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We were two movies deep before we found a film that scared the crap out of both of us.

That’s when it happened. We’d been nodding off intermittently, exhausted from practice and school, so I’d missed what led up to the scene where the girl screamed.

Pope and I jumped, grabbing onto one another.

I don’t know who pulled the sheet over our heads, if it was me or Pope, but we’d been so close to each other.

Our breath smelled like butter, garlic and sugar, a combination of what we’d eaten and drank. He looked at me, and I looked at him.

Pope didn’t say a word as our breath mingled.

He licked his lips, staring at me, and I did it.

I pressed my mouth to his and counted to five then sat back.

He stared at me, shocked. Heat filled my cheeks.

I was embarrassed because I’d kissed my best friend and ashamed because I hadn’t asked permission.

What was I supposed to say? Sorry? Please don’t tell my parents?

Instead, I scooted away, afraid of what Pope might do. If he decided to beat me up, I’d deserve it. I had no right to do as I did.

“I think I’m going to bed. How about you take the couch tonight.” Pope eased out from under the sheet and went to the double bed my parents always kept downstairs for us.

“Sure.” I turned off the television, freaking out internally. What had I done? Why? How could I be so stupid?

By morning, Pope was gone.

Thierry, age seventeen...

Pope and me... We started drifting apart.

We practically did everything together, until we didn’t, and it was all my fault.

Hockey had been what bound us together. Or at least it had, until the end of our freshman year of high school.

Pope quit being a goalie and started practicing with the football team.

Once he left our team, we started losing and my parents changed programs, putting me with a team near Knoxville.

To say they were a little obsessed with my success was an understatement.

They wanted me to win. Always. While they were planning my future, I held onto my friendship with Pope by my fingertips.

Unfortunately, the glue that bound us together, hockey, caused our bond to crumble, rotting to the core.

I tried several times to apologize to Pope. But every time I worked up the courage to approach him, I realized nothing I’d have said would change what happened in my basement. I kissed Pope Ellis. Guess I should’ve been happy he never outed me to anyone on the team or at the high school.

Maybe James and Rodney—yeah, I finally learned both their names—were right all those years ago.

When I met Pope, I’d been a lost puppy looking for an owner, and that night, I wasn’t thinking.

Then again, I had the biggest crush on Pope, so making up excuses was stupid.

I knew I was gay, and I knew I liked Pope.

Kind of figured it out after the first 8U championship we won.

God that day was amazing. I still replayed the memory of each save and goal we’d made in the game, including Pope’s first goalie goal.

Few could say they’d done that at the youth level.

The second the final buzzer sounded, Pope hugged me, and the best feeling in the whole world exploded inside of me.

A cataclysmic Boom of sorts. Pope wasn’t just my best friend or the team’s goalie.

He was the boy who made me feel warm inside.

Happier than I’d ever been on the outside.

I never wanted to let him go, but I knew if I didn’t, we’d look weird out there on the ice.

Now, I couldn’t even say two words to him, besides, hey. Or how goes it? We went from having zero secrets between us—because if we were going to be the best goalie/defender combo on the ice, we had to know each other’s darkest thoughts—to not even recognizing my best friend.

Or myself.

I messed things up so bad. I wished I could go back and tell my younger self to not do it. To not kiss Pope.

Perhaps then we’d still be best friends.

Yet, even as I moped about the loss of my greatest friendship, I still went to every football game.

I cheered on the team, but most especially for him.

Pope. I even introduced myself to the team’s right tackle.

I’d been Pope’s right-hand man on the ice, and it seemed it was time for me to pass the torch to Malcolm.

Probably looked stupid telling him to keep Pope safe out there.

Then again, he’d undoubtedly heard those words several times over the years.

Shutting my locker after changing out of gym clothes, I grabbed my backpack off the bench and headed out.

Spring brought track and field and with it, a few months of running to keep up my endurance and stamina during the off season.

This summer I was joining the 18U – US Men’s team in hopes of making the final roster for the USA Men’s Olympic Hockey team.

