I plopped down next to the couch Viktor was laying on.

I didn't say anything.

He held out his hand to me, and I laced my fingers through his, then looked at his face.

"I blew it," he whispered. "I ruined your dream."

I bit my cheek. "Don't be ridiculous. We can work with this."

"Work with what? Five months of rehab and a fifty percent chance that I'll ever be what I was? Because that sounds—"

"What's your source?"

"What?"

"Your source. You need to cite your source. Who told you that you only have a fifty percent chance of getting back to your level?" I asked.

"I made that up, but I'm sure it's true."

I shook my head. "Let's say that it is true, just for our purposes. That means that you have an equal chance of making it back to where you used to be. I figured you'd at least be able to do some basic subtraction."

My throat hurt as I spoke, but that wasn't my primary concern. He was.

"But what about Caroline?" Viktor asked me.

"What about her?"

Those meds were seriously affecting his unfocused mind more than usual.

Viktor frowned. "She won't want anything to do with me anymore."

"So what if she doesn't? In that case, she needs to fucking go," I said.

"But she's my only chance at getting drafted."

"What about me? You know, the person who's stuck with you through thick and thin, the person who's dragged you to this point? Don't just conveniently forget about all that."

"But you can't get me on a line with the Jardetzky twins. Candy Cane, I know you do your best, but you're limited," he said.

Me? Limited?

I thrived when people told me, "You can't."

I bit my cheek and reminded myself not to get pissed off at his comment. Instead, I said, "What does she do to get you on a line with the Jardetzky twins? Talk to her daddy for you?"

Spoiled. Fucking spoiled.

Viktor shrugged, then winced a little. "More or less. I wouldn't have gotten the opportunity if it weren't for her offering to help me out."

More or less?

More or less?

That wasn't a concrete answer.

"So is that what you do? You convince girls you love them just to get them to help you? That's pathetic, and honestly, it's really hurtful," I said.

He took his hand out of mine, then ran it through my tangled-up hair. "That's not what I do."

"That's what you did to me. You always want something for nothing, but that's not the way the world works. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, so unless you're acting, you're not gonna get the reaction you want. It's Newton's Third Law."

He kept his hand in my hair. It must have been stuck.

"I do stuff. I have to deal with Caroline's attitude all the time," Viktor said.

"Why do you say that? You don't have to do anything besides listen to me."

"Because if I don't, or," he sighed, "if I didn't, then the twins would be gone, the team would collapse, and I would cost us the chance of a division championship. I can't do that."

I rubbed my eye. "You're not making much sense. I'm trying not to lose my patience with you, since I'm pretty sure it's just the drugs talking, but you're making it difficult."

"You're so pretty," he said.

"Thank you, I guess."

"Is your hair naturally that color?"

"Considering it's the exact same color as Matt's, I'm going to go with yes. It's called genetics."

"You're prettier than Matt, though."

I smiled. "That's not much of a compliment."

"You're not mad at me?" he asked.

"Not really. I can't be mad over an accident. I mean, with this bump in the road, we'll just have to turn up our social and emotional game. You absolutely cannot lose your spirit over this. You have to stay positive. Otherwise, yeah, our dream is over."

"I meant over comparing you to Matt," he said.

"Oh, yeah. That too."

He smiled. "My fingers are stuck."

I smiled back at him. "They can stay stuck. You're not allowed to move, and I'm sleeping here."

"On the floor?"

I nodded. "Goodnight, Swedish Fish."

"Have you eaten anything all day?" he asked.

"I told you, I'm sleeping."

"Amanda."

"I don't want food. I'm not hungry."

"I know you're the medical one here, so I shouldn't have to explain that you need food to get better."

"I don't want to get better. I'm fine."

"You're not fine."

I laughed. "Well, neither are you, so we're stuck."

"Literally, too," he said, shifting his fingers in my hair.

"You're probably gonna get sick now, too. I'm germy."

"I like your germs."

"That's so fucking gross."

"I know."

I rested my head against the couch, then let out a breath.

"Amanda," he said, "I don't know where to go from here."

"Neither do I, but we'll figure something out. We always do."

"But no one's going to want me if I can't prove that I can play hockey."

"I will."

He hesitated for a moment. "Don't lie to me. You're just getting my hopes up."

