Page 117 of Blindside Me
I snap on latex gloves and start with the benches farthest from his locker. Methodical. Precise. Spray, wipe, and move on. The rhythm settles my racing thoughts for about thirty seconds.
A strand of blonde hair falls from my messy bun. I ignore it. It can stay right where it is. Maybe it’ll hide the dark circles under my eyes.
I move to the next bench, then the next. Work my way around the U-shaped room, deliberately dragging out the trip to his locker. The guys are surprisingly neat, but I still find protein bar wrappers wedged between benches, a forgotten mouth guard, and someone’s damp jockstrap.
Why is it damp?
Concluding I don’t want to know, I drop the jockstrap into the laundry bin with a grimace. “Men are disgusting.”
But the words lack conviction. Drew’s space was always immaculate. Obsessively organized as if his life depended on every item staying exactly where he placed it. Control freak. Perfectionist. Broken.
No. I can’t think about that last one. Not yet.
I attack a scuff mark on the floor, channeling frustration into elbow grease. Ten days since Barton’s. Ten days of him avoiding me. Ten days of pretending I’m fine.
My roommate suggested therapy. I chose scrubbing a hockey locker room instead.
“This is stupid,” I mutter, but I keep cleaning because the alternative is my dorm. My sketchbook. My thoughts.
And right now, I’m afraid of all three.
My uncle stopped by my class yesterday, catching me after Creative Writing ended. Asked how I was holding up. I gave him the smile I perfected at thirteen when Mom walked out for the fourth time.
“I’m fine.”
“Drew’s suspension is two games,” he’d said as if that was what I was worried about.
“Good for him.”
He’d studied me for a beat too long. “If you need to talk?—”
“I don’t.”
But maybe I do. Maybe that’s why I’m here, wiping down lockers where sweaty hockey players store their gear when I could be elsewhere.
Regardless of what my uncle was trying to say, I still can’t shake off the feeling he’s still watching.
I check all the shower stalls for stray washcloths. Reorganize the towel shelves. Twenty minutes later, I’ve run out of excuses to avoid the corner where locker Thirty-Three waits.
Drew’s locker.
I could leave now. Pretend I didn’t see the number. But my feet keep moving like they know better than I do.
I stare at the door. My hands hover. One breath. Two. Then I pull. The locker opens with a metallic groan.
It’s empty.
The hooks are bare, and the shelf is wiped clean. I don’t know what I expected to find, but emptiness wasn’t it.
I slam the locker shut, mind reeling. Uncle Rick said he’s coming back so why is it empty? Shaking off the eeriness sweeping through me, I grab another wrapper from the floor and toss it in the trash. When I move away, I catch a reflective shine coming from the trash can.
What the heck?
I lean in to get a closer look and gasp. Buried amongst the trash are Drew’s skates, shattered and unrecognizable. I blink, but their appearance doesn’t change.
A clean crack opens inside me as I lift to examine them. These aren’t just worn out or beat up. They’redestroyed.The right one’s blade is bent at an unnatural angle. The right skate is cracked all the way up the side, just like my sketch. Unusable. Abandoned. A perfect fucking metaphor for his absence.
Those skates were sacred to him. Old and battered, but he refused to replace them despite Coach’s repeated insistence.“They’rebroken in just right,” he’d say, that rare half-smile playing on his lips.
