I’m sitting with her in her shitty apartment while she quietly sobs and I don’t even know what the fuck I’m doing here.

Maybe looking at her.

Maybe realising just how badly I fucked up.

Maybe looking around at the state of this place.

She doesn’t even have a bed. Just a shitty mattress on the floor, and the carpet’s covered in bottles, pills, and half-empty baggies.

I stare at her. I don’t know this kid.

I mean, I do know her. But I don’t know her.

She was the result of a drunk night after a win.

Just another one of many.

She’s pretty. Young, but there’s something mature about her too. This weird glow where she’s sharp but also soft.

And she stumbled into my bed because I’m a dick who wanted to get laid after a game.

She’s eighteen. First year at PCU.

God, I don’t even know what she studies.

I don’t even know her fucking last name.

Or her favourite colour.

I know how she gives head, but I don’t fucking know where she’s from.

Great guy, right?

To be honest, I never expected to see her again. I never expect to see any of them again.

And it’s not like we didn’t use a condom.

Plus ninety-nine percent of the time I assume girls at college — especially the ones hanging around the kind of parties hockey players throw — are on the pill.

It’d make sense.

But she was drunk that night.

Maybe she threw up.

Maybe she isn’t on the pill.

Maybe—

God, does it even matter?

It’s been 6 weeks since we had sex. 6 weeks since I even fucking saw her.

I don’t even know how she got my number.

But she did.

And now I’m sitting here.

And I can’t change the fact she’s pregnant.

She’s looking at me like she’s trying to decide whether telling me was a mistake.

Honestly, I wouldn’t blame her if she regretted it.

It’s not like I’m exactly prime dad material.

I barely have a relationship with my own parents.

Hockey’s always been the only thing that matters.. Training. Games. Scouts in the stands every night at PCU watching every shift.

My whole future rides on that ice. Not a girl. Not a kid.

She knows that.

Probably why she just looked at me blankly earlier and sighed.

“I don’t need anything from you, Atkinson. Just thought you deserved to know.”

And that’s the thing.

I have a way out.

The fact she waited this long to tell me means she’s been dealing with this shit alone.

She really doesn’t need anyone.

For a second I even wondered if she was trying to baby-trap me.

Wouldn’t be the first time a hockey player’s had that happen.

But if that was the case she could’ve blown this whole thing up already.

Media finding out. Scouts hearing about it.

My full-ride scholarship at PCU gone. My shot at going pro gone.

She didn’t do that. She’s just a kid. A kid who, from what I can see, has no fucking idea how to deal with her own life.

The baggies and pills scattered around the room make that pretty obvious.

This girl’s a baby.

Babies taking care of babies.

I’m still young, sure.

But there’s a difference between twenty-three and eighteen.

I can still have a future after this. She can’t.

And I’ve worked too fucking hard for hockey.

Six a.m. workouts. Brutal practices. Living and breathing the game since I was a teenager.

Hockey’s always come first.

Always.

I can’t even explain how badly I want to walk out of this shitty apartment and never look back.

Pretend this never happened.

But I’m staring at this girl who was so full of life when I met her six weeks ago.

Who danced with me like a teenager.

Who the morning after sat on our kitchen counter and made Connor and the guys laugh like she’d known them for years.

Now she just looks tired. Like someone drained the life out of her.

So I make a choice that might completely screw up everything I’ve worked for.

But whatever. Maybe I’m a masochist.

“Kid,” I say, rubbing the back of my neck, “I’m not a dad. I don’t do relationships. I hook up with puck bunnies, I play hockey, I drink”

I pause.

“But I can try. I can’t promise it’ll help. But I can try. But you’ve gotta try too, less coke more nappies.”