According to Coach, if I did well during the international tournament starting in a few weeks’ time, I was a shoo-in for the Olympics next winter which meant I would tie the record for being the youngest member of the squad. The first person I’d wanted to share the news with was Pope.

For some reason, I never told him.

It was for the best, anyway.

“Hey Pope,” Cherie chirped, running past me toward the boy of my dreams. She was captain of the cheer squad.

The quintessential All-American girl. The southern sweetheart with a heart of gold.

Blonde, blue-eyed, and sweeter than apple pie.

She made my back teeth ache and my stomach churn with jealousy.

She was everything I’d never be. A girl for one, and the one person out of the whole school who caught Pope Ellis’ eye.

I hated her so much.

But I was also happy for my ex-best friend.

Still sucked for me, though.

“Hey Thierry,” Lily-Mae said, stepping in front of me, causing me to come to an abrupt halt. “Can I come to one of your games?”

Where Cherie had this gregarious personality all bubbly, giggly, and obnoxious, Lily-Mae was softness personified.

Petite and mousy, she had chestnut wavy hair and the biggest brown, doe-eyes I’d ever seen.

She didn’t play any sports. Nor was she part of the cheerleaders.

Lily-Mae was in the band. According to the football program handed out at the gate at every game, Lily- Mae was the first chair flute player which was pretty cool in my book.

My gaze lingered on Pope and Cherie as Lily-Mae’s question filtered through my brain. “Uh...”

She glanced over her shoulder then back to me. Her doe-eyes filled with a mix of sadness and disappointment as she exhaled. “They’re dating. You know?” Her words were whispered, barely audible over the ruckus commotion of the remaining football players exiting the locker room.

“Yeah,” I replied, the same sadness and disappointment tinging my tone. “I heard.”

“Did you want to date her too?” Again, Lily-Mae glanced over her shoulder as Pope looped his arm around Cherie’s waist, pulling her in close to him.

“Nah,” I said. “Nothing like that.” I tried to put on a good show by giving her a small grin. I’m sure it looked more like a grimace.

“Yeah,” she replied. “It’s okay if you don’t want me at your game.”

I kicked myself for being an asshole. Here Lily-Mae was trying to be a friend when I desperately wanted Pope.

Instead of being grateful, I’d acted put-out.

Clearing my throat, I forced myself to be happy and gave her the best fake smile I could muster.

I had to move on. Because Pope certainly had. “I’d like it if you came.”

Her features lit up while her cheeks turned a warm shade of pink. “Thanks, Thierry.”

“You’re welcome,” I replied. “We’re having an exhibition game in a few weeks before summer starts, if you want to go to that one?”

“Yeah,” she said. “You’ll have to tell me when and where.” Lily-Mae pulled her iPhone 4s out of her pocket. “Put your info in, and I’ll text you, so you’ll have mine. Then you can send me all the deets.”

“Sure,” I said, doing as she asked. “Maybe I could come watch you practice or something this summer. When we’re not playing, obviously.”

She grinned. “That’d be awesome.”

“Come on, Lily-Mae,” one of her friends said, motioning for her to join the growing group on the field.

“Well, gotta run,” she murmured. “See you, Thierry.”

“Later,” I replied as she hurried back to her friends. I didn’t have the heart to tell her we’d only ever be friends.

Thierry, nineteen years old, winter break...

“Come on, Thierry,” Lily-Mae shouted from the living room of her apartment on campus. “We’re going to miss the kick-off.”

“No, we’re not,” I said, bringing our to-go containers of food from the kitchen. “We still have ten minutes before the game starts.”

Coach offered me a full-ride scholarship to the University of Tennessee to play for the Vols hockey team.

I could have gone to any program in the country, but sticking close to home after dad’s diagnosis of stage three colon cancer seemed only fair after everything my parents sacrificed for me.

So far, he was responding to his treatment and his oncology team, along with his regular doctors, appeared encouraged by his progress.

