Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

"Duang! Cheewin! Can we get a word?" the reporter chased after him.

Duang, still catching his breath, removed his helmet and ran a hand through his sweat-dampened hair. "Make it quick."

"That was a dominant performance out there. Did you ever doubt you'd take this championship?" the reporter asked, microphone thrust forward.

"No." His deadpan reply was immediate. "Why would I doubt? We're the best team. We proved it."

"Some critics said Soldier Tiger was too aggressive this season—"

Duang’s gaze turned cold, his brown eyes narrowing slightly. "And? We won, didn't we? I don't play for critics. I play to win."

"What about the Thai netizens' thoughts about you playing for a Canadian team instead of your own country—"

Duang’s jaw tightened, his grip on his helmet visibly tensing. "I play for Soldier Tiger because they gave me the opportunity when others didn't. That's it." His voice thickened with irritation. 

"My country? I represent the Thai community every time I step on the ice. The jersey doesn't change that." He shifted his weight, already turning away. "Besides, hockey is hockey. The puck doesn't care what language you speak. Are we done?"

"What's next for you? NHL scouts have been watching—"

"What's next is celebrating with my team. I don't think about 'what ifs.' I think about now." 

The reporter opened his mouth to continue, but Duang was already walking toward the locker room, his shoulders cutting through the crowd.

(Qin)

It had been officially one week since Tiw came back. And my life had already degraded into a complete disaster. I thought I would be free from him since our breakup two years ago.

But now, it just felt as if this past year had been a trial—a demo before the actual game of life—when Tiw somehow came back into my life.

I’d spent my entire university life out here rebranding myself—making sure no one knew about my past.

And it had gone well. No one knows me outside of my name being Qin—just Qin. I’m pretty sure 95% of the people here don’t even know who I am. Or maybe 99%, since the only people I talk to are Kim and Tong. But that’s not the main issue here.

I liked not being known. Hoped it could stay that way forever. But I guess Tiw wouldn’t just leave my life that easily.

I stared down at my phone, the sound of the Halloween party muffled from where I sat—in the back stairs of his huge, huge house. 

Don’t worry about us, Qin is what ma had messaged me. But I know better.

I had to worry. Ma and Pa were starting to lose business because of Tiw’s family. Because it was the only way Tiw’s family could grab my attention. 

His family had always loved me—really loved me—loved me much more than their own son ever could, I guess.

The second I broke it off with Tiw, his parents had haunted me—finding me and trying to persuade me into getting back with him. When they said they would do anything to get me back, they also meant buying away Ma and Pa’s customers.

And if there was one thing I cared about most, it was my parents and their safety. I could have just dropped this and pretended to like Tiw so his parents would stop—but the other problem was that Tiw had decided he didn’t want me anymore.

I was lucky enough to be sent away from my hometown, away from Tiw and his parents’ bullshit. But I guess you can’t run away forever.

So I decided. Today I was going to make a move. I was going to win my stupid fucking pig-ass ex back just to save my family’s business. And I swear I had dressed up perfectly for this exact occasion.

Waldo. Yes. Waldo from Where’s Waldo.

In my defense, I had no idea Tiw was going to be here.

I pushed open the door, walking back into the party and pushing my way through the crowd. This fucking crowd that felt as if everyone was a microorganism that had to stick to each other like they were hardened rock solid.

I tiptoed and finally found Tiw. He was dressed up as Captain America—a classic costume for a boy, really. I excused my way through until I reached the kitchen where, to my surprise (not really), Tiw was actively inhaling a girl’s face.

Jesus. If God had a chance to swap my body with someone else’s, this really would be the time.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Okay. I got this.

I approached Tiw and his eyes drifted open to me—still actively making out—which I really did not want any more of. He raised his brows, his eyes on me but his hands rummaging through the girl’s corset and back to her waist, pulling her closer.

I wanted to puke.

“I need to talk to you.” I tried to be louder than the speakers.

Tiw pulled back from the kiss and the girl turned to me with a glare. “Can’t you see he’s busy? Go find some other boy to fuck with, twink.”

What the fuck?

“Okay, blondie, what the fuck is your problem? Can’t you keep whatever is going on down there in check for a second and let me talk to Tiw?”

The girl parted her mouth to speak but Tiw cut through it. “What is it, Qin?”

I turned to him and bit back. “Not here.”

“Well, if you need a word in private then it can wait—” He pulled the girl back into a sloppy wet kiss.

God, this was so infuriating. I was considering grabbing a wine bottle and smashing it right onto both of their faces so their lips would bruise and they could no longer kiss—but I knew they would just end up licking the blood off each other because that’s apparently what people’s kinks are now.

The other alternative was to leave. But leaving meant giving up on my parents.

“Tiw, can we get back together—”

The girl pulled back from the kiss and laughed—a full-on belly laugh—and turned to me. “Hey, twink, whatever you’re dressed up as. Look at me and look at you. There are hundreds of hot girls in this house and you genuinely believe Tiw would choose to date you over hooking up with us?”

She pushed my shoulder back with her finger. “Just face it. You’re never going to get back with Tiw, so stop trying.”

Tiw laughed with her and didn’t even turn to face me. And I couldn’t believe he was the same guy who had actively courted me throughout junior high and senior high. 

The same guy who had told me I was the only person he could see in a room full of people. The same guy who would tell me that I mattered.

Fine. Go and suck her face because I’m still going to make you suck me by the end of the day. MY PARENTS NEED THIS STUPID GUY WHO IS A PIECE OF SHIT—

That same guy was now making out so hard with his princess peach that they stumbled back and completely shoved me, sending me stumbling backwards.

“Woah, careful there.” The familiar voice came from behind. A hand pressed against my back, stopping me from falling completely.

I didn’t have to fully turn around to recognize that voice. Duang. A friend of Tong’s boyfriend who couldn’t seem to stop bugging me every time we crossed paths—and that had been what, just twice? 

Once at Tong’s birthday party and once more at Pae’s birthday party. And in just two nights I could already tell what type of person he was.

Loud.

He was loud. Not just his voice—everything about him was loud. The way he carried himself, the way he dressed, and just his overall personality.

..a year back (Tong’s birthday party)

I slipped out of the party through the back door, mostly because the front was a wall of bodies and noise and I had reached my social quota approximately forty minutes ago.

The back porch was quieter. A pool that caught the light from inside the house, a trampoline off to the side, and most importantly—no people. 

Or so I thought.

I had just located the perfect chair. Far corner, away from the speakers, partial cover from the overhang. I was literally three steps away from sitting down and achieving the first moment of peace I’d had all night.

When something in my peripheral vision moved. I turned.

To my right, half behind the bush that lined the porch fence, were two bodies that appeared to be in the active process of trying to become one body. 

“JESUS—” The sound came out before I could stop it. I slapped my hand over my mouth. 

Both heads shot up. The girl looked bothered and the guy above her had the audacity—the absolute audacity—to have a smile on his face. 

And I recognized that face. Tong had shown me a photo once—his boyfriend’s hockey team at a dinner after some winning game—That face had been in that photo. Right in the center of it, naturally.

“Oh my god.” I averted my gaze hard, staring very intently at a specific tile on the porch floor. “Get a room. Literally— there is an entire house with rooms right here—”

I turned on my heel and walked straight back inside.

