I toss and turn most of the night until I finally break down and take one of the painkillers I still have for my shoulder. There's been a dull ache in it all night, but it's not the only thing keeping me from sleep. The idea that I'm going to have to face Jayden, and act like I haven't seen Hannah naked will be easy. But pretending I don't like her… that might be hard. If Jayden finds out about this, I am dead, and I don't even blame him. If one of my teammates slept with my mom, I would ram a hockey stick down their throat without even thinking. But my mom doesn't have the figure of a toned thirty-something. My mom might be smart, but she isn't witty, and she doesn't giggle with a lightness that makes me feel like I'm floating on the sound.
When the painkiller finally kicks in I over-sleep, and when I wake, the room is obscenely bright. I grab my phone off the nightstand and realize it’s eleven. Shit! Crap! I jump out of bed and yank on my clothes, running my hands through my hair as I hurry down the stairs. I was hoping that I could help Hannah with breakfast and then maybe have her for breakfast. Once… twice if you count the shower… was not enough. And I know as soon as Jayden shows up, this is done for good.
And sadly, I realize as I hear more than one voice when my feet hit the bottom step, that time has come. I turn to the right, and as soon as I step into the great room, he calls my name. “Wall! Hey man!”
Jayden is standing in the kitchen leaning on the island. Beside him, making coffee is his girlfriend Ariel. Hannah is sitting at the long table, a mug of coffee in her hands. Beside her is Coach Emerson. He's one of the two assistant coaches on the team. Emerson handles defense more than offense, so I don’t work with him much, but I like him. I just don’t understand why he’s here.
Everyone is staring at me while I stare at them. And expressions are starting to change. Jayden looks annoyed I haven’t answered him. Ariel looks confused that I’m just standing there like a Christmas tree. And Hannah’s eyes are growing wider by the second. “Hey! You made it! That was faster than we thought.”
“Yeah, they ended up clearing the road at about three a.m.” Jayden explains. “Ariel had an app on her phone and got an alert it had opened, so she woke me up to get on the road. Luckily Coach E. was a good sport about the four a.m. wake-up call.”
“There isn’t much that would get me to miss a Christmas in Whistler,” Coach Emerson replies, and now I’m focused on him. “Jayden heard I was going to be alone this Christmas and invited me along. Wasn’t that nice of him?”
"Really nice. Great!" I swallow the scream of disapproval in my throat. "I'm in the same boat."
“We love big Christmases.” Hannah finally speaks, and she sounds different. She’s got this airy upbeat lilt to her voice. “The more the merrier.”
"We are short some bedrooms in this place," Jayden notes and looks at me again. "There's a pull-out couch in the ground floor office. Would you mind moving there?"
And give the coach a room that attaches to Hannah's room? Fuck no. But of course, I can't say that. I glance at Hannah, who is looking into her coffee cup like it's giving her the numbers to the next Powerball. "I… yeah man. Of course," I nod. "I'll go grab my stuff now. It'll take me a minute with one arm."
“How is that shoulder healing, Wall?” Coach E. asks, and he looks genuinely concerned. I can’t hate the man. He doesn’t know he’s a cock-block.
“It kept me up last night. I think I over-exerted it,” I reply, and Hannah’s eyes widen again. I shoot her a quick, calm-down glance. “I went for a hike in the morning and restocked the firewood when the storm hit. Carried too much I think. Also, I fell in the snow.”
“You’re also not wearing your sling,” Jayden notes. “Dude you have to take better care of it. We need you back now, not in three months.”
He's pissed like I've destroyed the team or something. Great, now Jayden is annoyed, and I'm sleeping a full floor away from Hannah. I nod. "I swear I am."
“Wall, keep the bedroom.” Coach E. says. “I’m good with a pull-out.”
“But it’s not as nice or comfortable—” Jayden starts to argue.
“That’s so sweet! And smart, because the last thing the poor kid needs is a crappy sleep,” Hannah says glancing over at me. But she smiles at Coach E. and pats his arm where it’s resting on the tabletop beside her.
“No. No. I insist Coach get the bedroom,” Jayden interrupts. He turns to me, a smile on his face but his eyes hard. “You’ll be fine won’t you?”
“Yeah. Of course.” What the hell else can I say? I purposely avoid making eye contact with Hannah and turn back to the stairs.
“I’ll help you move your stuff,” Jayden offers and turns to his girlfriend, who had been ignoring everything and taking pictures of her coffee with her phone. “Ariel, can you change the sheets on the bed for Coach E.?”
