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ONE
Sebastian
Tyler smiled in a way only I could see.
The corners of his lips were always a little curled. He never looked like he wasn’t in on a private joke. And when there was a private joke, his upper lip pressed the lower one, the change to the set of his face infinitesimally small. Yet his eyes lit up by a fraction of a degree.
He locked his phone and slipped it into his pocket.
“What’s so funny?” I asked in a low voice. Thirsty Thinker was loud enough with an entire hockey team celebrating the first victory of the new year.
Tyler glanced at me. “Our chat.”
I snorted. I’d flooded his inbox with memes before the game. It was a calming technique before a big game, getting my mind off the anxiety. And Tyler had a particular taste for the silly kind of memes. He loved seeing Gollum in job interviews. I wasn’t a die-hard fan, but my best friend was. “I figured you’d like that.”
As we lifted our glasses, a few gazes around the table darted somewhere behind us. The tables we had joined together were filled with all the usual suspects. Our captain, Beckett Partridge, and his right-hand man, Caden Jones, sat across from Tyler and me. On either side of the couple sat Jordan Mitchell and his little stepbrother and sulk of the year, Asher Sullivan. It was always smart to seat them away from one another with enough of a buffer. It hadn’t happened yet, but we all anticipated Asher spilling his drink on Jordan. It would be fair since Jordan would probably start the fight by reminding Asher that he shouldn’t be drinking in the first place. Tyler and I would take the opposite sides just for shits and giggles. Another freshman, Phoenix, sat next to Asher, and next to him was our goalie Sawyer, his physics tutor turned boyfriend Noah, an empty chair, and then Avery.
When the gazes lifted to the door on the far side of the tavern, I knew who it was without looking. Even so, I turned to glance at Grayson Reed walking confidently between the scattered tables. He wore a little smile and shrugged, his palms open, his arms spreading a little. “Here I am.”
“I hope you brought your wallet,” Beckett said.
Grayson’s smile was tight as he nodded. “Serves me well for making silly bets.” He passed around the end of our tables and threw his arms around Avery who stood to greet him. The two kissed like they were alone on the face of the Earth before they both sat down.
Grayson, the captain of our nemesis team, the Blizzard Breakers, had made a little bet with Beckett about the outcome of tonight’s game. We were getting a free round of drinks for the glory we had snatched from his team out on the ice.
“You never learn, do you?” Avery stated. The flat expression on his face was softer around his eyes now that Grayson was here. It was impossible to miss when a guy was in love up to his ears.
“I’ll get you guys someday,” Grayson said, leaning back on the hind legs of his chair and folding his hands on the back of his head. “But for now, what’s everybody having?” He tipped his chair back down on all fours and pulled out his wallet, slapping it against the table with a cocky grin. Guys laughed all around.
Tyler’s hand was on the back of my head. His fingers played with my black curls idly. “What are you having?”
I tilted my head for him to scratch a sudden itch near my right ear. “A walk to clear my mind,” I said. “I think I’ll go and see what Jennifer’s up to.”
“Netflix and chill,” Tyler concluded.
“Or cuddles and sleep,” I said. I was tired. The two weeks of early drills and a week of hardcore preparation, followed by a fierce game against the Breakers, took a lot out of me. Besides, this was my last semester at Northwood. I was more than busy.
“You don’t have to walk two miles for cuddles, buddy,” Tyler said with a chuckle.
I snorted. “Yeah, but Jennifer’s my main girlfriend,” I reminded him.
Tyler jerked his hand away from my head and grabbed his chest. “I’m the side chick?”
I shook my head at him, but I couldn’t stop the laugh that welled in me. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Have fun, kids,” Tyler said.
I made my excuses to the team and the enemy captain, then hopped onto my feet and headed out. The January night sent chills into my bones as soon as I stepped out, but I thought longingly about the warm bed in Jennifer’s little studio.
We’d gotten together after my last relationship went down in flames. It was a bit of a pattern at this point. Even when I’d given up on dating and started a long-distance thing with Amy, I couldn’t seem to catch a break. Amy and I had gotten bored of it pretty quickly. And Jennifer blazed into my life like wildfire. She had been in a bad place before we’d met, too, so we connected through our mutual disappointment in relationships.
The walk succeeded in clearing my mind. The tiredness that kicked in after the game could wait until I was warm and cozy and in good company. I wasn’t sad to miss out on the fun with the guys. If the past was any indicator, we were about to kick ass for the rest of the semester. We might even have a shot for another Frozen Four trophy. I would still get to spend time with them.
I crunched ice under my boots and enjoyed the bite of the wind on my cheeks. The colder I was now, the warmer the embrace would be. Not that I would ever say something like that aloud. Jennifer wasn’t particularly romantic, which I respected, and my friends would laugh out loud if I told them I liked being hugged. But it was true. I loved it.
Even with all the anti-romance sentiment I got from her, I still picked up a chocolate on my way there.
When I finally got to Jennifer’s building, I punched in the code and let myself in. She had rented a tiny slice of heaven on the top floor. It was a well-lit room with a maximalist design, cluttered with books, scraps of paper, endless vines from her house plants, and the bed was piled high with pillows. Every messy, out-of-place detail of her studio was a dream.