The party swallowed me immediately. Music, bodies, someone spilling something near the hallway. I pushed my way back through and found a space near the far wall, pressing my back against it and staring at absolutely nothing.

Okay. I had not needed to see that. Nobody had needed to see that.

I grabbed the nearest snack from the side table—didn’t even look at what it was—and took a bite and tried to physically relocate my brain somewhere far away from the image that was now apparently burned permanently into my retinas.

A few minutes passed. The music changed. “HEY.”

I knew that voice before I turned around. Duang was making his way toward me through the crowd with his shirt slightly rumpled and his hair aggressively unbothered. 

Loud. Everything about him was just loud. Not just the volume of him, though that was plenty. 

It was the way he took up space, the way his expressions were never halfway, the way he grinned like the world was constantly doing something he found entertaining.

I looked away. Looked back at my snacks.

He stopped right beside me. Leaning against the wall with the widest grin ever. “You know,” he said, “most people knock.”

I furrowed my brows. “There was no door,” I said to my cup. “There’s a bush.” I turned to him. “You were behind a bush. Was that even comfortable— nevermind. I don’t even want to know.”

Duang pressed his lips together. His eyes were doing something deeply amused. “Fair enough. I’ll give you that one.”

I turned back to face the party. He stayed where he was.

“You could’ve just kept walking,” he offered.

“I was going to. And then you—” I stopped. “Never mind.”

“And then we what?”

“I’m not finishing that sentence.”

He made a sound that was almost a laugh. I felt him shift to lean his back against the wall—not taking the hint, not even in the same universe as the hint—and for a moment he just stood there. 

“You good?” he asked.

“You’re seriously asking?” I turned back to him. “I just saw your naked butt—and you’re asking if I'm good? I’m trying to forget the last five minutes of my life.”

“That’s a little dramatic. Everyone has butts, don’t tell me you’re scared of your own butt too.”

“Seeing people’s naked butt shouldn’t be something normal!”

“Okay, okay—” He was definitely laughing now, trying to keep it behind his fist. 

“Also—“ I said way too loudly. “—why are you dressed like that?! It’s bothering me.” I pointed at his outfit. He is wearing a full vertical black and white striped outfit. Top and bottom. BOTH.

“It's chic isn’t it. Girls dig it.”

“No it’s not? You look like a barcode.”

“Thank you.” Duang smiled unbotheredly. 

“Wha— That wasn’t a compliment—“

“Wanna scan me and see what comes next?”

“I’m leaving—“ I turn to leave but he quickly stepped in front of me, both hands up to show defeat.

“Kidding, kidding. Don’t leave yet, please,” he blinks. Pleading slightly. I sighed and leaned back to the wall, which he followed after. “This is what you call Mime-core.” 

“That is not a thing.”

“It’s very underground. I don’t expect you to know it.”

“You look like you escaped from a silent film.”

Duang now, shooting finger guns at me. “Thank you again.”

“STOP— saying thank you!”

“Stripes are timeless. Stripes are classic. Cary Grant wore stripes.”

“What are you even saying.”

He turned to look at me then, and even from my peripheral vision I could see the exact moment he slightly tilted his head. With the grin that meant absolutely nothing good.

“You know, if you scan this barcode up,” he said, casually, “you’d get a full discount of getting whatever you walked on back—”

“OKAY.” I pushed off the wall. “Goodbye. I’m leaving. This conversation is over—”

Now he actually laughed. “I’m teasing!”

“Don’t care!”

“Oh c’mon—”

“I will walk into oncoming traffic before I finish hearing that sentence—”

His laughter followed me across the room, bright and completely unrepentant, loud enough that I was fairly certain three separate people turned to look.

I did not turn back around.

And that was just the first time I had talked to him. I did not want to remember how the second time at Pae’s party went.

present.

I stood up properly and turned to him. Duang raised his brows, looking down at my toes and back up to my eyes with an amused expression. 

“Mind explaining why you’re dressed up as a candy cane at my party?”

“I’m Waldo!”

“You’re joking. Waldo from Where’s Waldo?” Duang pressed his lips together, clearly holding back his laughter. “So I'm not allowed to wear full on black and white striped clothes, but you’re allowed to wear red and white striped clothes?”

“I’m not having this conversation.” I turned on my heels and walked away, ignoring the calls from the brown-haired guy.

“I wonder where Waldo is!!”

“Shut up!” 

…

The afternoon shift at the campus café was, on most days, the most peaceful part of my week.

Quiet enough to think. Busy enough to not have to.

Today was not one of those days.

“I still can’t believe you witnessed Princess Peach making out with Captain America,” Tong said from the other side of the counter. “Maybe that’s why Waldo is never found. Cause he’s hiding from all the trauma he saw.”

I didn’t look up from wiping down the espresso machine. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“That’s such a specific visual.”

“Tong.”

“I’m just saying—” He leaned his elbow against the counter. “Of all the halloween costumes in the world. Princess Peach and Captain America. That’s not even a crossover that makes sense.”

“None of it made sense.” I wrung out the cloth and moved to the next machine. “Can you move your elbow, I need to clean that.”

Tong moved his elbow exactly two centimeters. Kim, who had been sitting at the end of the counter with his laptop open and his coffee going cold, didn’t even look up when he said.

“Did she really call you a twink.”

“Yes.”

“To your face.”

“That is generally where calling someone something happens, yes.”

Kim finally looked up. He had the expression of someone who was genuinely offended on my behalf but was also trying not to find it slightly funny. 

“I’m going to need her name,” he said.

“You don’t need her name.”

“I’m just going to look—”

“Kim.”

He huffed and closed his laptop halfway. 

The café door chimed and I turned on autopilot. “Welcome in, what can I get—” and then the customer took one look at the menu board and immediately became indecisive, which gave Tong a full uninterrupted window to continue.

“So what’s the actual plan now,” he said, dropping his voice slightly. “After the— you know. Halloween thing.”

“I don’t have one yet.”

“You went there with a plan.”

“That plan failed.”

“Spectacularly,” Kim added helpfully from behind his laptop.

“Thank you, Kim.” I turned to the indecisive customer—oat latte, finally—and started pulling the shot. 

The familiar noise of the machine filled the counter space and for about forty seconds I didn’t have to think about Tiw or Princess Peach or the fact that I had stood in a kitchen and asked my ex to get back together with me while he was actively making out with someone else.

Forty seconds.

God it was humiliating.

Then the machine finished and the silence came back.

“His parents messaged mine again,” I said, keeping my voice flat. “Yesterday.”

“What did they say,” Tong asked.

“The usual.” I slid the oat latte across the pickup counter. “Enjoy,” I said to the customer. Then quieter, back to them. “That they missed me. That Tiw misses me. That the family would love to have me back.” 

I folded the cloth in my hands. “The message was very warm actually. Very nice. Very—”

“Qin.”

“Three of my parents’ regulars cancelled their orders this week,” I said. “Same week as the message. Funny how that works.”

The café was quiet for a moment save for the background music the morning shift had left on. Something acoustic that sounded like I’m not bothered by the rain. 

“Okay,” Kim said. His voice had changed. 

