Page 98 of Line Change

I pick up my keys and leave him standing in my bedroom.

He says my name again as I close the front door.

28

NOLAN

Bobby looks at me again from across the locker room.

I don’t look back. He’ll take it as an invitation, and I don’t want to hear a single fucking word about what he saw in my kitchen.

I should have told him that before he left. At the time, Ben was in my bedroom trying to put his arm through the side of a shirt, and Bobby was the problem I could get out of my condo.

Now he’s sitting across the locker room with his mouth visibly full of questions.

Ben’s stall is empty.

He’s not late yet. He has time to get here, although not much. I have no idea whether he found an Uber right away or stood in my bedroom until he could breathe again, and I keep picturing the tag sticking out of his inside-out shirt.

It’s none of my business now.

Telling myself that doesn’t help.

The room is louder than it was at the start of the season. Winning does that. Guys talk over the music and each other. Bobby and Sindre are arguing about a goal from last night’s game, dragging in anyone who gets too close. Two stalls down, one of the rookies has the standings open on his phone and keeps turning the screen around for anyone who walks past.

We’re winning enough that the playoff conversation has changed. Nobody says it like a wish anymore. We’re above the line, and the teams chasing us have to catch up. If we keep playing the way we have been, we’re going to stay there.

I should be enjoying this. After the start we had, every guy in here should be unbearable.

Bobby catches my eye again and lifts his eyebrows.

I stare him down until he turns to Sindre and says something I can’t hear. He’s holding a fresh can of Monster. When he notices me looking at it, he points toward the hallway and mouths, Vending machine.

Under any other circumstances, I’d give him shit for spending that much on something he could have bought by the case. Today I ignore him.

The locker-room door opens. Ben comes in carrying his gear bag, dressed in the same clothes he wore to Tessa’s party. His shirt is right side out now. His face is blank enough that nobody else looks at him twice.

Bobby does.

Only for a second. Then he bends over his skates.

Ben goes to his stall without looking at me. There are only a few feet between us, but nobody would guess he woke up in my bed this morning.

He strips off his shirt and sits to pull on his gear. The careful way he lowers himself onto the bench tells me he’s feeling what we did last night. I see his thighs spread under me again, and heat pulls low in my stomach before the anger comes back.

Ben catches me looking.

His hands stop on the laces of his skate. Neither of us moves until Bobby yells at Sindre that the replay proves nothing, and the rest of the room gets loud around us again.

Ben looks down first.

I still want privacy. Knowing Bobby saw us makes my skin crawl, and I don’t want the story getting out of this room any more than Ben does.

I just didn’t need him to act like being caught with me was the worst thing that could happen to him.

Caleb turns the music down when Gunderson steps into the room. We get the practice plan, a reminder about travel tomorrow, and the usual warning that winning a few games doesn’t make any of us special. Nobody needs the speech, but nobody talks through it either. We know what the standings look like, and we remember how quickly they can change.

When we get up, Ben and I move at the same time. He stops to let me pass in front of him.