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Tobie

“How much?”

“Fifty dollars.”

My eyes bulge. “For tickets ? But the match already started.”

“Game.” The ticket agent doesn’t even try to hide his judgment.

It’s not my fault I don’t know anything about hockey. I’m just here to be a supportive girlfriend. If that means freezing my ass off watching a game—match—whatever, broken up by the occasional burst of violence, then so be it.

I stick my hand in my coat pocket and thrust a handful of bills toward him. “Fine. Here. Commit daylight robbery.”

After collecting my overpriced ticket, I stop at the concession stand and nearly have a heart attack when I learn the going price for two hotdogs.

I can’t really afford tonight, especially after blowing two hundred dollars on a new dress and however much dinner will cost at Luigi’s, an Italian restaurant in our small Pennsylvania city.

Marc’s LSATs are literally around the corner, and he needs to ace them to get into the law school of his dreams. Sure, I’d hoped he would send me flowers or take me out since today is our six- year anniversary, but he never misses a hockey game.

We’ll have other nights together. He’s worth it. He deserves a treat.

The lobby of the Fairfax Arena, home of the Lamont Wolverines, is awash in bright sponsorship signs plastered on every wall.

Someone talking sports has always made my eyes glaze over, but I vaguely remember Marc saying the Wolverines have been winning. They’ve been winning a lot.

I put my hotdogs on a shelf and undo my coat belt, swallowing the anxiety growing in my gut.

The skirt of my dress rides up, and I tug it back down to my knees, silently willing it to behave. In the store, the navy blue wrap dress felt like the perfect choice. Now, all I see are lumps and bumps.

I should’ve gone with something looser.

Or black.

Every day is a jeans and hoodie day for Tobie Myers because finding a dress that flatters my thighs, belly, and B-cup breasts isn’t easy.

It never is. I’d wanted to make an extra special effort for Marc—a dress instead of baggy jeans, contacts instead of my thin gold-rimmed glasses, and block-heeled sandals instead of my Chucks.

And makeup. Not much of it—lipstick, blusher, mascara, and dark brown kohl eye shadow to bring out the green Marc says he loves about my hazel eyes.

Now I feel like a kid playing dress-up.

Mom died when I was in the eighth grade. I was thirteen and just getting interested in makeup. When she passed, I threw out the few pieces of makeup she’d bought for me and told myself it didn’t matter. But I miss how it felt sitting beside her, laughing as we tried out eyeshadows and lipsticks.

I just miss her.

Before I can talk myself out of entering the arena, I throw my shoulders back, pick up the hotdogs, and walk inside.

Marc loves you. He won’t care if you look ridiculous. He’ll be happy you showed up to surprise him when he knows you hate hockey.

I shiver when I’m hit in the face with a chilling blast of cold air from the ice.

As a library science major used to a quiet library, the roar from the excited crowd and the loud boom of the announcers’ voices makes me want to turn around and walk back out.

I carefully make my way down the stairs toward the season ticket holders’ section, somehow remembering where it is from the one time Marc brought me to a game in our freshman year. Between freezing my ass off, sipping flat beer, and having no clue what was going on, I decided hockey wasn’t for me.

Too many rules. Too fucking cold. And my glasses kept fogging up so I could barely see anything.

I won’t be able to sit with Marc, but I’ll surprise him, give him a hotdog, and find my seat until the game is over, and I can take him out for dinner.

Figures move with graceful ease across the ice.

I have no idea who’s winning, and frankly, I don’t care.

“I’m just here to be a supportive girlfriend,” I mutter.

As I scan the seats for his blond head, his face pops up on the big screen like it was meant to be—clear blue eyes, thick, dark blond hair, wearing the dark blue, silver, and white Wolverines’ jersey. There is the love of my life.

I smile, calling out as I approach, “ Marc !”

The camera pulls back, and a heart shape forms around his image on the screen.

I snort. Marc is here alone. He doesn’t have anyone to?—

My boyfriend of six years dips his head and draws a pretty blonde into a deep, open-mouth kiss that stuns me.

My stomach clenches, and pressure forms in my chest as a wave of lightheadedness makes me dizzy.

He was my first everything.

First kiss.

First time I had sex.

First guy I said I love you to and who said it back.

Marc Peters owns my entire heart.

“You don’t have to come to hockey with me, babe. I go on my own or with Doug from class.”

That’s what he said.

She doesn’t look like a Doug to me.

Don’t they need to come up for air at some point? How the hell can this kiss just keep going?

The crowd is loving it, cheering and stamping their feet as my boyfriend shatters my heart into a million tiny pieces.

And I am still holding these stupid fucking hotdogs and not doing anything but staring.

Throw them at his head, Tobie, I tell myself. He deserves worse than that, but just do something .

The camera pans from Marc to me, and the announcer’s voice booms. “Uh, oh. Looks like there might be trouble in paradise.”

Marc breaks the kiss. He’s smiling, flushed, and happy until he spots me.

His smile freezes, and he shoots to his feet. “Tobie, I can explain.”

Four words are all the confirmation I need that this was no innocent kiss.

I don’t like confrontation.

The moment it looks like I might have to stand up for myself, my palms sweat, my heart races, and I can’t breathe.

Then I have this desperate urge to run away.

If I don’t, I spend the next several seconds stuttering and stumbling over my words before coming up with the perfect response approximately forty-eight hours later.

But this time, I know exactly what to say.

“How could you, Marc?” There’s a quiver in my voice as a burn starts at the back of my eyelids.

“Tobie…” He steps toward me, but I want nothing to do with him.

I take a step away, and there’s nothing but air.

It happens so fast.

One moment, I’m at the top of the stairs. The next, I’m sitting on my throbbing ass at the bottom. Along the way, something happened to the hotdogs I was holding because they’re no longer in my hands.

How I didn’t break my neck will forever be a mystery to me. To my surprise, I’ve only broken the strap on my sandal. From somewhere behind me, Marc is calling my name, but there’s no way in hell I’m looking back at him.

Looking forward isn’t much better.

I might have missed what happened, but no one else did.

My face is blown up on the screen, making the kohl around my eyes look like a child went at it with a blunt crayon. Marc was wrong. The brown does not bring out the green in my hazel eyes. It highlights the fact that I don’t have a clue how to apply makeup correctly.

As I sit on my aching ass, the sound of laughter grows louder, echoing as it spreads like a pack of hyenas cackling.

Some moments will stick with me until I’m gray-haired and old. My face, blown up on the big screen in a packed arena with ketchup smeared down the front of my dress will go down as a core memory.

I shove myself to my feet, stumbling out of the arena as the first hot tear hits my cheek.