"Oh, please. Don't start with this. You know I love you," I said.

"I know you do."

I let out a huff. "Then act like it."

"Sorry," he said, then his eyes wandered down the room and into the hallway.

I looked over my shoulder, but there was no one there. "What are you looking at?"

"Nothing."

"Okay, whatever. So I think we're going to have to take a twenty-first century approach to our new problem, like social media and acting all positive even though we all know everything's gone to shit. What if we made a big deal about your rehab process, and we played more into the social game?" I asked.

"Can we just stop with that for a second? You need to sleep."

I let out an annoyed laugh. "Ha, pal, I need a lot of things, but sometimes, that's not the way life goes."

"You're so funny. You can't even let yourself get better when you have a problem that needs fixed." He pulled his fingers free of my rat's nest of hair. "Hey, I got de-stucked."

"It's unstuck," I said.

"What the screw?"

I pulled the blankets tighter around my shoulders and smiled.

What the screw were we going to do?

***

Despite the fact that I had sent a million birthday wishes to baby Jesus, there was no Christmas miracle.

Viktor's injury wasn't just the nightmare before Christmas. It was a reality.

But at least my flu and anger went away, and Blaine wasn't afraid of catching my germs or my hands anymore.

Yay.

"And I guess he's just gonna talk to his agent, so they can arrange something with any teams that may still want him," I said.

I smacked the puck down the air hockey table at Blaine.

He hit it back at me after it bounced off the side. "And that's it?"

"Pretty much."

The puck went into my goal.

"Goddammit," I muttered as I put in back in play.

"Then that makes your life easier," Blaine said.

"Sure, until there's some fancy ass thing that Viktor wants me to go to, and I'm gonna be fifty shades of out of place."

"Doesn't he have that other girl, the coach's daughter, blah, blah, blah?"

"Yeah."

"Then congratulations, he's not your problem anymore."

I bit my cheek. "He's not exactly a problem to me. He just creates more problems than he fixes."

"You know what we call that in literature? An antagonist."

"Alright, smarty pants. I get your point. Jesus, you go to a better school than me, and suddenly you think you're smarter than me."

He smiled, distracting himself for just long enough to allow me to score.

"Fuck you," he said. "And for the record, I'm definitely smarter than you."

"Oh really?"

He nodded. "For sure."

"Want to explain why my GPA is higher than yours now and in high school? And for the ACT, I do believe that a thirty-four is much, much higher than a thirty-three."

"One point is not much, much higher. Chill the fuck out." He laughed. "It's not an attack on you. I'm just smarter, and you're going to have to live with that for the rest of your life."

I rose an eyebrow. "Dude, at least you've got a decent personality. My mind is all I have. Just let me have this."

He hit the puck off the wall beside my goal, then couldn't keep it away from his own goal.

Amanda: 10, Blaine: 6.

"I believe that's a win for me, both on the scoresheet and in intelligence," I said.

"How does that make you smarter than me?"

"I hit the puck into my own net exactly zero times." I laughed, then set the paddle down.

"That means nothing."

"Numbers mean nothing, examples mean nothing. Nothing means anything, apparently."

He smiled. "College turned us into nihilists, huh?"

"Not me, just you." I smiled back at him.

"I'll tell you what, there's only one thing that means something to me."

"Cheesecake?"

"Okay, there are two things that mean something to me."

I laughed. "And what's the other one?"

He placed his hands on my hips and pressed his forehead to mine. "You know what it is."

"I'd still like to hear you say it."

"Words mean nothing, Amanda. We've been over this."

"That's true, but you've done enough to back up those words. I'm willing to trust what you tell me."

He hesitated before speaking. "That's, like, oddly satisfying."

"Don't let it go to your head. You don't need any more of an ego."

He laughed, then pressed his ice-cold hand to my cheek.

"What?" I asked.

"There's just something about you. I don't know what it is or why it took me so long to discover it, but—" He stopped talking and kissed me.

And like the weak little bitch I was, I liked it.

"—But I'm glad I have the chance to fix it all. I was kinda afraid that you'd find someone else," he continued.

"Someone better than Blaine Jacobs? Uh, yeah, I don't think that exists, besides me."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. I said someone else, not someone better. It doesn't get any better than this, baby."

I rolled my eyes. "You still have to live without me for another semester."