“We need to actually sit down and think about this properly. Not workshop it. Actually think. Because I'm not letting my best friend suffer anymore from this Tiw thing. We weren’t there in high school to protect you, but now we’re here.”

I feel a small shift of warmth inside of me. Suddenly remembering how I do in fact have Tong and Kim and this right moment to guide me and be by my side—that I'm no longer facing anything that’s in front of me alone like I used to.

People always said that romantic love is what guides you through life. That somewhere out there is a person whose sole purpose is to be your compass—your anchor, your great love story.

But that was never quite true for me.

Because long before romance ever entered the picture, there were two people already sitting in my corner. Not by obligation. Not by circumstance. 

Platonic soulmates, I think, are one of life’s most underrated gifts. The kind of love that asks for nothing and shows up anyway. The kind that doesn’t need grand gestures or perfect timing—it just exists, constant as breathing, easy as coming home.

They were here before anything else. Before the heartbreaks and the bad decisions and the versions of myself I’m not particularly proud of. 

They witnessed all of it and stayed anyway, which I think says more about love than most love songs ever could.

And no matter how far I wandered—no matter how many times I convinced myself I could handle things alone — I always knew. I could run back to them when I needed strength.

Not because they would fix everything.

But because somehow, just being in the same room as them made the weight of everything feel a little more bearable. A little more survivable.

So even in this cruel world, I’m glad life has decided to give me Tong and Kim.

Tong had his chin resting on his folded arms on the counter. He was looking at me with that quiet, careful expression he got when he’d already thought three steps ahead and was waiting for the right moment to say it.

I looked at him. “What.”

“Nothing.”

“You have a thought. You never form a thought.”

“Ignoring that. I have a small observation.”

“Say it.”

He was quiet for a second. “At the party. After the Tiw thing.” He paused. “You were talking to Jack Sparrow.”

“Excuse you?”

“Duang. I meant Duang.”

The cloth in my hands stopped moving. “No I wasn’t.”

“I clearly saw you.”

“He caught me from falling. That’s not talking.”

“You were talking after that. I’m just making an observation. I didn’t say it meant anything.”

“Then why bring it up.”

Tong blinked. Said nothing. Which was somehow worse than if he had said something.

Kim looked between us slowly. Then he opened his laptop back up. Then he closed it again. “Wait.”

“Nope. I know that face. I’m not doing this conversation anymore—“

“Oh c’mon Qin. His family is as rich and high in the industry as Tiw’s family. Just— I don’t know ask him for help or something?”

“ask—“ I was too baffled to even talk. “—ask him for help?! I don’t even know the dude bro.”

“Teeet” Tong made a beep sound. “And that’s where you’re wrong. Because you do know the guy. You’ve talked. And have mutual friends. Friends that are dating—“

“Can you stop the sneak attacking about your very healthy relationship with Pae.” Kim shoved Tong’s shoulder as Tong stuck his tongue out smugly. “But I agree—“

“Absolutely not.” I picked up the cloth and turned back to the machine. “Whatever you just said. Whatever it was, it is, it isn’t, it wasn’t, no. The answer is no.”

Kim pressed his lips together. “Okay fine. But you’re still coming tomorrow, right?”

“To the match? No. I have homework.”

“Qin! Just pull an all-nighter the next day, you’re coming.” Tong complained.

“You’re there to support your boyfriend. Why should I be there? People don’t support their boyfriends with their friends, you know?”

Tong rubbed the back of his neck and parted his mouth to argue back. The café door chimed again and I reached to pat his shoulder. “I’m not going to the match.” And turned around.

“Welcome in,” I said. “What can I get you?”

And across the counter, Kim and Tong exchanged the very specific look that I had learned, over years of being their friend, to deeply, deeply dread.

(Duang)

We are so completely, catastrophically, cosmically fucked.

Tomorrow. The match is tomorrow. And Pae had just spent the last twenty minutes explaining to Jamie, why he believed hot dogs were legally a sandwich, and Jamie had been countering with equal passion.

And not a single neuron in either of their brains had been allocated to the fact that we had lost our last two scrimmages, our left wing kept overcutting, and our goalie, bless him, had the reflexes of a very committed golden retriever.

I loved these people. I genuinely did. 

But sometimes I looked at them and felt something I could only describe as a very tired, very specific kind of grief. Like a tired mom of 21.

“Okay but hear me out,” Pae said, dropping onto the bench beside me and immediately stealing my water bottle. “Structurally. A hot dog bun is hinged. It opens. That’s a pocket. That’s a taco situation.”

“A taco is not a sandwich,” Jamie said.

“I didn’t say it was a sandwich, I said it was a TACO SITUATION!”

“DUANG.” Coach’s voice cut across the rink. “You’re up.”

I pushed off the boards and skated out, and for about four minutes I was a functional human being with a singular focus and the ice was clean and loud under my skates and everything made sense.

I came back to the bench, huffing and taking off my helmet.

“—so what you’re saying,” Jamie was saying, “is that a calzone is just a sandwich that gave up.”

“A calzone is a SANDWICH IN WITNESS PROTECTION,” Pae said, deadly serious.

I sat down. I picked up my water bottle. I stared at the middle distance.

“Duang,” Pae said. “Calzone. Sandwich or not.”

“I’m not doing this.”

“DUANG.”

“Nope.” I shook my head.

“He’s deflecting,” Jamie said to Pae, like I wasn’t right there.

“Classic avoidance behavior,” Pae agreed.

“I’m not avoiding, I’m conserving brain cells for the match tomorrow that we are going to lose—”

“We’re not going to lose,” Pae said. “We’re the fucking Soldier Tigers bro.” 

“Pae you fell DOWN yesterday. During warmup. Before anyone touched you.”

“The ice was really wet!

“It’s a fucking rink!”

“PAE.” Coach yelled and Pae fled off.

The bench shifted. Jamie scooted over to fill the gap, close enough that our shoulders touched. “You okay, dude?” Jamie asked.

“You’re genuinely asking?”

Jamie raised his hands in defeat. “Okay, I know you’ve having post match anxiety right now, but trust me you’re not going anywhere with that heavy feeling, Duang. Plus what Pae said was true, we’re the soldier tigers, with a team like us and captain like you—what can we not do?”

The thing was—he was right. I knew our numbers. I knew this team. I had run every line combination in my head since Monday and I knew, I knew, we had a real shot tomorrow. Or any other day.

And yet. Here’s the thing about anxiety that people who don’t have it don’t really understand—it doesn’t care about logic. It doesn’t sit across from you and debate. It doesn’t give you a fair fight. 

It just settles somewhere behind your sternum like a stone you swallowed and forgot about, and then match eve rolls around and suddenly it’s the only thing you can feel.

I had been playing hockey since I was seven years old. I knew what pre-match nerves felt like. I knew how to breathe through them, skate through them, check someone into the boards through them. I had done it a hundred times.

But I somehow couldn’t ever get used to this feeling. It wasn’t about the match, exactly. It wasn’t even really about winning.

It was the thought of my parents watching from the stands, and what my face would look like if I let the team down. 

It was the version of me that exists in some parallel tomorrow where I miss the critical play, where my read is wrong, where my legs don’t do what I need them to do—and the quiet, terrible way that version of me would have to live with that.

