Maybe I don’t deserve the rope my father is holding out to me. Maybe I should tell him to take his ultimatum and shove it up his ass. God knows I’ve done that plenty of times before.
But this time feels different. I’m teetering on the edge of actual destruction, and there is a very tiny part of me that is terrified by that. I’ve always had a safety net.Poor, spoiled little rich girl.
And there is a whisper, deep down, buried under months of self-sabotage. Just a tiny, fragile part of me that still wants to live and grab tightly to that rope.
I guess this must truly be rock bottom, because I’m selfish enough to finally reach for it.
* * * *
BEEP BEEP BEEP.My phone alarm is screaming into my ear. I smack my hand out to my nightstand, blindly reaching for the shrieking piece of metal, and only succeed in accidentally launching it across the room, where it continues its incessant beeping.
I growl in frustration, swing my legs over the side of my bed, raising my body up like I’m moving through molasses. Sleep is crusted in the corners of my eyes and I rub at it, a yawn escaping my mouth. I find my phone, which has somehow managed to land underneath my dresser, and I finally switch off the noise.
Four-thirty-two a.m., the clock reads.
Time to get moving, I guess. Elsie was expecting me at the rink at five a.m. I’m not sure what my tasks will be today, but my stomach is in knots over seeing her this morning. I haven’t spoken to Elsie in months, and our last interaction wasn’t exactly a positive one.
I brush my teeth, wash my face, and run a comb through my hair. It was getting longer now, auburn strands hitting right around my rib cage, and I can’t remember the last time I had it cut. Just showering was a hard enough chore these days.
My bare face stares at me in the mirror. It has been a long time since I had really looked at myself. Dark circles have permanently moved in under my eyes, and the once-prominent freckles across the bridge of my nose are now faded from hiding away in the dark for months. I consider putting on makeup, but ultimately decide against it. Maybe I’ll scare away anyone who tries to talk to me today if I look like a corpse.
I throw on a sports bra and leggings, zipping a tight athletic jacket over the top, and I quickly braid my hair down my back. My favorite baseball cap sits on my front entryway table and I grab it at the last minute, throwing it on top of my head.
My keys jingle in my hand as I lock my door and walk into the cold to my Jeep. Connecticut in early January is brutal. There’s no snow on the ground right now, but it’s icy and the windchill is unforgiving. February will probably be worse. It always gets colder right before the spring.
I sit in my Jeep, rubbing my hands together as I wait for the car to warm up, then slowly back out of my parking space. I should have remote started it, but I forgot in the chaos of being awake before dawn.
The drive to the rink is short, only ten minutes or so. The parking lot is as empty as I expected, but I can’t make myself park up front in the spot I usually would. I haven’t stepped foot in the rink since last April.
I think back to the Nationals team from the party this weekend. They’d recognize my Jeep instantly. Yeah, no, definitely can’t park where I usually would, so I circle around to the very back of the parking lot.
Wind whips at my face as I trek toward the rink. It takes several minutes to get there from my car, and my nose is cold and undoubtedly pink by the time I open the heavy glass doors. They groan under the weight, and I ease them shut behind me, careful not to let them swing closed.
I spot her before she spots me.Elsie.She’s standing at one of the concession stand counters, deep into reading some stack of papers. Her blonde hair is streaked with gray these days and it reflects the can lights above her head. I shove embarrassment deep down, an act I’m so used to doing by now, it’s secondnature. I know she has to hear my feet clicking against the linoleum floors, but she doesn’t look up.
“You’re late,” she says, barely glancing at me from the paperwork in her hand. I look at the clock above her head.Five-oh-four a.m.“I told your dad you could work here under two conditions—you don’t fuck around and you get here on time.” Her icy eyes finally look up and meet my own hazel ones.
“I—” I start, then stop myself. What good would an excuse do with Elsie? I stopped talking to her because she saw through every inch of my bullshit, and it hurt too much to be called out continuously. “Won’t happen again.” I shuffle my feet.
“You’re on bathrooms to start.” She isn’t looking at me anymore. “Girls’ locker room, guys’ locker room, guest bathrooms and the staff bathroom. You know where the supply closet is. I’d better be able to eat off it when you’re done.”
I fuckingknewshe’d put me on bathrooms. That was always my punishment when I’d mouth off to her growing up. I can’t count how many times I heard,If you’re going to talk like you belong in a toilet, you’re going to clean them up, too. Maybe that’ll teach you to quit jawing.
It hadn’t. I was mouthy from the time I stepped into this rink to the day I walked out of it.
Elsie was stern. No-nonsense. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard her tell me in words, but I never doubted for a second that she loved me more than my own mother did. I had always wondered if maybe something would develop between her and my father—I used to spy glances between the two of them growing up—but to my knowledge, nothing ever has. Or maybe they’re sneakier than I give them credit for.
The day I left the rink, I shouted at her. She was pushing me to get back on the ice, even if I wasn’t at thelevel I was before. I told her to go fuck herself in front of an entire class of eleven-year-old girls.
Elsie had put up with me pushing back at her for over a decade but that day…that day, I pushed too far.
“Get out of my rink and don’t you dare come back until you’re ready to stop taking your anger out on the people who love you, Monroe Abrams.”
I trudge to the supply closet, leaving Elsie standing up at the front of the rink. It won’t officially open until six-thirty, so I have a little time to get going before the rink is teeming with people.
Occasionally, you’ll get a skater—figure or hockey—booking an earlier time slot. Generally one of the Wolverines running drills or a figure skater working early with a coach, so I’m not too surprised to see one of the Wolverines on the ice already. I peek in to see who it was.
Rhodes McKnight.