The Boyfriend Goal (Love and Hockey Book 1)

Wesley

Maybe I should feel terrible. After all, Josie’s standing frozen in place on the other side of the coffee table, dressed in white fuzzy socks with purple polka dots on them and cute matching PJs, and her eyes like a rabbit’s.

But I’m too intrigued to feel bad. “I’m at the top, and I’m the only item crossed out,” I continue, then take my time swallowing a sip of the scotch I poured. “Seems you’ve got a lot left to do.”

This list is too fascinating to let go of. I’ve never met someone with a list of…dreams. Adventures. Personal challenges. Josie isn’t like anyone I know, and I’m a little hung up on the way she’s chasing a certain kind of life.

“I do,” she says tentatively, but then her lip curls. “You really looked at my list?”

“I didn’t not look.” Should I feel bad? I don’t. This list is like a gold mine of Josie.

“You’re using the not not excuse?” She’s confused, and maybe hurt.

Okay, I feel a little bad now. I set down the tumbler on a coaster on the coffee table. “I sat down with a drink and it was there.”

“It was there?” she asks it with familiar emotion etched in her features. She’s embarrassed, like she was the night I met her, especially as she repeats, “It was there?”

Well, shit. I scratch my jaw. But I don’t understand why she’s this upset. Why anyone would be this upset. The list isn’t super personal. It’s not sexual. It’s an inspiration list. A bucket list. “It’s not bad, Josie. The list is actually kind of…cool.”

She swallows and looks away. Slivers of moonlight stream through the window, dancing across her ivory skin as she seems to think. “It’s just…it’s personal,” she says softly.

Lesson I just learned—just because a list isn’t sexual doesn’t mean it’s not private. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have looked.”

She rolls her lips together, lets out a big breath, then meets my gaze, straightening her shoulders. “It’s okay. I shouldn’t have left it there,” she says, then she shakes her head, like she’s letting go of her emotions. “And it’s fine. It’s okay you saw it. Some of my friends know about it, like Maeve and Fable. They know bits and pieces, but I haven’t shown it to them. My mom knows I’ve started it now, but that’s all. None of them know everything that’s on it. No one does.”

She doesn’t have to say except you for me to understand what she means. “I won’t tell anyone,” I say.

“I know,” she says, but she sounds kind of sad, and I feel fucking worse.

“I promise. You can trust me. You know that, right?”

“I do. You caught me off-guard, and I don’t always do well with surprises. That’s all.”

That’s quite an honest admission. “I’ll be more careful,” I say, genuinely contrite now over the whole thing. And yet, I’m still a little obsessed with it. “For what it’s worth, I think it’s pretty cool. This list. I think you’re brave.”

She scoffs, then comes around to the couch at last, bends for the paper, and folds it back up along well-worn crease lines, holding it close. I feel a little chastened, perhaps rightfully so. I push to my feet. “Sorry again. I’ll leave you alone.”

A hand comes out, grabs my biceps. “It’s taken me two years to start it,” she admits quietly.

A beginning. A truce.

I sit back down. “Yeah?”

She sits too, taking her hair down and sliding the scrunchie onto her wrist. It’s like she’s unlocked. “My aunt gave it to me before she died. She’d been sick for a year. A really hard year.” She takes a beat, to collect her thoughts I suspect. “But she wanted me to have fond memories of her. Of us. She wanted to leave me with something. So she wrote me this list so I’d have…” She stops again, her voice breaking. “This piece of her when she was gone.”

My heart lurches toward her. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you,” she says, then meets my gaze, her blue eyes pools of emotions. “That’s why I was so happy when you had the scarf. It’s hers, and she gave it to me.”

“I’m glad I found it,” I say, and not only for the reason I’d originally wanted it. But because it means something to her. Something important. “And I apologize again for looking at your list.”

She shakes her head. “It’s okay. I would have done the same. I didn’t want you to think I wrote it myself, and it always takes me a minute to say she’s gone. You know?”Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

No one I’m that close to has died, so I don’t truly know. “I understand,” I say since that feels true enough.

Fiddling with the scrunchie, she says, “It’s taken me a while to start it because…” She stops, eyes welling. “I’m not that good at getting out of my comfort zone. I’m…a creature of habit.” She meets my face, shrugs a little hopelessly. “I’m not the daring girl. I’m not the bold one. I’m the girl who escapes into books.”

My heart clenches for her. For the way she sees herself. For how she believes she’s not adventurous. “I don’t buy that. You’re the girl who walked half-naked through the city to get back into her apartment rather than waiting till her friend came home,” I remind her.

She gives a small shake of her head. “But it’s taken me two years because…I research everything. I’ve researched all these items on the list. I’ve never had a one-night stand. I’d only been with one guy. Before you,” she quickly adds, and this intel should not delight me as much as it does. Yet it’s so fucking delightful. “I mean, I even looked up how to have a safe one-night stand.”

Yep, called it with her being adorably old-fashioned. “And everything about you makes perfect sense now.”

That earns me a small laugh. “I did! I read articles on what to talk about, how to discuss STDs, and consent. Where to have one.”

“Well, you nailed it—your first one-night stand.”

“And you nailed me,” she says, and now I’m picturing bending her over the bed, sliding home, feeling her tighten around me. Hearing her ask for what she wanted.

“And that is on my list of things I don’t regret,” I say, since we’re being honest.

