I looked down at the ground. "Fuck."

"That sucks, dude. They did so well," Blaine said.

I rubbed my eyes underneath my glasses and looked up at him. "No. It doesn't suck. It's so much worse. Matt put everything for fifteen years into the sport, and it's all over for him. He deserved better."

I looked back at the ice. The other team huddled at one end of the ice in celebration, and it sickened me.

Matt was on the bench, his head hung in disappointment, David laid on the ice, and Viktor stood beside the net without moving.

I watched Viktor turn his attention up to the crowd, and his eyes met mine. He immediately looked away and skated off the ice and down the runway.

I glared at his back. "It's over for Matt. If the situation was reversed and it was Viktor's last game, Matt would've done anything to keep that puck away from the net. Anything. I'm fucking pissed."

Blaine frowned. "He doesn't have the same heart as you and Matt."

"You aren't born with heart. You find it within yourself when people rely on you. And that's where he and I will never see eye to eye. He doesn't realize that he has certain responsibilities on a team, and when he doesn't perform to the level he's expected to, he should be pissed."

"You could always kill him," Arti said.

I shook my head. "I'm not gonna kill him."

Blaine smiled. "How mature of you."

I stood up from my seat and wiped my sweaty hands on the front of my jeans. "Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck."

"You're handling it pretty well. I'm proud of you," he said.

"Just wait until I get my hands on Viktor. Then you'll be thoroughly disappointed in me again."

"It's going to take a lot more than murder for you to disappoint me."

"I don't know how to respond to that," I said. "I'm just gonna go wait for Matt, and, you know, probably not murder anyone."

I turned and headed for the exit.

Blaine laughed. "Probably not murder someone. Probably."

I shook my head as I opened the door.

I sat against the wall by the exit door with the cool, spring-like air washing over me anytime someone came in or left. Part of me wished that I still had my long hair so it would provide some protection from the breeze, but I could live through it.

David walked into the main entrance hall with a limp so slight, I probably wouldn't have noticed it if I wasn't looking for it.

"Hey little Janye," he said and ruffled my hair as he walked past. He turned back to me and laughed. I smiled and didn't even bother to comb it all back into place with my fingers.

Winterview University was his next stop, and as much as I wanted that spot to go to Matt, he was a good option too. It would be nice to have him around if I ended up going there.

But who else would want me for their school? Suspensions spoke volumes about students.

I waited for a moment longer, and that was when I saw Matt.

Matt's eyes met mine, and unlike Viktor, he didn't look away. He just frowned and shook his head. "I'm sorry we couldn't pull it off for you."

I wrapped my arms around him. "I'm sorry it ended like this. It wasn't supposed to."

He chuckled. "Ended like what? With a loss? That doesn't matter to me."

I looked up at him but didn't say anything.

"Look, I'm upset that it's all over. I've spent fifteen years of my life on this. But realistically, there comes a point where everything has to end," he said.

"It shouldn't have ended with a loss, though. You guys should have won, and you would have if it wasn't for Viktor," I said.

"But where the hell would we be without him? It's my fault that he wasn't into the game today anyway."

"It's not your fault. It's his. He didn't think I'd be there, and he played like shit just to prove that his dumbass superstitions are legit."

"Every single person you like is at least a little messed up, Amanda. And I can guarantee you that his dependency on you was only half the reason he couldn't focus today. I told him something that I probably shouldn't have on the way here."

My mouth fell open. "You didn't tell him that you like him, did you?"

He nodded. "Pretty stupid of me, huh?"

"I'm gonna guess it didn't go the way you wanted it to."

"He gave me the whole, I'm flattered, but there's someone else speech. And I can guarantee you I know who it is."

I bit my cheek. I thought I knew who it was too, and it certainly wasn't just my ego thinking for me.

I didn't need that. I didn't need that at all.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I'm sorry that he doesn't like you, that this season sucked, that—"

He smiled. "You have nothing to apologize for."

"I just thought for sure that this was going to be the year that Madison High finally got into that fucking tournament, and maybe won the whole damn thing. And if Viktor wasn't so emotional, it could have happened. He was supposed to give you a season worth remembering." I looked up at Matt. "I'm sorry it wasn't. I wish I could have gotten to him just a little more."

He shook his head. "It was a season worth remembering, though. There's more to it than you ever saw on the ice. The bus rides to road games, the stupid mistakes during practice, the way he mumbled in Swedish on the bench. I finally got to be with him again, and if that's all I ever remember from these fifteen years playing hockey, that's perfectly fine with me."

"You're a good person, you know that?"

He shrugged. "That's debatable."

I smiled. "So what are you going to do now that the hockey era's over?"

He thought for a moment before answering me. "I still don't know. I'll just have to find something new to keep me distracted for another fifteen years."

"You could try yoga."

"I'm definitely not the yoga type of guy."

"Fine, fine." I laughed. "Where's Viktor anyway? I want to talk to him."

"I don't really know. He's probably still back in the locker room, mourning in Swedish."

I smiled. "Can you go get him for me?"

"You're so freaking needy," he said.

"I know. Please?"

He smiled and went back down the hall to get Viktor for me.