My parents had never once said I should quit. Never once made me feel like hockey was a wrong choice or a waste. They showed up. They affirmed. They were—genuinely, consistently—good about it.

That almost made it worse, somehow. Because that just shows that the pressure wasn’t coming from them. 

It was coming from me, and it had always been coming from me.

This voice that lived somewhere just behind my eyes that kept a running tally of every imperfect game, every missed opportunity, every match where I was good but not good enough. Not for me. Never quite good enough for me.

The idea of losing tomorrow didn’t scare me because of what anyone would say.

It scared me because of how it would feel to stand in the locker room after and know that I had performed beneath what I was capable of. That I had been given a team that trusted me, a game I had built my whole life around—and I had come up short.

That feeling—I can never describe it properly except to say it starts somewhere in my throat and works its way down until I genuinely feel like I need to throw up everything inside me just to make room for the shame of it.

Irrational. I knew it was irrational. Jamie would tell me it was irrational. Pae would probably use the word “unhinged” and then try to cheer me up by singing a hamilton song.

But knowing something is irrational has never once stopped it from feeling completely, devastatingly real.

“HUFT!” Pae flopped back into the metal seat. Taking off his helmet and chugging down his water. “Okay where were we— anyway. Different topic. Hypothetically. If you had to describe your situationship as a sandwich—”

“None of us have a situationship, Pae.” I groaned and leaned against my palm while Pae and Jamie continued their sandwich talk.

Jamie leaned forward, genuinely invested. “I’m thinking a banh mi. Complicated. A lot going on. Looks put together but structurally chaotic.”

“I don’t have a situationship,” I said again.

“You have something,” Pae said.

“I have a hockey match tomorrow and a left wing who keeps overcutting and a team that—”

“DUANG.” Coach called again.

I was on the ice. The ice was clean and fast and blessedly, mercifully silent. For a few minutes I got to skate and play without another thought but the strategy of scoring a goal and great pass. Then I came back.

Pae and Jamie were in the middle of what appeared to be a staring contest.

“…what’s happening,” I said.

“He said my situationship is a gas station sushi,” Jamie said, not breaking eye contact with Pae.

“It has POTENTIAL but the EXECUTION IS QUESTIONABLE—”

“I’m breaking up with both of you,” I said.

“You can’t break up with us,” Pae said. “We’re your emotional support.”

I put my helmet back on. I looked out at the rink. I looked back at them.

“We have a match tomorrow,” I said slowly, like speaking to two very beloved, very unreachable golden retrievers. “We need to win. I need you both present. Mentally. Physically. Spiritually.”

They looked at me.

“Duang,” Jamie said gently. “We love you.”

“We’re absolutely going to win tomorrow,” Pae added.

“And also,” Jamie said, “if you had a situationship it’s definitely a banh mi.”

“Jesus—“

Coach blew the whistle.

…

The parking lot was mostly empty by the time I got to my car.

I sat in the driver’s seat for a full two minutes without starting the engine. Just sat there with my bag in the back and my hands in my lap and let the silence do whatever it needed to do. 

The rink always left this specific kind of exhaustion in my body—not the bad kind, more like being wrung out. 

Like every anxious, overcrowded thought that had been rattling around in my skull since morning had been skated out of me, at least temporarily.

I pulled out my phone. Opened SoundCloud. Scrolled past three things I’d already heard too many times this week until I landed on a self cover mix someone had uploaded.

I put it on. Let it fill the car.

Lua — Bright Eyes playing..

I started the engine.

Three minutes. I had been driving for maybe three minutes when I had to brake.

There was a person in the street. Not standing in the street—running in the street, chasing something, arms out slightly like he was trying to corner it. A piece of paper. 

A flyer, actually, the glossy kind, tumbling and skipping ahead of him on the wind with what I could only describe as a personal vendetta. It spun once, dodged left, and plastered itself flat against my passenger window with a definitive smack.

The person chasing it froze. I looked at the flyer on my window. I looked at the person. The person was Qin.

He was wearing a white t-shirt with a pink coloured cat printed, panting and huffing which explained everything I needed to know. He stood still, leaning against his knee and other hand hugging a pile of flyers, staring at my window like he was deciding whether he could pretend he hadn’t seen me.

I felt the amusement start somewhere in my chest before I could do anything about it.

I rolled down the window. The flyer fluttered. “Hi there, candy cane. This yours?” I said.

Qin’s jaw tightened. “Give it back.”

“I didn’t take it. The wind gave it to me.” I leaned my elbow on the door, settling in. “I think that means it’s mine now.”

“That’s not how that works—“

“Finders keepers, Qin.”

“You didn’t FIND it, it flew into your car!”

“Into my window,” I corrected. “Which is basically my personal space. So legally—”

“Do NOT say legally.”

“Legally,” I said, “I think this is mine.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Just.” He walked up to the window and held out his hand. “Give it back, printing price isn’t free you know?”

“Say please.”

“Duang—”

“It’s two syllables, candy cane.”

“Stop calling me that!”

“Calling you what?” I grinned. “Candy cane? Say please and I’ll give it back and leave you alone.”

“I will not—” He stopped. Breathed through his nose. “Please.”

I picked the flyer off my window. Looked at it properly for the first time.

It was small, printed on glossy white cardstock. Clean design, actually—someone in the music department knew what they were doing. A little promo for a performance night. Live sets, a couple of names I half recognized, a date at the bottom.

The venue was X. 

I looked up. “This is at X.”

“Yes.” Qin reached for it.

I held it back. “I go there.”

“Good for you.”

“With my hockey mates. Like every other weekend.”

“Congratulations.” He made another grab. I pulled it out of reach.

“Are you performing?”

Something shifted in his face. Just briefly. “No.”

“No?”

“No.” Flat. Final. “My classmates are. I’m just helping them hand out the flyers.”

I looked at him. He was already looking slightly away, chin up, in the particular way Qin held himself when he wanted to look like something hadn’t landed. 

It always looked like dignity. It always looked slightly too deliberate to actually be dignity.

“So you’re out here,” I said slowly, “in the freezing weather with a plain Tee—“

“Don’t.”

“—chasing paper—”

“I swear to god—”

“—for other people’s glory.”

“Duang!”

“That’s very noble of you.” I tucked the flyer into my sun visor. “I’m keeping this.”

“Duang! That’s the original copy—”

“Then it’s very lucky the wind delivered it to me.” I put my hand back on the wheel. “I’ll come watch. Tell your classmates.” I was about to drive off but then remembered something.

“Are you coming with Tong tomorrow?”

“No I'm not. Don’t want to further damage my eyes by watching you play.”

I raised my brows. “Pretty sure you’re afraid of falling for my charm on ice.” I winked.

“Keep dreaming, Cheewin.” Qin flipped me off with both hands, turned around, and jogged back across the street to where a small cluster of people were waiting—presumably his classmates. 

I watched him go and pressed my finger against my smile. There was something so amusing with annoying Qin. Even if our encounter was countable, and yet each one was memorable enough to make me laugh in the middle of lunch recalling our conversation.

I looked up at the flyer in my sun visor. Then I pulled back out into the street, turned the soft song back on, and drove back feeling considerably lighter than I had in the parking lot.

