Fake Dates & Ice Skates: (The North University Series Book 1)

Apparently, Ryan Redmond’s parties are yearly events. According to Evan’s ‘inside sources’ Ryan has been at NU for almost six years and no one really knows why. I bother to ask why more questions and brought a six pack of beers with me to his house. Evan stayed at home to study, which is what I should be doing. One last night out won’t hurt. Will it?

Parties like these are where I’ve been wasting away my nights drinking cheap beer until I can’t see straight. There’s something so strangely comforting about intoxicated and happy strangers. It makes this whole ‘moving on’ thing feel less daunting.

I take the beers I brought into the kitchen and grab myself a cold one out of the fridge, trying to get away from the music for a second. I take a long gulp too quickly that I start coughing over the sink. I gasp and splutter as I try to breathe normally again. A soft hand comes to my back, and I shiver at the contact, still finding a way to catch my breath.

“Woah there. Take it easy,” the calming voice says from behind me.

I turn and I see her.

The same girl from the photo’s blinks up at me. The same blurry face I saw coming out of the dean’s office earlier today. And, now in the dimmed lighting, I’m reminded of the hallways between the skating rinks. If my memory isn’t that foggy, she’s probably the same figure I see passing through the rinks; always practicing until late and getting shouted at a tall skinny dude who’s probably her coach. I rack my brain around, but I can’t remember what her name is, but she must be Hacks’ daughter.

The resemblance between her and the girl in the photo is uncanny. The same blonde that had me mess up one of my games because I was stood watching her for a little too long. Just from watching the way she moved on the ice, she effortlessly trapped me in a trance. I try to swallow as I take her in. She’s still a little blurry but I can make out her satin black dress which she must be freezing in, and her hair tied in a large clip behind her head. She throws me a puzzled look, but I don’t have the energy to stop staring.

I take my time to memorise the curve of her neck and collarbones before she reaches around me. What? When did she get this close? How long have I been staring? Her face is so close to mine that her vanilla perfume hypnotises me. I don’t move as I drink in her fresh smell of soap and lavender. She laughs quietly and the sound is so heavenly I restrain myself from drinking her in even more.

“Sorry. I’m just looking for some water,” she says with a nervous chuckle. I snap out of my trance and realise I’m blocking the fridge. I move out of the way and watch as her delicate arms reach for a bottle.

“You’re the dean’s daughter, right?” I ask, clearing my throat. She freezes, pushing a strand of hair out of her face before flashing a shy smile and coming to face me.

“That’s me,” she replies with a bored expression. I can tell she doesn’t really want to speak to me but that makes me want to talk to her more. I’m not sure why but I hold out my hand.

“Miles Davis,” I say. She hesitates before slipping her gentle hands into mine. Small electric shocks travel up from where our hands meet to my brain.

“Wren.” She pulls back her hand, gripping onto the bottle. She stands gingerly next to the counter, just out of reach. I don’t know what to do with my hands, so I fold them across my chest.

“I saw you outside her office today, right?” I ask. She hums in response, opening the bottle and taking a sip. “What did you do to land a meeting with her?”

I can tell she doesn’t want to answer my question. She backs up further to the counter, mirroring my position with her arms across her chest, unbeknownst to her, slightly pushing her boobs up. I keep my eyes focused on her eyes; green and brown swirled within them.

“I’ve had a pretty shitty day and my friends were supposed to help me fix it. Instead, I’m here, so excuse me if I don’t want to talk about it,” Wren explains, sighing. Her voice is silky and relaxed. Almost tired but fierce. Less strained than I thought it would be. Is it bad that I could listen to her talk forever?

“Does your shitty day have anything to do with your meeting with the dean?” I press, wanting to know more. Something in me can’t tear my focus away from her. I need to find some way to keep her talking to me. She lets out a small laugh, shaking her head. The sound reverberates through me, instantly sending goosebumps across my arms.

“Do you always ask strangers this many questions?” Wren retorts, pushing off the counter, her stance defensive. Her face searches mine for something but when she comes to nothing, her shoulders drop.

“Just the ones I’m curious about,” I drawl, and I swear I catch her rolling her eyes. “Besides, we’re not strangers if we know each other’s names. If you tell me about your bad day, I’ll tell you about mine. Deal?”

She rolls her eyes again but this time it’s followed by a small smile.