"Yeah, but now there's an end in sight. Something to work toward."

I looked down at the floor. "I know what you're doing."

He tilted my chin up. "What am I doing?"

"Trying to distract me from the fact that I just kicked the shit out of you at air hockey. A dirty trick, Blainejamin, but I guess I shouldn't have thought you were above something like that."

He laughed, then brought his lips to mine, half kissing me, half talking. "Dirty tricks are definitely beneath me. I'm an honorable person."

"Can I be a dirty trick then?"

"Huh? Wait, oh my god, Amanda." He laughed. "You're still the worst at being in love."

I shrugged and gave him a half-smile. "Some things never change."

"Good. I don't want you to ever change. You're not perfect, but damn, you're perfect the way you are. Get on the air hockey table."

"What?"

"Ask, and you shall receive. Get on the fucking air hockey table."

"Like, for real?"

"No, for fake." He squinted and shook his head. "I swear, Amanda, you drive me fucking crazy."

"We can't have sex on the air hockey table. We'll break it, because that's what you always do, and then Matt will be pretty pissed. He doesn't need that kind of negativity in his life. Plus, there's, like, eighty people here. That'd be weird."

He put his hand on the top of my head. "Shut your brain off for two fucking seconds."

"Yeah, that's not possible. Thanks for trying, though."

"And turn off your smartass attitude too, while you're at it. Come on." He grabbed my hand.

"Did I piss you off?" I asked as we went up the stairs.

He didn't answer.

"Did I?" I laughed.

"You pissed me off just enough that I want to—"

A thought crossed my mind, and it came right out, even though I didn't actually mean to interrupt. "We didn't unplug the air hockey table. Now it's just gonna blow air for no fucking reason."

"Oh my god, Amanda. That's it. I'm officially going to lose my mind."

"Where are we going?"

He turned around and gave me a tight-lipped smile. "I'm gonna shut you up."

"With making out or chloroform?"

"Yes."

"Okay," I said, then laughed.

If button-pressing was an Olympic event, I would have had more golds than Michael Phelps.

***

Dear Mom,

I'm not really sure why I'm writing this. I guess it's always been easier for me to figure out what's going on in my head when I can see it written out. It makes it easier to get through the bias that comes with being a regular person. I know you weren't one to judge and that you could keep an open mind about everything, but that's a superpower that unfortunately wasn't passed down to me. Thanks, genetics.

Christmas is good so far. It was your favorite holiday I know, and I'm trying to keep some traditions going in your memory, but in some cases, that's a little difficult. Turns out the triplets don't believe in Santa anymore. Well, they're ten years old, so I'm not really sure why expected anything different. They're smarter than anyone gives them credit for. Natalie even asked Matt for uranium-238 for Christmas. I don't know what she plans to do with that.

I'm pretty sure that you already know that Blaine and I are kind of back together, even though that never really ended in the first place. Sorry for not liking Viktor. I know that's what you always wanted, but sometimes, no matter how hard we try to force something, it just doesn't happen. I still love him to death, though, and I know that somehow, we'll overcome his injury.

I guess I've always been a doer, but for some strange reason, I just couldn't bring myself to feel anything more than platonic love for Viktor, no matter how much I tried to convince myself that I should. Maybe I'm just a coward who's afraid of what he does to me. Maybe there's just nothing there. I don't know. I don't really know anything. He's the one who's supposed to figure out my feelings for me.

God, I really don't know why I'm writing this. Do I like to put myself through hell? (Apparently, the answer is yes to that question. I still don't know why I do this to myself.)

I hope you don't worry about any of us. We're all happy for the most part. Or, at least I think Matt and the triplets are all happier than I am, and that's what matters to me. There's not much I can do to fix any of this though, so I'm just doing the best I can. I hope it doesn't disappoint you any more than I already have.

All my love,

Amanda

P.S. Blaine says hi. He misses his second mother.

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Decisions were made, buttons were pushed, and goals were set. How is the gang going to keep up with the challenges being thrown their way? Is Amanda's lead in the score over life enough, or is life just beginning its comeback?

Also, I have a favor to ask of you guys. I want to start editing The Exchange (you know, with all my free time) and I'm interested in what you think. Is there anything that could have been better, left out, or fixed?

Thank you!!