it.

“You should have told me that you could spy on me. What if I was walking around naked or something?” I say and put my hands on my hips. “Also, don’t threaten me, Nash-Hole. It fools me into thinking you have emotions and it turns me on.”

“First, we’re well past having modesty around each other, don’t you think? And secondly, if I tell people I have a security camera, it defeats the purpose.” He sounds growly.

“I’m not anyone. I’m your wifey-poo,” I remind him with a sarcastic smile. “You won, you shouldn’t be so grumpy.”

“You painted my house.”

“It’s an apartment and it looks fabulous,” I huff. “You’ll like it.”

“It’s a loft and I can already see it. I don’t like it.”

“It’s only one coat. It needs two to be the right shade. I’m doing the second one later,” I reply.

“I hate it.”

“I bet that camera lens isn’t showing it accurately,” I argue. “Let’s test it…”

I reach for the hem of my sweatshirt and pull it over my head, dropping it on the floor by the coffee table. “What color is my bra?”

There isn’t an answer for a long second. And then, in a thick tone that gives me a shiver of pleasure, “Tenley. You aren’t wearing a bra.”

“Oops! Right. My bad.” I pick up my shirt and walk slowly toward the camera, smiling. “Good game, Nash-Hole. Great pass to Landon. You’re a good captain. Night-night!”

I toss the sweatshirt at the camera and it covers the whole thing, leaving Nash with nothing to see. “TENLEY!”

I ignore him and go back to painting the second coat. I tell Alexa to play Taylor Swift, loudly, and Nash eventually stops yelling at me through the camera. By two in the morning, the painting is done and, despite what Nash thinks, it looks amazing. I take a quick shower and crawl into bed. I scroll through social media. I notice that, without even telling me, the network has released a trailer for my docu-series. My heart races. It's already got a hundred thousand views and it's been up five hours!

It’s a series of clips from already shot footage, set to a trendy song, with just a few sentences from the clips being heard over the music. The Quake at a practice chirping at each other and having fun. My parents, at their newly purchased Los Angeles condo, Mom proudly bouncing Dylan on her knee and Dad sharing hockey advice with Tate. That clip makes me smile. My aunt Callie and Uncle Devin walking into the hospital in Silver Bay, Maine, with bags full of gifts for the sick kids, talking about the Garrison Charity. A clip of Emmett Echolls on the phone arguing with his girlfriend, which I guess is the ‘controversy’ they wanted to add. I roll my eyes, the last clip is Nash and me making his lunch in the loft kitchen. I’m taken aback by how cute we look together. Weird.

I repost the video to my feed, which not a lot of people will see because my account is private, but at least all my friends and family will know it’s being promoted now. It’s real. My dream is real. I smile. But then the next video on my feed steals my smile. It's a Sports News clip about how the Vancouver Comets have swept the San Diego Saints. They'll play whoever wins the Winterhawks-Quake series. And of course, they interview Vancouver's assistant coach. Bryce Achilles. The sight of him makes my stomach turn and my heart stammer. He hasn't aged well. He's only in his fifties like my dad but he's got deep creases on his forehead and more salt than pepper in his short, badly styled hair.

“These boys have what it takes to win and now that they know it, there’s no stopping us,” he says.

“Fuck you,” I hiss and blink back tears, which shocks me.

I have tried very hard not to think about Bryce Achilles. It’s been fairly easy since he was only in the league, as a player, for two years, and up until last year he’d been coaching in the minors. Other than one casino night a few years ago, I haven’t seen him. Last year I heard he was promoted to assistant coach for the Comets. I worried, briefly, about having to see him in the playoffs if they played the Quake but Vancouver didn’t make playoffs. But now they have. And the Quake will win this match-up with the Winterhawks, which means we will be playing them.

Ever since Bryce became a coach in this league I’ve just avoided going to Tate’s games when they played the Comets. But now, I won’t be able to. I won’t be able to avoid every game in the series. Not when I’ve got a film crew expecting to shoot me and my husband during the playoffs. I shut Instagram and put my phone face down on the night table.

I push the heels of my hands into my eyes. I will not cry over this asshole. Not again. I will not feel shame or anger or anything. I will not suffer a second longer because of him. Fuck Bryce Achilles. Monster.

I close my eyes and force myself into sleep. It’s fitful with vague dreams of cold hands and a gym mat splattered with drops of blood and the vile smell of sour alcohol breath hissing out threats.