I follow behind as Foster leads me down a hall and onto an elevator. We get off on the second floor. The hallways are packed with college boys, and he waves to quite a few as we pass. A few doors down, Foster stops and ushers me into their tiny dorm room. Inside are two twin beds, two desks, a futon, and a microwave on top of a mini fridge. There are pictures of hockey players and sexy women plastered on the walls. Foster gestures for me to sit on the futon as he sets his crutches aside and hobbles to one of the beds.
"What happened to your leg?”
"I hurt my knee during practice last week. Why are you here?"
"I need to tell you guys something, but it can wait. I want to know what's going on with your knee."
He shrugs like it’s no big deal, "Torn meniscus, maybe some other damage."
I pester him with more questions. "How long are you out for? Are you going to miss the next game?"
"The doctor thinks I need surgery. I don't know when or if I'll play hockey this season."
"It's that serious?"
"It might be. And I never got to play in even one fucking game. But at least the pain pills are good."
His voice hasn’t lost its bite of anger. I don’t know what his problem is, but he’s obviously not happy to see me.
"Why didn't you tell me?" I ask quietly.
"Why would I tell you?"
He didn’t think of me when something this important happened to him because I am nothing to him.
"Because, if nothing else, I thought we were at least friends. Maybe even a girlfriend,” I argue with him, but my heart isn’t in it. It’s broken in pieces at his feet.
Foster goes silent, and I fidget while I wait nervously. This is not the time to drop another bomb on Foster's life. I can tell that this injury has messed with his head.
"A girlfriend, at least a real girlfriend, doesn't sleep around with many guys," he throws in my face.
That’s the final blow. I won’t tell him I’m pregnant like this with so much hostility coming from him. He's not ready for that, and I can't sit here and take whatever fallout would come.
I want to escape this hateful version of Foster because I can't be around him anymore. “Do you know where I can find Cole? He didn't answer my call earlier.”
"He's at the ice rink, skating. He'll be there for about another fifteen minutes."
I stand up from the futon, "I should go to meet him there and then head home before it gets too late. Take care of yourself, Foster. I hope all goes well with the knee."
"Thanks. Good luck with Cole," he says, and I awkwardly walk away, feeling like I'm closing the door on our relationship.
I turn the doorknob, ready to walk out when Foster calls me. "Didn’t you have something to tell me?"
"It's nothing. Goodbye."
I walk out, and part of my heart stays behind with Foster Holland.
My chest aches after my encounter with Foster. Whoever I had just left was different from the boy I had spent the summer with. I’m already regretting my decision to drive all this way, making me apprehensive to find Cole. I can’t handle that kind of brush-off a second time.
I pull up to the ice rink only five minutes before his skate ends. I go inside and wait. A sweaty Cole emerges from the locker room about twenty minutes later and stops dead in front of me.
His face shows his shock, “Blake?”
I nod, “It’s me.”
He wraps me in a bear hug, and my body sags in relief. The boy I’ve known my whole life is holding me.
“What are you doing here? Why didn’t you call me?”
