Crazy Pucking Love (Taking Shots)

by Cindi Madsen

  I also knew that the second I saw Megan again, I’d forget about the valid reasons I wasn’t crossing the friends line and be tempted to push that boundary way farther than I should. But if anyone could turn the day around, it’d be her.

  So as the phone rang, I shoved logic away, ignored the high likelihood of her brother finding out we were hanging out—just friends or not, I was sure he wouldn’t take the news very well—and silently pleaded for her to pick up the phone.

  The instant her “hey” carried over the line, every muscle in my body relaxed, while my nerve endings pricked up, a clashing mix of relief and want.

  “What are you up to?” I asked, plopping down on the couch and kicking my feet on the coffee table, making a spot for them among the Gatorade bottles, dirty plates, and books.

  “Trying to figure out what I’m going to do, since my roommate’s sex buddy is about to come over and make being in my room awkward, with a side of unbearable.”

  “I just so happen to have my place to myself.” Hudson was with Whitney as usual, and Ryder had gone to visit his family since his mom had some political thing she needed him for. Thanks to the couple-hour drive, he always came home late—or early, depending how you looked at it—and I figured this was my chance to hang out with Megan without any questions, or the guys giving me shit about it. “I thought maybe we could just chill. Maybe watch some Netflix?”

  “Are you asking me to Netflix and chill?”

  I sat up stick straight, not realizing how it sounded until she put it that way. “No. I swear, I didn’t even think—”

  She laughed. “Relax. I was only joking. Want me to grab a pizza on my way?”

  “I’ll order the pizza. You just get yourself over here as soon as possible.”

  “See you in a few.”

  As soon as I hung up, I called in an order for pizza, and while I was waiting for Megan to arrive, I cleaned up the living room the best I could. I wasn’t sure what it said that I cared if my place was clean, but I decided not to analyze it too much, because tonight was about ignoring common sense.

  I nearly sprinted to the door to answer it when the knock finally came.

  Megan had a two liter of Coke under one arm and a package of Oreos under the other. “Your cheer-up squad is here!”

  “Squad? Squad usually implies several people.” I made a big show of looking around. “No other cheerleaders?”

  She tapped me on the chest. “Sorry, I’m no cheerleader.” The two-liter bottle slipped, and when she went to catch it, the cookie package slid a couple of inches. It crinkled as she curled it into her stomach with her forearm, making me think we might be feasting on crumbs. “Anymore, anyway.”

  I relieved her of the soda before she dropped it and we couldn’t open it without creating a volcano of foam. “Wait. Anymore? That means at one point you were a cheerleader?”

  She lifted her chin. “Until all the girls on the team thought it’d be funny to make me fall off the pyramid. I had a giant bruise on my ass for a week.”

  Do not think about her in a short cheerleader skirt or her ass.

  My just friends claim was crumbling by the second, that line drawn in the sand getting blown over enough I couldn’t quite see it anymore. “No wonder you decided to go squadless. Who said I needed cheering up?”

  “I could hear it in your voice,” she said, placing her hand on my arm, and my heart snagged in my chest, temporarily forgetting how to beat.

  The doorbell rang again, interrupting the warm fuzzy moment. This time, it was the pizza. After spreading the food out on the coffee table—good thing I’d cleaned it—we argued over what to watch.

  “Let’s see how you like it when I push your buttons,” Megan said, swiping the remote from me. She searched up a movie, and the horrible boy band she was so fond of popped onto the screen.

  “Hell no.” I snatched the controller out of her hands, holding it far out of her reach. “Now you’re grounded from decision making. I hope you’re happy.”

  “Excuse me for thinking you wanted to watch the ultimate fan guide to One Direction,” Megan said, crossing her arms and forcing out a huge huff. The twitching corners of her mouth made her mock anger crumble.

  “Mm-hm. How many times have you seen it?”

