The Things No One Else Sees

She shouldn't have responded to his text, but it was so hard to ignore him now that she knew him so well. He was more than just the party-going hockey player who was a ladies man. He was intelligent and insightful and kind and sweet. And he was funny, too. He made her smile.

Despite her plans and schemes to keep herself busy and her insistence that they couldn't be friends, she still thought about him every day. Two days ago she'd confiscated a phone from a student in her class who was texting. The wallpaper on the smartphone was Lupul. The little boy admired him so much, he looked at a picture of him in his hockey gear every single day. She'd asked the class to read quietly to themselves so she could compose herself after the punch to the gut.

So, when he texted her with that little line, telling her that he missed her, she felt powerless to ignore it. She managed to keep her hands off her phone for almost forty-five whole minutes. But in the end it was inevitable.

Lucy crawled into bed with a pair of headphones so she could play the song she'd just downloaded off iTunes. When he'd told her to take it to bed with her, she was tempted to look up the lyrics to see what he was trying to tell her. They were such cowards, the two of them, trying to have a conversation through the veil of music.

Settling into middle of the mattress, she laid her head on the cool pillow and pressed play.

The song started out so gently, a jazzy guitar with soft percussion and multiple vocals layered over one another as they repeated the title of the song again and again. It was smooth and vaguely sexy. Relaxing, especially coming through her headphones while she rested in bed. A minute into the song, a man started talking. It wasn't really rapping because the flow was softer, more poetic.

He was telling a woman all the things he wanted to give to her, or rather, be for her. It was sweet, but still very adult. Not puppy love and glitter, not pussy-popping and dicks. It was intimate and sexy, though.

She melted down into the bed as the verse ended and a man started singing very slowly, wooing. It was the best word she could apply to it. Wooing or courting.

Lucy almost texted him when the song finished. But if she had, then she'd have end up telling him to come over. And that would have been jumping the gun. Whatever had happened between them needed to marinate for a bit.

**********************************

LUCY: Come through and arouse you every morning like the sun do.

It was six forty-seven on a Wednesday morning. She'd fallen asleep listening to the song he'd told her to download, and it was still in her head. The text was one of the lyrics, one of the lines of poetry.

JOFF: I want you to come to when I come through and make you shine like the sun do.

He replied to her text before she'd even gotten out of bed, like he'd been lying in his and waiting for her to say something. It made her heart thud in her chest as she read his lyrical response, another line from the song.

LUCY: Good morning, Mr. Lupul.

JOFF: Good morning, beautiful. Thank you for talking to me last night.

He was melting her resistances again. It was like a cycle. But she was determined to do something about it this time. She'd been lying to herself when she rebuffed his advances. She was already too deep not to get hurt. When she'd crossed that blurred line wasn't really evident, but she wouldn't have three library books on how to grow organic produce if she hadn't already been trying to cope with heartbreak.

LUCY: Why up so early?

JOFF: Light workout before morning skate. We have a game tonight.

LUCY: Good luck.

JOFF: You need to tell me when I can see you. You and I have unresolved business.

She smiled at his attempt at seriousness and humor all rolled into one.

LUCY: I'll think about it. I need some time to digest everything.

JOFF: I'm out of town this weekend. Away games. You have a week and then I'm going to come find you.

LUCY: A threat?

JOFF: A promise.

She put her phone down and went to get a shower. Really, she wanted to get in the car and drive over to his place. But there were twenty kids who would be expecting her in her classroom not long from now. And Lupul's bedroom was probably a black hole that wouldn't spit her out anytime soon.

****************************************

She was a fucking chicken. A big, fat chicken who was scared to call him. It had been a week and she suspected he’d be calling her. She’d watched part of both games he’d gone out of town to play. But she didn’t call him or text him. And he didn’t reach out to her. But she knew he was just giving her the space she’d asked for that night they’d texted. Calling just seemed so intimate. Texts were easier. She had time to think about her responses.

“Deanna’s mom hates me,” Jacob said before he put his forehead on their usual table.

Lucy patted the back of his head. “She does, not Jay.”

“She does. She thinks I’m a deadbeat because I don’t own a house.”

“You’re just imagining it. I think she’s just... stern. Old school.”

He lifted his head. “Old school and hates me.”

She laughed. “Deanna loves you. And her mom will learn to love you.”

Jacob looked at his watch and then the door.

“You waiting for her mom to bust up in here and demand you buy a house?”

“I wouldn’t put it past her.” Jacob hit the table with his fist lightly. “I gotta go. I promised Deanna I would, uh, buy groceries and shit.”

