DRIVING MY DRUNK girlfriend, her roommate, and some random dude home at two in the morning is not my usual post-game routine. Amara and her date jump out, and Summer sleeps soundly in my passenger seat.
I touch her cheek to nudge her awake, but she swats it away and burrows further into the seat. “Summer, wake up.”
She mumbles something again, most likely a threat.
“If you want to sleep in my truck, I’m all for it, but we’ll have to move to the backseat. I’ll keep you warm back there.”
Summer blinks herself awake. “Do you enjoy irritating me?”
I chuckle, retrieving a water bottle from my glove compartment. She takes it, downing the entire thing.
“Why did you wake me? My dreams are so much better than reality, full of little fairies braiding my hair.”
“I could braid your hair.”
She stares blankly. “You don’t know how to.”
“I’ll learn,” I say. Summer smiles, rests her head against the seat, and her eyes flutter shut again. I can’t shake the notion she’s hiding something. “Why are your dreams better than reality?”
She shrugs.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“I want to sleep.” Summer tries opening the passenger door and groans when it doesn’t budge. “If you’re trying to kidnap me, I have two thumbs and I’m not afraid to use them.”
“Stay at my place.”
“Why? So you can hold me in your stupidly large arms and coax everything out of me? I’m not falling for your tricks, Clifford.” She points a finger at me, eyes narrowed to the point that they’re basically closed.
The name change tells me she’s more drunk than Amara let on. “You can come with me, or I’m staying with you.”
“Nope. That’s a bad, bad idea. Sober Summer is screaming at me right now.”
“Tell her not to, or she’ll wake up with one hell of a hangover.”
She groans in frustration. “Stop making sense! Just let me sulk in my dorm.”
“Sulk with me. No questions asked,” I lie. I need to know why she wants to sulk and why keeping it from me is so important to her. “Please?”
She shakes her head more vigorously. “Don’t give me those eyes.”
I hold back a smile. “What eyes, baby?”
“Those! All green and innocent looking. You can’t fool me, buddy.” She closes her eyes, trying to stay firm.
“Summer, you can barely stand, and Amara’s up there with her date. Let me take care of you.”
Her eyes fly open, and I’m sure she’s about to argue, but she pauses instead. “You want to take care of me?”
“As long as you’ll let me.”
It doesn’t take much persuading after that to get Summer to come home with me. When I carry her inside, the house is as quiet and I’m relieved there isn’t an impromptu party. After my talk with Dylan, he’s banned from attending or throwing parties until further notice. But that isn’t stopping him from getting blitzed like he’s at one.
Summer strips out of her dress and pulls on one of my T-shirts before diving under the comforter. I do the same and slip in beside her. She abandons the mattress to lie on top of me. The way she kisses my chest sparks a hot sensation on my skin. My hands are firmly set on her waist, unmoving despite her protests. She’s drunk, and as much as she wants to, I know the only thing we’ll be doing tonight is sleeping. And figuring out why the hell she went and got wasted.
“You’re boring. Should we go see what Kian’s doing?” She tries to climb off me, but I tighten my hold. Apparently, drunk Summer is adventurous.
“I’d rather not get another lecture about tarnishing the sanctity of his room.”
“He’s so dramatic! We only mistook his room for yours once.”
Kian made me buy him new bed sheets and wash his old ones, twice. We weren’t even completely naked. Last week, Summer and I were both so lost in each other that we didn’t realize we turned right after the staircase instead of left. Kian locks his door now.
She’s quiet for a moment, allowing her fingers to draw shapes on my chest. “Why did you come get me tonight?”
“I’ll always come get you, Summer. Even when you don’t want me to.”
She makes a face. “You’re nauseatingly perfect. I think I really like you.”
Drunk Summer likes to reveal her feelings too. Though, I assume the prerequisite to dating is liking each other. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
Her mouth twists in thought. “I’m still deciding.”
“Can I do anything to speed up the process?” I tuck her hair behind her ears, and she shivers.
I wrap her in my arms, and she pecks my chin. “You being you is enough.”
“So you’re nice when you’re drunk, eh?”
“Don’t make me regret it,” she grumbles.
She turns away to lay her head on my chest again. I can feel the shift in her mood. Times like these, I wish I could see the problems swirling in her head and sort them out for her.
Summer rolls off me to lie on the mattress, but I don’t let her get far. When I cup her face, the thread of indifference snaps, and vulnerability spills into her expression. The action draws the tears she’s been fighting to soak the pillow.
My heart squeezes to an uncomfortable degree as I wipe the wetness. “What’s wrong, baby?”
She shakes her head.
“Will you tell me why you got drunk tonight?”
“For fun.” She sniffles.
“The real reason, Summer.”
“A lot of people get drunk for fun.”
“People? Yeah. You? No.”
