My Turning Page

Chapter 10

"You heard me, somewhere we can talk" Elias curtly replies.

"I heard you, smartass. You and I both know I mean where". My dwindling patience is obvious in my words, but he just laughs. He fucking laughs.

"You'll see when we get there, it's not much further up the road here". He points lazily with the index finger of the hand that's steering. Soon, the familiar domed building comes into view.

"You're bringing me to your hockey arena?" Disbelief in my voice.

He scoffs, "there's hardly anyone there at this time. Do you have a better idea? Between your roommate, AKA my sister and all the testosterone of my roommates, I think we have narrowed choices".

My reply is silence, and he seems to understand that as he pulls in and then leads us to a door that he unlocks with his keys. The building is dark, only necessary lights are on, and oh so quiet. I blindly follow Elias to the ice rink, where he rummages behind a counter for a while before pulling out ice skates and handing them to me. My gaze lingers on the skates before looking at him. "Yes Mira I want you to put these on" he rolls his eyes as he plops them onto the bench I'm on, before going through the hallway that leads to his lockeroom. By the time I've got the skate almost on, he is back with his skates in his hand.

"You know, it's is a little uncanny that you knew my shoe size" I say as I tighten the laces from the bottom and work my way up. Elias suddenly kneels in front of me, swatting my hands away from the laces. He starts to re-tighten them, no doubt not pleased with my work. As he does this, he speaks with each pull of the lace.

"All these years, you've borrowed shoes from Nadine and say that her shoes are a bit big each time. So I made an educated guess" my cheeks flush at the idea of his remember something so minuscule. An uncommitted hum squeaks out. Silence ensues as he finished my skate and puts his own on. He stands tall and extends his hand to me silently. My nails bite into my other hand's knuckles that are thread together. After a few seconds I raise my hand and connect my fingertips with his own. Just a small brush sends small tingles through my arm. I slide my fingers further up his hand, starting with his fingers, then his palm, before wrapping my thumb with his own. His hands closes firmly on mine, a silent deal happening. I stand myself up with some help of Elias. He doesn't let go until I'm on the ice. The air between us is thick and I feel awkward and tense. Suddenly, he releases my hand before skating far away. My hand clenches closed that was once warm with his. I can't help the urge to shake my hand from the feeling before I skate further away from him. We keep up a meticulous dance around each other of keeping our distance. Some unspoken rule governs us. I feel my body start to relax as I skate in a loop. After a while, I can't help but notice Elias seems to be getting closer and closer in the loops I'm making. At one point we were at opposite ends of this loop we had going and now he's not but 10 feet skating behind me. My nerves have me kicking up my speed a notch. Call it that or maybe a sadistic urge to make a game of this, I'm not entirely sure. Wind throws my hair back as a speed through the makeshift loop I've been doing all this time. The sounds of skates coming closer has me speeding more. I don't look back, but don't need to. I can hear him, maybe even sense him. A part of me thinks that is preposterous, another knows it's been true all these years. My breath and heart starts to pick up as we play this game. The cold air starts to seep through my cheeks and ears. I speed up more, and after a little bit I try to listen for the telltale sound of him behind me but am left confused because I don't hear him at all. I glance back for the first time to see no one there. Before I can even process the sound of skates in front of me, I am crushed into a hard chest of Elias as he wraps his arms around my waist and we both go down in a tangled pile.

"What the hell Elias?" I ask frustrated as I rub my face.

"Someone had to end the cat and mouse game". God, he didn't have to speak it out loud. My face flushes more. "Now, are you ready to talk" My body squirms out of his hold as I get up and start to skate a bit away, before turning around to face him.

I take a deep breath before my next words. "I already know what you're going to say. It was stupid, it was rash. It was just a kiss. I get it. You want to be single, I want to be single. Nothing has to change. Nadine doesn't have to know. We will just act like it never happened". I take another much needed deep breath after my ramble of words. The pin drop silence between us makes this all worse. Elias' eyes stayed glued to the ground as his mind seems to be processing everything I said. When he looks back up, his eyes hold a distant, cold look.

"That's what you know I'm going to say?". I tersely nod. "Okay. Right. Yeah, yeah that is the logical thing" he nods back slowly. My stomach grows queasy to hear those words. I had an idea it would be, but fuck does it still feel terrible. I clench my jaw to stop tears from forming. Nothing more is said about our time in the dark closet. He skates back to the bench and I know this means our talk and time here is done. He drives me home after. I keep myself together until I get to my room where I finally release my frustration, anger, and sadness into my pillow.