“You work too much.” I don’t intend to sound pissy.

She’s snappy in return. “I don’t have a choice.”

“Sorry. That was assholey.” I run a frustrated hand through my hair. “I just wanna see you. What time are all your shifts the day after?”

“I teach skating from seven until eleven-thirty in the morning. My other shift is from five to ten at the coffee shop.”

“And after that?”

“I go home to sleep and get up for a nine a.m. shift at the rink. Then I work at the coffee shop again in the afternoon.”

I blow out a breath and scrub a hand over my face. “Fuck.”

“I’m sorry, Randy. It looks like it’s not going to work out this time. Maybe when you’re back in Toronto, if I plan far enough ahead and you still want me to come to a game…” Her voice goes soft at the end.

“That isn’t for, like, another month.”

“Oh.”

At least she sounds disappointed. “We’ll figure something out,” I tell her.

“Yeah. Sure. I should probably go. I have to be up in less than six hours.”

“Right. Okay. I’ll talk to you soon.”

“Good luck on Friday. Night, Randy.”

She ends the call. I bang my head against the headboard and swear.

Miller comes out of the bathroom, butt-ass naked. “What’re you doin’ up here? And why’re you banging your head?”

“Lily’s not coming to the Toronto game.”

He half-smiles before he neutralizes his expression. “You get blown off?”

“She’s gotta work—unless that’s an excuse.”

Miller tosses his phone on the bed and scratches his leg, right beside his balls. “It’s probably not an excuse. Sunny’s mentioned that she works a lot. Pulls doubles all the time and stuff.”

“You gonna put on some boxers or something.” I keep my eyes on the blank TV screen.

“I’m airing out.”

“We’re not in the locker room.”

“You know, Balls, you can do it, too. No one gives a shit that your junk’s a little wonky.”

“Fuck you, dude.”

“I’m not being an asshole. I’m serious. The scars make you gangster.”

“I don’t need a therapy session about this.”

Miller’s sensitive about his dyslexia; I’m sensitive about my junk. But then, almost losing half of it as a kid can do that to a guy.

“I was there, man. I saw it all happen. You’re not the only one who has nightmares about it.”

“Drop it, Buck.” I rarely ever call him by the nickname asshole kids gave him in grade school, so he knows I’m serious.

He holds up his hands. “Consider it dropped.”

Back when we were kids, we used to play hockey on the pond down the road in the winter. We never wore helmets or cups or anything; we were just goofing around on the ice. Sometimes we’d join games with older guys—teenagers who played rep looking to get scouted to the minors. Miller’s dad was always on the lookout for new talent.

Once we were playing with them and I stole the puck—even then I was better than most kids. It was one of the perks of having a pro dad. He knew guys who could train me the way I needed in order to make professional hockey a career. Anyway, some kid didn’t like it and decided to put me in my place. It got a little rougher than it should’ve, and I ended up with a skate to the groin.

Vascular appendages bleed a lot. Emergency surgery repaired the damage, but the end result was pretty fucking disturbing. My dick looks like it belongs to Frankenstein. I was off the ice for a few months while I recovered. Dick stitches are not fun, especially with the whole onset-of-puberty deal, when erections are spontaneous and uncontrollable.

Everything still works, obviously, but there are residual sensitivity issues, lots of scars, and a bend that otherwise wouldn’t have been there. The upside: I still have all of my dick, instead of half of it. But I don’t swing free in the locker room because I don’t like answering questions, or making people uncomfortable.

I shut down those unpleasant memories and go back to quizzing Miller about Lily’s job situation. “She teaches figure skating. Doesn’t it pay well enough? Why does she need a second job?” It’s seriously interfering with my ability to see her.

“There’s financial stuff goin’ on there. I think she helps out her mom. Sunny’s mentioned a couple of times that things are tight. She’s got school loans and stuff. Her dad’s a deadbeat. I think he was pro hockey, and he got her mom knocked up and bailed.”

“That’s seriously shitty.” It also sounds kind of familiar.

“Right? She was, like, prepping for Olympic trials but the money wasn’t there to support her, so she had to drop out.”

“How do you know all this shit about her?”

“Because Sunny’s my girlfriend, and we talk as much as we fuck.”

Interesting. When I talk to Lily, it’s mostly me sexting her, or joking around about stupid shit. If things were different, I could know all this stuff, too, without having to ask Miller.

He nabs the remote and turns on the TV, flipping channels until he gets to the highlights from tonight’s game. “Maybe it’s not a bad thing she can’t come to Toronto.”

I glance at him, waiting for an explanation.