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3

Nick

“ S o what’s Jennings like?” Schultz asks me as we’re getting ready for practice.

I look around the locker room to make sure that nobody else is around. Most of the team’s not here yet, but I enjoy getting here before everyone else, and Schultz and Rhys almost always have the same idea.

“We haven’t talked much,” I say.

“I wonder why he transferred?” He stretches his arms and grabs his gear. “Makes little sense to me why he’d come here when he was on a team that was doing so much better.”

Rhys shrugs. “Maybe it was a personal reason. Coach is his uncle, so maybe his family’s from Buffalo. Why don’t you ask him, Nick?”

Coach was vague about it, but he said that Caleb was going through something, and I wonder if that’s the reason he came here.

“I can’t ask him because he hates me.” I attempt at nonchalance, but my words come out clipped. Rhys lifts his eyebrows.

Caleb hasn’t said it outright, but that’s the impression I get from him. Caleb’s unpleasant and he doesn’t hold back, and I can’t tell if he’s that way to everyone or if there’s something specific about me that he dislikes. It seems too petty to me that he’d be that way only because of the way I smile.

Rhys scoffs. “What makes you say that?”

“He said my smile was creepy, and he glares at me for no reason.”

“What an ass.”

Coach pretty much asked me to befriend him, and Caleb’s doing everything possible for me to fail at that. Granted, it’s only been a day—so maybe he’s simply adjusting and he’s not usually this difficult.

Though, my impression of him as my new roommate matches the impression I have of him on the ice—cocky, obnoxious, and antagonistic for no reason.

“Speaking of the devil!” Schultz suddenly yells. He puts his hands on his hips and grins wide at Caleb, who’s just arrived with his hockey bag over his shoulder and a blank look on his face. “Yo! I’m Schultz, one of your defensemen. This is Rhys Morgan, our captain—and you should know Nick!”

Caleb seems taken aback by Schultz’s enthusiasm, though he recovers quickly and nods at him. “Hey.”

Rhys gets up from where he’s sitting. “C’mon, I’ll show you around the place.”

“I’m good.” Caleb yawns and walks past us. “It’s a rink, Captain . How hard can it be to find my way around?”

Frowning, Rhys gives me a look and rolls his eyes, and I can’t help but stifle a laugh.

All right, then. Maybe he is this way towards everyone, and I don’t need to take it personally.

Schultz is undeterred by Caleb’s attitude though, striding right up next to him and telling him he’ll show him to his stall. He also tells Caleb his uniform’s been delivered, and then asks what he’s majoring in.

After a few minutes, Caleb’s one-worded grunts have turned into actual answers, and it seems he’s warmed up to Schultz. It doesn’t surprise me, though. Schultz has always had that effect on people.

Fantastic for them, I guess.

***

Shit. Caleb’s amazing.

He’s incredibly fast and his handling is out of this world. During drills, the other guys on the team struggle to keep up with him and watching him pumps up my energy.

I pull away from the team for a quick water break. Walters, another forward, does the same.

When he’s done gulping water from his bottle, he wipes at his chin and gives me a look. “Why are you smiling?”

Without hesitation, I cock my head at Caleb. “He’s good.”

He frowns. “You think this is really how he plays all the time? Or is he showing off because it’s his first practice with us?”

“I don’t think he’s showing off. He’s always been a menace when we’re against him.”

“Yeah, but there’s no reason to go all out right now. We’re only doing drills.”

“Don’t let Rhys hear you,” I joke. Rhys hates it when we slack off only because it’s practice. He always tries to push us, no matter what. I think it frustrates Rhys that, during our stay here, we haven’t made it to the finals. It’s not that our team’s not good—I’m positive that we are—but we’re missing something . What that is, I don’t even know.

Caleb comes to an abrupt stop in front of Walters and I. “Why are you two standing around?”

“Resting,” Walters answers for both of us.

“Ugh. Gross.” Caleb makes a face. “Move, pillow princesses.”

He skates away, and Walters gives me a scandalized look. “It’s his first fucking day! Who does he think he is, talking to us like that?”

I can’t help but laugh. When it’s not directed at me—all right, this time, it was only half directed at me—he’s pretty funny.

Coach blows his whistle and tells us to line up for the next drill, and I skate right up to Caleb. He turns and gives me an unamused look, and I instinctively give him a smile before I remember he hates it.

Now that I’m already smiling though, it’d be weirder to drop it—so I let it stay. Caleb stares at me as if I’m a psychopath.

“You can’t talk to your new teammates like that,” I tell him.

He genuinely looks confused. “What’d I say?”

“You called us pillow princesses. Walters is pissed.”

“Oh.” He looks behind me and grins, and when I look over my shoulder, I see Walters seething at our direction. “I bet you I’m going to have his spot on first line before our first game.”

I agree with him, but I won’t tell him that.

Caleb smirks and meets my gaze. “Or maybe I’ll take yours, golden boy.”

“Golden boy…?”

“You heard me. Or do you prefer campus hottie? Prom king?”

Frowning, I mutter, “What are you going on about?”

He waggles his eyebrows and lets out a huff of laughter, making me even more confused. “Boy next door?” he asks. “Shit, don’t tell me you actually prefer pillow princess?”

“Not sure what this nonsense is,” I tell him just when one of the assistant coaches blow a whistle. Ahead of him, one of our forwards move, and Caleb blinks when I push him aside slightly to take his turn. “But just so we’re clear, you’re never getting my spot.”

Caleb wheezes. “Well, well, so the golden boy actually has some personality!”

I ignore him completely, though his laughter rings in my ears as I leave him behind.

Trash talking on the ice isn’t entirely new, if you could even call it that—he was basically making a list of nicknames that mocked me, but I doubt being called hottie could even be called an insult.

Weird, though… me proclaiming that he’d never get my spot escaped me before I even knew what I was saying.

I didn’t even realize I cared that much about my spot.