How To Improve Communication With My Boyfriend?

He’s the campus hockey king. She’s the girl he was never supposed to want. Logan Shaw doesn’t do relationships. As the captain of the university hockey team and the son of an NHL legend, his future is simple: hockey first, everything else second. Girls are fun. Temporary. And never a complication. Harper Lane is the exact kind of complication he avoids. Smart. Stubborn. Completely unimpressed by his reputation—and the one girl on campus who refuses to fall for Logan Shaw’s charm. They were never supposed to collide. But when Logan shocks the entire university by spending five thousand dollars to win Harper in a charity date auction, suddenly the whole campus is watching. What starts as a fake date quickly turns into something much more dangerous. Late-night celebrations. Arguments that end in kisses. Chemistry neither of them can ignore. Logan was supposed to stay focused on hockey. Harper was supposed to protect her heart. Instead, they’re playing a game neither of them knows how to win. Because the more Logan tries to keep things casual… the harder he falls. And when NHL scouts start watching and Logan’s controlling father steps in, Harper becomes the one thing Logan might have to give up to chase the future he’s been raised for. But walking away from her might be the one game Logan Shaw can’t win. Enemies-to-lovers tension Hockey captain energy Slow burn with explosive chemistry And a love story that might ruin everything.

He almost never texts me first, and in person he barely says a word. In three years together, he's never remembered a single anniversary, and he's never once suggested we celebrate a holiday. But the second I message him first, he lights up, all "baby" this and "baby" that, fussing over me, coaxing me to sleep. Sometimes I'd get this strange feeling that there were two different Noahs. His explanation was that he was just bad with words face-to-face, and that texting or voice notes felt like less pressure. I kept telling myself that being together meant meeting each other halfway. He was quiet and reserved, so I'd be the one to reach out. He forgot anniversaries, so I booked the restaurant and reminded him to keep the night free. He had no time to schedule our engagement shoot, so I handled the whole thing with the studio myself. He was too busy with work to help us move, so I packed everything alone, booked the movers, and got it all done. When I was so worn out I was about to break, I'd send him a voice note, and he'd say, "I'm so sorry, baby. The lab was insane today. I couldn't be there for you, and it kills me to watch you run yourself into the ground." Hearing how guilty he sounded, all my hurt just melted away. And that's how I carried three years of this relationship on my own, running on the flawless tenderness he only ever gave me online. Until today, when I found a program on his laptop called Boyfriend Assistant. It analyzed every message I sent and generated the perfect reply, the perfect response, every single time. Cold snap? It sent: Bundle up, baby. Time of the month? It pinged an API and auto-ordered hot chocolate to my door. All those late nights he spent "working," the gentle voice notes that lulled me to sleep, every one of them was synthesized in Noah's voice. For three years, the person who'd been there for me, day and night, was never Noah at all. For three years, I'd been performing a one-woman show.

It's my first time going on a trip with my boyfriend. I overhear him on the phone with his friend as they discuss how he's going to deflower me. "Grayson, you should be able to have your way with Summer this time, right?" "Don't even talk about that. She's so conservative—I've said and done everything, yet she refuses to budge!" I lower my hand instead of knocking on the door. I stand outside the room and listen as he continues. "Come off it. We've given you so many ideas in the group chat, haven't we? Have none of them worked? And didn't you guys get a room yesterday? You should've just brought sedatives. Think about how easy it would've been if you could've just knocked her out!" Grayson Hale snaps, "I forgot, alright? Besides, who would've known there'd be two beds in the room? She insisted on sleeping separately, too. I sneaked onto her bed in the middle of the night when I saw she was asleep. She woke up just as I was about to take off her clothes and kicked me off!" My blood runs cold. My hands tremble as I reply to my boss' message. "I accept headquarter's decision to transfer me."