I was honestly surprised that he didn't temporarily hate me for being that someone else Viktor brought up. At least I thought it was me.

Was that egotistical?

Probably.

Viktor came out from the hall, and he hesitantly walked up to me.

"I screwed everything up today, huh?" he asked.

"A little bit, but that's over now. We'll work on your defensive responsibility after you take a quick break from hockey."

"I don't really want to," he said quietly.

"You need to take a couple weeks off to recover before we start any training for next year, but I don't think I can be much help for you at this point. It's a little over my head," I said.

"Amanda, I don't know if I even want to go through with this anymore."

I paused. "What?"

"I don't know if I can handle it. I can't even handle playing a stupid game when I don't think you're there."

"You have the opportunity that Matt dreamed of but couldn't have, and now you're suddenly having second thoughts about it?"

"I'm being realistic. I have another life back in Sweden that I miss, and I feel like you forget about that sometimes."

I glared at him. "You do this all the time. You don't realize what the hell you have, and just how much people would do to get the same opportunities as you. Lukas wanted the same opportunities that you just take for granted, and he was willing to fucking stab you over it. That was kinda overkill, but shouldn't that have been a wake-up call?"

He didn't say anything.

"What do you want from me? A speech? Because I have some news for you; I'm not that great with words," I said.

"I don't want anything from you. I just—" He stammered for a moment. "This isn't fair. You have a better English vocabulary than me."

"What the hell are you thinking? I don't care if you have to resort to interpretive dance. Just tell me."

He took a moment to collect his thoughts, then spoke. "I just want you to realize that I'm not like you. I need you even though you don't need anyone else, especially me."

I took a deep breath and tried to maintain my cool. "You don't need me. Get that idea out of your head. You are a damn good hockey player with or without me in your life, and you will be fine at Winterview until I can get there myself. Do you understand me?"

"I'm not just talking about hockey. I need you. You're the piece I'm missing."

Suspicions confirmed. It was not my ego giving me the idea that he liked me.

I looked down at the ground. "Viktor, this is a really shitty situation we're in. I don't know what's going on most of the time in your mind or mine. All I know is that I'm in a relationship whether you like it or not, and you're just going to have to deal with that."

"Do you need me to wait, or do you not like me? I know things are going to be difficult when I go back to Sweden—"

I interrupted him. "Be rational about this. I have Blaine, and you're leaving soon. Just think about that for one goddamn second. It would be impossible, and you just shouldn't have said anything."

"It wouldn't be impossible."

I shook my head. "There's clearly something wrong with you right now. You're not thinking straight if you're even thinking at all, and so it'd probably be best if we just carry on and act like this never happened."

"Have I pushed too far?" he asked.

"Considering I have a boyfriend and a whole lot of conflicting thoughts about what's going on right now, I'm gonna go with yes."

"I'm sorry. I really shouldn't have said anything."

"Let's be honest, we both say a ton of shit we shouldn't. Don't feel bad about it, but I kind of like my boyfriend who has a shovel in his car and lied about finding a stuffed kitten in the school bathroom."

He rubbed his eyes with his hand. "I'll figure you out eventually. Why you can't just let yourself feel, why you struggle with relationships. I'll figure it out."

"First of all, I'm not struggling with anything. I'm fine. And second, did you ever think that maybe there's not a reason besides the fact that it's my personality?"

"No, because I don't think it's true."

"But it is. No one ever hurt me and made me like this. It's just the way I am."

He looked at me with an eyebrow raised.

"When's the last time I lied?" I asked.

"There's the time when you didn't tell anyone about our exchange where you'd train me, and I'd play hockey. And there's the time when you—"

"Hold up. I never lied about the exchange."

"You kind of did."

"Omitting the truth isn't lying. It's just not being one hundred percent transparent."

"My point exactly."

I crossed my arms. "What is?"

"You're never one hundred percent transparent, even though you pretend to be."

"So? You're not either."

"But I don't pretend to be, which makes me much more truthful than you."

I scoffed. "This isn't a competition."

"That's true, but all I'm saying is that you aren't the Amanda Jayne you try to be. You're someone completely different."

"If you're just going to lecture me about how I just need someone like you to bring that Amanda out of her shell, I don't want to hear it."

"That's not what I want to say at all. I just want to say that I'd like to get to know that Amanda because I really like her from what I've seen."

I let out a sigh. "So you like the made-up Amanda in your head, and not me? Thank God. That makes my life easier."

"That's not what I said, Amanda."

That was exactly what he said, and I could live with that. Anything more would just be too much.

I turned for the door. "I don't even know how long I've been talking to you and Matt anyway. I need to get back to Arti and Blaine before they kill me or each other."

"Can we finish this conversation later?"

"Nope."

I hoped he was proud of himself. I really did. But he put me in a shitty situation since he couldn't keep his damn mouth shut.

I had never really believed in karma, but it was hitting me like a fucking dump truck.

Good job, me.

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Hello everyone! Thank you so much for reading! So how are we feeling about this chapter? About life in general? We have one chapter to go, and I originally wrote it from Viktor's POV, which I'm pretty sure I'm going to keep that.

So for today's question, what has been your favorite part of the book? What part didn't you like?