…

The living room was in its natural state—controllers on the floor, someone’s socks on the coffee table that were definitely not mine, and the specific blue light of the TV casting everything in that particular shade of we live here and we have given up on aesthetics.

Jamie and I had been at it for forty minutes. FIFA. He was losing and he knew he was losing and he kept doing the thing where he leaned his whole body into a turn like it would affect the game.

“THAT WAS AN OFFSIDE!”

“It was not offside—“

“DUANG!”

“IT WAS NOT AN OFFSIDE JAMIE!”

Footsteps on the stairs. Then Pae materialized in the living room doorway, freshly showered by the look of it, and instead of saying anything he just drifted over to the couch and sat down.

Jamie glanced at him. Looked back at the screen. Looked at him again.

“…what’s wrong with you.”

Pae smiled at the middle distance. “Nothing.”

“You look weird.”

“I look happy.”

“That’s what I said.”

I paused the game. Pae was still doing the smile. The slightly annoying smile of a man who had recently received a text message he wanted to talk about but wanted to be asked about first.

“Okay,” I said. “What.”

And that was apparently all the invitation he needed.

“So.” Pae pulled his phone out. “Tong just called.”

“Oh here goes the homosexual again.”

“And he said—” Pae paused for effect, which was unnecessary and he knew it, “—that he’s going to make food. Handmade. And bring it for me tomorrow before the match.”

Jamie groaned and covered his face.

“He said he already knows what I like.” Pae’s smile widened incrementally. “He just knows, guys. I didn’t even tell him. He just— he paid attention and he remembered and he’s going to—”

“Oh he’s so normal about you,” Jamie said, in the tone of someone being forced to acknowledge something genuinely wholesome against their will.

“He really is,” Pae agreed, deeply pleased with himself and Tong and the general situation.

I unpaused the game. “That’s cute.”

“It’s more than cute.”

“So are they coming tomorrow?” I asked. Eyes on the screen. “To the match.”

“Probably, I haven’t asked yet—”

“Is Qin not coming?”

Silence. I felt it before I looked up. The specific texture of a silence that had weight in it. I looked up.

Jamie had turned fully on the couch to face me. Pae was already wearing an expression I deeply did not like. 

The game was still running. My player was standing on the pitch doing nothing. I was losing now probably.

“—and Kim,” I said. “Obviously. Since you always say Tong is with them, so I just meant, like. The group. Generally. Whether the group was coming.”

Neither of them said anything.

“To the match,” I added. “That’s tomorrow.”

Jamie turned slowly back to the TV. “Yeah,” he said carefully. “Smooth cover up, Capt.”

“Completely smooth,” Pae agreed, in a voice that was doing a terrible job of pretending to be neutral.

“I was just asking because you said Tong was coming and I thought—”

“Should I ask him?” Pae said.

“…”

“I don’t mind asking.”

“…”

“I can just text him right now, super casual, hey babe are you bringing anyone, totally normal—”

“…”

“I can also,” Pae said, setting his phone on his knee with the careful deliberateness of someone laying down a very good hand, “ask Tong to persuade them. If that’s what you want.”

I looked at the TV. “That’s not what I want.”

“Okay.”

“I was asking generally.”

“Completely.”

“About the group.”

“The group, yes.”

“Jamie, back me up—”

“I am so far out of this,” Jamie said, raising both hands. “I’m a ghost. I’m not here.”

Pae was fully smiling now. Not the soft Tong smile from earlier. The other one. The one that meant he had filed something away and would be using it at a later date of his choosing.

“You know,” he said conversationally, “Qin was watching last month too. The one you didn’t join because you said the opponent wasn’t worth training for.”

“They really weren’t.”

“Anyway.” Pae stood up. Stretched. Patted my shoulder twice. “You owe me a big one.”

Then he walked into the kitchen, completely unbothered, leaving me and Jamie and the unpaused game where I was now definitely losing.

Jamie picked his controller back up. Said nothing. Said nothing for a very long time.

“Don’t,” I said.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You were about to.”

“I really wasn’t.” He unpaused his side. “I was just going to ask if you wanted to order pizza.”

I looked at him.

“…and also,” he said, “Qin seems cool.”

I threw a pillow at him.

(Qin)

“Qin, Kim. Double checking but you both are coming tomorrow right?” Tong finally looked up from his phone.

“Yep, got nothing better to do.” Kim flashed a thumbs up, and I shook my head.

“Still not going.” I said, and turned back to my screen.

The file was a mess. Not a catastrophic mess—more like a someone handed me half finished exports and disappeared for three days kind of mess. 

The audio levels were inconsistent, two of the transitions were clipped in the wrong place, and whoever had named the folders had done so with what I could only describe as chaotic personal logic. 

A folder named “FINAL.” Another named “FINAL ACTUAL.” A third named “FINAL ACTUAL USE THIS ONE PLS.” Inside that one, six files, none of them labeled with dates.

I adjusted the levels on track three, rendered a quick preview, watched it, found another problem, and started again.

“Qin.”

“No.”

“I haven’t said anything yet—”

“You were going to ask me to come tomorrow.” I didn’t look up. “The answer is no. I have to finish this.”

Tong set his phone down on the table between us. “You’ve been editing that for four hours,” he said.

“It needs four more.”

“It doesn’t.”

“The transition on the second segment is half a beat off and if I leave it like that I will think about it every single day for the rest of my life.”

Tong considered this. “Fair,” he said, which was one of the things I genuinely liked about him. He knew when to concede a point.

Across the table Kim was lying on his stomach on the couch, feet in the air, scrolling through his phone.

“Still,” Tong said, “you could finish this tonight and come tomorrow—”

“Or,” I said, “I could finish this tonight and sleep.”

“You could sleep after—”

“Tong. I’m not going to a hockey match.”

“It’ll be fun—”

“I don’t know anything about hockey.”

“You don’t have to know anything about hockey—“

“Guys.” Kim was the one who beat me into it now. He sat up straight in a way that meant he had found something on his phone. “Look what I found. It’s Tiw.”

Tong leaned over. I kept my eyes on my screen for two more seconds before I looked.

It was Tiw’s story. Posted maybe twenty minutes ago. A photo taken slightly from below. Hockey tickets. Two of them, fanned out slightly in one hand, the rink name just barely visible on the print.

can’t wait for tomorrow !! 🏒

Kim looked at Tong. Tong looked at Kim. They both looked at me.

“So Tiw’s going,” Kim said.

I looked at my screen. The waveform sat there, patient and unmoving. Track three. Half a beat off. I had been staring at it for four hours.

My phone buzzed.

I looked at it without meaning to.

It was a reminder I’d set for myself two days ago. Call back. My parents’ name underneath.

I had called them this afternoon, in the gap between handing out the last of the flyers and getting back to the editing. 

It had been one of those calls that started normal—my mother asking about my meals, my father asking about my sleep, both of them asking about the performance. 

Making sure to sound interested and not worried even though I knew the topography of their voices well enough by now to hear both things at once.

And then somewhere in the background, past their voices, the factory had sounded different.

Someone talking too fast, equipment running when it shouldn’t be, the way the acoustics changed when people were moving through the floor in a hurry. 

