Center Ice (8 page)

We started walking again and Tyler took some time to digest what I’d told him. But apparently he was still having trouble. “Like, if I asked you who won the Stanley Cup last year…”

“I know what the Stanley Cup
is
. I know people get excited about it way too late in the year, when it’s already practically summer time and I can’t understand why anyone’s still playing hockey. But, no, I have no idea who won. I don’t know who played. I could probably name a few teams in the league if I had to, but…that’s about it.” I was starting to get nervous. I really liked this guy. And everybody knows girls are supposed to care about the same things their boyfriends care about. Not that Tyler was my boyfriend, but…a girl could dream. Was I screwing all this up by not liking hockey? “I maybe just don’t know enough about it,” I tried. “I’m sure it’s a good game.”

“It’s a great game,” he said with the quiet confidence of someone stating common knowledge. “But…” he looked over at me with a crooked grin. “It’s not your thing. That’s fine.” He nodded as if confirming to himself that it was okay. “It’s kind of cool, actually. I mean, it’s nice to be with someone with some perspective on it all. Does that make sense?”

“I guess?” It seemed like I was going to get away with this, but I didn’t want to screw it up by saying the wrong thing now. “But one step below the NHL? And you’re the top scorer? That’s good, right?”

“Well, I used to think so,” he said with exaggerated sensitivity. “Now, it doesn’t seem too great, all of a sudden.”

“Poor princess,” I said, and I gave him a hip check that ended up brushing my elbow against his. I sucked a pained breath of air in through my teeth, and of course he noticed.

“Your arm?” he asked concernedly. “What happened?”

It was strange, but I didn’t want to tell him. Not because I was ashamed, or because I wanted it to be a secret, but just because it seemed like time for it to be over. I had no idea what was going on with Miranda, but I was pretty sure Sara was right; there was more to this than just having trouble adjusting to a new person in the family. She’d obviously been miserable, back at the house, and I wasn’t cruel enough to take that as a personal victory. It was time for me to move on. So I just shrugged. “Wiped out on concrete and scratched up my elbows. Not one of my more graceful moments.”

“You scratched your elbows…you wiped out
backwards
?” He was clearly trying to picture it in his mind and having some difficulty. “How’d you manage that?”

“I’m like a ninja,” I said seriously. “I have special skills.”

“Skills that let you fall over backwards on concrete.”

“They don’t come in handy all that often,” I admitted, “but when I need them, I’ll be ready.”

“Okay,” he said calmly. “That’s good to know.” We walked on in friendly silence for a while, and it wasn’t long before we could see the flames of several bonfires and hear music and laughing and fun.

But now that we were so close, I was suddenly shy. I wasn’t a huge partier at the best of times, and this was far from the best. I was with a hot guy, and he seemed nice, but I barely knew him, and I didn’t know
anyone
else. Which would have been fine, if none of them had known me. But I thought of the girls in the drugstore the day before and wondered how many other people had heard Miranda’s version of my life. “Who did you ask?” Tyler looked at me blankly, so I clarified. “When you were curious about why I was living at the Beacons’. Who did you ask?”

“A friend’s girlfriend. Why?”

“It’s just weird, people I’ve never met thinking they know stuff about me.”

Tyler’s smile was sweet, but there was a little bit of teasing when he said, “Welcome to Corrigan Falls, Karen. Small towns are different.” He nudged me gently with his hip, pushing me in the direction of the party. “Come meet people. They can get to know you themselves, and then they won’t have to bother with gossiping.”

“Yeah.” It sounded good, in principle, and I let him guide me forward. It was an opportunity, I told myself. This was my new life.

I just had to get used to it.

Chapter Twelve

- Tyler -

I led Karen along a grassy path between the dunes and we came out onto the beach. There was a big bonfire in the middle of the space, and a few smaller fires around the edges, but there was no other light. The breeze was cool coming in off the lake, but I knew it’d be warm near the fires. Karen stopped walking and looked around, and I remembered my own reaction to my first Corrigan Falls beach party. The town was plain and a bit ragged during the day, but on nights like this? The whole scene felt like something from a movie.

