Ice Between Rivals

POV: Ava Carter

The puck hit my stick and the world went quiet. That is what happens to me every single time. The crowd disappears. The shouting disappears. It is just me, the ice, and the net sitting wide open like a door I was born to walk through.

I pushed off hard and flew. My skates cut into the ice. My legs burned. The defender on my left was big, fast, and mean. He lunged for me. I faked right, spun left, and left him grabbing nothing but cold air. The goalie dropped into position, watching me with sharp eyes.

I pulled my stick back.

The puck screamed across the ice and buried itself in the top right corner of the net. The sound it made hitting the back of the goal was the most beautiful sound in the world.

Then the crowd exploded.

"NOAH! NOAH! NOAH!"

I lifted my arms. My heart was slamming against my ribs. My lungs were on fire. Every single part of me was alive and electric and burning bright.

But they were not cheering for me. They were cheering for Noah Carter.

My brother.

Whose jersey I was wearing. Whose name was on my back. Whose documents were folded carefully in the bag sitting in the players tunnel. Whose face everyone expected to see when the helmet came off.

++++++

Three weeks earlier, I was standing in our kitchen watching my brother hold a letter like it was a piece of hot coal he wanted to drop.

The envelope was white and clean with the Falcons Academy crest stamped in silver on the front. Falcons Academy. The best junior hockey program in the country. The place that launched careers. The place that made players into legends.

It said Noah Carter on the front. But I had wanted that letter my whole life.

"It came," Noah said. His voice was flat.

"Open it," I said.

He tore it open slowly. His eyes moved across the page. Then he put it down on the counter and walked to the window and stared outside at nothing.

"Noah." I grabbed the letter.

Dear Mr. Carter, we are pleased to offer you a full position at Falcons Academy starting this fall.

My hands were shaking. My eyes burned. I read the line three times. Then I looked up at my brother.

"This is it," I whispered. "This is everything."

"I know," he said. He would not look at me.

"Then why do you look like someone died?"

He turned around and his face was tight and pale. "Because I don't want it, Ava."

The kitchen went very still.

"What?" I said.

"I never wanted it. That was always your dream. Not mine. I played because Dad wanted me to play. I am so tired of pretending I love something I don't love." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I am done. I am quitting."

Something cracked open in my chest. Hot and sharp and ugly.

"You can't quit," I said. My voice came out strange.

"It is my life."

"They chose you!" I slapped the letter down on the counter. "Do you have any idea what I would give for that? What I have given? I have trained every single day. Every day, Noah. I am better than half the boys at Riverside and everyone knows it and nobody cares because I am a girl and they just keep telling me to try cheerleading or figure skating and now you stand here and tell me you are throwing it away like it is nothing?"

Noah looked at me with tired eyes. "I know it is not fair."

"Not fair?" I laughed but nothing was funny. "It is not fair that I cannot even try. They will not recruit girls. They will never recruit girls. And you just got handed the only door that exists and you want to close it."

He was quiet for a long moment. Then he said the words that changed my entire life.

"You can't even try. They don't recruit girls."

I stared at him.

And something cold and certain settled inside me like ice forming on a lake.

"Get out of my room," I said quietly.

+++++

I cut my hair that same night. I sat in the bathroom with scissors and I cut it short and practical and I watched pieces of it fall into the sink and I did not cry. I was too busy thinking.

Noah's training gear was in his bag. His registration documents were in the folder on Dad's desk. His player ID. His acceptance confirmation.

He looked like me. We were twins. Same jaw. Same eyes. Same height. People had mixed us up our whole lives. I picked up his jersey.

I put it on.

++++++

Falcons Academy was colder than I expected. Everything was sharp edges and high ceilings and boys who walked like they already knew they were going somewhere. I kept my head down and my jaw set and I answered to Noah like I had been doing it forever.

Because I had been doing it forever. Every local match. Every scrimmage. Every time I needed ice time and the only way to get it was to be someone I was not.

The welcome assembly was loud and bright. Coach Merritt stood at the front with a clipboard and read out dorm assignments in a voice that expected no arguments.

"Carter." He looked up. "You will be sharing a room with Bennett."

From across the room, someone moved. He was tall. Broad shoulders. Eyes like cold water. He turned and found my face immediately like he already knew exactly where to look.

Kai Bennett.

I knew that name. Noah knew that name. Everyone in junior hockey knew that name. Kai Bennett who was fast and ruthless and had beaten Noah in three separate tournaments. Kai Bennett who had made it personal every single time.

He smiled slowly. It was not a nice smile.

"Finally," he said. His voice was low and smooth and sharp at the edges. "My favorite rival."

My stomach dropped straight through the floor.

He thought I was Noah. He wanted to destroy Noah. And I had just agreed to sleep in the room next to him..