ALDER
I'm pretty suremy brother broke all the bones in my hand while squeezing it during his tooth extraction with Dr. Sinclair. I have no idea what she's doing in his mouth, but she assures me he's numb, and she keeps singing softly to him with a lovely voice that I can hear above the humming of her tools.
After what feels like twenty hours, she leans back, flicks her ponytail over her shoulder, and confidently declares him to be all set.
Tucker flops around in the seat, meeting my eye and pulling his lips back. I squint, looking at his mouth, and see… a hole where his upper front tooth used to be. "Looks smooth," I tell him. He closes his eyes.
Dr. Sinclair—Lena—pats his hand. "You should be able to eat and speak normally once the anesthesia wears off. I'll get to work building a temporary tooth and bring you back to get fitted for that as soon as possible. Hopefully, we have a model of your ‘before’ mouth in here somewhere." Lena waves a hand toward a set of drawers. I cringe internally because I happen to know that mouth mold day was one of the times Tucker bribed me to come in place of him. So, I guess he’s getting a tooth-shaped like mine…
Lena stands and walks to the sink, washing her hands while still humming to herself. She and I have a few things to discuss.
Brian reappears in the room and tips his chin at me, signaling with his hand to his ear in the universal sign for 'call me later.' He swats Tucker on the shoulder. "Come on, big guy. I'll take you home."
Tucker moans and shakes his head but rolls himself out of the chair and gets to his feet, following Brian, who is already talking to him about endorsement deals for orthodontia. I glance around the room at the heaps of dental tools and gauze that Dr.—Lena has started cleaning up. "Don't you have staff for that?"
She shrugs. "Probably? I think they’re maybe all hungover after …everything…"
She drifts off, and I chuckle. Then, I hear her stomach gurgle loudly in the quiet room. "Right." I nod. "Well, we've got shit to discuss, and you're starving, so why don't we head to the cafeteria and kill two birds?"
"Mmm." She nods again, dumping a bunch of metal tools into the sink and wiping her hands on her scrub pants. "Lead the way."
We walk silently through the halls of the training facility, which resembles a ghost town. Makes sense since I ended our season last night, but I guess I assumed the staff would at least be here yelling at each other and threatening to bench me or send my ass down to the minors.
The cafeteria is pretty quiet, but I hear the sounds of someone washing dishes in the back, and there are a few meals in the grab-n-'-go cooler. So Lena and I help ourselves and sit at one of the booths along the window overlooking the training ice. It's dark down there, which seems fitting. I realize neither of us has anything to drink, so I grab a few mugs and find coffee in a carafe. I see that Lena has grabbed asmall tray of cream and sugar, and I smile at her as I sink back into the booth.
I hand her one of the mugs, and then we reach for the creamer simultaneously. Her hand is warm and soft, and I retract mine as if I got burned. I clear my throat. "After you." I wrap my hands around my mug, grateful for the warmth.
Dr. Sinclair—Lena—stares into her mug as if it contains answers instead of caffeine. The silence between us isn't exactly uncomfortable, but it's heavy with the weight of shared humiliation.
She glances up, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear. "Is it always like this? Your life being... public property?"
"Only when I screw up spectacularly." I attempt a smile that feels more like a grimace. "Or when I'm doing something marketable. It's Pride Month, so I'd be getting attention anyway."
"That's right." She nods slowly. "You're out. I mean, clearly, since everyone knew about Adam."
I take a sip of coffee, wincing at both the heat and the memory. "Yeah. Since college. It's never been a big deal with the team. Adam, though..." I trail off, surprised by my sudden urge to explain everything to this woman I barely know. She sets me at ease, and I don’t even think she’s aware of doing it.
"Adam wasn't out?" she prompts, a dark brow raised in confusion.
“Not like I am. After six months of dating, I've never met his friends. He's never spent holidays with my family—which, trust me, is a whole circus you can't avoid in the Stag household." I stare at my hands. "I made excuses for him. Said he needed time."
Lena's quiet laugh holds no humor. "I know about making excuses. Brad was 'focusing on his dissertation.' That's why he couldn't work, couldn't contribute financially, couldn't help around the apartment..." She rubs her temple. "God, I'm an idiot."
"Hey." The word comes out sharper than I intended. "We're not idiots. We're just people who trusted the wrong people."
There's a moment of silence as she absorbs my statement, and both of us attack our food. I'm not even sure what she grabbed, but I've got some kind of oatmeal bowl layered with nuts and seeds. I make a mental note to stop for fast food later since it's the off season, and I can murder my guts with grease if I want.
"You know what kills me?" Lena says after several bites. "I paid for everything. His books, his conferences, our rent." She stabs what looks like a potato. "I even paid for his therapy because—get this—he said he needed to work through his commitment issues."
"While he wascommittingto someone else." I shake my head. "Adam always had reasons why we could only meet at my place. Never in public." I pour syrup over my oatmeal, watching it pool at the edges of the bowl. "I thought he was protecting me from fans and media. Turns out he was keeping his options open."
"Brad claimed I'm too boring for anyone else to be interested in," Lena says so matter-of-factly that it takes me a moment to register the cruelty of those words. "Said I should be grateful he saw past my size to the real me."
My spoon freezes halfway to my mouth. "That's fucked up."
"Yeah." She holds my gaze, and something shifts between us—a recognition that we're not just complaining about bad breakups. We're acknowledging genuine harm. "And you know what? That grad program he claimed took all his time? He was barely passing his program requirements. His advisor called once looking for a draft that was months overdue."
"Adam would always text during our dates. Said it was work." I shake my head. "Probably texting your boyfriend."
