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KAYDEN

R emember how Erik was nagging me about criticizing him for not playing hard enough in previous games?

Well, I guess he took that to heart, because he tried to show me up in the seventh and final game of the conference championship series.

He tried to steal every puck, make every shot, defend against every opponent, and put the entire team on his shoulders when it was unnecessary to do it.

He did all the work instead of distributing it to the rest of the team for god knows what reason.

To make a point in his twisted little world, I guess.

In other words, he was being Erik De Ruiter.

He thought he could do it alone. He didn’t need the rest of the team. Mister Erik De Ruiter, the calm and collected farm boy, the voice of reason, and the guy who’s tried to make me look like the asshole of the century just had to steal the spotlight.

And I knew why. It was because I’d criticized him.

I’d done my job as a team co-captain, I mean.

I’d held him accountable the way I’d expected him to do with me.

It was probably because there was a damn good chance I would get picked up by the Maple Leafs while he stayed with the Larkin Lions.

I might be hard-headed, but I’m not stupid.

You know what happens when you do that shit?

You lose…or come way too close to it for comfort.

It’s called teamwork for a reason, you know.

In our case, we nearly lost the conference championship game because Erik had to dick around.

I mean, this was game seven for chrissake, but there was still the principle.

Every single contest was a win-or-go-home affair, and my boyfriend knew that as well as anyone.

Instead of helping us coast to the NCAA championship series, we nearly got sent home.

Weird as it sounds, I wondered if he wanted us to lose. You know, because that might be the one thing that would keep me in Buffalo. Crazier things have happened. Just saying.

Anyway, I couldn’t let any of that go. Yeah, I knew things had been shaky between Erik and me, and saying anything to him would upset him.

But the stakes were too high for everyone.

I couldn’t let it go. Winning was still more important than anything, and I had to make sure we didn’t wind up with the short end of the stick.

I saw the looks on everyone’s faces, including Coach Hardison’s. They’d never seen this side of Erik before. Every one of them glanced at me, like I would logically be the one to know what to do, but I had nothing.

After the game, Erik and I were alone in the locker room. Something had to be said about the game, like right now. I could have waited until we got back to my place to talk about it, but the whole thing bothered me too much to stay silent.

“You know, you didn’t have to do all that,” I said.

“Do all what?”

“You know what I’m talking about, bro. Don’t act like I’m stupid.”

Erik zipped up his bag but didn’t strap it over his shoulder. Maybe he really did think I was stupid.

“Look,” I said, “if this is about what I told you the other day, I stand by it. It was for your own good and the team’s good. I had good intentions. All I wanted was for you to pick up your game, not for you to come back and literally do the exact opposite.”

“I played the game the only way I know how. What’s the problem?”

Okay, that was low-hanging fruit, and I wanted to hit him with an insult. That would only make matters worse. Even I, Kayden Preston, the king of petty, would resist temptation and attempt to smooth things over maturely.

“You know as well as I do that doing all the work undermines the rest of the team,” I said.

“Are the guys complaining?”

“No one’s complained…yet. I can tell by their looks and body language they’re not too impressed, though.”

“But they haven’t said anything?”

“Look, I’m expecting someone or several someones to come to me privately and ask what the fuck’s going on.”

“So, until then, it’s only a possibility, right?”

You know, you’d think that my boyfriend would’ve been happier about moving on to the NCAA championship series. Like, he at least wouldn’t feel the need to act like an idiot. But I could see he was as intent to act that way as he was to put the entire game on his shoulders.

I knew how to deal with the calm, rational Erik De Ruiter. The really stubborn one was a different animal, and I approached him with caution.

“We won,” he said. “That’s all that matters. Haven’t you said that yourself at least a hundred times?”

“Yeah, I have, and I meant it. But you’ve got to be smart about it. What happened out there…that just brought us uncomfortably close to losing.”

“Did we win or not?”

“You’re just trying to avoid the facts. We didn’t need to go into overtime, but we did. We didn’t need to go into a shoot-out, but that’s what wound up happening.”

“That’s just how it is, Kayden. If you don’t win in regulation or overtime, you wind up in a shoot-out.”

“Yeah, I know we do. That’s not the point, and you know it. What I’m trying to say is?—”

I stopped myself there, practically choking on the words.

Sometimes there’s no reasoning with someone, and this was one of those times.

My boyfriend had simply shut himself off to anything and everything he didn’t want to hear.

And then it dawned on me. He had another reason for being a total pain in the ass.

I didn’t take the time to think about it.

I went ahead and said it so I could catch him off guard.

“You thought a pro scout was going to be there, didn’t you?” I asked.

He perked up, giving me this look like he didn’t know what I was talking about.

“What are you saying?” he asked.

“I’m not saying anything, just wondering.

Like, maybe you thought a pro scout was going to be there and you wanted to impress him.

You put the entire team on your shoulders, including me, to show them that you’re the real star of the Larkin Lions.

Then you’d at least be on the same footing with me, isn’t that right? ”

My boyfriend’s eyes widened. He shook his head. I knew he was full of shit

“If that’s the truth, you can tell me,” I said. “You don’t have to shake your head. Just use words, okay? Maybe we can clear the air that way.”

“But why would I do that? You said yourself that I nearly cost us the game.”

We weren’t going anywhere with this. That was a given. Sure, I could speak truthfully in a nice way, but Erik would take it any way he wanted. In some way, that was the kid he’d been ever since the Maple Leafs had taken interest in me.

“It’s not like I really want to get into this,” I said. “I’ve got better things to worry about with the national championship series coming up. I am going to tell you I don’t want that ruined.”

My boyfriend’s face reddened a little, and he headed for the door. I followed him. No way could I let this conversation end without some sense of closure.

“What’s the deal, bro?” I asked. “Are you just going to walk away from me?”

“I’m not just walking away. I’ve got somewhere else to be.”

“Come on, this isn’t the Erik De Ruiter I know.”

And love, I reminded myself.

“Maybe not,” he said, “but you’re not the Kayden Preston I know.”

Normally, a comment like that wouldn’t have bothered me.

Now, it felt different. And no, it wasn’t because I thought my boyfriend had any kind of point.

It was because I saw a change in him,a side that I’d never seen before, and I didn’t like it.

Worse, I didn’t know if I would get the Erik I’d fallen in love with back.

And I knew that our fights would only grow worse and worse.

Yeah, we’d fucked each other’s brains out a bunch of times lately.

There was nothing wrong with that end of our relationship.

But if we couldn’t master the basics of just getting along, Erik would wind up as just another ex, much like all the girls I’d dated before he came along.

I couldn’t let that happen. Yeah, I know I’d been in no hurry to announce our relationship to the world.

Still, I won’t deny that what I’d had with Erik held more substance than anything I could’ve imagined.

“Look,” I said, “I know I’m not supposed to be the rational one here.”

“No, you’re definitely not.”

“Thank you, Erik. Thank you very much. I appreciate the confirmation. Anyway, we do have to talk these things out. If we don’t, it could become a real problem for us in the championship series.”

Erik paused, drew a deep breath, and forced the air out through his nostrils. He knew that it was the truth. I knew it, too, because he hadn’t even tried denying it. And yeah, I’d brought hockey into it again. It was the most important thing in the world to both of us. S

He turned from me, but didn’t just walk away. We left together. That was the good news. Maybe that sounds surprising given how we’d sniped at each other the whole time we’d been alone. We should’ve been celebrating the conference championship win, right?

Our relationship was like a ticking time bomb. It might not detonate immediately, but it would blow sooner or later, and time was running out.