“Me too,” she says, then pauses before she turns more serious. “With the list though, I put it off so long, and then it was easier to start it when I moved here.”

“Why now?”

She sighs. Swallows. Inhales. “I missed her so much when she died. It was hard to…” She purses her lips, fighting off tears. “Move on.”

My heart aches for her. I want to wrap her in my arms and kiss her hair. “Maybe it’s not true that you’re not the bold one. Maybe you were just holding on to someone you loved.”

With a small smile of admission, she rubs her palms on her thighs, blowing out a breath. “I felt like she understood me better than anyone else. I guess that’s why I didn’t do it. Maybe also because I was getting my master’s degree and school and all that.”

“Maybe you weren’t ready. Not being ready doesn’t mean you’re not bold,” I say.

“But some of the list terrifies me. Well, not the item My O Supplier checked off.”

It takes me a few seconds before I realize what she’s done. Given me a nickname. “That’s what you call me?”

“It’s true,” she says.

“It’s seriously fucking true,” I say, wishing, wishing so damn much that I could make it true again. Even though that’d be a big mistake. I force myself to think about the rest of the list.

Then, about walking into my home a half hour ago, pouring a scotch, sitting down to chill on the couch and play a video game, and seeing it there.

Too tantalizing to look away from.

The promise of new horizons, new potential, new possibilities.

The list is like a blueprint for becoming…your happiest self. It’s a list that cries out—do me now.

Several minutes ago I was thrilled to be on it, masculine pride and all driving me on. Now, there’s a new feeling taking root inside me.

There’s a possibility that the Top Ten Things I Never Regretted would be good for both of us. Sounds, too, like that’s what she needs—a partner in taking chances.

Excited by this possibility, I sit up straighter and jump headfirst into the waters. “Can I do it with you?”

She flinches, taken aback. “You want to do it?”

“I do.”

“Why?”

“I’m already part of it,” I say, and I feel connected to it. But I feel like it’s what I’ve been missing too. “But it’s also…” I stop, take a deep, fueling breath, and then say something hard. “You know what you said the other week about me being hockey, hockey, hockey?”

She winces. “Yes?”

“You’re not wrong. I am. It’s hard not to be. It’s why things didn’t work out with my ex, Anna. She said I didn’t like anything besides hockey.”

Josie shakes her head adamantly. “That’s not what I meant when I said that. I was impressed with your discipline. That’s all.”

“I know,” I say gently. “I know you didn’t mean it the same way. She wanted me to be someone I’m not—someone who discusses theoretical issues at dinner parties. Who reads long-ass articles that go on for days. Who debates philosophical issues.”

Josie shudders.

“Exactly. I don’t want to talk about some man named Immanuel Kant,” I say. “But it still made me think—I don’t always have fun outside of my job. And I’d like to. I’d like to do something that has nothing to do with hockey. Someday my life won’t be hockey, hockey, hockey.”

“That won’t happen for a while. You’re twenty-seven.”

“And yet, you never know.” I tilt my head to the side. “So, what do you say?”

For the first time since she walked into the living room tonight, her smile spreads. “You really want to do this?” she asks, not uncertain but like she wants to be one hundred percent sure I’m on board.

“I do.” Then I shrug, a little cocky, pointing to the item about making a new friend. “And anyway, I’m number one and number three, so you’d regret not doing the rest of the list with me.”

She taps her chin playfully, seeming to consider my offer, then looks back down to the paper, her eyes landing on the third thing. “So we’re friends now? The jock and the nerd?”

“We are. How’s that for our roomie rule?”

She sticks out a hand and I take it, shaking on this new friendship rule. Too bad I still want to tug her onto my lap, pull her close so she’s straddling my thighs, then hold her face, run a hand down her throat, and trace the outline of those pretty lips.

But there’s too much at stake. This living situation. The team. And now, her.

This woman who’s on the cusp of something. Who’s changing. Learning how to be a bolder version of herself. Maybe I’d like to be another version of me too. The version that isn’t defined by the one thing I’ve been good at, the only thing I’ve ever been told I could do well.

She takes the paper and unfolds it, then grabs a pen, and hands it to me. “Well, new friend, why don’t you cross off number three?”

I uncap it, then make a long strike through that item—Make a friend who’s nothing like you. You learn the most from them.

I set down the pen, then say, “Time for the next one.” I read number two out loud. “Overcome a fear (take a class you can’t prepare for, baby! Psst—improv class time!)”

She groans. “Why does anyone take improv class?”

“To think on their feet better.”

“It sounds dreadful.”

“Why?”

“I need to be able to prepare for things. Research them. Prep. There is no prep in improv. Ergo—it is my personal hell.”

“And yet we’re doing it. We’re going through hell and coming out on the other side. When is it?” I smile, loving this little bit of intel I’ve gathered about her. “I’m sure you’ve researched the next and best class in town.”

“I have. And it’s Thursday night.”

“And why does it sound dreadful?”

“See the list—overcome a fear. Your roommate has a fear of public speaking. When I teach classes at the library, I have to speak to groups of people, of course. But I can plan those out. I have materials and curriculum and information at my fingertips. But without information I’m free falling. I hate acting. And I am not good on my feet.”

I smile, then drape an arm around her shoulders. “Well, I am good at all those things. So I’ve got you.”

I might want more, but this will have to be enough.