Page 88 of Rookie Rules

After practice, Rowan completed treatment while Luca left with Finn and Jace. Usually Luca waited long enough to argue about video or send one last remark across the room. Today his stall emptied before Rowan returned from Owen's table.

The absence was not dramatic. Luca had friends, obligations, and an apartment of his own. Rowan had no claim on the hour between practice and seven.

He noticed anyway.

In the captain's office, Claire sent the proposed interview outline. Six questions. Early team success. Veteran-rookie chemistry. What each player had learned from the other. Rowan drafted safe answers without difficulty.

Bennett adds speed and an unconventional read.

The line works because all three players communicate.

Trust is earned through repetition.

He stopped at the last sentence.

It was true in hockey. It was true on his living-room floor. The difference was that hockey let him say it without identifying what trust had come to include.

Rowan closed the document and left for home.

At home that evening, Rowan prepared dinner for two.

He had invited Luca after the game, before the broadcast caption and the message that refused to perform reassurance. Seven, he had written that afternoon.

Okay, Luca had answered.

The exchange was ordinary enough to prove the arrangement had acquired routine. Rowan knew Luca would arrive hungry after practice. He knew Luca disliked mushrooms but ate spinach if it was cooked into something he could not accuse of virtue. He knew twelve minutes late meant Luca considered himself on time.

He used the chicken Luca had left in the refrigerator and added spinach to the sauce because Luca would complain, then eat it. The glass container was washed and waiting near the sink for Luca to take home. Rowan moved it to the counter, then back beside the sink.

The decision occupied less than a minute and exposed too much.

On the refrigerator, the team schedule showed the final November game circled by no one. Rule four had given that date a private meaning. Rowan had once liked knowing the boundary existed.

Tonight he looked away from it.

He checked his phone. Luca's last message remained I know.

Rowan could ask what it meant. Instead, he checked the stove.

At six forty-eight, Rowan set two bowls on the counter.

At six fifty-five, he checked the stove.

At seven, the doorbell rang.

The punctuality felt like warning.

Luca stood outside holding the glass container from Rowan's refrigerator. Clean, dry, empty.

"Returning evidence," he said.

The joke was present. The ease was not.

Rowan stepped aside. Luca removed his shoes and hung his jacket on the familiar hook.

"Dinner is ready."

"Smells good."