  She shrugged a shoulder. “Maybe twice. But it was when I was fifteen, which is probably still too old to be as obsessed as I was. I know the guys’ signs, where they were born… Pretty much all the scoop.” She nudged me with her elbow. “Jealous?”

  “Surprisingly, yes.”

  She laughed and then reached for another piece of pizza. “Would it make you feel better if I knew your sign? Your favorite color?”

  “I’m an Aries, I like the color blue, and I enjoy candlelit walks on the beach…”

  “Candlelit walks on the beach? That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Hot wax? Think about it.”

  She laughed again. “I think you have issues.”

  “Believe it or not, that’s not the first time someone’s suggested that.”

  Finally we settled on watching this obscure sci-fi movie neither of us had ever heard of—completely neutral territory, so I decided it was a go.

  I couldn’t stop glancing at Megan, and part of me wished this was a Netflix-and-chill situation. That cute little nose, those lips… It was almost worse that I knew what it was like to kiss them.

  Okay, maybe it was more than part of me.

  Time to remind myself of the reasons I needed to keep from crossing lines. She was Beck’s sister. I couldn’t promise her more than casual hookups, and we were way past that option. She’d already had to deal with too much disappointment in her life, and I didn’t want to add to it. Jazmine and I had been close at one time. We’d been such good friends, then we’d added more to the mix and it complicated everything. And look at where we were now, contempt bordering on hate.

  The thought of that happening with Megan… Of no more jokes and giving each other a hard time, or chill nights that gave me the escape I needed from life for a while? My chest ached at the thought. There was no one else I’d rather spend all my sleepless hours with. I couldn’t mess it up. No matter what.

  So I forced myself to pay attention to the movie. Every few minutes, Megan would refill her glass with Coke and offer me some more, but I waved it away. I was trying to cut down on my soda consumption since I already relied on coffee to keep me going, and too much of that crap would leave me winded on the ice.

  By her third—or was it fourth?—cup, Megan was clearly having a hard time sitting still. She kept crossing and uncrossing her legs, making it almost impossible not to think about how sexy they were. Then she’d wiggle her foot, while her fingers went to tapping on her thighs.

  Finally, I curled my hand over hers. “I think you’ve had too much caffeine.”

  “Maybe.” She bit her thumbnail. “Have you ever thought about what it’d be like in space? Like, would you get halfway to the moon and be like, jeez, this astronaut thing isn’t as fun as I thought it’d be? Then you’d still have to go land on the moon, and be like I already saw a picture of this desolate rock and it’s not any cooler in person, and make your way home.”

  She arched her eyebrows, leading me to believe she wanted an answer.

  “I can’t say that I have ever thought about that.”

  “Hmm.” She twisted a strand of hair around her finger. “You know what I used to be really good at? Figure skating. Sometimes I wish I hadn’t stopped. I took lessons when I got bored with the piano.”

  I lowered the volume on the unwatched movie—the characters in it seemed perfectly happy to be in space if you asked me, but maybe I hadn’t been paying enough attention. “You could probably get back into skating. There are plenty of rinks around here.”

  “Okay, let’s go to one.”

  “Right now?”

  She bobbed her head. “Why not? Or are you sick of skating? Is that like asking a doctor medical advice on his one day
off?”

  I grabbed the all but empty two liter and the package of Oreos. “You’re cut off. No more sugar or caffeine for you.”

  “But…” She slouched back against the cushions.

  “If you’re not digging this movie, we can choose something else.”

  “No, the movie’s fine, it’s me. I’ve put so much into this idea of a fresh start, and earlier today, I wondered if I’ve actually made any real progress, while also wondering if I’ve been too ambitious with my class load. A few are harder than I thought they’d be, and I suddenly worried that I’ll keep on the track I’ve chosen just to prove I can do it, and then four years from now I’ll look back and think I should’ve picked a different career path.”

  “And you’re thinking that maybe you should’ve made a career of figure skating?”

  She laughed and shook her head. “No. I just miss the ice sometimes. That gliding feeling, you know? I’m sure you know.”