“It looks more like a bunch of little parties,” Karen said. Maybe she’d been a little less impressed by it all than I had been. After all, she was from the city, and probably went to big events all the time.

“It’s still early,” I said. I didn’t want to sound defensive, but it was true. “People are in their groups, getting warmed up. Once it gets busier, and everyone gets drunker, they’ll mix more.” I hadn’t realized how much I valued all this until just then, as I worried that she wouldn’t like it.

“I don’t have a group,” she said quietly. “Can I borrow yours?”

“Absolutely.” I guided her across the sand toward the team, but she was still looking around like she wasn’t totally comfortable.

“People are staring at us,” she whispered.

I’d gotten so immune that I hadn’t noticed. “I told you,” I said lightly, “I’m a big deal. Very important. People care what I do.” She didn’t look convinced, which I still really liked. “Plus, you’re new. Everyone’s curious. Don’t worry about it.”

I let my fingers brush against hers, just to see her reaction, and then did it again. She looked up at me, one eyebrow raised, and I grinned back at her as I took her hand more firmly. “Okay?” I asked.

“Okay,” she agreed, and squeezed my fingers tighter than I’d expected.

“Mac Daddy!” a familiar voice called out, and I turned my head, then raised my free hand in acknowledgement.

“Winslow!” I called back, and steered Karen in that direction. “He’s a good guy,” I said quietly as we got closer. “Some of the team…they’re a bit rough. But Winslow’s okay.”

“Hey, dude,” Winslow said, reaching out a hand and giving me a fist-bump. “You made it. Good. It’s a team thing.”

“It’s a kegger, and three quarters of the team is underage,” I corrected. “You make sure the coaches don’t hear you saying it’s for the team.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Winslow said dismissively. Then he turned to Karen. “Chris Winslow,” he said, and nodded to the dark-haired girl nestled under his arm. “And this is Terri.”

“Tori,” she corrected. She shrugged at Karen as if they should both understand he couldn’t be expected to know better, and I cringed. Winslow was bad at names. He’d only learned mine after I’d pointed out the fast food connection, and he still wasn’t sure about most of the rookies on the team. But Karen didn’t know that, and she might think he’d gotten Tori’s name wrong because he was an uncaring asshole who treated women like they were interchangeable. And I didn’t want her to think that about him. Or about me.

“I’m Karen,” she said, cutting through all my stupid angsting with an easy smile.

“Karen’s a friend of mine,” I told Winslow, putting just a little extra emphasis on the word ‘friend’. He’d know what that meant.

Winslow gave her another look and then nodded slowly. “Nice to meet you.” He half turned and gestured into the shadows. “The keg’s in the truck bed. Help yourselves.” He looked at Karen, then me. “Dawn’s got a bunch of coolers and stuff, too, if you want. I think they’re in the cab of the truck.”

“Thanks,” I said. He’d gotten my message clear enough. I didn’t let go of Karen’s hand as I guided her toward the truck. “You want a cooler?”

“Beer’s fine,” she said, then added, “I’m not a huge drinker.”

“I don’t know if that is going to work for you up here. Once it gets cold, drinking’s about all there is to do at night.”

“No TV, this far north? No books? No conversation, or video games, or cooking classes?”

I squinted at her. “Cooking classes? That’s what you think’s going to keep you busy?”

“Yeah, that was a weird thing to say,” she admitted with a grin. “I just thought of it because my best friend in the city loves to cook. She was always trying to get me to take classes with her. But usually I’d just go to her house and eat her homework.”

“I don’t understand that. Isn’t cooking, like…don’t you just follow the recipe? Why do you need a class?” I pulled a couple plastic cups from a stack in the bed of the truck and held one under the tap of the keg.

“There’re techniques,” Karen said. “Like, you’re pouring a beer, right? The recipe might just say ‘pour a beer’, but you have a way of doing it. Tilting the cup, letting the beer hit the side first…whatever. That’s the kind of stuff she’d learn.
And
recipes.”