“I’m sure you saw what happened with the regional figure skating championship.” I shake my head. “Well, to spare the details, it was awful. Augustus dropped me and broke up with me in the same breath. We were disqualified obviously, but since then no one has paid any attention to the other events we’ve held, and the team will be cut if we don’t drum up support for it by the Winter Showcase in December.”

Jesus. I only heard whispers about what happen at regionals, but I never knew it was that bad. Maybe it’s because I didn’t really care. The hockey team never interact much with the skaters because they’re so uptight from training so hard and don’t take any shit from anyone. We try and steer clear unless absolutely necessary.

“That is pretty shitty,” I say, taking a swig of my beer.

“Yep,” she says, popping the ‘p.’ The way her full lips move around her words does something to me and I have to clear my throat. She catches me staring and narrows her eyes, her cheeks turning a light pink. “Your turn.”

I take in a breath. I put the rest of the beer down the sink because for once, I didn’t want to forget this night. “You know what happened to Carter Reyes, don’t you?”

Her face changes. Something in her smooths out, relaxes, but I can see the sympathy in her eyes. “Yeah, I do. And I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine…” She trails off and shakes her head lightly.

I nod in appreciation. “I found out something my family had been hiding from me and then just after that Carter got into his accident, and I went down this really dark path. I guess I’m still on it. I don’t know. Anyway, coach said I can’t play until I’m looking better and doing better in my grades which is really fucking hard to do without the motivation.”

What I don’t mention is how my mom had been cheating on my dad for half of my life and everyone knew, and no one wanted to tell me. My sister, Clara, who I thought I was close with had been hiding it from me the whole time. I don’t mention that it’s my fault that Carter was driving so late after I called him, a drunk mess, to pick me up. If I didn’t think my problems could be solved by a drink, Carter would not have gone on the road that night and he would not have been hit. He would still be here. I know he’s disappointed in me. Of course, he is. I didn’t lie when I told Coach Tucker I was trying. I am. Every time I think I’ll get back on the ice, I can’t do it. He should be here, playing alongside me. In some ways, I suppose he is.

“Well, look at us. Two rising stars, slowly falling down,” I say with a flourish, trying to lighten the mood. Wren grimaces, her arms hugging her middle.

“How do you know I’m a rising star? You’ve never seen me preform. I could be really fucking terrible,” she laughs, downing the last of her water. I cock my eyebrow and tilt my head.

“You wouldn’t be so worked up about it if you were bad. Plus, I’ve seen you skate before. I hope it was you anyway or else I have some explaining to do to a poor girl on your team,” I say, trying to piece together the images of the skater I usually see and her.

“And what did you think?” she asks, suddenly guarded, afraid that I’ll tell her that she isn’t any good.

“Are there any other blondes on your team?”

She shakes her head, pulling her lip between her teeth. I can feel my dick twitch at the motion. “Why?”

Suddenly feeling ballsy, I lean into her, my lips mere inches from her ear. “So, then I know it was you that completely mesmerised me. Over and over again.”

Her breath hitches and I pull away. I watch as she swallows, not sure what to make of my comment. I don’t say anything else. We stand there, neither of us speaking, listening to the music blasting from the stereos around us.

“I should probably get back to my friends,” she murmurs after a while, searching aimlessly around the crowded house. I don’t want her to leave. Not yet. I know we’re not even talking but I enjoy her presence. I feel like a moth and she’s the flame.

I reach out my hand and grip hers before she walks away. She turns back to face me, her eyes travelling to our hands and then to my face. She jerks her hand away with a puzzled look.

“I have an idea,” I announce, my hand suddenly feeling empty. She folds her arms across her chest. “Why don’t we help each other out? You need to get people to see your performance and I need to get back on the ice. I don’t know if you know this but I’m pretty popular and if I show interest in your little performances, people might start showing up.”

She laughs at my idea. Like, a full shoulder shaking, tears springing to her eyes, kind of laugh. I would be offended if I didn’t like the way it sounded so much. The way her head tilts back, giving me a perfect view of her throat. The way her voice rasps when she’s come down from the high.

“I don’t really know you and I don’t particularly like you either. Why would we do that?” she asks when she catches her breath.

“Ouch,” I say, clutching my heart dramatically. I already knew that, but I thought we were getting somewhere. Apparently not. “Wait, how can you say you don’t like me if you don’t know me.”

“I know of you, and I know people like you.”

