19. Sophie

nineteen

Sophie

I sit frozen in my seat, waiting for Axl to acknowledge me after the game, but it is clear he needs some time alone. I haven’t seen this side of him before—the side where he’s hard on himself. Guilt snakes back into my gut, reminding me that although the last two days have been magical, I can’t ignore that Axl deserves to know the truth, even if it hurts him. If he’s this hard on himself over one loss, I can’t imagine how hard he’ll be on me if he thinks I intentionally tricked him.

The thing is, we both went into this knowing it was fake, and we both had something to gain from the deception. He can’t be mad at me for that part. I never expected the emotions to snowball, and I need to clear the air about this.

The timing is horrible.

He gave me his jersey!

I can’t wear his jersey while knowing what I know.

The guilt is so thick that I’m nearly trembling, but I can’t risk blurting anything out in public, so I race home. We need to talk tonight, but I struggle with what to say. I know he’s down, and I decide to try to cheer him up. I text:

Sophie: I’m still wearing your jersey.

The dots immediately appear on my phone indicating he’s texting back, and excitement bubbles in my gut.

Axl: Take it off!

Panic leaps in my throat, as the realization hits that something terrible has happened. I try to text, but my fingers are clumsy, and I’m afraid. Instead, I press call on his name and put the phone to my ear, and pray he picks up.

Who am I fooling?

Of course he doesn’t answer, and hot tears prick the backs of my eyes. He’s upset about the game, but he wouldn’t say that to me unless something else happened.

And since there is something terrible he could find out, my mind goes to the worst.

He can’t possibly know.

I cool my expression while I breathe and collect my purse and phone. I head down the hall, taking my mom’s keys off the hook, and call to my parents, who are watching the news in the living room, “Going out. Taking the car.”

“Where are you going?” Mom asks.

“I have to find Axl. I did something incredibly stupid, and I have to apologize.” I wish I could lie, but I have a suspicion my lying days are over.

“Do you know where he lives?” Mom is crocheting something in her lap, but she manages to lift a brow in my direction while continuing her perfect stitches.

“I know the out-of-town players all stay in the apartments across from the rink.”

“All except Axl,” Mom says as she continues to stitch.

“How do you know that?”

“How do I know anything? Norma and her reliable church friends. She saw you last night sitting on the porch and came over earlier while you were gone. She made it a point to tell me everything she knows about him. For some reason that Norma couldn’t figure out, even though she inquired about it to all her friends, Axl rents a room above the barber shop downtown. She says it’s an older building, not even having air conditioning for the summer, and it’s not nearly as nice as the new complex the other guys stayed at. She was wondering if I knew the scoop.”

“Wow, thanks for the info, Mom.” Normally, I’d chuckle at something so ridiculously nosey as this, but tonight, I want to thank my lucky church ladies. I slip my shoes on and call out, “Don’t wait up for me!”

The weather has changed, and snow flurries flutter down. It’s nothing threatening but it makes driving at night a little hard, especially once I get into town and have to deal with the glaring light from the lamp posts. I know exactly where the barber shop is, and I don’t slow down until I’m parked outside of it. Sure enough, Axl’s truck is parked in the alley.

I kill the engine, nearly tumbling out of the car, but something catches me.

Movement in my peripheral vision.

There’s a little park in the center of the town square. It’s where they set up the Christmas tree after Thanksgiving, and they do flea markets here in the summer. There’s also a little manmade wishing pond that’s purposely frozen into a skating rink in the winter

Someone’s on it.

I don’t need to ask Norma and her reliable church friends why Axl would live here.

This pond closely resembles the one he described from back home.

And if he’s still feeling down on himself, it makes sense that this is where he’d be.

It’s chilly, but I barely notice as I’m still scared. I jog across the street, and I know he can see me as I’m the only other moving thing out here at this time of night, but he doesn’t turn my way. He’s slamming the puck into the cement wall that surrounds the rink, rebounding it, and repeating.

Ignoring me.

My steps falter when they meet the edge of the rink. “Axl.”

“I told you to take that jersey off,” he growls, still not meeting my gaze as he fires off another puck at the back wall.

I suddenly know what happened.

There’s nothing else that makes sense. “Bill talked to you.”

His eyes slam to mine, and he rasps, “So you admit it?”

