And for some reason, I’m distracted by thoughts of Thiago and his claims that he’s related to us. I can’t seem to shake the gut-sinking dread that he might be telling the truth. Does he play hockey too? What’s he like? What’s he interested in? What’s his mom like? Does Mom know her?
Part of me wants to skate right up to the bench and demand answers from Papá, and the other part of me wants to forget I ever heard the words come out of the kid’s mouth. Not my circus, not my monkeys. Except it kind of is.
It’s like I’m carrying around a grenade with the pin pulled. Like I have this one piece of information that has the potential to detonate at the core of our family and blow us into a million pieces.
Usually when I have a problem I can’t solve, I go talk to Abuelita. There’s rarely an issue she can’t solve with a mug of spicy hot chocolate and her trusty flip flop. But with this… it’s pretty sensitive.
Though, I’d literally give my entire trust fund to watch Abuelita go after Papá with her shoe.
Someone shoots the puck my direction. I’ve been working on learning my teammate’s names. If I was paying closer attention, I’d know who sent me the puck, and that alone makes me want to grind my teeth and punch myself in the fucking face. I’m slower to react than usual, too, but with a little burst of speed I’m able to deflect the puck and pass it to Artemis, who is collecting the pucks around the net.
Or at least that’s what it looks like.
“Don’t let him throw you off your game.”
“Who?” I aim for causal, nonchalant, like I don’t give a flying fuck that our father is standing behind the boards evaluating every fucking breath we take out here, but I clearly miss the mark.
“Right.” Artemis slides a puck back and forth with the blade of his stick as he inches toward me.
“’toy bien.” I sweep a puck across the ice to Raffi, then shoot another to Justin. I’m not fine, but I need to be.
“You’ve got this.” A man of few words, Artemis smacks my shoulder, and something in the contact makes the knots of anxiety that are holding my body hostage unravel a little.
For the rest of the practice, I tune out the noise. Eloise, Thiago, Alonso, the suits—they all get shoved out of my brain. I focus all of my energy into stopping the puck from getting into the net, at all costs.
By the end of the session, my legs are burning, my eyes sting from the sweat streaming down my face, and I stink.
Papá beckons the twins over to the bench with a jerk of his head and makes introductions to the guys in dark suits. Are they investors? Scouts? Dudes he works with who happen to like hockey? I have no idea, and I hate that curiosity is burning in my stomach.
It burns even more that he hasn’t called me over, too. I’m fighting the urge to skate over and insert myself in the conversation. I don’t want to give him any more ammunition against me. But it’s hard as fuck to resist.
I linger for a beat before I realize yeah, he’s really not going to invite me to join them, so I give up waiting to get tagged in with the big boys and head to the locker room. I left it all out on the ice. Once I pulled my shit together, I put my entire existence into that practice, and I bet he never even fucking noticed.
I don’t know why I ever think he’s going to change. And yet, I keep waiting around for his table scraps of affection.
Once I’m out of my gear and showered, I don’t hang around, stopping at the store to buy Bacon, some more celery, and apples—he broke into my stash overnight and ate the lot. I’ve never known anyone to love celery the way that damn pig does.
I’m about to check out when a flash of pink hair passing the entrance draws my attention. I’ve had a stressful morning; the universe definitely owes me some good luck right now.
Throwing money at the cashier, I grab my bag of vegetables, and haul ass out onto the street. She can’t have gotten far. I spy her up ahead, but unless she has magic hair and it grew alotovernight, it’s not my girl, mytesoro.
It’s clearly a bright pink sign from the universe that I was an idiot last night when I didn’t ask Eloise out again. I pull out my phone.
Ares:Buenos días, preciosa. I was wondering if you’d like to get hot chocolate later.
Ares: I mean, with me.
Puta madre. I’m like a bumbling idiot. And I’m doing my level best to resist the urge to send her a third message. I tuck the phone into my ass pocket and head to the apartment. Halfway there, my butt vibrates.
It’s been so long since I’ve gotten laid that it feels kinda nice. Sure, Séb wasn’t forever ago, but it’s never been this long. I don’t do droughts. At least I didn’t beforeher.
It’s not a reply from Eloise, but rather my brother telling me that the suits at the rink were family business, not hockey. The weight pressing on my chest eases, enough to suck in a full breath. Thank God it’s not hockey. If he’d cut me out of both the family business and hockey career opportunities… well, I’m not going to think about that.
Grinds my gears that he’s keeping me out of the business, though. He claims I’m too hot headed, too brash, too unreliable and irresponsible to be put in charge of anything to do with the family name.
I used to want to be Papá when I grew up. I followed him around, wearing his thousand-dollar shoes, getting underfoot. But the older I got, the more I realized that he had already selected my older brothers to replace him at the top of the de la Peña food chain. And it didn’t matter how well I did in school, on the ice, or by any other metric, the only things he’d ever notice me for were the bad things.
So that’s what I did.
