Page 103 of Rookie Recovery

I breathed in deep and laced my skates.

The first game of the season was in four days. Four days! I had to skate it. I couldn’t not. This was me. This was what I was.

This.

But it felt like a goodbye.

Of all the people who could have benched me, why, why did it have to be Jamie?

Dr Sullivan.

Kitty.

My boyfriend?

We’d never said those words to each other. Boyfriends. So maybe we weren’t that serious. Maybe what we had was nothing more than a couple of months of Bowie having all the feelings, and the other guy having none.

I’d invested far too much of myself. As per.

Like I did for every relationship. And every trade.

People saw me as temporary. Something great, for a brief span of time, but not long term.

Use me. Play me. Break me. Pass me off onto someone else.

This was why I never bothered to unpack my boxes. Why I never fully moved in anywhere.

What was the point? One season with a team, then a move across a country so big it had no fewer than six time zones. Maybe more. I couldn’t remember the exact number.

Another season, a different team, a different guy for me to latch my affections onto.

Rinse. Repeat.

Kitted up in everything, because why the fuck not, I headed from the locker room down the short padded corridor and burst out onto the ice, like an Ascot racehorse out of the blocks. I dug my edges in, and the tension melted from my body as the wind whipped my face under my half-shield. Instant balm.

The rink lights were on, but the stands were shrouded in darkness. Creepy. Apt. Anyone might be out there, lurking, watching me. But I knew it wouldn’t be him.

I sucked in the smells again.

I hadn’t even made it half a season with the Bobcats. And, okay, they weren’t talking about trading me just yet, but they never involved me in these discussions, anyway. I’d only know because I’d get a feeling from deep within. That something bad was creeping up on me.

Olly used to call it the ‘Impact Term’. The moment in Jurassic Park when the kids saw the water rippling in the glass before the T-Rex tore down the fence and ate that guy straight from the loo.

Harry used to call it the ‘Stampede’ after the bit where the ground shook and the rock bounced around in The Lion King, and then Mufassa got pancaked by a million cows.

Theo used to call it ‘Smell Ice Can Ya?’ because—well, you got the picture.

But Mum used to say it was the ‘Bowman Depth Perception’, and we’d all laugh at the term, because out of them all, it always sounded the most misaligned. But now I was starting to think she understood better than anyone.

Because it felt like I was constantly gauging, constantly second-guessing, how far, how deep I could get into something, before somebody came along and told me I wasn’t good enough. That they’d found some place else for me to be. And that it was all in my best interests, of course.

The Cavaliers have put in an offer.

The Bobcats have put in an offer.

Translation: we like you, but we’d rather have the dollar.

You’re young, kid, you’ll bounce back. You’ve got your entire future ahead of you.

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