“Now? I thought we were going to town so I can get some shots for Instagram?” Ariel pouts.
“As soon as we’ve moved The Wall,” Jayden replies, his tone hardening. “So if you help, that happens quicker.”
I continue up the stairs with Jayden and a disgruntled Ariel behind me. When we get to my room, I head to the bathroom to gather up my toiletries. I remember what Hannah said about locking the doors so the person in the adjoining room doesn't walk in on you. I really hope Coach E. gets the same lecture. Jayden is directing Ariel to the linen closet in the hall and pulling the sheets I slept in off the bed. "We can just throw these on the pullout couch if that's fine by you."
“Yeah, man. I’m cool with it,” I say with a shrug.
“So did you do okay with my mom?” Jayden asks.
I glance up at him, but he isn’t looking at me. His dark eyes are concentrating on pulling a pillow out of the case. “Sure. She’s nice. Really easy to get along with.”
“Yeah, she’s the best,” Jayden replies, and now he’s smiling. “I hope Coach sees that too.”
I freeze. “Wh… what?”
"I hope Coach sees how great Mom is," Jayden repeats. I look through the bathroom door at him, and he's gathering my sheets in his arms as he looks up at me. "Emerson is single. Divorced about five years ago. He's obviously financially secure, and he's only four years older than my mom. She's been dating lately with not a lot of luck, so when I found out his daughter was away at college and spending Christmas with her mom in Montreal, it seemed like the perfect way to introduce them without… you know making it obvious I'm setting them up."
“You’re setting them up?” I croak and I really do sound as dumb as I pretend to be right now.
Jayden lets out a soundless laugh and shakes his head. “Dude, keep up. Yeah of course I am. Coach E. is great, don’t you think?”
“Yeah he’s nice,” I say because it would be shitty of me to disparage him just because the idea of him with Hannah makes me want to puke. “But shouldn’t you let your mom pick her own potential dates? I mean, she seems like she’s pretty capable.”
“She’s the most capable woman in the world,” Jayden agrees as Ariel stomps back in with new sheets, looking as thrilled as she did when she left. He takes them from her without a word. “It’s just, they would never meet if I didn’t do this. And I think they’d be a good fit. My mom never comes to games. She’s not keen on everyone’s shocked face when they see how young she is.”
"Yeah, when I watched a video clip of your draft, I thought Hannah was your sister," I say as I take my now-packed toiletry bag and head back into the bedroom. Ariel and Jayden are tugging on the new sheets.
But he stops to stare at me. “You watched my draft video? And you call my mom Hannah?”
“Her name is Hannah, and she… it was her idea,” I swallow and shrug at the same time as I move to my duffle bag and shove my case inside. “She’s only like eleven years older than me. We both thought it was weird to call her Mrs. Diaz.”
Also, I kind of know what she looks like when she comes, so like…
Jayden frowns like he doesn’t like that but doesn’t say it. He hands Ariel a pillow to recover and grabs one himself. I hand them both covers from the pile of sheets at the foot of the bed. “Why the fuck were you watching my draft?”
“Because I had insomnia and I just thought like… I should get to know you better, and you don’t exactly talk to me so…” I don’t add that I was distracting myself from getting out of bed last night and walking into his mom’s room and doing more dirty things to her. “I thought your aunt was your mom.”
“Great aunt. Yeah. That’s happened my whole life,” Jayden mutters, and he finally finishes making the bed.
I grab my duffle but Jayden takes it from me and motions with a tip of his head to the sling, hanging on a velvet-covered sage green chair in the corner of the room. I walk over, grab the sling, and stick it over my head. Then I grab the sheets so I can put them on the pull-out couch.
"So here's the plan," Jayden starts as we filter into the hall to go downstairs. "We'll toss your stuff in the office, and then you'll come out with Ariel and me while we check out the town. Mom will say here, she likes to spend Christmas Eve Day prepping appetizers and just chilling. Coach E. will stay too because he's exhausted from the drive. That will give them time alone to get to know each other."
This sounds like the worst plan I’ve ever heard. I hate it with every fiber of my being. But I can’t say that of course, so I just give him a curt, “Sure thing.”
Ariel smiles up at me. “You can take the photos I need of me and Jay together. It’ll be so much better than a selfie.”
“Yeah. Cool.”
I hate everything about this. I hate it even more when Hannah and Coach E. don’t object to being left alone together in the house.