The Hockey Playing Alpha and His Human Ice Princess

Georgia

The storm stranded us together, and neither of us tried very hard to fix that.

A week has passed since Puck’s warning in the stairwell, since he said my name for the first time and told me to drop it. A week of careful distance, of him avoiding my usual paths across campus, of me telling myself I don’t care while checking every dining hall entrance out of the corner of my eye anyway. We don’t talk. We don’t work on the project, which is starting to become a problem neither of us has addressed directly, an unfinished outline sitting untouched in both our bags like something we’re each pretending doesn’t exist.

Then the storm hits, sudden and fierce, the kind of early season snow nobody predicted, turning the sky white and heavy in the space of twenty minutes while I’m walking back from the library. I duck under the nearest covered walkway to wait it out, snow already collecting fast on the cobblestones beyond the overhang, and I’m not alone there for more than a few seconds before someone else ducks in from the other direction, shaking snow off his jacket.

Puck.

We both go still. The awkwardness of the last week presses down between us until he seems to decide, with visible effort, that pretending I’m not standing three feet away from him isn’t an option anymore.

”Guess we’re stuck,” he says, voice rough, eyes fixed on the snow instead of me.

”Guess so.”

Neither of us moves to leave. The storm thickens fast, visibility dropping to almost nothing beyond a few feet, and there’s no version of walking back to the dorms that doesn’t end with both of us soaked through and freezing. So we stay, tucked into the narrow shelter of the walkway, close enough that I feel the warmth radiating off him even without touching. The silence between us shifts. Less awkward. More charged the longer it stretches.

”I’m sorry,” he says, eyes still on the storm, voice low and rough at the edges. ”About last week. The way I said that.”

”You don’t owe me an apology.”

”I do, actually.” He exhales, shoulders dropping, some careful wall coming down just slightly, just enough that I notice. ”I don’t get to just say your name like that and then disappear. That’s not fair to you.”

”Then why did you?”

His mouth opens like he has an answer ready, then his jaw tightens and he stops. ”It’s complicated. There’s a lot going on that I can’t really-” He cuts himself off, shakes his head once, sharp, annoyed with himself. ”No. That’s the easy answer.”

He goes quiet for a long moment, long enough that I think he’s done trying. When he speaks again, his voice comes out softer, more honest than I’ve heard from him before.

”There’s a lot of pressure on me. More than you’d probably guess, looking at me.” He glances at me sideways, something raw flickering behind his usual careful control. ”Everyone’s always watching. Waiting to see what I do, how I handle things, whether I measure up. It’s exhausting in a way I don’t know how to explain to someone who hasn’t lived it.”

”Try me,” I say, voice quiet but steady.

He looks at me properly then, studying my face like he’s deciding whether I mean it. ”There’s this whole life laid out for me. Expectations I didn’t choose, responsibilities I’m supposed to accept without question. Sometimes I just want something that’s mine. Something nobody assigned me, nobody’s watching me do, nobody grading how well I do it.” He shakes his head, short and frustrated. ”I don’t even know if that makes sense.”

”It makes sense,” I say, meaning it more than he probably realizes. ”I get watched too. Just differently.”

”Your mom?” he asks, tone gentle, careful, like he’s testing the edges of something fragile.

”Yeah.” I look out at the storm instead of at him, the words easier to find when I’m not meeting his eyes. ”Every jump, every competition, every choice I’ve ever made about skating, it’s never really been mine. It’s been about proving something to her, or for her, or because of her. I don’t know anymore what I want out of any of it separate from what she wants for me.”

I almost tell him more. I almost tell him about the medals buried at the bottom of my suitcase, not displayed, not celebrated, just hidden proof that I existed before Rosethorne decided who I might become. The words sit right there at the edge of my mouth, ready, and I pull them back at the last second, some old instinct still insisting it’s too much to hand over all at once, even to him.

He tilts his head, watching me with a focus that makes my skin warm. ”What?” he asks, voice curious, low.

”What?”

”You stopped.” His tone stays gentle, no pressure in it, just quiet attention. ”What were you about to say?”

”Nothing,” I say, dismissive, quick. ”It’s not important.”

He doesn’t push, though I can tell he doesn’t believe me. ”Okay,” he says, quiet, and something in the way he says it tells me he actually understands, more than most people ever have.

The storm doesn’t let up. If anything it thickens, snow swirling harder beyond the overhang, the campus around us gone white and silent and strange. Neither of us suggests making a run for it. Neither of us wants to, I think, both of us tucked into this narrow shelter with something easier passing between us than anything that’s happened since the library.

A streetlamp nearby flickers on early, the storm dark enough to trigger it, casting a warm, golden pool of light just at the edge of the walkway. We drift toward it without deciding to, some instinct pulling us both a step closer to the light and, without either of us quite noticing until it’s already happening, a step closer to each other.

Our hands hang close between us, his and mine, not touching, just near. The same charged nearness from the library, except this time there’s no book to justify it. I feel the warmth radiating off his skin even from this small distance, steady and constant, like standing too close to a fire. My pulse kicks up hard. I don’t pull away.

His fingers shift slightly, like he’s considering closing the last few inches between us.

I look up right as the streetlamp’s glow catches his face fully, and that’s when I see it.

His eyes flash gold. Clear this time, unmistakable, no flicker I can talk myself out of, no trick of shadow or angle I can explain away the way I’ve explained away every other glimpse before this one. Gold, bright and sudden and undeniably, impossibly real.

My breath catches hard in my throat. My whole body locks in place. Every other glimpse, every flicker I’ve talked myself out of, snaps into focus at once. This time there’s no shadow, no angle, no excuse.

”Your eyes just-” I start, voice barely above a whisper.

”Puck!” someone calls from across the courtyard, voice sharp and urgent, cutting through the falling snow.

He steps back so fast it’s like I burned him instead of the other way around, putting several feet of distance between us in less than a second.

”It was the light,” he says, tone clipped, urgent, already turning toward the voice calling him.

”Wait, the project,” I try, voice rising, but he’s already moving, already half-swallowed by the snow, and whatever answer I might have gotten disappears with him into the white.

It is very obviously not the light.