“I like the ‘eat the homework’ idea.” I handed her a filled cup and then poured my own before reclaiming her hand. It felt natural, like it just made sense for us to be touching each other. “Come on,” I said. “I’ll introduce you to some people.”

And that was when things got kind of stressful. Because practically everyone in town was at the party, at least everyone between about fifteen and twenty-five, and there were quite a few people in that age category that I didn’t really want Karen to talk to. Which was stupid, because it had been my idea to come to the party in the first place, and I’d known who would be there. I guess I just hadn’t thought it through. Everything seemed so simple when it was just me and Karen, but I should have known things would get complicated once other people were added to the mix.

I’d have to face my past sooner or later, but for tonight, at least, I didn’t want to. So I steered Karen through the party like we were playing that old video game where the frog has to get across the road. We’d hop a little bit forward, say ‘hi’ to a few people, and then I’d spot trouble coming and we’d jump a few spots to the left, finding another group for a quick greeting and then someone else would approach and I’d tug Karen away, trying to keep us from getting splatted by a big frog-killing truck.

Not quite what I’d had in mind when I’d suggested Karen come out with me. Maybe I should have suggested we do something with just the two of us, but it had seemed too early for that, somehow. Which made no sense, because we’d already spent a whole afternoon alone together, but that had been kind of accidental. This? Showing up at her house, talking to her dad, even. It felt like a date. And I was pretty sure it felt the same way to her, but I wasn’t totally positive, and if she
did
feel that way I wanted her to keep thinking of it that way. A date, not a hook up. Something that might be the start of something. That’s what I was hoping she was seeing tonight.

“You know a lot of people,” she said after we’d made several hops. “But who are you really
friends
with?”

“The team,” I said without hesitation. “Winslow, and Coop—I haven’t seen him yet, but he’ll be around somewhere. I’m pretty tight with most of them, I guess.”

“But we haven’t been hanging out with them tonight?”

No, because the team was at the center of all the speeding vehicles my frog was trying to avoid. But that wasn’t something I wanted to explain to Karen, so I just shrugged. “I spend a lot of time with them already. It’s nice to have a change.”

So, there it was. I lied to her. Not a big lie, but I was hiding something I shouldn’t have been hiding, and it didn’t feel good at all.

Chapter Thirteen

- Karen -

Tyler and I roamed all over the beach, until everything turned into a blur of unfamiliar faces, a cacophony of new names, and too many subtle interactions and reactions for me to begin to keep track of. He repeated the phrase “my friend” with the same special emphasis to practically every guy we met, and it began to get on my nerves. Was he making it clear that he wasn’t really interested in me? I mean, I’d thought the hand-holding meant something, but maybe he was just touchy-feely? I wasn’t as flashy as most of the other girls, that was for sure. I felt mousy, my dress too conservative compared to their outfits, my hair too simple, my makeup more appropriate for the gym than for a party. Maybe the hand-holding didn’t mean as much as I was hoping it did; maybe he just wanted to keep track of me in the crowd.

He eventually released me when I had to go to the bathroom. I walked to the concrete building with a couple other girls, and I listened to them talking as we stood in line. They’d apparently come to the party with each other, but were hoping to leave with guys, preferably hockey players.

“Too bad you already scooped Tyler up,” one of them said to me. She didn’t sound hostile, just resigned. “I almost had him last spring, and I was totally planning to close the deal tonight.” She shrugged. “Oh well. Next time.”

“He’s worth the wait,” the other girl said. “I would absolutely go back for second helpings of him.” She turned to me. “You’re going to have a
good
time.” Their laughter was somewhere between giggles and cackling, and I was incredibly relieved when a stall door swung open and I was able to take the excuse to get away from them.

I bolted the thin metal door behind me and tried to figure it out. Mostly, I tried to think of a way for them to have been talking about something other than what I
thought
they were talking about, but I couldn’t do it. One of those girls had come to this party with plans to have sex with Tyler, and the other one already
had
, and would be happy to do it again. No shyness, no broken hearts, just…sex.

With Tyler.