  “I’ll get my skates,” I said. “Then we’re going to a rink.”

  “Really?” Excitement pitched her tone, the little squeak at the end totally endearing.

  “Really.” While I’d been looking forward to doing nothing, expending some energy would be nice. Especially since it’d hopefully keep my mind off expending energy in other ways, most of which involved me laying Megan back on the couch and kissing her until neither of us could breathe, much less worry about the future.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Megan

  This. This was what I needed. Gliding across the ice, pivoting and spinning. Even the icy sting of the cold air on my cheeks and filling my lungs helped wash away the anxiety that gouged at my internal organs all day.

  I dug in my toe, bringing myself to a stop. Dane slowly approached, his hands shoved into the pockets of his puffy blue coat, a slouched gray beanie on his head so that only the dark ends of his hair stuck out.

  This, and that guy right there—I already felt way better. Yes, I’d overdone it on the caffeine, but I couldn’t pinpoint the restless feeling I’d had all day. For the first week, I thought this college thing would be fairly easy. Once the assignments piled up during week two, though, and as my hours slept spread thinner and thinner over several days, it hit me what exactly I’d jumped into.

  I doubted another six months of high school would’ve properly prepared me, but for the first time since I’d decided on this track for my future, I questioned if it was what I really wanted.

  “The spinning thing is impressive,” Dane said, his words coming out on a white puff of air.

  “You do one now.” I made a circle with my finger, like otherwise he wouldn’t know what spinning entailed.

  He shook his head. “Nah. I’ll leave the fancy stuff to you.”

  “Oh, come on. I’ll show you how—it can’t be that different from hockey.”

  “The things you talk me into,” he muttered. I demonstrated, crossing one ankle over the other and folding my arms in tight before dragging out a toe in a wide circle and bringing myself to a stop.

  Dane attempted a couple of spins. Then he stumbled slightly, growled, and charged at me.

  “Wait! That’s not a spi—”

  He looped his arm around my waist, and spun us both—but instead of a figure-skating-type spin, it was an aggressive one, like he just got the puck and was going to break for the other goal.

  I elbowed him to make my getaway, and we sprinted across the ice after nothing, but the metaphorical thrown gauntlet meant we both gave it our all. Once we reached the other side, I doubled over, trying to catch my breath. “This is…hardly…fair. You’re used to skating more than I am.”

  “What would be a fair competition, then?” Dane lifted his arms. “Bring it on.”

  I wheezed a laugh, still struggling to fully fill my lungs with oxygen, then gripped his coat and used it to pull myself upright again. His cocky expression faded when our gazes met, another emotion taking its place.

  Desire rose, and I wanted to close the distance between our mouths and kiss him with reckless abandon, the way he kissed me that first night we met.

  He let out a shallow exhale and pulled back. “Megan…”

  “Please don’t say it. I already heard the speech.”

  “There are other things going on, too, and I just…I really like being friends with you, and I don’t want to do anything that’d mess—”

  I held up a hand and he stopped. My heart throbbed, and I hated that I suddenly understood the expression ‘so close, yet so far away.’

  …

  Dane opened the car door for me and even extended a hand to help me out. To our credit, we did a remarkable job of rushing back into the friend zone, only a minute or so of strained awkwardness as we’d left the rink.

  “You know, I recently changed my major,” Dane said. “I started in management and leadership, because…well, it was the easy degree the team’s academic advisor recommended. But now he’s no longer here, and I’m rethinking a few things. So I switched to Kinesiology…”

  At my confused look, he said, “Most people know it by exercise science. That’s why I have to take calculus and anatomy and biology, and I feel like I’m drowning, too. I wish I would’ve decided on a better backup earlier, but I’m halfway through my junior year and making the change, so if you decide you want to switch, you can. Nothing’s set in stone.”

  During my earlier freak-out, his words would’ve been exactly what I wanted to hear. Now…? I knew he had a point about not wanting to mess up our friendship because it meant a lot to me, too. I needed us to be okay.

