The Understatement of the Year by Sarina Bowen Read Free Book Online

the soap in the showers.”
    Another defenseman began to laugh, and then the Canadian kids joined in, the way people do when they’re not sure if they understood the joke. With Big-D right there in my face, I forced a smile and I took another deep drink.
    This time, the alcohol burned all the way down.
     
    Coach’s speech always came before dessert. So when I saw the cupcakes coming out of the kitchen, and heard the telltale ding ding ding of a spoon on a glass, I made my way to the front lawn.
    “Tonight,” Coach said, scotch glass in hand, “I want to read to you my favorite quote of President Teddy Roosevelt’s. Maybe you’ve heard it before in a history class, or philosophy. But it could have been written for hockey players. We’re going to go far this year, and along the way people are going to try to tell us that a little Ivy League school can’t play hockey at the national level. But that’s bullshit!”
    We cheered, of course. We always did. On other nights like this one, I’d breathed in every word Coach said. The last two seasons, I’d stood here taking in his wisdom as gospel. But tonight I felt as though I stood on the edges of my life, looking in.
    That’s what a weeklong anxiety attack will do to a person.
    “Listen up!” Coach squinted at his notes. “‘It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.’” Coach smiled at us. “‘The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming. And who, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly , so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat!’”
    There was more cheering then. And Hartley put two fingers up to his lips and whistled.
    “Now, boys,” Coach continued. “I don’t love failure. I fucking hate it. But what Teddy meant was that you have to embrace the fact that failure exists, or you will never find greatness. The man wrote a long fucking sentence which really means — go big, or go home!” At that, he raised his glass again, and we all drank whatever we had.
    My stomach rolled with discomfort. Again. Because I wasn’t feeling the love. Every shitty thing I’d ever done in my life had just caught up to me.
    Check, please . It was time for me to sneak out.
    First, I headed toward the bathroom to take a leak before walking home. As I wove through the house, I got a little distracted by an oblique glimpse of Bella in the study. She was standing in front of Frenchie, her hands on his chest. She was rubbing him gently, and talking a mile a minute. And he was gaping at her like she was a vision from heaven. Good God, she was working him over. The kid wouldn’t know what hit him.
    Lost in half a smirk, I didn’t look where I was going. Which is the only way I could have ended up shoulder-checking Johnny Rikker as he came out of the bathroom.
    “Jesus,” he swore, grabbing the doorframe to keep his balance.
    The word “sorry” got trapped in my throat as I realized who it was. And I leapt back, away from his body. But not before the shock of getting so close to him sunk in. The face I’d been ducking all week frowned up at me. I was taller than he was, I realized. When we were fifteen, we’d been the same height.
    It had made kissing him really easy.
    No doubt the look on my face now was one of total horror, since that had been my default expression since the moment he’d walked into the locker room a week ago.
    He studied me for a second, his expression darkening. A hand rose to rub his pectoral where I’d slammed into him the moment before. Then he seemed to pull himself together, lifting an eyebrow tauntingly. “Was that good for you?”
    I only stood there, mute, and choking on my own