The Hockey Star and His Roommate; She Has A Secret のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 31 - チャプター 39

FINNBeing a goaltender changes the way you look at the world. You spend your entire life standing in a crease, watching a play develop before the puck even crossed the blue line. You learn to read the gaps in the defense. You learn to spot the exact moment a structure is about to collapse.Right now, looking around my house, the defense is completely non-existent, and the collapse is imminent.It is Monday evening and Aurel is sitting at the kitchen island, staring a hole through the granite countertop. He has been sitting there for an hour, entirely motionless, radiating a dark, suffocating misery that is practically choking the oxygen out of the room. He spent his afternoon parading Elise around the campus quad to keep her blackmail threat at bay, and it has completely drained him out.I am sitting on the living room sofa, watching a hockey game on mute, waiting for the inevitable explosion.The door to the downstairs guest room clicks open.Aurel doesn't look up, but I see his sho

AURELYou wouldn't believe I haven't moved from the couch since she left. I am sitting on the living room sofa in complete darkness. The television is off. The lamps are off. The only light in the room is the pale, amber glow of the streetlamp filtering through the front window, cutting a sharp rectangle across the floor.For some weird reason, my brain is now a miserable, relentless projector screen. Every time I close my eyes, I see exactly what is happening across town. I see Jerry pulling into the parking lot at The Anchor. I see him asking for the back booth. I see him gesturing for Wrenley to take the inside seat so she can face the door. I see her face relax when she realizes she doesn't have to watch her back.Was I really that obsessed with her?A low, pathetic whine vibrates in the back of my throat. Something inside me has been pacing against my ribs all night, restless and violently agitated, completely incapable of understanding why I let her leave with another male. The

WRENLEYIt is Thursday afternoon and the campus design lab has thirty other art students realising midterm are next week. The heavy industrial sewing machines are running in a continuous, deafening hum. To a normal human, it’s just loud. To me, with hearing meant for tracking prey through a silent forest, the overlapping mechanical grinding is like a drill pressing directly into my temples.I have three days left until Finn’s Sunday deadline. Three days until I either pack my trash bags and leave the only safe place I’ve had in a year, or Aurel’s best friend goes to the athletic board and gets me expelled."You're glaring at that fabric like it did something to you."I blink, dragging my eyes up from the needle. Priya is leaning against the edge of my cutting table. She is holding a half-empty iced coffee, wearing a flawlessly layered outfit and looking at me with mild concern."It’s this stupid stretchy material, " I mutter, rubbing the back of my neck. My muscles are screaming in pr

AURELThe house is completely silent when I finally walk through the front door.It’s past midnight. I spent the last three hours driving up and down the highway with the radio off and the windows wound down, trying to outrun the suffocation my chest. It didn't work. My lungs still feel restricted. The ghost of the panic attack from the athletic lobby is still sitting right behind my ribs, a dull, constant ache reminding me that my entire life is currently entirely out of my control.I toe my boots off in the entryway and drop my keys into the bowl on the table. The metal clinking against ceramic sounds obnoxiously loud in the dark.I rub the back of my neck, walking down the hall toward the kitchen. I just want a glass of water. I want to go upstairs, pass out, and forget that I have to wake up tomorrow and lie to everyone all over again.I turn the corner and stop.The overhead lights in the kitchen are off, but the warm yellow bulb above the stove is glowing.And there is the cause