I went through the motions in the stall, my mind far away, and when I was done I bent over a sink and splashed water on my face, trying to cool down. Was this what Tyler was expecting from me? Casual sex, no attachment, no real feelings, just…what had the first girl said?
Closing the deal
.

I saw one of the girls come out of her stall and head for the sink, but I didn’t wait for her. I’d only had two beers over a couple hours, but I suddenly felt dizzy, and my brain wasn’t working properly. I wasn’t a virgin. I’d had a serious boyfriend in the spring, and we’d ended up having sex a few times before having a stupid fight and breaking up. He’d been cute, but nothing like Tyler. If Tyler expected sex tonight, was I prepared to go through with it? I wasn’t ready for it, psychologically, but maybe that didn’t matter. If sex was what it took to keep him in my life, and if I
did
want him, then maybe it wasn’t that big of a deal to just go a little faster than I’d be completely comfortable with.

It felt wrong, but it felt wrong to think about walking away from him, too. Or watching him walk away from me, when he realized that I was just a scared little kid, not a sophisticated woman like these others. I pushed through the crowd and found my way down to the lake. The air was cool, but I kicked my sandals off and waded in up to my ankles. I was tempted to just keep going, to swim away from the confusion, but I knew it would just follow after me. And of course, I started thinking about my mom, and how good she’d been about all this stuff. I’d talked to her about sex last time, and she’d been calm and accepting, letting me know she thought I should take it slow, but not making me feel like a slut. She’d been the best mom ever, and now she was gone. But I wasn’t ready to be alone; I still needed her.

“You okay?”

I turned to the shore and saw Tyler, silhouetted against the light of the campfire. I thought of his gentle smile and quiet humor and tried to reconcile it with what the girls had said.

“I don’t know,” I answered.

He was wearing jeans, but he didn’t even hesitate before wading out to me, the water soaking the cuffs of his pants. At least he’d just had sport sandals on, so he wasn’t ruining his shoes. Still, I felt like an idiot, someone who constantly needed rescuing and caretaking.

“No, I’m fine,” I said, and when he got close I took a step back, away from him.

He stopped moving. “What happened?”

“I’m just being stupid. Sorry.” But I still didn’t want to touch him, and he seemed to be able to tell.

“Do you want to go home? I can walk you home if you want.”

“So you can come back and hook up with somebody else?” I snarled. Apparently I’d decided to address this head on. If Tyler was just a junior version of Will, I needed to know now. “That girl with the white shorts, maybe. She said she’d be interested. Or her friend. I guess you’ve already slept with her, but she seemed like she’d be happy with another round.”

Tyler’s jaw literally dropped. He looked adorably confused, the moonlight casting dark shadows beneath his cheekbones, his eyes wide with surprise. “Shit,” he finally said. “I didn’t think they’d move in so fast.”

“What? Move in?” I shook my head. “Is that true, Tyler? I mean, Miranda kept implying that you’re…you know. A bit promiscuous. But I thought she was just being bitchy. I don’t…this is freaking me out, Tyler.”

He nodded slowly. “Yeah. I can see that. I’m sorry.”

“But it’s true. You…” I wasn’t sure how to put it into words. “That’s what you do. You sleep with lots of girls, just one-night-stands, just…”

“Karen,” he said as if he wanted my attention, but once I gave it to him he didn’t seem to have much to say. Finally, he said, “Yeah. I guess. I mean, it’s the hockey. That’s why they’re interested. They’re puck bunnies, you know?”

I stared at him for a moment, trying to wrap my ears around what he seemed to have said. I couldn’t do it. “They’re
what
?”

He looked uncomfortable. “Puck bunnies. Like…like hockey groupies.”

“You have groupies. And they’re called ‘puck bunnies.’” It was sinking in, but it wasn’t making much sense.

“That’s the more polite term. You don’t want to hear the others.” He looked like he knew this wasn’t going over too well with me, but he kept talking. “This is my third year in the league. The first two years…it kind of went to my head, I guess. I was sixteen, living away from home and hanging out with guys who did the same things, and these girls—women, sometimes—they were throwing themselves at me, and…I caught a lot of them. It was fun, and everybody knew the rules.”

“The rules?”

