Page 16 of Here We Go Again

I give him a quick summary of my interaction with Becca, which is easy because it barely lasted five minutes. All the carefully planned things I wanted to say, the words I rehearsed, then rehearsed again—I didn’t say any of it.

“So that’s it?” Holly asks when I finally finish.

“That’s it,” I say. “And it’s all it will be because I don’t think she’s going to text.”

“It’s only been a week, man,” Carter says. “Not long enough to justify that kind of a statement.”

I’m already shaking my head before he’s even finished his sentence. “Trust me. I was there. She didn’t want to talk to me.”

They’re both quiet for a beat before Holly asks, “So what do you do now?”

I shrug. “Nothing, I guess. Try to move on.”

I make eye contact with Carter, but I quickly look away. After what happened last spring, when I saw Becca at the hospital and learned she was living in Atlanta, he has to know there’s more to the story than what I’ve been willing to admit. But we’ve never talked about it.

Somehow, this is the one secret I’ve kept from my brother.

Instead of telling him the truth, I’ve let him believe that my dating history full of almosts and not quites is a result of choices I’m making intentionally. If you listen to sports reporters who peddle player gossip, I’m the playboy twin. The wild one who won’t settle down.

In the past, the reputation has amused me more than annoyed me. They weren’t that far from the actual truth; I never have dated anyone seriously—not since Becca. But they’ve got my motivations all wrong. I would love to settle down.

I just don’t know how to do it with anyone but her.

Rebecca Bradley is the only woman I’ve ever loved. And the echo of that love has been chasing me since our relationship ended. Every woman I meet has the unfortunate burden of being compared to her, and so far, no one has measured up.

So I’ve lived on the surface. Kept my feelings close and the truth even closer.

Until now.

I’m not sure what shifted. Maybe it was Carter finally falling in love or my injury and the sudden realization that I can’t count on hockey to be the center of my life forever.

But at the end of last season, some long-rusted cog in my brain shook loose, and I knew I had to do something—anything—to put myself on a different path.

As soon as I was released from the hospital, I called the therapist Carter’s been trying to get me to see for years. If I wanted to move forward, I needed the kind of closure that would only come from apologizing. But I had to forgive myself first. And not just for what I did to Becca. For the accident too. For the role I played in my father’s death. For all of it.

That’s a much more complicated part of the journey that I’m still trying to figure out. But I’ve made a lot of progress. Enough that I thought I was ready to see her. To say the things I’ve been thinking for months.

But she has to talk to me for that to happen.

I probably should have considered how to proceed if she wouldn’t, because now I have no idea what to do next.

“What are you not telling us, man?” Carter asks. “The look on your face makes me think this is about a lot more than an apology.”

Holly leans back in his chair, running a hand across his closely cropped beard. “Do you still have feelings for her?”

It takes me a very long time to answer. It feels foolish to admit it out loud. We were barely adults when things ended, not even out of high school. But the way my whole body reacted when I saw her—that has to mean something.

“We aren’t the same people we were back then,” I finally say. “It feels silly to think we could just … go back to the way things were.”

“Let’s say you could,” Carter says. “Would you want to?”

An ache pushes through my chest, making my ribs feel tight. “Maybe?” I concede. “But what does it matter? If she doesn’t text me, I don’t really have any options here.”

“Maybe you could try again?” Holly says. “It had to feel like a shock to see you. Maybe she needs to get used to the idea.”

“Try again, how? I can’t just lurk around the hospital hoping to run into her. She knows I want to talk. And she knows my number. At this point, the ball is in her court. If she doesn’t want to talk to me, I can’t make her.”

“No, you really can’t,” Carter says. “It sucks, but you’re right.”