“I-I . . . Yes, uh, yeah.” I’m not making excuses. He deserves the truth, and I take a deep breath and let everything rush out. “I thought it was a terrible idea, but he insisted it would make everything better and help us both. I didn’t think you liked me, or that it would matter, and we both already agreed to fake this. My tour is running out of money, and my crew hasn’t even been fully compensated yet. He offered to pay their salaries, and I caved. That was before, though.”

“It was yesterday.” He scowls. “You can’t tell me you changed your mind since yesterday.”

“I can’t explain it.” I lift my shaking shoulders, willing to let all my honesty out. “You said it best when you said that the kiss changes it all. For me, it did.”

“What did it change?” His eyes snap up, and his expression can only be described as cold.

I shake my head. It’s so silly considering it’s only been a day, but everything feels different. “I went from feeling like we had a job to do . . . to I don’t know.” I wag my head, giving up. I have messed everything up. “I’m so sorry, Axl,” I squeak out. “I never meant to hurt you, but I wasn’t faking it anymore.”

His lips twist into a cocky snarl. “So, tell me, how much does a kiss from me cost?”

My jaw drops, and I can’t spit out a rebuttal fast enough. “I didn’t take any money, and I won’t!”

“You didn’t take any money,” he says coldly, his eyes narrowing on me, “because you haven’t had time to cash the check?”

“No,” I assert, knowing I’ll never convince him. It’s hopeless. I did this to myself. I should have known better. This whole thing started as a way to get revenge on Rocco, and my getting my heart broken again is likely karma for my ill intentions. I reach down, taking the hem of Axl’s jersey in my hand, and pull it over my head.

I’m still wearing my pink sweatshirt, and even though I loved it this morning, I hate it now because it’s not Axl’s jersey. “I don’t know how else to tell you I’m sorry,” I choke out. When he doesn’t move to take the jersey, I fold it neatly into a square. With trembling fingers, I lay it on the ground next to the rink.

He still doesn’t budge.

In my head, I beg him to say he understands. I turn on my heel, ready to trudge back to the car, when he calls out. “Is there any other lie you need to confess?”

I spin on my heel, panicking that he believes something else, and I shout, “No, there’s nothing else! The only other lies are the ones you are in on, but I know I’ll never lie again. It’s exhausting, and I feel so terrible.”

“I have one.” His stony glare smacks me hard.

“One w-what?” I stutter, but answer myself, “You have a lie?”

He slips one foot in front of the other, slowly sliding my way, but his expression softens, and at least for right now, I gather his temper has cooled. When he glides to a perfect stop on the edge of the ice, squaring his body with mine, I hold my breath. He doesn’t mince words. “I knew something was off last night. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to kiss you, but I could tell you weren’t completely comfortable. Your timing was terrible. And everything was rushed.”

“You knew! Then why did you kiss me?” I blurt. “Why did you say all that about how it changes everything? Because I believed it!”

“I thought you were just being silly.” He threw his hand up, cutting me off. “And that’s why I warned you. I was confused about how you made that leap. I thought you were bluffing or something, but when you accepted my terms, that’s when everything changed. Everything changed before the kiss. You stopped being uncomfortable and goofy, and we connected. I just can’t believe you’d play me like that, because you ruined something that could have been amazing by destroying my trust before we even had a chance to try.”

“I destroyed your trust,” I echo, my voice losing strength as my worst nightmare is coming true.

He pulls one side of his lips up in a cocky grin as he spins on his heel, skating farther from me. “I’m curious how much a kiss from me goes for.”

“I would never put a dollar amount on it,” I say, my tear-stained words following him. “I’m so sorry, Axl,” I cry out. “I never meant to hurt you, but I also never expected these emotions to be so strong, and I promise I’m not faking it anymore. Will you forgive me?”

“No.” His single word echoes into the night air.

Panic pounds through my chest, engulfing my heart, but he’s skating far away without even sneaking a look back. In an odd way, I understand his betrayal, because I lived betrayal with Rocco. I just never thought I’d be capable of causing this. I fight to maintain my composure. This is nobody’s fault but my own. "I understand," I reply softly, but deep down, I can’t ignore the aching in my chest. For the tiniest glimmer of a moment, I fooled myself into believing that I would be happy this time.

With my heart in my throat, I sulk back to my mom’s car, but I can’t shake the dejection that clings to my heart like a steel cloak. Once again, I’m returning home to Mama with a broken heart.