Ferris blinked rapidly. He wasn’t really looking at me, but thanks to half my friends now being somewhere on the blind spectrum, I no longer relied on that to know if people were paying attention.
And he was.
He seemed overwhelmed.
“Was wrong thing to say?”
“No.” He shook his head, then met my eyes for abrief second. “No. I…thank you. Sometimes I feel a little lost here? Because I’m, ah. Well. Not like everyone else.”
“Goalies always weird,” I told him with a small grin. It made me think about Micah and Jonah. They were both delightfully weird in their own way. Different from each other. Different from me.
But our friendships—and other ships, whatever they were—made sense. They made me feel safe. And I wanted Ferris to have that too.
“It’s different for me,” he said after a beat. “Being autistic. Being South Asian.” He stopped, then shook his head. “Being the only one of my siblings to look like I’m Pakistani. People didn’t really care. They didn’t really notice when I was in school. But they notice here.”
“It was same for me. A little,” I added. “My mother from Islamabad.”
His eyes widened. “Wait. Really?”
“Mm. She die when I was very little, but my grandparents help me remember her. Is not the same for me though. I look more like my papa.”
Ferris bowed his head. “My brothers are more like you. No one thinks we’re related. I think sometimes it’s harder for them. They look just different enough for people to notice, but when they try and connect to who we are and where our family came from, people tell them they don’t belong. My brother Logan took it the hardest. But it’s hard to talk to him when he doesn’t deal with the same shit I do.”
I knew what that felt like, but it wasn’tsomething I often thought about. And maybe that was the privilege of it. Something Ferris couldn’t relate to.
But I’d been playing hockey for a long, long time, and I’d seen what he was dealing with. I’d seen what happened to players who didn’t fit the expectation of who we were supposed to be and what we were meant to look like.
“You feel…uncomfortable? Someone saying something to you?” I demanded. “Tell me who? I will order hit on the ice and?—”
“No.” His lips twitched as he tried to hide his smile. “You sound like Quinn.”
“Do I?”
Ferris laughed and nodded. “You know he works for the team now? Physical therapist. Hopefully, you won’t have to meet him, but if you do, I think you’ll like him.”
“Well, if he sound like me, he is good guy. He and I will take care of problem for you if you need.”
Ferris bit his lip, then settled into his seat and very, very cautiously eased himself closer to me. “Is this, um…I mean. I noticed some of the guys are touchy. Which is hard for me sometimes. And I never seem to know when I’m allowed or when it’s weird. I almost got beat up a couple of times my freshman year, and?—”
I grabbed his shirt and yanked him over until his head was pillowed on my shoulder.
He let out the smallest sigh. “Thanks.”
“Of course, new best friend. Is what I’m here for.You missing boyfriend and need a cuddle? I can do that. I know how it feels.”
“Do you have a boyfriend?” he asked.
My heart twisted in my chest, and I let out a heavy exhale. “I don’t know. It’s…”
“Complicated,” he said, and I nodded against the top of his head. “Yeah. With me and Quinn…it was complicated. And hard. And scary. I think, in the end, if he hadn’t been so sure of me, I would have run.”
“What helped?” I tried not to sound desperate, but I was. I needed to know what I could do to shut all those ugly voices up in Micah’s head.
“He was patient. And sweet. And with him, it was easy to remember that I could be myself. That I didn’t have to try and put on a mask to seem just like everyone else. He loved me for being different.”
“Yes. Is same for me,” I said. “He’s different and amazing. And falling for him is hard because he’s so stubborn.”
Ferris snorted a quiet laugh. “Sounds like he and I would be good friends.”
