In the second round of the tournament we were playing against the Michigan Grizzlies, and beating them seemed to be an impossible task. It was like one minute we were one game away from sweeping the Cactus Blossoms and now the Grizzlies were one game away from sweeping us.

I definitely wasn’t helping things. I was a big heartbroken mess who was absolutely useless on the ice. I hadn’t seen or spoken to Mark since we broke things off, though not for lack of trying on my part. He wasn’t answering any of my texts or calls and I didn’t feel right just showing up at his apartment considering what had happened last time. Mark’s roommates probably had orders to immediately escort me off the premises. Part of me wanted to find Shannon and ask her to help me out with the situation, but I still didn’t even know how much she knew about it and I didn’t want to accidentally make things worse by outing myself unnecessarily.             

My teammates and the entire coaching staff obviously knew something was wrong, but they had no idea what it was or how to help me. They had tried talking, begging, bargaining, yelling, and distracting. So far none of it had worked, mostly because I just flat out refused to talk to them. I was also seeing Dr. Casey once a week per Hawthorne’s instructions, but I wasn’t really talking to her either. She was trained to give psych evals, but she wasn’t a psychologist; I didn’t understand how it worked either. Either way, I felt no obligation to talk to her outside of normal chit chat and confirmation that I was eating properly and that none of my bones or muscles hurt. Every visit ended the same, with her frowning and then sending me away.

I’m pretty sure Coach or Dr. Casey or someone had contacted my mother because she had been calling me nonstop, but I rarely ever answered. I’d just let the phone finish ringing and then text her that I was too busy to talk.

I think my team would have happily taken me out of the lineup if they’d had even a single forward to spare, but as it was, they were stuck with me. I was drowning, and I was taking them all down too. It was ridiculous the impact that just one player could have on a team. It was also ridiculous how I used to care about such things. I used to call myself a robot, but now I knew the true meaning of the word. I wasn’t living my life or experiencing anything important. Everything I did, I was doing on autopilot. Lather, rinse, and repeat. 

Today, I was doing solo drills on the ice while the rest of the team was in the changing room supposedly going over video. I knew that was just code for talking about me behind my back, but I didn’t really have it in me to care. I just kept lining up shots with the empty net and shooting blindly without really caring whether or not they went in.

I was about five minutes from just lying down on the ice and waiting for someone to give me permission to leave when voices started carrying over to me from behind the bench.

“This place looks so much bigger from down here,” said a familiar voice that sent a tingle of annoyance down my spine. A second later, Steve came into view followed shortly thereafter by Sal and then the rest of my teammates. I dropped my stick onto the ice and folded my arms over my padded chest.

“What on Earth is he doing here?”

“I went up to your room and asked him to come,” Sal said, helping Steve through the bench door and onto the ice. His sneakers appeared to have very little tread, and if it wasn’t for Sal’s guidance he probably would have fallen flat on his ass.

“And why would you do that?”

Sal shrugged and raised the arm that wasn’t being used to support Steve.

“You won’t tell us what’s going on. I thought maybe you would talk to one of your friends.”

“We’re not friends,” I said immediately. “We just live together.”

Steve shot me a look.

“Bro, that’s harsh,” he said, but he didn’t actually seem offended.

I rolled my eyes. “Steve, go home.”

“No,” Steve said indignantly. “Your captain said I could stay and watch practice and that’s what I’m going to do.”

The boys were all looking at me with bated breath to see what I’d do. I just sighed and picked up my stick.

“Let’s get this over with.”

We went back to normal drills and maneuvers, this time with the added bonus of commentary from Steve. He was sitting out on the bench next to a very irritated Hawthorne and a semi-amused McAvoy. He had his body hunched and his arms draped over the stanchion like a petulant child.

“This is boring!” he shouted as I passed by him. “Somebody do a triple axel.”

Someone, I’m pretty sure it was Phony, responded to that statement by sending a puck flying at the boards just inches underneath Steve’s dangling fingertips. He yelped so loudly that McAvoy started audibly laughing. Hawthorne only shook his head and yanked Steve back inside the bench by the back of his T-shirt.

When we were done, Steve followed us all to the changing room and stood in the open doorway while we stripped down to our civvies and put away our sticks and pads. I gulped down some water and was just about ready to head across the hall so I could get in a nice hot shower before returning to my room to sulk. Then, the last words I ever expected came spilling out of Steve’s mouth.

“You know, I think it’s really cool how none of y’all seem embarrassed about changing in front of a gay guy.”

My breath caught and my vision narrowed. My heart was beating faster than it ever had in my life. I had to dig my fingertips into my thighs to keep myself from passing out.

“Listen, man,” Matty was saying. “We don’t really care what you do in your free time.”

“Speak for yourself,” Phony interjected, covering himself with a towel.

“We invited you here because we thought it would help Undies. Not so that you could be creepy and live out some weird fetish.”

Steve’s eyes narrowed and then widened with understanding.

“No, no, no,” he said immediately, waving his hands. “I’m not gay. I was talking about Carter.”

Every eye in the room suddenly turned to me. There was no playing it cool. The shock and inner turmoil I was feeling had to have been written clearly across my face. My mouth fell open, but I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe. I felt like the world was crashing down around me. The only thing I could do was run.

I stood up on shaking legs and bolted for the door with frightening speed. Steve hopped back out of the frame just in time to avoiding being trampled. I could hear my teammates calling after me, but there was no way in hell I was slowing down. I ran and ran and ran until my lungs burned and I physically could not take another step.

I crumpled to the ground outside of the fine arts building and hugged my knees to my chest. I was making these ugly choking sounds that were halfway between a gasp and a sob. My face was wet from both sweat and tears and anyone passing by probably thought I was having a mental breakdown. Heck, maybe I was.

It didn’t matter how much I’d written off hockey in the last month. I’d still, somewhere in the back of my mind, believed that one day my problems would work themselves out and Mark would forgive me and everything would go back to normal.

But now my secret was out.

Things would never be normal for me again.