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“Call him!” Max tugs on my shirt. “Please. I want to talk to Duke.”
“We have some adult things to work out, baby.”
“Daddy said he’s going to a game with Duke,” she says, sitting down at the kitchen table. “They’re friends. Why can’t I be friends with Duke?”
Confused, I narrow my eyes at her. “You must have heard wrong. Daddy isn’t friends with Duke.”
“Yes, they are. If you were talking to Duke, you would know that.”
Why would Duke and Ted be friends? Duke hates Ted, and after their little blowout at the rink, the feeling is now mutual. This doesn’t make sense. Max is rarely wrong, which makes me wonder if Duke is doing this for Max. I could see him setting aside his differences with Ted to make life easier for us. Duke is a good man.
I fix two hot chocolates with the usual number of marshmallows, four for Max and three for me. Our lives are simple, structured, organized for efficiency. We eat the same meals on the same day of every week. Nothing is ever out of place. Duke disrupted our carefully planned days and turned them into nights neither of us will forget.
I don’t know why I pushed him away. Ted used to tell me I shut him out, that I didn’t let him into my sheltered world. I thought some distance would make our relationship stronger. But the longer we’re apart, I wonder if I’m doing more damage. What if he sees the real me? Will he still want me when he does?
Max sips from her cup, and a chocolate mustache stains her skin. I wipe it away with my finger, and she laughs.
“You had a mustache,” I say and then take a sip from my mug.
Max points her finger at my face and laughs. “You too, Mommy!”
I wipe it away and then lead Max into the living room. She has the iPad tucked under her left arm, drinking her hot chocolate with the other hand.
Max lifts the remote from the coffee table and turns on the television. “Can we watch hockey?”
“Sure, baby. Watch whatever you want.”
Duke is still suspended for a few more games. Pretty soon, though, he’ll be back on the road and busy with his team. It was silly of me to squander the time we could have had together. Instead, I spent the last few weeks moping around the house, taking my bad moods out on Max. She cried for days after watching the videos of Duke and me. I couldn’t stand to see her heartbroken, so I took the iPad away.
Max has begged every night since to get it back. She finally wore me down. And in all honesty, I can’t keep her from the truth forever. No one has secrets when it comes to the Internet. No amount of money or connections can erase my past with Duke. Not that I want to delete him or any of the memories that we made together. Still, I wish I would have made him wait. It was the professional thing to do. It would have been the right thing to do. My decision to date him was purely selfish, which felt right for once.
“The game is about to start,” Max says, tapping me on the arm. “Do you think we’ll see Duke?”
“No, baby. Duke isn’t playing tonight.”
“Can we go to one of his games?”
“If his team makes the playoffs this year.”
“Once Duke is back, Daddy says the team will start playing better.”
“Let’s hope so.”
“Daddy says Duke is the team, and they suck without him.”
“Max,” I say, surprised by her comment. “We don’t talk like that. It’s not nice to say people suck.”
“You just said suck,” she says with laughter in her tone.
“Max,” I warn.
Looking down at her screen, she groans. “But they do, Mommy!” She raises the iPad and shows me the Capitals statistics as proof. As usual, she’s right. “They lost the last five games.”
Before the game begins, the cameras sweep over the Capital One Arena. My mouth falls open in shock when it lands on Duke… and Ted. Together. At the game. What the hell?
Max screams and throws her arm out at the television. “I told you! Daddy and Duke are friends.”
I have no words right now. Why are they at a hockey game together? They’re in the team’s luxury box, and from the looks of it, there are women inside it. I lean forward, straining my eyes to get a better look. Two women, wearing red-white-and-blue uniforms, are talking to them. Are they cheerleaders? If so, why aren’t they closer to the ice instead of in their box?
