no-one saw me (not in the way you did)

Chapter 7

Saturday. Game day.

It's the first thought in Stan's mind when he stirs. He notes faint light seeping through the gap in his curtains, how he's half hanging off the mattress while entangled in his sheets, and how his desk chair is still wedged under his door handle from the night before.

Stan's head is killing him and his eyes are bleary, but he's excited.

He rolls onto his back. It's silent; no movement, no one awake other than him. The clock at his bedside reads just a few minutes past seven-thirty and he knows he's barely slept.

Randy had kept him up almost all night. He'd come home just as Stan had finished his final, intensive pre-match practice, reeking of beer and looking even worse for wear. It had been an exhausting night of arguments, screaming matches and things being smashed. Stan had barricaded his door to try and get even just a little sleep, so he wouldn't show up to the game with a black eye and split lip. It had happened before and led to the questions flying the first time.

It ceased early into the morning with Randy leaving in a storm, and Sharon taking the bed - alone. Despite the silence, Stan slept fitfully, his dreams consumed with waking nightmares about his mother's condition.

He wishes he weren't so cowardly, wishes he were able to protect her and keep her safe from Randy. Stan thinks if he were a little taller, or worked harder at hockey, he'd be able to fulfil this duty.

There's a dull ache present in all of his joints. Stan's been practising hard all week, labouring more than ever before. Vaughn insisted that they train intensively - above and beyond their limits.

There had been no more games. It was all serious now.

He pushes himself upright, wincing, rolling his shoulders and stretching his legs out and over the side of the bed. A slight chill wraps itself around his bare legs and arms. It had been trying once again to snow this week, with the temperatures dropping even further, but the meagre evening snowfalls they had gotten had been washed away by showers of rain. Stan wraps his arms around his torso, hugging his ribcage in a meagre attempt to settle his oddly excited nerves.

Still, nobody stirs. Shelley might be at her boyfriend's. Randy's definitely not home, and Sparky has long since outgrown the need to wake Stan with his rough tongue every morning.

Stan finally moves off the bed. He pads across his carpet, stepping over the notebook that had slid off his bed last night, his laundry, and various trinkets. In front of his closet is his skate bag, his kit spilling out the top and his skates leaning precariously beside it. He kneels down and begins folding it, putting everything back in its place. There's a relaxing rhythm to it - calming the slight trembling in Stan's hands and keeping his overactive imagination from running away with itself. He slots his skates into place. For a brief moment, he feels complete.

He backs up for a second to collect the aforementioned notebook. Stan had been making a vain attempt to catch up on his homework the evening before, trying to use the dull routine of formula, plug, solve to drown out the harsh tones of his father's yelling. It had quickly derailed, with Stan scrambling for his headphones and stolen iPod and burying them deep in his ears. He doesn't even care that American Football is quick to begin blasting, the sorrowful melodies only reminding him of Kyle and everything he's lost. As Mike Kinsella sings of nostalgia and regrets so strong they could kill him, Stan scribbles down messy lyrics, his handwriting barely legible and his fingertips drumming against the page as he scrawls.

When sleep finally claimed him, the notebook slipped onto the floor. Stan now gathers it in his arms and stuffs it in an overflowing drawer of unfolded clothes, burying the secrets it holds between the folds of graphic tees and scruffy ripped jeans.