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Christian Riley

I ’m not sure which is worse—losing the national hockey championships or finding out I’m a father who has missed the first four damn years of my son’s life.

Never mind. The latter is definitely worse.

There’s always next year to try to win the championships or the year after that. I have at least five more years in the pros to obtain that goal.

But being a father to Finley? I lost that chance. I wasn’t there the day he was born, and I didn’t get to see his first steps or hear his first words.

He grew up without me in his life and I’m not sure if Maya will ever give me a chance to be a part of it even now that I know the truth.

It’s not like she’s the one who finally told me we have a son together.

No, that was all Preston. I thought he showed up at my apartment a few weeks ago to beat me to death, not turn my world upside down. I’ll never forget that moment when everything changed.

“You have a son.”

“Huh?” I stare at Preston, unblinking after he says four little words that change…everything.

“His name is Finley. He’s four and, of course, he loves hockey.”

I jump to my feet. “What the hell are you talking about, Preston? I think I would know if I had a son.”

I’m careful, always careful after the one time with Maya… Oh shit.

“Did you say…he’s four? Like years? Like four years, the time since I’ve seen Maya plus about eight or nine months?”

“Yes.”

I shake my head, my jaw clenched tight, pointing my index finger at Preston. “This isn’t fucking funny, man. I’m tired of you fucking with my head, and now you’re making more shit up!”

“I’m not making this up. My sister gave up everything to become a mother while you skated off into the night, going pro and then screwing every woman you met.”

My head keeps shaking in denial. “No. You’re lying! This is some trick to fuck with my head, so I’ll lose the biggest game of my life tomorrow!”

“It’s not your game to win or lose, jackass. It’s the whole team.”

Running my fingers through the front of my hair, I start to pace across the room, along the wall of windows that showcase the city below. “I saw…I saw Maya at game three with a little boy. I figured he was hers, that she had met someone else and they…you know…”

He looked so young, and we’ve been apart for so damn long.

“You didn’t notice he looked four?”

“How was I supposed to know how old he was? I don’t know shit about kids. I…I figured she ended the pregnancy in college as soon as possible, met someone, got married, and started a family with someone else! I didn’t want any details.”

“Right. You didn’t want to know the truth.”

“I would’ve wanted to know that I have a son!” I roar. “Are you fucking with me? Please, don’t joke about this. Are you sure, like, a thousand percent certain that he’s mine?”

Of course he’s my son. It was stupid of me to doubt Maya for a second.

Ever since that day, I’ve felt like a complete idiot.

How did I not realize that Maya had decided to become a mother, that the little boy next to her at Preston’s games was mine ?

That’s the other thing that’s been nagging me after last week’s loss.

Maya is never going to forgive me for walking away from her, even though she’s the one who broke up with me. She’s the one who refused to respond to my calls or text messages or even my goddamn handwritten letters. Love letters from a guy who barely graduated from high school because the only thing I’ve ever been good at is hockey.

I’m depressed and angry, lost in the memories of those few blissful weeks dating Maya in the minor leagues when there’s a knock on my apartment door.

A knock, not a call from the front desk that’s supposed to ask me if I want to accept visitors before sending people up here.

Trudging over to the door in my sweatpants and wrinkled tee, I look out the peep hole. The last person I expected to see yet again is Preston freaking Lawrence.

I unlock and open the door for him. “What do you want now? Have you come to brag about your championship win or tell me that I knocked up some other girl who didn’t bother to tell me for five years?”

“You had a great season and played a damn good series. There’s nothing for you to be upset about,” Preston remarks.

“We fucking lost!” I shout at him, even though I don’t blame him. Not really. His team was better. The Warhawks beat us fair and square in four games.

“I’m well aware that you lost. It’s time to get over it and think about next season.”

“Easy for you to say, since you got to kiss the girl and the championship cup.”

“That is true,” he remarks with a grin at the mention of Elle, my ex, before he strolls past me, right into my apartment as if I invited him to stay. “And I wanted to talk to you about my news.”