“Oh, so you’re saying that you know people like me, but you don’t?” I play on her words on purpose because I don’t hate the way she looks at me like she wants to strangle me. It only makes this more fun.

“What? You’re not making any sense.” She sighs, closing her eyes for a second. “Look, all I’m trying to say is I’m not your biggest cheerleader. Not every girl that you meet is going to drop down on their knees for you if you whisper sweet nothings into their ear.”

“Is that what you think I’m doing? Whispering sweet nothings into your ear?”

She laughs incredulously. “No, I think your trying to get yourself laid and it’s not working.”

I can’t understand how she can see through me so well or am I really just that transparent? It’s probably written all over my face that I want to touch her again. In any way. Anywhere. And I don’t even know why other than this tight magnetic force drawing me to her.

“Right. I thought that girls had the whole ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ thing written in the first page of their journal.”

“Well, you thought wrong,” she relays, throwing her water bottle in the trash. “I should really go and find my friends.”

This time I let her leave and watch her as she walks over to two dark haired girls who embrace her as if they haven’t seen each other in years. I’m still watching when I feel Xavier stand beside me. I can’t figure out why I am so drawn to her. How easy it was to talk about why I’m struggling. Her pretending like she hates me is the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. Watching her try to fight it was the best part of our conversation. Xavier holds a beer to offer me, but I shake my head.

“Were you just talking to Wren Hackerly?” he asks, taking a long gulp.

“Yeah. Well, I think so?” I reply, only half paying attention as I try to keep my eyes on her in the crowd.

“What do you mean you think?” he asks, nudging me with his shoulder.

“I don’t think she likes me, dude. Like, even as a human,” I say, trying to fight off a smile. I smother it with my hand and pretend to cough. If Xavier gets a whiff of this, he’s never going to let me live it down.

“Don’t take it personally. I don’t think she likes anyone other than those girls she hangs out with. She’s pretty hard core,” Xavier explains with ease.

“What do you mean? And how do you know?” I quiz, taking my eyes off her to meet his. He holds his hands up in fake surrender.

“Chill. It’s just the gossip I hear from Michelle.” He and Michelle have been dating for forever. Since one infamous food fight in high school and some heroic tray shielding, Michelle has not left his side. “Anyway, you know what happened last semester with that Augustus guy?”

I shrug in response.

“Right. Well. She dated him since high school and at regionals he completely ruined their routine, supposedly on purpose, and broke up with her on the ice. If someone fucked up my gameplay, I don’t think I’d be that nice. I guess everyone’s frightened that she’s just gonna go ham on him one day without warning.”

I conjure up a picture of Augustus in my head and I instantly hate him. He must have been the tall foreign guy who I always saw shouting at her from across the ice. I always thought he was her personal coach or something.

“Oh yeah, I think she was just telling me about that. I don’t think I was fully there. She’s, like, fucking mesmerising,” I sigh, ignoring every flag that is going off in my brain.

“No, no, no. You can’t do that. Not now,” Xavier shouts, coming right in front of me, blocking her from my view. I take in his dark expression, his brown eyes pinning me.

“Do what?”

“This,” he says, wafting his hand across my face. “Using big words that you don’t even use in your essays. You can’t go following her around like a lost puppy. You can’t get attached. I need you back on the team. We can’t have you on the bench all season.”

“I don’t get attached,” I mumble. He laughs again. Louder. As if I just told him the funniest joke ever.

“Yes, you do. If Emily didn’t go to Drayton, you would have been attached the hip. If you weren’t playing, you were either with her or talking about her.”

I don’t retort. What could I say to that with how true it is.

Emily Fraser and I met through Carter a few years ago but we never spoke at first. Carter had met her on a holiday in Florida and I was not prepared to do the long-distance thing. He always pushed me to date her but there was always something in the way. When we started at NU, she started at Drayton, only a twenty-minute drive away. We made it work for a few months but there was something still missing that I couldn’t place. Before everything happened with my mom and with Carter, we called it quits.

“Fine, I’m not going to argue with that but it’s not going to happen. I barely know her. If I’m not playing anymore, I won’t see her at the rink,” I say, mostly trying to convince myself.

He downs the rest of his beer, flashing me a sceptical look over his glass. “Women are fucking crazy. The second you say shit like that, they end up everywhere. It’s, like, manifestation or some shit. I thought the same thing would happen with Michelle but here we are. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, dude.”