  Still, the sting of rejection lingered, eerily familiar to the abandoned sensation I’d experienced way too often in my life. I pushed through it, telling myself there was no reason to feel lonely. Dane and I were friends. We’d continue to be friends, and I should be flattered that he cared so much about preserving that relationship. Somewhere inside, I did.

  I nodded, forcing myself to focus on this conversation here and now, not that moment on the ice. “True. And with my dad’s company as an option, it’s not like I’ll end up without a job. I know I could easily get one there.”

  “I’m sure your dad would be happy to work with you.”

  I frowned at him, confused.

  “Sorry, is that not something you want? Is he pushing you to work there? Is that why you had a…well, it wasn’t so much a freak-out, as a hyper-explosion of words.”

  “My dad died a couple of years ago,” I said, and as usual, saying it aloud brought up the ghost of grief that’d taken over my life for a while. “He and my mom were in a plane crash. I thought you knew.”

  “How would I know?”

  “Because you play hockey with Beckett.”

  Dane ran his fingertips across his jaw. “Before Lyla came into the picture, the guy hardly talked. And if he did, it was about hockey. He’s a lot more involved with the team now, but he still doesn’t talk about personal stuff much.”

  Considering the fact that my brother had almost let Lyla get away because of keeping everything all bottled up, I guess that shouldn’t surprise me.

  We neared my car, so I leaned on the hood and gave Dane the brief version of D&T Pharmaceuticals. How my great-grandfather started it and how my parents died a few years ago on their way home from a business trip. I withheld the part about their affairs. As I relayed what’d happened to Dane, I understood why Beckett hadn’t mentioned any of it—it wasn’t the kind of story you wanted to tell over and over.

  “My parents were gone a lot, and often it felt like it was just me and Beckett, which made us really close. But actually losing them for good…” A lump formed in my throat. “Well, you’re close to your family. I’m sure you can imagine how hard it was.”

  “I’m not even sure how you deal with something like that,” Dane said, his voice soft, “and I’m sorry you had to.”

  I blinked repeatedly so I wouldn’t start crying, working to keep it together.

  Dane moved over
and sat next to me on the hood of my car. “My parents were gone a lot, too, which made my sisters and I close in a lot of ways. But without parental supervision, we also got into plenty of trouble, not to mention some of the fights… I’ve broken up many a battle over borrowed-without-permission clothes and jewelry.” A smile ghosted across his lips, there for only a moment before it faded away.

  “Is it weird that that sounds kind of nice? I mean, I’m serious about my jewelry, but I always wished I had someone to share with and borrow from.”

  “I’m not sure many girls could pull off your giant earrings.” He reached up and flicked the longer of the asymmetrical heart drop earrings, and it made my pulse skitter under my skin, my body forgetting about the just-friends decree for a moment.

  All traces of humor faded from Dane’s features. “Right now things are off back home, and even all the way from here I can sense it. Yet I can’t really do anything about it, and it makes me feel so helpless.”

  “Care to expand? Maybe I can help?”

  He kicked at the ground and then his brown eyes lifted to my face. “I’d rather just forget it a while.”

  A shiver ran through me, and I wrapped my arms around myself. My nose and ears were passing the numb point, growing ever closer to the burning, angry point.

  “You’re freezing,” Dane said, frowning. “We should’ve had this conversation inside—I wasn’t even thinking.” He tipped his head toward the door of his place, only a few yards away.

  I glanced back at my car. It was late enough that Vanessa and Justin would probably be done with the part of the night I didn’t want to be there for.

  Dane placed his hand on my knee. “You should come in. I won’t be falling asleep anytime soon, and I’m not quite ready for tonight to be over. Unless you’re tired…”

  If I headed back to the dorm, I could lick my wounds alone, but then I’d be alone. Alone and sad sucked ass. “I’m always tired,” I joked, only it wasn’t a funny one because it was a little too true. “But since I won’t sleep if I go home, and I’m not looking forward to it, I could come in for a while.”