Red Flags

Jaxson

The ice after midnight didn't have the bright, pristine glare of a game night.

The arena management had shut down the primary stadium floods, leaving only the low-wattage emergency amber lights humming from the high steel rafters.

The rink looked like a frozen black mirror, shrouded in long, skeletal shadows that stretched from the empty penalty boxes all the way to the blue line.

I skated in slow, heavy circles, the rhythmic scritch-crunch of my blades against the cold surface the only sound echoing through the cavernous building.

I wasn't wearing my pads.

Just my skates, a pair of worn track pants, and my practice jersey thrown over a gray hoodie.

My left shoulder was tightly taped, the medical adhesive binding my bruised joint, but I needed the burn. I needed the physical exhaustion to drown out the noise in my head.

"Reed!"

The sharp, authoritative voice cut through the hollow space, echoing off the empty rows of fiberglass seats.

I dug my inside edge into the ice, spraying a fine white spray of frost against the boards as I came to a halt near the home bench.

Standing in the tunnel, silhouetted against the dim concourse light, was a man in a heavy charcoal overcoat.

Mr. Vance from the Detroit front office.

An NHL scout whose opinion could dictate whether my rookie contract started with a starting spot on the primary roster or a quiet assignment to an AHL affiliate in the minors.

"Mr. Vance," I said, my voice raspy as I leaned my forearms against the top of the wooden boards. I didn't take off my gloves.

“Didn't expect to see anyone from management out here past midnight."

Vance walked down the steps, his leather shoes clicking sharply on the rubber mats before he stopped directly across from me.

He didn't look at the ice; he looked straight into my eyes, his expression a flat, unreadable line of corporate assessment.

"I stayed in town after the championship banquet to review the final athletic clearance files," Vance said, his tone dropping into a low, professional register that immediately put my guard up.

“You played a hell of a game on Tuesday, Jaxson. Your defensive positioning was brutal, dominant, and exactly what we look for in an Eastern conference line. But the front office isn't just looking at the tape anymore."

My jaw tightened, the muscle beneath my ear ticking. "If this is about the HypeTV footage—"

"It is," Vance interrupted, lifting a gloved hand to cut me off.

“And it isn't. The network drama is cheap entertainment, and frankly, our legal team doesn't care about a college breakup. What we do care about is volatility. The Detroit franchise is a legacy team, Reed. We don't invest multi-million-dollar draft capital into a defenseman who carries character red flags into the locker room."

"I haven't missed a single practice," I hit back, my voice dropping an octave, a dangerous edge creeping into my tone.

“I took a separation clearance from the media crew, and I won the National Championship with a grade-two shoulder separation. My performance on the ice speaks for itself."

"Your performance speaks to your talent. Your behavior on campus speaks to your stability," Vance said coldly. He stepped closer, leaning over the glass.

“I talked to Professor Harrison this afternoon. He mentioned your senior seminar presentation turned into a personal shouting match. I saw you in the diner last night, Reed. You looked like a man looking for a fight, and you were using a civilian student to bait one. The scouts are noticing. If you can't keep your personal malice out of the locker room, you're a liability to the franchise before you even sign the dotted line."

He let the word hang in the air.

Liability.

The exact same word I had thrown at Summer in the press room.

The exact same concept I had used to justify the wall of ice I had built around myself.

"Fix it, Jaxson," Vance warned quietly, tapping his knuckles against the top of the glass.

“Clear the garbage out of your head. We're announcing the definitive draft order in Montreal next month, and I'd hate to see a top-tier asset drop to the second round because he couldn't control his temper around an ex-girlfriend. Get some sleep."

He turned on his heel, his heavy coat swirling around his legs as he walked back up the dark concrete tunnel, leaving me completely alone in the amber gloom of the empty arena.

A harsh, self-deprecating laugh tore out of my throat, echoing hollowly against the steel rafters.

Fix it. How was I supposed to fix a system that was completely broken from the inside out?

I pushed off the boards, skating back out toward the center red line with long, aggressive strides.

I dug my blades into the ice, forcing myself into a sprint, my breath coming in ragged, freezing plumes as I pushed through the throbbing ache in my left shoulder.

I wanted to forget.

I wanted to mentally erase the entire semester—the scripts, the cameras, the soft, betraying curve of her lips under the diner neon.

I crossed the blue line, throwing my weight into a sharp, leaning turn.

My skates cut deep into the surface, but as I balanced on the edge, a sudden, vivid memory flashed behind my eyelids with the force of a physical blow.

The midnight-blue gala dress.

My hands distinctly remembered the exact, delicate feel of her waist under the silk fabric.

I remembered the way she had leaned her head against my chest in the hallway, her small fingers clutching the lapel of my jacket as if she were terrified the ground would swallow her whole.

The scent of her vanilla shampoo seemed to rise directly off the cold ice, filling my lungs, suffocating me with the phantom heat of a girl who didn't even exist.

I lost my edge.

My left skate skittered across a rut in the ice, and my balance vanished.

I went down hard, my broad frame slamming against the frozen surface with a dull, heavy thud that rattled my teeth.

I slid across the blue line, my bruised left shoulder taking the brunt of the impact, a sharp, white-hot spike of agony ripping through my joint.

I lay flat on my back, staring up into the dark, empty rafters of the arena, my chest heaving as the physical pain radiated through my arm.

I didn't get up.

I just let the freezing cold of the ice seep through my practice jersey, numbing my skin, trying to freeze out the realization that no matter how fast I skated, no matter how hard I hit, and no matter how much I claimed to hate her I couldn't erase her from the ice.

She was already there and there wasn’t anything I could do.