Forest
Hey man. You okay? It’s been a minute since we talked.
I hit Send, and then immediately feel three or four different kinds of uneasy. I get unhelpful flashbacks to our past conversations when I’ve told Beck I’m not long-term relationship material. Hell, I once told him he ought to meet someone closer to his age—someone with more time and less baggage.
My gut gives a twist that I don’t want to analyze.
Glancing at the computer on the desk in front of me, I shake the mouse to wake it up. When the screen lights up, I google the Ice Cats game schedule. Their next away game is Saturday night. Which means Beck has been home all week.
And not texting me.
I stare at our text thread again. There’s nothing much to go on, here. No smoking gun. Our last exchange involved Beck sending me a picture of a massive cheeseburger and asking if I thought it looked “elite or just desperate.”
I hadn’t replied. And that was it. Nothing since. No dumb jokes. No unsolicited opinions about sandwich structure or condiments or cat cafés.
Which means either his phone’s at the bottom of a lake, or I said something that scared him off and didn’t notice doing it.
Or he met someone.
He’d tell me, though.
Wouldn’t he?
For reasons I don’t wish to examine, I send him one more text.
Hey, I might clock out early tonight. You around?
I set the phone down on the desk and open the box of receipts. Rifling through it, I attempt to impose some order on them, while keeping one eye on the phone.
It lights up five minutes later.
Beck
Hey
Busy
I blink. The chilly response is so unlike Beck.
My first thought is to worry. Maybe he’s been kidnapped, and the one-word responses are a cry for help.
But that’s dumb. There’s another explanation that’s far more likely.
Maybe he’s finally giving me a taste of what it’s like to communicate with me.
Thirty-Six
That Wiggling Thing
Beck
“Are you even listening?” Rigsy asks. He's using his authoritative voice—the one he usually saves for intimidating our opponents.
“I’m listening,” I lie. But my ears hurt, along with everything else in my body. I just need Rigsy to leave me alone so I can go back to wallowing in peace.
Until two days ago, I was having the best month of my life—playing great hockey, getting call-ups from the Cougars. That all came to a screeching halt when I started to feel sick. Then I had a positive Covid test. Now the team is leaving on a road trip without me.
“Okay, here's the setup.” Rigsy sounds like he’s so far away. “The pain relievers are on the kitchen counter. There are Popsicles in the freezer. There are four cans of soup in the cupboard and a lot of drinks in the fridge. You know the drill. You’ve had Covid before, right?”
