Todos los capítulos de The Collision : Capítulo 141 - Capítulo 150

Ariana's POVThe game ended with Westbrook up by one, and the crowd spilled out of the arena into the cold. Becca hugged me at the gate, quick and tight, then pulled back and studied my face."You okay?""Yes.""You're lying.""Yes," I said, she laughed, and that helped a little. She checked her phone and said she had a lecture to attend. She told me to text her when I got home, then walked off toward her lecture hall with her hands jammed in her pockets.I didn't go home.I walked the long way, past the bike racks and the library steps, while the streetlights on Fifth came on one by one. I wasn't thinking about the game. I was thinking about my feet, the cold coming through my boots, and whether I'd remembered to bring my student card. I'd decided on the walk over that I wasn't going to think about anything else.The coffee shop was where I'd left it, the yellow sign in the window and the bell over the door. I pushed the door open, and the warm air hit my face. The place was half ful

Ariana's POVWe were two minutes into the first period when I stopped pretending I was there for the hockey.Becca had her elbows on her knees and her hands tucked under her chin. She'd been quiet since the anthem, which for Becca was practically a medical event. I had my bag on my lap, the strap wrapped twice around my fingers, and a program I hadn't opened.I told myself I was watching the game.Jace was on the wall at the far end of the rink, pinned between a Kingsport defenseman and the boards. The defenseman leaned in, shoulder first. Jace took the hit on his left side, the way he'd practiced, and the puck squirted free. Somebody in the crowd groaned.Jace stayed down for a second. Then he got up.He got up without help, and he didn't look at the bench. He skated back toward center with his right arm pressed flat against his ribs, and he kept his face forward, like there was nothing to see.I knew that face. I'd seen it in the library, in the hallway outside the training room, an

Ariana's POVThe clip had fifty-three thousand views when I opened my laptop, and my face was in the first frame.I closed the app before the comments could load. Then I opened a blank document, typed my name at the top, and stared at it. The cursor blinked. Somewhere down the hall, a door slammed, and someone shouted about a bike lock.My phone sat face-down beside the keyboard. Becca came in twenty minutes later, her backpack hanging off one shoulder and her cheeks pink from the cold. She dropped the bag by the door and looked at me, then at the phone, then back at me."Did you see it?" she asked."Yes.""Do you want to talk about it?""No."She nodded slowly and sat on the edge of her bed. I waited for the joke, the one about how I was handling it like a professional. It didn't come. She just pulled her laptop onto her knees and opened a chemistry worksheet, and after a while she said, "Okay," very quietly, like she was agreeing with herself.I was grateful for that too.The libra

Ariana's POVThe scholarship email had been sitting in my inbox since Friday, and by Wednesday night it had gone from a reminder to a warning.*Please submit a brief statement of your current coursework and professional activities by Friday.*I opened it at my desk with the lamp on and my laptop humming. The dorm was quiet for once. Becca had gone to the study lounge after dinner, muttering about a chemistry problem set that she swore was designed to make people cry. The radiator ticked under the window, and somewhere down the hall, someone was practicing a song on a guitar.I read the email twice. Then I opened a blank document and typed the heading.*Statement of Current Work.*The first sentence came easily. I had a column in progress, a regular reporting shift at the student paper, and a seminar on long-form features that I was enjoying more than I expected. I wrote that down in plain words, the way I'd write a news brief, and I didn't add anything that wasn't true.The second sen

Ethan's POVThe mall car park was almost empty for a Friday afternoon. I had driven across town instead of going straight to the arena. I'd told myself I needed to get out of the house, and then I'd walked past two shop windows without going into either one. The radio played a song I didn't know, and I turned it off at the second light. Now I sat on the top level, facing a concrete wall with a painted number on it, the engine off.On the passenger seat was the ticket for tomorrow's game. I had bought it on Tuesday, the same week the tournament ended. The paper was stiff in my jacket pocket, and I'd taken it out twice already to check the date, as if it might have changed.I took out my phone and opened the contacts. Jace's name was near the top.I pressed it.The screen changed to the call view. His face from last year's team photo filled the corner, the one where the photographer had told him to smile and he hadn't. The ring came through the speaker, soft and even. I held the phone t