Page 128 of Any Second Now
I scoff and break eye contact with Lucy, pretending like her words aren’t twisting a knife in my gut. She’s absolutely passive-aggressively continuing the conversation we had when she questioned why I couldn’t stay. Why I couldn’t actually date her brother.
Reese and Oliver are watching our exchange with wide eyes.
“I feel like we missed something,” Reese says slowly.
“Aye. I’m sure of it.”
But I cross my arms and Lucy keeps her lips zipped. She unmutes the television and we watch the Blizzard players skate onto the ice. I look away when they show Atticus.
My stomach rolls. Why am I fighting with my best friend? The person I’ve missed so much this summer and was exactly who I needed to see after breaking up with her brother?
Is it because I can’t help but wonder if she’s right?
She implied that I’ve made up the rules to my life, and that I don’t really need to be following a perfect life plan anymore. Well, I get it, which is why I deleted my spreadsheets.
And now I have a blank next chapter in front of me, waiting to be written.
How will I pen it?
I’m a bit afraid that if the story is that I sold my RV and flew back to Connecticut to my old life—but worse—than maybe I don’t deserve to be the main character at all.
So whatwoulda main character do? Because I want to give off that energy. I don’t want to be a side character.
I wasn’t acting like a side character this summer.
But now I’m gonna go back to my old life?
Just like that?
And it’s happening soon.
CHAPTER 28
Tourists
ATTICUS
Friday, August 1
Fresh off a win in the charity tournament, everyone is in a good pre-game mood in the locker room.
I send Lucy a picture from earlier today before clicking off as Coach Jackson walks to the middle of the locker room for his pep talk. Like a bunch of middle school kids on a field trip, a group of us took the ferry over to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island this morning. It was actually really moving. I never went as a kid. There was a New York City field trip in high school, but I was so wrapped up in hockey there was no way I could take four days to do tourist shit.
And now I have group photos of me, Kellen, Harley, Lachlan, and freaking Barrett Steele in front of the Statue of Liberty, taken on the ferry by an attractive middle-aged woman who definitely didn’t know who we were but stared at the group of us with wide eyes. Barrett kept staring at her like he wanted to gobble her up. Maybe the kid’s got a thing for older women.
Coach Jackson launches into a speech about working together, staying motivated, skating hard, and the weaknesses of the otherteam. He wraps up with the lineups for the game, as he always does.
I half zone out, as there aren’t usually surprises or major shifts.
“First line offense: Kellen in center, Atticus as right wing, Barrett as left wing. Starting defensive line is Lachlan and Jasper.”
Oh, shit.
A heavy silence settles on the room and seems to stretch unnaturally long. Not that we weren’t respectfully listening before, but starting the game with Barrett in Harley’s place on the first line?
Everyone takes a pause at that.
Fucking intense.
