“Let’s talk about the worst-case scenario,” I try, remembering a tactic I read about in one of my courses. “We can get it out of the way so it doesn’t seem so scary.”
“Well,” Jack starts, “the worst-case scenario is I’ve fucked my arm up beyond repair, and I never get to play hockey again.”
“And what would you do if you couldn’t play hockey again?”
“I…I don’t know,” he says honestly. “I’ve never taken the time to think about it.”
“Is there anything else you love doing?”
He wiggles his eyebrows. “You mean besides you?”
“Focus,” I say, pinching his side.
“I don’t know,” he says forlornly. His brow furrows in thought as he considers the question, finally giving me a shrug. “I liked helping Ian out with the kid,” he tells me. “I liked showing him how to play.”
“Have you ever considered coaching?”
“I mean…maybe? In abstract? I’m not exactly the best with kids though.”
“Is coaching kids the only option?”
“It’s not like spots are opening up for NHL teams every day,” he points out.
“But that’s not to say they wouldneveropen up.”
“That’s a long shot by far.”
“I’m just trying to talk through the worst-case scenario,” I remind him. “This could all be for nothing.”
“It hurts today,” he admits quietly. “It has for days now.”
I slide my hand down the length of his arm, finding his fingers and intertwining mine with them. “It’s going to be okay,” I assure him. “No matter what happens.”
“You don’t know that,” he laments.
“I don’t,” I admit. “But we’ll get through it.”
He looks up at me with a question in his eyes. “We?”
I consider the ramifications of that, of allowing this thing between the two of us to escape out into the open. I’m sure with my history that the press will have something to say, and then there’s always the awkwardness of telling my brother that I fell into bed with the guy I thought I hated and then found out, wait, he’s pretty great. There’s all sorts of reasons why I should probably continue to keep this under wraps.
But seeing the hopeful expression Jack is giving me now, I realize that none of it matters.
“Yeah,” I answer softly. “We.”
He squeezes my hand then, looking at me like I hung the moon, and there’s a seriousness now to his gaze that has my heart racing. “Abby, I think you should know that I—”
There’s a knock at the exam room door then, interrupting him before he can finish, and I find myself a little desperate to know what the end of that sentence was. I tell myself there will be plenty of time to hear it later.
The doctor steps in with a chart in his hands, peering down at it before he addresses us.
“Mr. Baker?”
Jack sits up a little straighter. “That’s me.”
“How are we feeling today?”
Jack glances at me, and I nod back at him in encouragement.