I STAND BY MAX RIVERA

Chapter 168MaxI woke up before Ace again. He was out cold beside me, one arm thrown over his face, his chest rising in a slow, steady rhythm.It made me wonder when he actually slept.After the meeting, we’d returned to his dorm and stayed indoors. We weren't hiding; we just needed each other’s company to stay grounded. We didn’t make love, we just held each other close until we drifted off. I lay there for a minute, just watching him the way I sometimes did when I needed to remind myself that this was real.Then, I reached for my phone.Bad habit. I knew it before I even touched the screen. But after yesterday, there was a compulsion I couldn’t shut off, like needing to check a wound to see if it had festered overnight.It had gotten worse. Obviously.Notifications had piled up while we slept, more tweets, more think pieces, more strangers with loud opinions about our lives. I scrolled past most of it without reading. I’d learned over the last twenty-four hours that reading the c

MY SON HAS MY FULL SUPPORT

Chapter 169MaxI had to put the phone down for a second, pressed the back of my hand against my mouth and stared up at the ceiling, fighting the rising panic in my throat. I breathed deeply through my nose until the tightness in my chest loosened enough that I trusted myself to keep going.Then, with trembling fingers, I picked the phone back up.My mother's video appeared on my feed next. It was the shortest of them all. I wasn't surprised, she wasn't someone who performed emotion for an audience. I had learned that about her during the months we'd found each other. She felt things deeply but kept most of it private, expressing love through action rather than words.She was sitting at the kitchen table of our family home, her hands folded neatly in front of her. She looked tired, yet profoundly composed. I wondered who had helped her set up the camera, likely Maria or Adrian."I don't know how to do these things," she said quietly, gesturing slightly as if the concept of the vide

All Chapters of THE HOCKEY ALPHA WANTS ME: Chapter 171 - Chapter 172

I STAND BY MAX RIVERA

MY SON HAS MY FULL SUPPORT