My husband, Chandler Goodwin, claims that he doesn't understand what the phrases "silent treatment" or "giving the cold shoulder" mean. Yet, in the three years we have been married, he has never once spoken to me sweetly. The first time we have a falling out, I remain proud and dignified. We end up ignoring each other for seven days straight. The seventh time we have a cold standoff, I start to panic a little. However, despite trying all sorts of methods, he doesn't back down. The 11th time it happens, I have already learned to work through my emotions myself. Chandler doesn't even need to say anything before I take the initiative to apologize first. I simply think that he's just a naturally indifferent person, that nobody can warm his stone-cold heart. Then, on the third year of our marriage, I accidentally ruin his dress shirt while ironing it. Chandler doesn't say a word, but that very night, he packs his things and moves into a hotel. On the third day of being blocked, I head to his company with a handwritten apology. While passing by his office, I spot him leaning over to shoot his angry assistant a doting smile. "I'm sorry for raising my voice at you just now and upsetting you. It's been 57 minutes since you started ignoring me. Please stop giving me the cold shoulder, alright?" I freeze on the spot, the apology letter in my hand practically burning my fingers. As it turns out, it's not that he doesn't know what the silent treatment means—it's just that I've never been the person he wants to coax.

I had stayed up all night to get the merchandise. It was then callously discarded by my boyfriend. On that stormy day, I knelt beside a dumpster and searched through bags of trash. Yarden Scott stopped in his tracks. “What are you looking for?” “My merch.” I did not look up. “I reminded you three times. It was in the left drawer of the sideboard.” His shirt was soaked from the rain. He subconsciously said, “Yvonne’s car broke down. I went to pick her up. I forgot.” He forgot. Last week, he threw away the commemorative ticket stubs I had stayed up all night organizing because he thought they were scraps of paper. The month before, he threw away the brooch my grandmother left me because he thought it was an old button. Every single time, he brushed it off with the same excuse. I gave a mocking smile. “You always remember everything when it comes to Yvonne, don’t you?” Yarden carefully wiped the hair tie Yvonne Jordan had left behind and answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “She’s your best friend. That means I have to treat her very well. “If I keep her happy, our relationship will last. Isn’t it all for your sake?” I watched his practiced movements and felt completely drained. I could not say another word. I had reminded him countless times before not to touch the drawers in my study. He ignored me and threw away my collection of rare stamps. I told him again and again that I was allergic to mangoes. At a group dinner, he still ordered a mango shake for me. But when Yvonne casually mentioned that she had trouble sleeping, he started sending her music to help her sleep every single day. If Yvonne wanted to eat at her favorite restaurant, he would pull every string he could to get a reservation. To him, everything about me was a burden. Everything about Yvonne was worth his time. If that were the case, then I should not bother him any longer.

At our engagement party, my fiancé, James Pierce, and my best friend, Rachel Bellini, slipped into Italian again. Years ago, the two of them had gone off to college in Milan together, leaving me to study alone in America. Right before our engagement speeches, James leaned close to Rachel's ear and murmured in low, husky Italian, "If you were the one standing here beside me today, I'd be so much happier." I turned to stare at him in disbelief, every ounce of joy draining out of me in an instant. But James just smiled at me, all innocence, and switched to English. "What's wrong, sweetheart? Nerves getting to you?" I had lost count of how many times James and Rachel had talked in Italian right in front of my face. At dinner, they critiqued the dishes in Italian. At the movies, they joked about the plot in Italian. Over afternoon tea, they traded old stories and private jokes in Italian, things only the two of them understood. I had protested. We had even fought about it. But James would only say impatiently, "Isabella, this is how we lived for four years of college. Can you stop making a scene over nothing? If you can't understand Italian, go learn it yourself!" Rachel glanced at me, smothered a laugh, and went on in Italian, "Look at that shocked little face. She clearly has no idea how hard you went at it with me the night before your engagement party." James answered with utter contempt and absolute certainty. "So what if she found out? You think she could survive without me?" The note card with my speech slipped from my fingers and landed without a sound, but the weight of it hit me like a blow to the chest. They had no idea. My father is Italian. I was born in Italy. After my parents divorced, I moved to America with my mother, Eleanor Bennett, when I was ten. I understood every word they said in Italian.