The Breaking Point

Jaxson

The locker room on Friday morning didn't have any music playing.

Usually, the walls would be vibrating with heavy bass, guys shouting over the noise, equipment slamming, and the raw energy of a team forty-eight hours away from a national title.

But when I walked in at seven-thirty, my gear bag over my shoulder, the atmosphere was like a morgue.

Nobody looked at me.

The usual morning chatter died instantly.

The guys were all huddled around Miller’s locker in the corner, their faces grim, staring down at a single smartphone screen.

"What's going on?" I asked, dropping my heavy bag onto the wooden bench. The metallic clink of my skates felt too loud.

“Did the line changes drop? Is someone scratched?"

Miller looked up, his face pale, his eyes full of a sudden, deep pity that made my stomach instantly drop into a cold, dark pit.

He looked like he was about to tell me someone had died.

“Jax... man, I'm sorry. You need to see this. It dropped on the HypeTV app ten minutes ago."

He handed me the phone.

The high-definition network logo flashed on the screen, followed by the title: BEYOND THE ICE: THE REALITY SPEC-TACULAR.

And then, the screen cut to a journalism studio.

Summer’s voice filled the room, crisp, clear, and utterly devoid of the warmth I had fallen in love with.

"Jaxson Reed is a violent liability... I won't be used as a prop to clean up his mess... I’m only doing this because the university pulled my funding and I need the money. It's a business transaction. Nothing more."

I stared at the screen.

The video didn't lie.

The time-stamp in the corner was from the second day of the semester—the exact day we signed the contract in the athletic lounge.

She was sitting in the journalism studio, her expression cold, cynical, and completely detached as she explained exactly how she was going to sell me out to save her tuition.

The room seemed to spin.

The air turned to pure ice in my lungs, the sound of her words repeating over and over in my head like a siren.

A business transaction. Nothing more.

"Jax," Miller said softly, reaching out a hand to touch my shoulder.

“It was Day Two, man. Before she knew you. Before any of the real stuff happened. Maybe she changed her mind—"

"Get out," I said, my voice barely a whisper, my gaze still locked on the frozen frame of her face on the screen.

"Jaxson, we have morning skate in fifteen minutes—"

"Everybody get the hell out of my locker room!" I roared, my hand slamming into the metal door of my locker with a force that left a deep, shattered dent in the steel.

The sound echoed off the concrete walls like a gunshot.

The guys scrambled, grabbing their sticks and rushing out the double doors until the room was completely empty, leaving me alone with the hum of the vending machines.

I fell back onto the wooden bench, my head dropping into my hands.

The pain was unlike anything I had ever felt on the ice. It wasn't a broken rib or a torn shoulder; it was the total, agonizing destruction of the first real thing I had ever allowed myself to trust.

The late-night diner visits.

The fries.

The way she broke down my skating tape.

The kiss in the production trailer where she told me I was an idiot.

All of it had been part of the deal.

All of it had been a calculated performance by a brilliant journalism student who needed to hit her marks to clear her debt and land her dream job in New York.

She hadn't seen me.

She had just seen a radioactive liability she could ride to a career.

The heavy door to the locker room clicked open again.

I didn't look up from my hands. "I said get out."

"Jaxson, please. Just listen to me."

I lifted my head. Summer was standing in the doorway.

She was still wearing her faded denim jacket, her hair messy, her eyes red and swollen from crying.

She looked devastated—but as I looked at her now, through the lens of that video, the script had flipped.

I didn't see vulnerability anymore. I just saw an associate producer who was terrified of losing her narrative control.

"Don't," I said, standing up, my voice dropping into a cold, dead register that made her flinch. "Don't say a single word, Summer."

"Jaxson, that video was from the second day of school!" she cried, taking a frantic step toward me, her hands reaching out across the space between us.

“ I didn't know you then! I thought you were like every other entitled athlete on this campus! But I changed—I fell in love with you, Jaxson, I swear to God, the diner, the trailer, none of that was for the cameras—"

"How much did they pay you?" I asked, the question cutting through her words like a blade.

Summer froze, her lips parting as a fresh sob broke from her chest, her hands dropping back to her sides.

“What?"

"The contract," I said, stepping closer to her, my amber eyes completely dead as I stared down at her.

“The tuition was just the start, wasn't it? Vance said there was talent compensation. A stipend. An internship in New York. How much was my sister’s clinic worth to your portfolio, Summer? Did you get a bonus for the courtyard kiss?"

"Jaxson, no! It isn't like that! I sacrificed—"

"Get out of my face, Brooks," I said, turning my back on her and pulling my blue jersey off the hook, my hands shaking with a rage that was tearing me apart from the inside out.

“The show is over. Tell Sarah she gets her ending. But if you show up at my rink tomorrow night... I'll walk off the ice myself."