Page 91 of The Chase

“TJ’s hopeless!”

She walked back into the living room and gave him a quick kiss. They were a little too cutesy for me right now. I needed to get out of here.

“I’m gonna go.”

“You sure?” Noah asked.

“I need to be alone,” I said.

Dinah frowned. “Have dinner with us, and then you can go grovel, okay?”

I shook my head. “I’m good. Thanks for listening to me.”

I didn’t let either of them get another word in edgewise, and I went next door. Benny left me a note about leftovers in the fridge, so I ate that in silence in front of the blank TV screen. Dinah and Noah tried to help, but I think I was beyond that. I fucked up too big, and I wasn’t sure I had a girlfriend anymore.

I wondered if Max was going to close her heart off from me forever now. I should have gone to her and apologized in person and talked it through with her. Her accusations hurt me. I never told my sister that my girlfriend didn’t like her job; that wasn’t my place, and it bothered me that Max immediately jumped to that conclusion. I didn’t want to lose her, but my reaction today made me feel like I already had.

I had to use this next road trip to think about what I really wanted.

* * *

When we touched down in Toronto, I got a text from my dad asking to meet me for a drink after I got through all the team bullshit today. We didn’t play until tomorrow, so I knew my sister called him.

I tried to compose another text to Maxine. I wanted to call her, but that ‘K’ text had seared into my brain and told me everything I needed to know. I knew I’d messed up, but I wasn’t sure how to fix it. I also knew it wasn’t my fault alone, but I couldn’t help but feel like such a fuckup.

I wasn’t in the mood to talk to my dad before the game. To Alain Desjardins, hockey was everything. I had a feeling he would tell me to focus on winning the cup instead of my broken heart.

It was hard to have a hockey player as a dad. I was constantly compared to him and expected to play as well as him. They expected me to be a faster skater, a better goal scorer, and a smarter playmaker. I was doing my best, but I would never shake the feeling that my best wasn’t good enough. That I wasn’t good enough.

When I met my dad at the bar, I was thankful there was already a beer waiting for me, and I took a huge gulp of it.

“Buddy,” Dad said.

“I think I fucked up,” I blurted out.

Dad raised an eyebrow and raked a hand through his greying hair. “Yeah, your sister told me you’re having girlfriend troubles. I didn’t even know you had a girlfriend.”

“We’ve been dating for a couple months,” I said.

I let my sentence hang in the air for a moment. Dad picked up his beer and sipped it like he was waiting for me to continue. I stared into my beer glass, not sure where to start.

I took my phone out and showed him my background. It was a photo Rox had taken of Max and me at my condo when we had people over for a party. In the photo, I was standing behind Max with my arms wrapped around her while she looked up at me and smiled.

He slid the phone back to me. “She’s cute. Tell me about her.”

“She’s shy until you get to know her. She’s a vegetarian, and she loves the Bulldogs, and Claude LaVoie was her childhood crush.”

Dad chuckled at that last part, but I ignored him and continued.

“But she was in a car accident in high school that killed her parents, and now she has night terrors and anxiety. I was such an asshole to her when she was having a bad day.”

“You apologize?”

I nodded.

“What did she say?”

I shook my head. “All she texted back was ‘k.’ Like, what the fuck?”