Top Ten(59)
Gabby threw up her hands. “Look,” she said. “I’m not going to sit here and watch you smash your brain to soup trying prove what a big man you are. I won’t.”
“So don’t, then!” Ryan mirrored her gesture. “Who asked you to watch to begin with?”
“You did, asshole! You asked me to come to your stupid game!”
Well. That was true enough, Ryan guessed, though he wasn’t about to concede the point. “Fine,” he said instead. “So I should just quit hockey altogether so that you don’t have to worry about me? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Can you stop trying to make it about me worrying?” Gabby asked. “That’s not what it’s about. But yes, basically. I’m telling you there are a lot of other things to do besides that.”
“Like what?” Ryan glared at her. “What exactly do you see me doing?”
“What, like, when you grow up?” Gabby looked at him like he was a moron. “Anything! Become a sportswriter. Be a lawyer. Start a business.”
“Like dog grooming, you mean?” Ryan scowled at her.
Gabby’s eyes narrowed. “Now you’re being a dick.”
“And you’re being ridiculous. I’m not going to go to law school, Gabby. Be real.”
“You could! Why couldn’t you?”
“Because I am not fucking smart enough for law school, Gabby! Jesus Christ.” Oh, he hated her for making him say it. He kind of hated her, period. He wanted this conversation to be over.
But Gabby was shaking her head, incredulous. “You are so,” she insisted, stubborn as a little kid. “You’re—”
“I’m not. And it’s insulting to say it to me. I’m not you, and I’m not Shay, clearly, so—”
Gabby’s eyes widened. “What does that mean?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Forget it.”
For a second he thought she was going to push, but in the end it must have felt too dangerous to her, and for that, at least, Ryan could be grateful. “You realize I need to keep playing if I ever want to get out of Colson,” he continued when she was silent for a moment. “The only way I’m ever going to college is a hockey scholarship.”
“That’s not true,” Gabby said.
“Oh, really?” Ryan demanded. He was enjoying himself a little bit now, in some messed-up way. “Even if I got in someplace with my grades, it’s not like my mom has some kind of magical college fund in a coffee can on top of the fridge.”
“There are loans,” Gabby pointed out in a small voice.
“Who do you imagine is going to pay those loans back, Gabby?” God, she was so thick sometimes. It killed him. “In case you haven’t noticed, my life is not quite as fucking cushy as yours.”
That stung her, he could tell. Good, Ryan thought. Let her sting. “Don’t tell me what I’ve noticed,” she said coldly, drawing herself up to her full height like a tall, affronted ostrich.
“Somebody needs to,” Ryan said. “Do you have any idea how spoiled you sound right now? I know you grew up in magical Sesame Street Candyland where everybody constantly tells you you can be anything you want to be, but—”
“You are not downtrodden!” Gabby exploded. “Oh my god, you’re a hugely popular white boy hockey player living in the suburbs, Ryan. I’m not going to stand here and listen to you talk about how hard your life is. It’s insulting.”
Ryan felt his face get hot, shame and anger. “That’s not—”
“No,” Gabby interrupted, “it is. Somehow you got it into your head that the only thing you have going for you is hockey, and if you want to believe that, then fine, I can’t stop you. But you’re bigger than this stupid, barbaric sport.”
Ryan laughed in her face. “I’m not, actually. But it’s nice to know what you think of it. And it’s nice to know what you think of me.”
“Can you stop it?” Gabby was shouting now, seeming not to care if anybody else could hear her; in another second she’d probably stamp her foot. “Your dad’s an asshole who doesn’t pay enough attention to you, Ryan, we get it. It’s boring. And just because he doesn’t give you enough credit is no reason not to give it to yourself.”
That was over the line, and they both knew it; when Gabby opened her mouth, Ryan knew she was going to backpedal, but he held up his hands before she could speak. “You know what?” he said. “I’m done with this conversation. My friends are going out.”
“Ryan—” Gabby reached for him then, trying to cross the distance between them; Ryan stepped neatly out of her way.