I wanted to scream, “Fuck this family. Fuck this world! Fuck it all.” It would have fit, since I was sitting on my old bed, staring at the stickers I slammed on my door during my teenage-angst phase.

I learned years ago that being an alpha adult meant keeping your mouth shut whenever you felt any semblance of pain. So every day, I bent my head forward and kept my mouth shut.

There was a soft knock on my door. “Addison, can I come in, or are you pissed at me too?”

Kristoff should not have been here. There was nothing left to say between us. So much time had passed since he let me go.

The worst part was that he looked cuter than I remembered. His striped long sleeve shirt fit tight around his lean body. I immediately felt my cock shift against my briefs, but I ignored my primal desires. Those tended to get me into some trouble.

It was his eyes that entrenched me. He had these dark, hazel orbs of delight. I used to get lost looking into them as if the entire universe was in those eyes.

Why did he have to look at me so sweetly, with such concern? It was almost like he actually gave a fuck about me. “You can come in, I guess,” I said, scooting off to the side of the mattress.

Kristoff shut the door and sat down next to me. I closed my eyes and tried not to get emotional, but these past few months wrecked my soul. My eyes shot open when he touched my bicep.

“Are you okay, man? I know the media is all hype, but I saw the video a few days ago,” Kristoff said.

“I don’t care about the damn video,” I muttered.

He nodded his head slowly. “Okay. Then, what do you care about?” he asked me, careful not to overstep his boundaries.

“Lately? Nothing. I just keep thinking about one thing. Holloway Jordan,” I said. Just saying the name sent chills down my spine.

Kristoff let go of my arm and sighed. “Addison, mistakes happen on the field. It wasn’t your fault. Holloway shouldn’t have been playing that game. The doctor told him he shouldn’t jump in so fast after his car accident,” he said.

I tried to lay it out as carefully as I could because it didn’t only amount to me hurting someone. It was everything that surrounded that moment that turned me off to the game.

“You don’t understand. I saw the look of terror in his eyes. I kept running. I heard the crack of his vertebrae. I kept pushing. I heard his cries and I just kept moving. What does that make me, Kristoff? I’m literally the scum of the earth,” I said.

Kristoff despised my manic moods for a good reason, but dealing with my mental health was harder than people thought. I couldn’t just flick the switch off. Sometimes, it was impossible to calm myself down.

When the images of what happened on the field played back in my mind, I just lost it, but Kristoff knew what to do to calm me down. He hugged his body around me and whispered, “Just breathe, Addison. Think of good things.”

“No,” I said, struggling to break free from his firm grasp. But I couldn’t, and eventually gave up.

“There we go,” he whispered, calmly. “You’re on a beach. You’re drinking a mixed drink. The sun is setting. Life is great.” I started to feel my anger, guilt, and sadness begin to dissipate.

“Okay. You can let go now. Kind of awkward,” I said.

“Sorry,” Kristoff whispered. He cleared his throat and scooted a step away from me. “You know why I do that?”

“Because you’re a clinger?” I asked, grinning. It was a stupid joke and one I immediately regretted saying.

“No. And screw you for suggesting that I’m a clinger. You’re the one who’d call me obsessively every single day after school,” he said.

“Alright. It was a dumb thing to say, okay? Go on with your story,” I said.

It felt wrong that he was here, but I couldn’t help but fall into the moment. For a second, it felt just like old times. “It calms your central nervous down,” he said. “That’s why they put animals in constricting positions before they die. It calms them down.”

“Oh, because that’s not weird or anything,” I muttered under my breath. “You’re still a morbid little freak, aren’t you?”

Kristoff grinned and nodded his head. “Well, I’m a personal care aide now. I deal with death on a semi-regular basis, Addison,” he said.

I felt my left eyebrow rise on its own accord with intrigue. “That’s what you do now? That’s actually really… noble,” I said. “Seriously, that’s awesome, Kristoff. I’m happy for you.”

He shrugged. Kristoff was always so humble about these kinds of things, so I didn’t expect him to brag. I admired him for that. “It’s not as awesome as what you do,” he said.

“You’re out of your mind. I’m a cheap entertainer,” I said.

“Come on. Stop that. You always belittle yourself. You make millions of people happy. You move mountains all of the time,” Kristoff said.

There went his eyes again. They looked so honest. It was hard not to eat up every single word he said about me. “I used to, yeah,” I said, sprawling back across the bed. “That was the old me. Now, I’ve decided to become a recluse.”

Kristoff rolled his eyes and leaned back next to me. “Look, I know what happened affected you a lot. I think an accident like that would fuck with anyone’s psyche. But you’re just so talented, Addison. You need to do something with your life,” he said.

I stared into his dark eyes. I wanted to get lost in them. More than that, I wanted him to hold me and tell me that everything would work out. I wanted to feel normal again, but I knew the day I hurt Holloway Jordan was the last day of that period of my life.

“I know that I can’t just sit around drinking all of the time. I know that,” I said.

Kristoff’s shirt extended ever-so-slightly over his belly button. I glanced down and felt my face turn hot. “Maybe you need to make amends with him. Have you thought about going to the hospital to visit him?” Kristoff asked, as his hands clutched around his tight, exposed belly.

“Not yet. I can’t face Holloway and his family yet,” I admitted. “I’m a coward. I know that it’s not attractive.”

“Well, who cares what I find attractive?” Kristoff asked.

I cleared my throat and quickly looked away from him. “I’m just saying, in general, it’s not attractive.”

I couldn’t believe I was even entertaining the idea of kissing my ex-love of my life again, but his skin was so soft and his lips, so supple. The slight hair below his navel was staring back at me. His body was begging to be caressed.

But I couldn’t do it. If I made out with Kristoff today, it would most likely come back to bite me in the ass.

“You know, I could visit him for you,” Kristoff offered. “I mean, it’s not much different from what I do for a living. I could see how he’s doing and report back.”

“Like a spy?” I asked him.

“No,” he said, almost immediately. “As a means to bridge the gap between you both.”

I placed my hand on his thigh and tapped it. “I’ll think about it,” I said. “He hasn’t reached out to the media yet, so maybe he doesn’t hate me.”

Kristoff carefully looked down at my hand. I quickly let go of his thigh and stood up, clapping my hands. “Okay,” I said. “I guess we should probably eat dinner.”

Before he could answer, I walked out of the room. My cheeks were on fire.