“Your news about what? Elle picked you. I know that. Is she moving up to D.C. with you too or something? Thanks for the heads-up so I can start looking for someone else to cut my hair,” I mutter as I slam the door closed and then go plop back down on the sofa.

Preston takes a seat in one of the matching swivel chairs, turning it toward me. “Seriously? You haven’t heard?” When I don’t respond, he says, “Elle isn’t moving to D.C. She doesn’t have to.”

“I don’t give a shit,” I lie. I do give a shit. Not that I lost Elle to Preston, my former best friend, but that Preston gets to be with the woman he loves, knowing she loves him back.

“You really haven’t watched any sports news or been on your phone this week?”

“Hell no. I don’t want to hear all the criticisms about what we did wrong, what I did wrong in losing the championship.”

“Wow. Well, if you’d been online, then you would’ve seen that the Bobcats have just signed a new defenseman.”

“Good for us, I guess.”

“Elle doesn’t have to pack her bags because I’m moving to Greensboro.”

“You’re what?” I ask before it dawns on me, taking longer than it should since I’m not the sharpest skate on the ice. “ You signed with the Bobcats?”

“I did.”

“Damn.”

“I thought you knew; Coach Bell said you gave them your approval.”

“They asked me how I would feel about you getting picked up. I said it was fine, since I didn’t think you would ever agree to come to Greensboro.”

“I didn’t think I would ever sign with any team you played for,” Preston admits. “But it’s time for us to bury the hatchet, don’t you think? The truth is out. You know why I hated you for years.”

“Yeah, I know. I knocked up your innocent sister and then had no idea she gave birth to my son four years ago.” I try my best to push aside the anger at Maya for not telling me herself, for not telling me when she decided not to end the pregnancy. It’s like pushing a thousand-pound elephant up a hill, but when I manage it, something else suddenly fills my chest —hope. “Wait. If you’re moving down here, does that mean Maya and Finley are moving to Greensboro, too?” I ask Preston.

“No, they’re not.”

I deflate so fast it’s a wonder I don’t dissolve into the damn sofa cushions. “Why not?”

“Because Maya has got it in her head that she doesn’t need me, that she can support herself and Finley on her own.”

“Can she?”

Preston shakes his head. “I don’t know. Maybe. It won’t be easy, though. She doesn’t have a degree or any work experience, so I’m not sure who would actually hire her. Whatever job she gets will be entry level, which means it won’t pay shit.”

“So, what is she going to do, then?”

“She’ll probably be so stubborn that she won’t ask me for help until bills are past due. At least the house is paid for…”

I don’t like it. The idea of Maya struggling to make ends meet to raise my son or Preston stepping up to help them when they should be my responsibility.

“I can give her some money,” I tell Preston. “For back child support, or whatever I owe her for the last four years of Finley’s life. If she had just told me…”

“I know you would’ve done what you could for them if you had known. And I think you want to do the right thing now.”

“The right thing? What’s that exactly?”

“Being a father to your son.”

“Of course I want that. I am his father!” I exclaim. “I’m not the one who decided it would be best to just meet him as a ‘family friend.’”

The one time I was able to meet my son, Preston and Elle convinced me it would be better if we didn’t tell Finley I’m his father. So, I pretended to be their friend when I wanted so badly to tell the amazing little boy the truth.

A boy who thinks I’m the fastest man on the ice and asked me for my autograph the first time we met, making me feel like a goddamn superhero.

“What’s the Bobcats training schedule look like for the summer?” Preston asks.

“Huh?” I reply in confusion, since he interrupted my thoughts of the first conversation I had with my son. A conversation I’ve relived a million times in my head.

“Is the off-season flexible enough for you to go up to D.C.? To spend time with Finley?”

“I don’t know. If Maya would let me, then I would say to hell with what the Bobcats want and go anyway.”

“Then do it. What’s stopping you?” the jackass asks.

