Page 277 of The Fall

Blair catches my eye, his expression too carefully blank. His chin tilts up the way it does when he’s preparing for a confrontation he doesn’t want but won’t back down from.

The playoffs start tomorrow. The first round of everything we’ve worked for, everything we’ve bled for all season. Blair should be on that plane. He should be focused on video review and line combinations, not standing in this sterile room watching monitors track the broken rhythms of my brain.

But Blair has already chosen.

How many times does he have to give up what matters most? Does loyalty always mean putting someone else’s future ahead of your own? Guilt gnaws at me, feeding on the memory of every time I’ve watched him lead through his own pain and come out hungrier for victory.

What if this is one sacrifice too many?

Nothing moves in him except the slow drag of breath. Not even his eyes—they’re fixed on me, ocean-deep and unyielding.

This isn’t how our story was supposed to go. We were supposed to chase the Cup together and stand side by side as champions. Instead, he’s choosing hospital corridors over arena tunnels, vigil over victory.

“Blair—” The word comes out fractured.

“Don’t.” His jaw tightens.

“When are you coming home?” Lily asks me, interrupting.

A question with no clean answer. “Soon, I hope.” I have no idea if that’s true.

“I miss playing Nerf with you.”

“Me too, Lily-bean.”

My father holds out his hand. “Hayes, Lily. Thank you for coming. It’s good to see you.” It’s a dismissal, gentle but firm.

Lily hugs me tighter before letting go. Hayes guides Lily off the bed and toward the door, her small hand tucked in his. He pauses before leaving, his gaze bouncing between me and Blair. “Call if you need anything. Anything.”

Then they’re gone; the door closes behind them.

Blair won’t look at me. He stands with his back to the door, a solid wall of muscle and misery, his eyes locked on the screen with my brain scans.

“You’re not playing,” I say. It’s not a question.

A universe of pain is in Blair’s eyes. “No.”

“You’re not even going with them.”

He shakes his head. “I can’t leave you. Ican’t.”

The words crack something open in him, and suddenly he’s moving, closing the distance between us. His hands frame my face as he holds me.

“You think I could step onto the ice knowing you’re here? You think I could focus on zones and matchups while you’re—” He stops. His forehead drops to mine.

How does he carry this much love? Where does this fierce, relentless devotion live in him? The playoffs were supposed to be our victory lap, the culmination of everything we’d built this season. He would rather lose all of that than risk losing me again.

“The team needs you,” I whisper.

“You need me more. And I need to be here, with you. That’s not negotiable, Torey.”

This lesion inside of me threatens more than tissue and memory—it reaches through me to him, to this man who would set his dreams on fire to keep me warm. He’s anchoring himself to me at the cost of everything he’s fought for, and I don’t know how to bear being chosen like this.

Shouldn’t I force him out that door, back into the bright glare of playoff lights where he belongs? But if our places were reversed?—

No, there’s no world where I’d leave him either.

“I don’t want you to regret this,” I say.