“That it’s not something serious. It’s not a
relationship
, or anything, it’s just fun.”

“Sex,” I clarified.

He shrugged uncomfortably. “Yeah. Usually. But always with protection. I was always really careful about that.”

“How many…” I started, but I caught myself. “No. I don’t want to know.” At least the conversation had clarified one thing for me. “I’m not like that. I mean, these girls… I’m not going to call them what you call them, I don’t think. I mean, is it an insult? It sounds like an insult.”

“Puck bunny? I don’t know. Like I said, it’s the most polite word I know for them.”

“But they’re not, like, a club. They’re individual people. Calling them all by the same name, it seems… I don’t like it.”

He frowned thoughtfully. “Okay. Most of the girls I’ve gone out with have a habit of sleeping with hockey players. Is that better?”

“And you have a habit of sleeping with lots of girls,” I said pointedly.

He nodded slowly, accepting responsibility. “Yeah. I guess so.”

“I’m not like that.” I honestly hadn’t been sure until I heard myself say the words, but once they were out of my mouth I knew they were true. I liked Tyler, a lot, but I’d seen too much of Will to let myself turn into Natalie. “If that’s at all what you’re expecting, then, yeah, I guess you should walk me home now, because it’s not going to happen.”

But he shook his head. “No. That’s not what I’m expecting. You’re not a…” He stopped and frowned at me, searching for more acceptable words. “That’s not what I expect from you.”

“But it’s what people expect from you,” I said slowly, thinking of Miranda’s accusations. “And if I’m with you…”

“The guys know. When I told them you were my friend, they knew. It’s like a code, kind of. That’s why Winslow offered you a cooler—the keg’s good enough for—” he caught himself again, shook his head in frustration, and said, “good enough for some people. But girlfriends get coolers.”

I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. Hearing the word
girlfriend
come out of his mouth, referring to me, should have made me ecstatic. But the ridiculous ranking of human beings, the matter-of-fact way he was talking about all the casual sex he’d had…it was overwhelming. “Okay,” I said. “I’m still freaking out a bit. I mean, I like you. I’ve had fun with you. But I don’t know if I’m ready for something like this. You know?”

“I should have kept you to myself,” he said quietly. “We could have gone swimming, and driven up the peninsula, and kept running together. I should have kept you away from all this crap.”

“It was just a matter of time,” I said slowly. “School starts soon, and lord knows Miranda’s been looking for any excuse to trash you. I would have found out sooner or later.”

“But later would have been better. I would have had more time to prove to you that I’m past that.”

“Are you? Why? I mean, if it was so much fun, why do you want to quit?”

He frowned at me. “I want something different, I guess. I don’t need to have fun all the time, not if it’s getting in the way of something bigger. Screwing around with…whatever you want to call them…it was fine while it lasted, but now I want something more.”

He was saying all the right things. But I wasn’t sure if it was enough. “My head’s spinning,” I confessed. “I think I should go home. Thanks for thinking of me tonight.” Saying the words was hard, but once they were out, I felt better. Going home was an excellent idea, and I started determinedly toward the shore.

Tyler followed after me. “I’ll walk you,” he said.

“No, you don’t have to.”

“We don’t have to talk. Or, if you don’t want to be seen with me, I can walk half a block behind, or something. But I should walk you, or you should call your dad for a ride. It’s Friday night, and there’s lots of drunk assholes out looking for trouble.”

“And what about the other girls? Who’s going to make sure
they
get home safely?”

He snorted in exasperation. “They can get home the same way they got out, just like you can. I can’t be responsible for everyone, Karen, but I should be responsible for you. I asked you to come, so I should see you home.”

He really did seem like a decent guy. And a total slut who used girls like they were toys. I had no idea what to do with the contradiction.

So we walked home in silence, and I tried not to miss the feel of his fingers wrapped around mine. When we got to the sidewalk in front of the house, we stopped walking and he said, “I missed running today because we had fitness testing at practice; I needed to save my energy. But I’ll be there tomorrow. Will you be there?”

“I have no idea,” I said, and I turned and walked slowly toward the house.