“Oh, I don’t know, Preston. Maybe the fact that Maya doesn’t want me around, that she probably never would’ve told me that Finley’s my son!”

“Maya…I don’t think she knows what she wants. She’s freaked out worrying about you trying to get custody of Finley.”

“Custody? Why would I do that? I don’t know shit about how to be a father.”

“Good. That’s good. Then tell her that and ask her to let you come visit this summer. In fact, do whatever you have to do to convince her to let you spend time with Finley.”

“Why are you encouraging this idea so hard?” I ask curiously. I would’ve assumed Preston would want me to stay away from his sister and nephew.

“Because I want Maya and Finley to come to Greensboro, and I think you’re one of the reasons Maya is adamant about staying near D.C.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. You broke her heart and knocked her up. You abandoned her when she needed you the most, just like our parents did.”

“I…I didn’t know that, about your parents. They really abandoned her?”

“They kicked her out of the house the day they found out she was pregnant. They told her they didn’t want anything to do with her or her bast…baby if she kept ‘living in sin.’ That’s when she moved in with me.”

“Living in sin?” I repeat in confusion.

“They wanted you two to get married. My father declared that Maya couldn’t step foot in his house again unless there was a ring on her finger.”

“Oh,” I mutter in understanding. “I would have married her.”

Preston chuckles as he gets to his feet as if to leave, so I do the same. “Yeah, I find that claim very hard to believe, and I’m sure Maya would too.”

“Find what hard to believe? I would’ve made her my wife. I would’ve done anything for her.” The fucking diamond ring I bought when I signed with the Bobcats is still shoved somewhere in the back of my junk drawer.

“Anything except stick around when she needed you,” he says. “And have you conveniently forgotten your reputation? Since you signed with the Bobcats, you’ve been nothing but a manwhore.”

“Because the only woman I’ve ever loved broke my heart!”

Preston turns back to me with his brow creased. “You were in love with Maya? Wait. She’s the one who ended it?”

“Yes! How did you not know that? Didn’t you ask her what the hell happened between us?”

“No. I assumed you ended things with her after you got what you wanted.”

Shaking my head, I tell him, “No! God, no. That’s not…we only had a few dates before we …before Maya told me she didn’t want anything to do with me. When she wanted to meet up a few weeks later, I thought it was because she had changed her mind. I had no idea she was going to tell me she was pregnant! If she didn’t want me, if she thought being with me was a mistake, then I-I just assumed she wouldn’t want to have my baby either.”

“Huh.”

Since Preston doesn’t sound like he believes me, I tell him, “That’s the truth. Ask Maya. She dumped me, then refused to respond to my calls, texts, or letters.” I withhold the part about her dumping me the morning after the first and only time we sort of had sex. That one terrible time, her first time, where I came faster than a speeding bullet, which was all it took to get her pregnant.

“Damn. If I had known that she dumped you, then I wouldn’t have hurt you as badly as I did every time I saw your face. I thought you broke her heart.”

“Well, now you know she broke mine. That is the truth.”

“Well, what’s done is done. Are you going to man up and try to be a father or keep sitting around here sulking in your own filth because you lost a couple of games?”

I had planned to sit around my apartment alone and sulk for at least a few more days or maybe weeks, but now….

“I’m going to D.C. Today. Right now,” I tell Preston.

“Whoa,” he says, holding up a palm. “I’m not sure if that’s a good idea. You should call Maya before you just show up on the doorstep.”

“I don’t even have her fucking phone number!” I say, frustrated with his wishy-washy advice.

“Fine, I’ll give you her number,” Preston says as he pulls out his phone from his back pocket. Retrieving my own device from the charger, where I’ve been content to let it sit untouched for days, I enter in the digits he calls out.

“Thank you. I’ll call her right now.”

“Good luck,” Preston says as he starts for the door. Over his shoulder as he opens it to show himself out, he says, “Don’t fuck this up.”

He’s gone before I can ask him for advice on not fucking it up. I guess he’s given me enough suggestions to get started.

The rest is going to be up to me to figure out.