Page 41 of Fractured Ice

"Right, right." He says it the way people say it when they know that and are also thinking something else. "He talks about you."

"He shouldn't."

"Not like that." Luca waves a hand. "Just, he mentioned you'd be on the trip. Made sure we knew." He tilts his head. "You guys are pretty close, huh?"

"We're not⁠—"

"You're lucky," Declan says, and he says it like he means it, straightforwardly. "He's one of the best guys on this team. On any team, probably."

"He is," Luca agrees. "The freshmen worship him. There's this kid, Petrosky, first year, completely lost at the start of the season. Ethan basically took him under his wing. Extra time on the ice, talking him through film, the whole thing."

"He does that every year," Declan says. "The new guys. He always finds the one who's struggling and just—quietly fixes it. Doesn't make it a big deal."

"And the youth program," Luca adds. "He coaches on Sundays. Kids, like eight and nine years old. He never talks about it. I only know because I drove him there once."

I'm writing, I realize. I've had my notebook out and I've been writing without fully deciding to, the way I do when a source is giving me something real.

Someone calls their names from somewhere in the crowd and they both turn, and Declan points at me. "Don't let him be an idiot," he says. "He's better than he acts around you."

They disappear before I can ask him what that means.

I'm still thinking about it when Ethan comes through the doors.

He scans the area, and he finds me, and the way his face changes makes my heart ache a little. He’s not showing the deliberate charm he deploys like a tool. It's something else, something more unguarded, gone before I can name it.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey." I lift my camera.

He raises an eyebrow. "Right now?"

"Natural environment. Post-game. Professor Bennett wants the full picture." I look through the lens.

Through the viewfinder he's different than he is straight on. I've been looking at him with context attached, every interaction we've had, every story I've collected, every version of him I've tried to reconcile. Through the lens there's just him. The loose ease of how he stands when he's not trying to manage something. The way his mouth curves on the left side before a full smile gets there. The warmth that sits in his expression when he's relaxed, it’s nice to see.

I take several shots and then I lower the camera and find him watching me.

"Get what you need?" he asks.

"Not yet," I say, and I mean it for the project, and I think I might mean something else. I don't examine what because I don’t even know anymore.

We walk back to the hotel.

The street is quiet and cold, and he walks beside me with his hands in his pockets and asks about the project, about what she thought of the game, about whether the away environment was different to cover. I answer him and ask questions back. It's easy in a way that shouldn't be this easy given everything.

I think about the freshman's face after Ethan said something to him on the ice. The way Rory said he didn't leave. The youth hockey program on Sundays that he doesn't talk about. Declan saying he's better than he acts around you.

Two versions. The one I've carried for years, built on every awkward interaction, every stupid thing said at the wrong moment, every story about some girl at some arena. And the one that keeps appearing in the spaces between what I expected, patient and steady and quietly showing up for people who need it.

I don't know which one is real.

I think, walking beside him in the February cold with my camera against my chest and his shoulder two inches from mine, that I might need to start finding out.

I don't think about it too hard.

But it follows me all the way back to the hotel.

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