Didn’t mean we hadn’t spent long nights at his bedside in the hospital, wondering whether he’d make it through emergency surgery or not.

“Do you think Coach will let Rick play tonight?” Lily-Mae took her box from me as she sat crossed legged on her couch. Lady Waddlesworth, Lily-Mae’s cat, purred up a storm as she stretched out on the opposite armrest of the couch.

“I don’t see why he wouldn’t,” I replied, taking up the spot beside her.

I always knew I couldn’t lead her on, so I’d been up front about my sexuality with her.

She was the first person to find out, besides my parents.

At first, she’d been a little embarrassed.

But once those few awkward moments were out of the way, we’d become the best of friends, though nothing like Pope and me.

Never like us.

When time allotted, I went to her band competitions and concerts and when her schedule permitted, she went to my games. She’d never replace Pope, but she was the best “girl” friend I ever had. She’d been my rock, when I needed it the most.

And I’d been hers too.

“It’d be so cool if we got to see Rick play.” For the first time since 2010 the Tennessee Vols were in a bowl game. They were playing in Florida, unfortunately, which meant we stuck close to home.

Rick was Lily-Mae’s current boyfriend and the quarterback of the Vols football program. They’d played a hard-fought season, so this bowl game was the prize for doing well. I had no doubt, if they were playing the game here, Lily-Mae, and I would have been at Rocky Top, cheering them on.

As for Pope and me, I tried so many times to find the words to apologize to him for what I did that night, but none of them ever seemed good enough or right.

Sure, we said the occasional hi in passing, but by the time we graduated high school, we didn’t have anything holding us together anymore.

His life pulled him in one direction while mine shot in the other.

I’d been put on draft watch a couple of weeks ago, which meant leaving college early.

Though our season wouldn’t officially end until March, Coach had brought me into his office and gave me a heads up.

Scouts would be watching me from now on.

I didn’t want to seem conceited and say I already knew, however having scouts at tournaments wasn’t new.

They’d been at the 18U tournament and again at the Olympics.

Fortunately, I’d learned to ignore them.

For the most part.

“So, what are we betting, tonight?” Lily-Mae tucked into her meal while Lady Waddlesworth continued to purr beside us.

“Loser has to buy the first set of tickets to the first home game of their team of choice,” I said.

“Football or hockey?”

“Either,” I answered.

“You’re on,” Lily-Mae replied, holding out her hand for me to shake.

For the next three hours we watched the game, both teams playing their hearts out. When the final whistle was blown, Tennessee had won, and of course, I was buying her tickets to whatever game she wanted to attend.

“I’ll make you a deal, Thierry,” she said. “When you become a famous hockey player, you can bring me to one of your games, no matter where, and we’ll call this bet even.”

I grunted. “You’re on.”

I couldn’t have known at the time I would become a famous hockey player or have enough money in my bank account to fly Lily-Mae, her fiancé Rick, and Lily-Mae’s sister out to my first game ever as a Thunderbird but making that bet then crashing in her guest bedroom that night, would reshape my whole life.

Now, if I could forget about Pope and move on like he had, I’d be better off. Regrettably, the next time we saw each other, old feelings would creep back in, and I’d be left wondering, if we were ever finished with each other, or if there was a whole new story waiting to be written about us.

That was later, however and this was now.

“For what it’s worth,” Lily-Mae said, stopping at the door to her room while I waited at the door to her guest room. “Pope was a fool to never see how much you cared about him. It’s his loss. Not yours.”

I pressed my forehead to the doorjamb and groaned. “He didn’t even know the truth. Plus, he’s not gay. Talk about unrequited love. I was so stupid. So cringeworthy. He isn’t thinking about me anymore. He’s moved on, and now, I’m going to do the same.”

Lily-Mae sighed. “No, you weren’t. You’ll see. One of these days he’s going to come crawling back. When he does, I want to be there to see it happen.”

From her lips to the Fates ears.

Though I was a thousand percent sure, it would never happen.