“I don’t know what to tell you,” he said. “All I know is that the next time our teams play each other, act like you don’t know me.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Okay, maybe don’t pretend like you don’t know me, but if Levi Dunn comes after me, Idon’twant you to come to the rescue. I want you to go ahead and let him knock my block off.”
Zane paused, seeming to understand how weird that last sentence sounded. I summoned all my willpower not to laugh.
“You know what I mean,” he said.
And I did but hated the message. It hurt me too, even though I wouldn’t say it. Either way, I understood he was in no mood to be challenged, and I’d lost all appetite to argue.
I grabbed a towel and headed into the shower. When I twisted the knobs, welcoming a warm spray onto my face, I couldn’t help wondering if I had it in my heart and soul to honor his wishes next time.
And there definitely would be a next time.
27
ZANE
Normally, I would never have accepted answers like the one Jakob gave me. I would’ve told him as much too, but I couldn’t. Like, it wasn’t literally that I couldn’t say so, but now I felt weak. Impotent, even.
Wait, scratch that. No sentence that includes words likeimpotentever ends well.
Something was up, (Dang, back to the impotence topic.) and I had to know what. I sat across from Jakob in a booth at Amy’s Place, a diner on Main Street. It stood a few doors down from Parkside Candy where Jakob had duped me so, um, uh, ingeniously. We chowed down on cheeseburgers and french fries, almost oblivious to the fact that we were out in public together and anyone could spot us. And then what the hell would we do?
Yeah, yeah, diner patrons would see us, but they were low risk. As long as they didn’t give a shit about local college hockey, we would be safe. Buffalo was a big city but still a damned small place all the same. None of my teammates frequented Amy’s Place but, as they say, there’s a first time for everything. Anykind of public appearance together posed a risk, and yet I felt unusually comfortable, as long as I had Jakob with me.
“So,” Jakob said, “what comes next?”
At least, that was what I thought he’d said. It came out sounding more like “ooh, ut oomes ext?” because he posed the question with a mouthful of cheeseburger.
You know, like the class act he is?
“Excuse me, Jakob, what the hell did you just ask me?”
“So, ut oomes?—”
“Would you eat with your mouth closed, for Christ’s sake?”
“Oo-aay.”
He chewed his burger, nearly choking on it, before swallowing.
“Okay,” I said, “now, you go ahead and ask your question.”
“What comes next?”
“What do you mean?”
He shoved his plate aside, flipped over the paper place mat, and fished a pen out of his backpack. And then he started drawing something.
“Why the hell are you doodling at a time like this?” I asked.
“To help you understand the super simple question I just asked. Obviously, you need someone to draw you a diagram.”
I wanted to slap the pen out of his hand. No, wait, I wanted to take that pen and stick it up his nose. That option sounded particularly tempting, but I recognized the need for self-control.
Rather than do what would really feel good, I settled for snatching his place mat, crumpling it into a little ball, and bouncing it off his forehead.