I had grown up falling asleep to that sound through walls and phone speakers and the particular quiet my parents got when they were managing something they didn’t want to bring into the room with me.

I had asked if everything was fine.

My mother had said yes, of course, don’t worry about us.

My father had laughed and said the usual customer had pulled their order. Just a minor thing. These things happened.

These things happened was what my father said when things were not minor.

I set my phone face down. Looked at my screen. Looked at the ticket photo still open on Kim’s phone, which he had conveniently not put away.

Tong was watching me with the expression of someone who was not going to say anything and was going to let me get there myself. He was very good at that. I resented that.

The factory sound. My mother’s voice doing the thing where it was warm on the surface and careful underneath. Two tickets. Tiw’s story.

I closed my laptop.

“Fine,” I said.

Kim looked up.

“Fuck it,” I said. “I’m going.”

Tong’s face did something small and pleased that he was smart enough not to make big. Kim, less restrained, pumped a single fist.

“Great,” Tong said simply, picking his phone back up. “It’ll be fun.” He was already messaging someone. 

…

The rink was louder today, much more than I expected.

I don’t know what I had pictures—something smaller, maybe. More contained. But the stadium had that specific energy of a place that existed purely for noise, the kind of building that seemed to vibrate slightly even when nothing was happening yet.

I found Kim and Tong near the entrance, Kim already holding a overpriced cup of something and Tong wearing a scarf in the team colors.

“You came,” Kim raised his brows with surprise.

“I said I was coming.” I looked around. “Have you seen Tiw?” I asked.

“Around probably,” Tong said.

“Around where?”

“Somewhere inside? We don’t know mate.”

I pulled out my phone. Open Tiw’s story—see you there! with a hockey stick emoji, posted this morning.

“I’m going to find him,” I said.

“We’ll get seats,” Tong said.

The hallway inside was that particular stadium beige, fluorescent lit, smelling like popcorn and cold air bleeding in from the rink. I checked Tiw’s story again. Standing somewhere near the east entrance by the look of the signage in the background.

I went to the east entrance. And he was there.

Standing near the wall, phone in hand, laughing at something. I walked over.

“Tiw.”

He looked up. “Qin?”

“Yeah.” I stopped in front of him and for a moment I just stood there because I had been thinking about what I was going to say for six hours last night and now that I was here the architecture of it felt suddenly very humiliating. 

“Hey. I— yeah. Hi. So I wanted to talk.”

“Okay,” he said, unbothered.

Okay. 

I had closed my laptop on a half-finished edit. I had listened to my parents’ voices doing the careful thing and decided that I was going to do this. I am going to give Tiw’s parents what they want. 

“I wanted to talk about what I asked— at um, the halloween party? Tiw can we get back together?” I blinked.

Tiw blinked. “Uh— Qin. I have a—“

“Baby!!” A girl was coming out of the bathroom down the hall. Pretty. 

She walked straight past me like I was part of the wall. Tiw’s arm went around her waist reflexively. And she pulled him in by the collar and kissed him, he laughed into it and his hand settled at the small of her back.

I stood there.

I wanted to die.

This was so humiliating.

I can’t believe this just happened.

Why did I have to ask Tiw that.

Why didn’t she appear before I asked him to go back together.

I needed to leave this hallway. 

I needed to leave it immediately and find Kim and Tong and stand next to them and not talk about this, not ever, and watch a sport I didn’t understand and go home and fix the transition on track three and never think about this again.

Tiw turned to me. “Qin. About what you said—”

Don’t you dare say sorry.

“—sorry, but I—”

A hand landed on my head. Heavy. Warm. Ruffling my hair before coming to rest there with complete and total ownership. I turned around to find Duang smiling widely at me.

“There you are.” He did one final stroke before dropping his hand to my shoulder. “I was looking for you everywhere.”

He was still in his team jacket, half unzipped, hair slightly damp at the edges from warmup. I narrowed my eyes at him. Then in the smallest movement, his gaze shifted past me. I followed it.

Tiw and the girl had both gone still. Their hands had dropped from each other without either of them seeming to notice.

“Are you two close?” Tiw managed.

Duang looked at me—just briefly, just enough—before turning us both forward to face them properly.

“I’m courting him.”

My eyes went wide. So did theirs. I looked at Duang but he looked completely composed. Like this was a normal thing to say. Like this was fine. 

“Oh, this has to be a prank!” The girl laughed, touching Duang’s arm. “You’re so funny. We all know you don’t do dating— is this guy one of your puck ducks?”

Puck what?

“It’s not a prank.” Duang’s voice was easy. “I like Qin. I’m fully courting him. He’s the best person I’ve ever met— he actually is. Anyone would be lucky to have him and I hope that person ends up being me. If he’ll have me back.” 

He turned to look at me then. I turned to look at him.

“Will you?” he said, and there it was—the tease sitting just at the corner of his mouth.

I pressed my lips together. Narrowed my eyes.

And then slowly, in the background, it clicked. I peeked at Tiw and the girl from the side. Neither of them were doing a good job of covering their faces. 

They had both let go of each other completely and didn’t seem to have noticed.

They were bothered.

Duang was helping me.

“Well,” I said. “I don’t know. Will you be good?”

“For you? Hell yeah.” He turned back to Tiw and the girl, easy and final. “Now let’s go— your friends are waiting. Nice to meet you both.” He nodded once, then turned us around.

Before I could look back he leaned in close. “Don’t turn around. I’ll do it.”

And he did. Whatever look he gave them over his shoulder I didn’t see, but I felt the weight of it in the silence we left behind. We walked.

“That was genuinely humiliating by the way,” he said, once we’d put enough distance between us and them. “Whatever was happening back there before I showed up.”

“Were you fucking eavesdropping?!”

“It’s not eavesdropping if I accidentally heard it. Also you were loud—”

“I was not????”

“But I did save your sweet ass though, didn’t I?”

“Check again whose ass you’re saving because it’s not mine.” I shook my head. “And what even was that? Courting? Who says courting?”

“Don’t you dare disrespect the tradition of courting.”

I raised my brows and said nothing. We rounded the corner and stopped near the closed snack counter at the end of the empty hallway. 

“I also accidentally heard what happened at the Halloween party,” he said.

I stared at him. “Wow. Surprise, surprise. Are you a stalker?”

“Emphasizing on accidentally.” He leaned against the closed snack counter, one shoulder against the wall, arms loosely crossed. “You were outside. I was coming through. I heard some of it.”

“Some of it.”

“Enough of it.”

I looked at him. “And the Halloween party.”

“Also accidentally.”

“You accidentally overhear a lot of my conversations.”

“You’re loud.”

“I am NOT—”

“Qin.” The corner of his mouth. Always that corner. “Do you want to hear what I think or not.”

I didn’t say yes. But I didn’t walk away either, which he apparently took as the same thing. “Okay.” He shifted his weight. “So here’s the thing about Tiw.”

“Don’t.”

“Not an insult. Just an observation of Tiw or any other guy, really.” He tilted his head slightly. 

“He’s comfortable, right? Easy about himself. The kind of guy who’s never had to reach for anything so he doesn’t really notice nor care when someone else is reaching around him. He’s had everything come to him so naturally for so long that he doesn’t register what’s right in front of him.”