She doesn’t speak, and I know I shouldn’t push her, but I can’t stand seeing her like this. If it has something to do with Donny again, I’m not confident that I can hold myself back from driving my fist into his face. Probation be damned.
Her eyes brim with more tears. “I’m leaving Dalton. I didn’t get into the master’s program,” her voice cracks.
My heartbeat goes into overdrive, and I’m sure she can feel the storm that brews below the surface. Words scatter and I barely form a sentence when I see her anguish. I hold her tighter, attempting to fix the broken look she gives me. “Fuck, I’m so sorry, Summer. Is there something we can do? Maybe an appeal? We can talk to admission or get Dr. Müller to vouch for you.”
She shakes her head. “It doesn’t work like that. Besides, I don’t think I can fight for this anymore. I’m just tired.”
Summer’s resilience through the entire assignment had me in awe of her. Knowing she feels depleted by the one thing she wanted most, tears at my chest.
“And Stanford is the only other place with a comparable program. It was my backup, and their offer acceptance deadline was tonight.”
Stanford? I’ll be in Canada after this semester, but I never thought she’d be more than an hour’s flight away. Let alone on the opposite side of the country. A headache blooms, and I try to keep from saying something stupid as I stare at the ceiling. “So, you’re going to California?”
“Yup.” Her shaky inhale tells me she’s trying not to cry. “Know any Stanford hockey players?”
“That’s not funny.”
Her sigh is heavy and full of despair. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“So, that’s it. You’re just going to leave?” It’s hard to keep my tone from being harsh. I can’t fathom that this is reality.
“It’s not like I have a choice. If I can’t get in here, I have nowhere to go. Everything I’ve been working for will be gone, just like that.”
“What about your five-year plan?” It’s a stupid question. That much is clear from her reaction.
“Aiden, I’m in bed with the captain of the hockey team. My plan is obsolete.”
I raise my hand to skim her jaw, rubbing my thumb on her smooth skin. “My sincerest apologies for ruining your plans.”
“Worth it,” she beams, soothing the rubble in my chest. “I’ve never done long distance.”
Realizing that Summer is thinking about us too relaxes me more than I expected, and my headache eases. “Me neither.”
“Do you want to? Do long distance, I mean.”
My neck almost hurts from how quickly I turn. “Are you kidding? You’re not getting away from me that easily, Preston.”
She grins. “Damn, I thought I’d finally found my window.”
“I’d board up all the windows before you thought about it.”
“You’re bordering on psychosis.”
“Does that get you going? I can turn it up a notch.”
“No.” She laughs. “I think we need to evaluate you again.”
“Evaluate away.” I strip away the covers, causing her to squeal when the cold air touches her skin. She clings to me, stealing any warmth she can.
“I meant psychologically,” she mutters.
I plant a kiss on her cheek. “We’ll make it work, baby. We would have to for my rookie season anyway.”
Brown eyes glow with surprise. “You’ve been thinking about the future?”
I’m not surprised by her question because when we first met I was adamant about not having a plan. At the time, hockey was my only priority. But now that I have her, I want to balance her into my life. It’ll be the easiest thing I’ll ever do.
“Our future. You make it hard not to want you in every aspect of it.”
Her perfect lips pull into a heart-wrenching smile. “Are you proposing?”
“I’m positive if I asked you to marry me right now, you’d kick me in the balls.”
She laughs, and the sweet sound strikes the heart that belongs to her. “I’d never hurt Aiden Jr.” Teasing fingers flutter down my abs. I let her do it, though it’s complete torture knowing I won’t act on the impulse. When her fingers dip under the elastic, I grab her wrist to stop her.
Her annoyance is clear when she huffs and slaps her hand on my chest. “You’re doing that thing where you’re trying to be a gentleman, aren’t you?”
“No, I’m doing that thing where I take consent seriously.”
She rests her head on my chest. She’s quiet for so long that I think she’s asleep, but she jerks. “You can’t watch our show without me. We’ll have to figure out a schedule.”
“Can’t we just watch, then discuss it later?”
Her gasp startles me. “That is so sick and twisted. Of course we can’t do that!”
“Okay, okay, we’ll figure out a schedule.”
She sticks out her pinky. “Promise?”
“I promise, Summer.” I curl my pinky around hers.
We grow quiet again as reality sets in. “This sucks,” she says, and I couldn’t agree more. “I’m going to miss you.”
“Me too, but let’s think about now. I’m here.” I pull her closer. “You’re here too, right?”
She nods. “No place I’d rather be.”
I’m all in. Mind, body, and soul, or whatever the fuck that movie Summer made me watch said. Down to my core, I’m hers. “I’ll just have to leave my mark, so you keep coming back for more.”
Because she’s already left hers and it’s right in the center of my chest.