She furrowed her brows. “What? Groceries? We’ve been here for fifteen minutes. You haven’t even finished your beer.”

“I know, but I gotta go. Lots to do. Be good.” He dropped his usual kiss on the top of her head and practically sprinted out. She turned her head to watch him go. What a jerk. He hadn’t even paid for his beer.

“Weird,” Lucy said, turning back around.

“Totally weird.”

She almost jumped out of her chair because Lupul was sitting beside her at the table. It was a setup. Those sneaky assholes. “You scared the hell out of me!”

“Your week is up,” he said, leaning in closer. She could smell his cologne. God, he was almost irresistible up close. He was in a long-sleeve tee that clung to every contour of his well-defined chest.

She looked at her clunky silver and black watch. “I’ve still got a few more hours.”

“I’ve got a few hours to waste.”

He was close, and she was having trouble thinking. Flashes of their texts kept popping into her mind. And that damn song he’d sent her to bed with with was stuck in her head. Had been for the past week. “How’s, uh, hockey stuff going?”

Lupul laughed and braced his hand on the back of her chair. “How can you be so clueless about hockey?”

“Does that bother you?”

“I told you before that it doesn’t. If anything, it’s a little cute.”

“I saved all my brain room for music knowledge.”

He leaned in and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “I bet you’ve got plenty of room in this brain of yours.”

Lucy grinned at him. “Are you hitting on my brain, Joffrey Lupul?”

“Totally.” He watched her with those beautiful eyes. “So, I figured out our problem.”

“What’s our problem?”

“You.”

Her jaw dropped and he used the index finger of his free hand to close it. “Me? I am NOT the problem.”

“I’m afraid you are, Lucy,” he said, trying to affect a serious tone, but his eyes were shining with humor.

“How do you figure?”

He scooted closer until his knees were pressed into her thigh. “Well, I want you to myself, but you won’t let me have you. So, I see you with other guys and I get mad.”

She tilted her head and gave him the look that said she thought he was full of shit.

“Mad and sad,” he said, pushing his lower lip out in a pout. “And then I want to get back at you by talking to other girls.”

“Sure, talking.”

“Talking and having sex with. But the problem is I can’t get to the sex part because I have this huge, massive... conscience.”

Lucy lifted on corner of her mouth up in a smirk. “A huge... massive... conscience?”

“I know. You’re intrigued now. Girls love my big conscience.”

“You are too much,” she said, leaning forward and laughing with her hand on his knee.

“I hear that all the time. It’s too big.”

Lucy let go of his knee and punched his shoulder. “Ouch,” she hissed.

“This body is a weapon. Don’t hurt yourself.”

“Do you have an earpiece in? Is Paul Bissonnette feeding you lines?”

This time he laughed. “So, anyway, the huge conscience gets in the way because I feel like I should be faithful to you. But we’re not dating. So, we get all the guilt, but none of the fun parts.”

“Fun parts?”

“I tried to throw in some fun parts when we were doing the weird friendship where we thought about each other naked, but that didn’t work. All we got was guilt.”

“It sounds like you’ve thought a lot about this.”

He nodded, eyes wide like a little puppy dog. He was totally screwing around; she could see that little gleam in his eye. But he was also being sincere in an odd way.

“Oh, I have. Road games are like therapy. You sit in a hotel room and think about your life. You sit in a bus and think about your life. You sit in a plane and think about your life. You sit in the shitty visitor’s locker room of Madison Square Garden and think about your life and how the woman who refuses to date you would probably drop her panties for Henrik Lundqvist.”

“Who is Henrik Lundqvist?”

He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “I prepared for that question.”

A couple seconds later, he held the screen up for her. A painfully handsome man with stubble was staring back at her. He looked like a model. “Wow,” she said.

Lupul rolled his eyes. Actually rolled his eyes and blacked out the screen before he pulled his phone away. “I knew it.”

“I just said wow.”

“You implied.”

“You’re saucy tonight,” she told him.

He chuckled and reached a hand under her leg to grab the seat of her chair and scoot it around to face him more fully. “I’m saucy?”

“Have you been rehearsing this conversation?”

“All fucking week. I didn’t want to screw it up.”

“I wouldn’t drop my panties for the Henrik guy. Who is he? A model?”

“The Rangers goalie.”

Lucy’s eyes widened. “Really? I thought goalies got hit by pucks.”

“Dig the hole, Lucy. Dig the hole. “ He paused and looked at her, the amusement fading out of his eyes for a moment. “How am I doing?”

She smiled softly at him. “You don’t have to try so hard. You’ve already got me.”

Notes