Page 88 of The Understatement of the Year

I turned to see Hartley jogging up to me. “Hey.”

When I headed for the courtyard gate, he followed. “You knew Graham in high school? He never mentioned that.”

Shit. “I’m pretty sure that was intentional,” I said, my voice low.

“Wow.” There was a silence while Hartley did the math about why that might be. Graham would probably shoot me if he heard this conversation. But what was I supposed to say?

When Hartley spoke again, what he said took me by surprise. “You want to grab a slice somewhere? I’m starved.”

The invitation made my throat feel thick. Because I did, in fact, want to grab a slice with Hartley. But if we did that, he might ask me more questions. And I’d be tempted to answer them. And that was simply not allowed.

I was feeling so raw, and totally friendless. “I didn’t really sleep last night,” I ground out. “I think I’ll have to take a rain check. Thanks, though.”

“Yeah, okay.” Hartley held the gate open. When I walked through, he touched my shoulder. “See you at practice Monday.”

“See you,” I grunted.

I’d made it only a few paces when Hartley called after me. “Hey Rikker?”

When I turned to look at him over my shoulder, he was smiling at me. “Awesome play last night. You know. Before…”

The game, and our crazy combo goal, felt like a hundred years ago. But it had, indeed, been awesome. “It was, wasn’t it?”

“The best.” He gave me a wave, and I crossed the street alone. Because that’s how I did everything.

I let myself into McHerrin and trudged up the stairs. When I opened my room door and looked inside, what I saw was an empty little shithole with bare walls. And I was never going take down Skippy’s snowboarding picture to replace it with a shot of me and Graham on a beach somewhere. Even your classic bro shot — two guys holding cans of beer, with baseball caps on backwards — that would never be okay with Graham. Because one of the two visitors I had to my room in seven months mightguess.

Dropping my bag on the floor, I flopped down on the bed, alone with my bitter thoughts. Sleep would help, so I tried to make myself comfortable. It was nice for Graham that his mom had come running into town to take care of him. But I’d bet cash money that I was a better napping partner than she was.

As I tried to fall asleep, another dark thought bothered me. It could have beenmewho sustained the concussion. And when I tried to flip the picture around in my mind, I didn’t like what I saw. Wouldmymom fly out to take care of me? Not hardly. And would Graham be willing to sit on the edge of my bed, asking me if I needed anything? Sure. Unless Hartley or Coach showed up to check on me. And then what would he do?

I had a feeling I wouldn’t like the answer.

In a few short weeks, the hockey postseason would be finished. I’d have my weekends free again. My teammates would use that time to go to parties with their girlfriends, or hang out with their buddies in the student center. And where would I be? Killing time until it was late enough to sneak into Graham’s room for a few hours, before I snuck out again before dawn.

Graham was never going to budge from his closet. So my choice was to either leave him, or just get used to dining on the scraps he gave me.

So pathetic.

I rolled over, feeling sorry for both of us.

The next two days sucked in much the same way.

For almost forty-eight hours I’d heard nothing from Graham. My texts went unanswered. Just when I was really getting worried, he finally called me Monday afternoon as I was walking out of Spanish class.

“Hey,” he said. “I only have a minute. My mom’s in the bathroom, but I just wanted to say hi.”

“Hi,” I said, maybe a little testily. “How’s your big old melon?”

“Hurts,” he said. “We just got back from the doctor, and there’s a whole lot of shit that I’m not supposed to do for a while. Like read.”

“All right…” I tried to imagine getting through a week at Harkness without reading. “How’s that supposed to work?”

“Exactly. This week Mom is coming to class with me to take notes.”

“No shit?” I stopped walking just outside of the Harkness Commons dining hall to finish our conversation.

“No shit. And I have no idea how long this will last. Shoot me.”