I said nothing.

“But the second,” Duang continued, “another guy steps in— especially a guy he knows, a guy up his level, a guy whose opinion registers to him— suddenly he’s doing the math. Suddenly he’s looking. Suddenly what he had sitting right there that he never once thought about becomes something he’s not entirely sure he wants someone else to have.”

The hallway hummed quietly around us. 

“Especially if someone like me wants you.” He shrugged his shoulders. “That’s just how it works,” he said.

I stared at him. “Oh now you’re just cocky.”

“I’m not cocky if it’s true.”

I rolled my eyes and looked away. “Why do you even care.”

He was quiet for a second. “Because I need entertainment,” he said. “And my mind is a mess and I need something fresh.”

I turned back to him. “…what.”

“And,” he added, “you’re good at piano.”

“…I’m sorry?”

“I need someone to teach me.”

The fluorescent light above us flickered once and settled. I waited for the punchline. It didn’t come.

“You seriously think,” I said slowly, “that I would believe a hockey player needs to learn how to play the piano.”

“First of all—” he pointed at me, “—nothing is wrong with hockey players wanting to learn piano. We are fully dimensional human beings and I resent the implication.”

“That is not what I said—”

“Second.” His voice dropped just slightly. “My parents’ 50th anniversary is coming up. And I want to— I don’t know.” He looked briefly at the floor. 

“Surprise them? They’ve done a lot for me. More than I think I’ve told them properly. And they love classical music, they always have, so I thought maybe if I could actually play something for them— “ He stopped. One shoulder lifted and dropped. “It’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid,” I said, before I could stop myself.

He looked up.

I looked away. “I mean. It’s a little last minute and ambitious but it’s not— “ I stopped. “How long do you have.”

“Six weeks.”

“That’s not enough time to—”

“I’m not trying to perform at Carnegie Hall, Qin. I just want to play one song without it sounding like I’m murdering something.”

Despite everything I almost laughed. I pressed it down.

“You’re joking,” I said instead. About all of it. The whole situation. 

“Okay.” He pushed off the wall. Straightened up. Back to unbothered. “Whatever you want to think.”

And then—because apparently he had been building to this the entire time and had just been waiting for the right moment to lay it down.

“But it’s clear to both of us that you want Tiw. For whatever reason, because genuinely, with full respect, he is not that interesting. He’s not even that attractive nor is he famous or even all that great physically and mentally.”

“Jesus.”

“I’m just saying I don’t fully see it but that’s not my business.” He held up a hand. “What is clear is that whatever I did back there bothered him. Which means it works. Which means—” he tilted his head, the corner of his mouth doing the thing.

“What is it, Candy Cane. Piano lessons, in exchange for me pretending to court you. Just enough to make him look. Just enough to make him remember you’re there.”

I looked at him for a long moment.

The thing was—and I would not be admitting this out loud, not today, not ever—he wasn’t wrong about the mechanics of it. I had watched Tiw’s face in that hallway. 

I had watched him recalibrate in real time. I had watched his hand tighten and his posture shift and his eyes do the thing eyes did when something they had never considered became suddenly, uncomfortably considerable.

Duang had done that in thirty seconds without even trying.

Six weeks. Piano lessons. 

A fake arrangement with the most aggravating person I had encountered in recent memory, who also happened to, apparently, want to learn the piano for his parents’ anniversary like some kind of secret soft person living inside a very annoying exterior.

“Go focus on your match, Duang.” I stepped past him. “Bye.”

I didn’t turn back.

…

Section C was easy enough to find. Kim spotted me first and waved me over. I sat down between him and Tong and fixed my eyes on the ice.

“Snacks?” Tong asked.

“Yes, thank you.” I took some popcorn.

The rink was filling up around us, the noise building in that slow compounding way of a crowd. I pulled out my phone. Put it away. Pulled it out again.

Piano lessons in exchange for me pretending to court you.

I put my phone away.

It was a ridiculous offer. It was the kind of offer a person made in a hallway when they were feeling dramatic and wanted to feel useful and hadn’t fully thought through the logistics of what pretending to court someone actually involved on a day to day basis. 

It would be messy. It would be complicated. I pressed my fingers against my eyes.

Don’t think about it.

My phone buzzed. I looked down.

Mom: Qin sweetheart, everything okay with you? Quick thing, is it alright if we send this month a little later than usual? Things are just a bit busy here right now, nothing to worry about 🙂

I read it twice. I knew that message. I knew the shape of it. I had grown up learning to read the distance between what my parents said and what they meant. 

And I knew that a little later than usual from my mother meant something had shifted and they were managing it quietly the way they always managed things quietly so I wouldn’t feel it.

I typed back: of course, don’t worry about me. I’m good.

I put my phone face down on my knee. The crowd shifted around me. Kim was saying something to Tong. I wasn’t hearing it. 

Then—movement, to my left. I looked without meaning to. Across the sideline, maybe twenty rows down and to the left, Tiw was standing with his girlfriend near the railing. He was looking at me. Not glancing—looking. 

When my eyes landed on his he lifted one hand and waved. 

Tiw was WAVING at me.

His girlfriend’s eyes followed him. She found me. She did not wave. The look she gave me was the very specific look of pure hatred. 

I looked away.

Tiw had a girlfriend. Had probably had her for a while if the ease between them was anything to measure by. And I had been relentlessly, trying to grab Tiw’s attention and none of the time working well—untill Duang helped today.

I thought about Duang in that hallway, saying what is it, Candy Cane like it was simple. Like the whole thing was simple.

Every bad outcome lined up in my head in a very orderly row. It wouldn’t work. Tiw would see through it. His girlfriend would make it worse. 

Duang would get bored halfway through and leave me in the middle of it because he’s probably that type of person too. And I'd have to redo my whole mission alone again. The row of bad outcomes was right there.

I stood up.

“Qin?” Tong looked up.

“I’ll be back.”

“The match is about to—”

“I’ll be back,” I said. I was already moving.

The concourse was busier now, people funneling toward their sections, the announcements starting up overhead. I moved against the current of it, scanning, already feeling slightly insane for what I was doing and doing it anyway.

Please, I thought, to no one in particular. Just let me find him quickly so I can do this before I change my mind.

Past the east entrance. Past the closed snack counter where we’d been standing twenty minutes ago. Down toward the team corridor where the signage changed from public to staff and the flooring went from stadium carpet to plain concrete.

Please.

And then—there he was.

Coming around the corner from the direction of the locker rooms, already in full gear except for his helmet which was tucked under one arm. 

He looked different in the uniform. More settled, somehow. Like this was the version of him that made the most sense.

And much as I hated to admit it, he looked incredibly good. He was frowning at the floor, head leaned against his stick, clearly mid-thought about something. 

“Cheewin!”

He stopped. Turned.

Took me in for a moment—standing there, slightly breathless, in the concrete staff corridor, gathering what was left of my dignity with both hands.

A smile reached his face slowly. “Oh.” A beat. “Want to give me a goodluck kiss now?”

I jerked my head toward the door on my left. Staff room. Dark through the small window. Empty.

“Inside,” I said.

He looked at the door. Looked at me. The corner of his mouth did the thing. He didn’t say anything—just walked over and pulled the door open, stepping aside to let me in first.

“So what is it—”

“Deal.” I crossed my arms. “Whatever you said. Piano lessons for cour—” I stopped.

He waited.

“…for the thing.”

“Courting, Candy Cane.” He tilted his head. “It’s really not that hard to say.”

“It’s weird!”

“It’s not weird, it’s romantic—”

“It’s only romantic in movies. Open your eyes, we are standing in a staff room right now. We are not in a romcom.”

“And if we were?” He raised a brow. “Who am I in this romcom?”

“The jock who falls in love with the quiet nerd.”

“Are you the quiet nerd?”

“Wha— NO! Find yourself a quiet nerd dude!” I pointed at him. “That is not the point. I’m agreeing to the deal, that’s the point.”

Duang narrowed his eyes. Genuinely, this time. “Why the sudden change.”

“Seriously?”

“I’m serious. I have a few minutes before the game so if you’re going to explain yourself, do it fast.”

“You came up with this plan and now I have to persuade YOU?”

“Hurry up~” The grin spread wider. He was enjoying this. Enormously. At my expense. I took a breath.

“Fine. Okay. Just now, in the stands— I saw Tiw looking at me. And then he waved at me.” I held up a finger. “Both things I could never get out of him in six months of trying. Six months, Cheewin. And then twenty minutes after you show up and do your whole— “ I gestured vaguely at him, “—thing—“

“Courting! It’s really not hard to say!”

“Shut up! And then suddenly he’s waving at me across a stadium.” I stepped forward without meaning to. Duang stepped back without seeming to notice. 

“You were right. About the mechanics of it. And as much as it genuinely pains me to say that out loud—”

“You can say it again if it helps—”

“It does not help. The point is I need this, okay?” Another step forward. He was against the table now. “I can’t fully explain to you why getting this right matters so much to me. I just— I need it. And if this arrangement gets me there faster then I’m in. So.” 

I looked at him straight. “Are you going to help me or not, Captain?”

He blinked once. Something moved behind his eyes that I couldn’t read. With a small huff of laughter, his head tilted with me like a mirror.

“Seeing you this desperate. How am I supposed to say no to you, candy cane.”

“Great.” I stepped back. Breathed. “So how are we going to— WAIT. You have a game right now, oh my god, go. Go go go—”

I grabbed his arm and started pushing him toward the door, which he allowed with the energy of someone who found this deeply funny and was choosing not to say so. 

We made it all the way to the main corridor entrance where the rest of his team was gathered and waiting—Jamie and Pae both clocking me immediately with expressions that had a lot of questions in them—and Duang was almost through the door when he stopped.

Turned around. And I had about half a second of warning before his arm hooked around me and pulled me into a hug, his chin coming to rest on my shoulder.

I stood very still.

“What,” I said carefully, “is this.”

“If we’re doing this,” he said, “it has to look convincing to everyone. Not just Tiw.” He pulled back and looked at me. “So. Careful there, Candy Cane.”

“Careful of what—”

“Don’t fall for me.”

“FUCK off! Oh my god!” I shoved him, both hands, and he stumbled back laughing, already moving, shooting finger guns at me over his shoulder as he turned back to his team.

Every single one of them was looking at me. Jamie with his mouth slightly open. Pae with the expression of a man who was going to have so many things to say about this later.

I stood in the corridor.

Okay, I thought. I did this. This is a thing I agreed to. On purpose. With my own mouth.

I turned around and walked back to section C.

I had just settled back into my seat with what remained of my composure when the lights went down. Not dimmed. Down. 

The whole stadium dropping into darkness in one clean cut, the crowd noise rising immediately in response the way crowds did when darkness told them something was about to happen.

“Oh good, you’re back,” Kim said. “You’re just in time.”

“For what—”

The opening guitar riff hit. Low at first. Just the first few notes of something I recognized—and then the full thing dropped and the crowd went.

Welcome to the Jungle had started playing and I understood suddenly that this song was not just a song people liked. It was a song that had been specifically engineered for moments like this one.

A spotlight cut through the dark to the tunnel entrance on the far side of the rink.

The MC’s voice came up over the music. “Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome your favorite University Soldier Tigers—”

The crowd erupted.

“Number fourteen, left wing— PAE.”

Pae came through the tunnel and hit the ice and the crowd cheered and he immediately did a small celebratory lap. Pointing at the crowd while shooting finger guns.

“Number seven, right wing— JAMIE.”

Jamie came out and pointed at someone in the crowd with that playful confidence of a man who had specifically told that person to sit in that exact spot so he could point at them.

One by one they came through—each name landing, each player hitting the ice, the crowd building incrementally with each one, the music holding everything together underneath.

I watched. Tong had his scarf raised. Kim was clapping. Around us people were on their feet and the noise had become its own physical thing.

“And finally—”

The MC paused.

Deliberately. Professionally. The pause of someone who knew exactly what they were doing and was letting the anticipation earn itself.

“Your captain. Number 21— PODDUANG CHEEWIN!”

The roar that came out of that stadium was a completely different category of sound than anything that had come before it. I flinched.

Genuinely flinched, shoulders up, water bottle nearly out of my hand—because it was loud, not just loud like a crowd being enthusiastic but loud, like several hundred people had been waiting specifically for this name and were now releasing everything they’d been holding.

Duang came through the tunnel.

He did a lap, full smile and waving. Turning every corner and making sure to reach every side of the rink before resting.

“Yeah,” Kim said, reaching past me for his drink. “He didn’t perform when you watched last month, right? So you haven’t seen this part.”

I turned to look at him. “Is it always like this?”

“Like what?”

I gestured at the stadium. At the several hundred people currently making sounds that I was fairly certain had structural implications for the building.

“Oh.” He shrugged one shoulder. “People really like Duang.”

“I can see that.”

“He’s been captain since sophomore year. The crowd kind of— adopted him, I think that is the word.”

On the ice the team was assembling at the center, helmets still on, circling once while the music finished its last few bars. I looked back at Duang.

He was looking around. Scanning the sections methodically, moving through them one at a time. I watched him do it.

He went through the lower sections. The student section. The far side. Then the near side—section B, section C—he found me.

I knew because he stopped. Just for a second. Just long enough. Then the MC’s voice came back up for the final note and the team reached up and pulled their helmets off in one collective motion and the crowd noise peaked again.

And Duang, looking directly at me from the center of the ice in front of several hundred people, winked.

The camera caught it. Of course the camera caught it. It went up on the big screen immediately—his face, that expression, the wink in full high definition.

And the MC laughed into the mic and said “ooh, somebody’s got someone in the crowd tonight—” and the crowd reacted with the enthusiasm of people who had been given exactly what they wanted.

Everyone in the near sections started looking around.

I stared at him with an expression that I hoped communicated, across the full width of an ice rink, that I was going to actually end his life.

He smirked. Completely pleased with himself. Then turned back to his team like nothing had happened.

I turned slowly in my seat. Kim and Tong were both already looking at me. Kim with his drink raised halfway to his mouth, frozen there, eyes wide. 

I turned back to the rink. Pulled the cap off my water bottle. Took a sip. On my left Kim opened his mouth.

“Nope,” I said.

He closed it.

Oh this is going to be one hell of a year.