Chapter 2 Fine Print

MIA

The contract sits on my kitchen table like a threat.

Twenty pages. I read page one last night. Thirty thousand dollars. I signed before I let myself read the rest.

Now it's six a.m. My hands smell like hospital soap from yesterday's pharmacy shift. I read page two.

Public appearances. Two a week, minimum. Photos, posted whenever his team decides. Physical contact "as required for authenticity."

I read that line three times. Nobody defines authenticity. Nobody has to. That's the problem.

I grab a pen. Start underlining.

My phone buzzes. Caleb's name on the screen, saved last night between fury and exhaustion.

Meet before the press conference. 8am. Bring questions.

I stare at it a long moment. Bring questions. Like I'm interviewing for a job I already sold myself into.

Where, I type back.

He sends an address. Some coffee shop two blocks from the rink. Not the one the team uses. He's already hiding us from the people who'd ask questions too early.

I get there first. Order nothing. Sit in the corner booth with the contract in my bag like something that might go off.

Caleb walks in twelve minutes late. Damp hair. Same Wolves hoodie he wore in the equipment room, like he didn't spend three years forgetting my name in front of half the team.

"You're late," I counter.

"I'm aware." He drops into the booth. No apology. Just a fact, flat, like time bends for him because it always has. "You read it."

"All twenty pages."

"And?"

I slide the contract across the table. Page fourteen. The page I underlined until the pen almost tore through.

"Authenticity. What's that mean, Caleb? Whatever you want, whenever the cameras are on?"

Something moves across his face. Not guilt. Surprise. Like he forgot someone might actually read past the number.

"It means we figure it out. I didn't write that to trap you."

"Who wrote it, then?"

He doesn't answer right away. Picks at his sleeve.

"Derek," he finally counters. "My agent. Wanted room to maneuver."

"Room to maneuver." I laugh, short. "Nice way of saying room to make me do whatever keeps your image clean."

"That's not what I meant." He meets my eyes. "You set the terms. Whatever you're not comfortable with, we don't do."

"I want it in writing. Real terms. Not Derek's terms."

"Fine."

"I mean it. No touching without warning. No pretending in front of my mom. Ever. If I admit stop, you stop."

"I counter fine." Something in his face shifts. Not the boy who shattered my laptop and never once said sorry. Someone tired of being the villain in a story he didn't write alone. "Add whatever you want. I'll sign it."

I wasn't ready for that. I expected a fight. I got a boy handing me a pen.

"Why," I ask, before I can stop myself.

"Because I need this to work." He looks down at the table. "And it won't work if you hate me by week two."

I already hate you. Three years of it, ready on my tongue. It doesn't come out. I don't know why. That scares me more than page fourteen ever could.

---

The press conference room smells like burnt coffee and nerves. Caleb's hand hovers at my back the second we walk in. Doesn't land. Waits.

"You can," I mutter.

His hand settles. Light. Careful.

Derek runs through the plan in a fast whisper. Smile. Don't overshare. Let Caleb take the hockey questions. I nod along, watching the reporters through a gap in the curtain, counting cameras, doing math on how many of them decide who I am for the next six months.

"Ready?" Caleb asks.

"No."

"Good. Neither am I."

That gets a laugh out of me before we walk into the lights.

Questions come easy at first. How'd you meet. How long. Does the team know. Caleb handles it smooth, practiced, a boy raised in front of cameras since before he could skate straight.

Then a reporter points at me.

"What's it like dating the guy half this city already has an opinion about?"

I answer before Caleb can run interference.

"Exhausting. I have to remind people he's not actually that impressive in person."

The room laughs. Caleb turns, something startled and delighted breaking loose on his face before he catches it.

"She's not wrong," he murmurs into the mic. "Ask my equipment manager. I leave my gear everywhere."

"I don't manage his equipment," I manage. "I manage the whole team's. His is just the messiest."

More laughter. Derek, off to the side, watches like he's found a stock he didn't expect to rise.

A photographer calls for one more shot. Just us, no pose. Caleb's hand finds mine.

The flash goes off. Neither of us lets go right away.

We walk out the back exit after, Derek already on his phone with someone about follow-up coverage. Caleb walks me to my bus stop without being asked. Second time this week that's felt automatic instead of arranged.

"That went well," he offers.

"Define well."

"Nobody asked anything that made you want to disappear. That's a win in my book."

"Low bar."

"I set realistic goals." He shoves his hands in his pockets, the cold turning his breath visible. "You're good at this, you know. The reporters like you more than they like me most days."

"They like the sarcasm. It's novel to them."

"It's novel to everyone. Most people around me just agree with whatever I press."

"I noticed that about you freshman year. Everyone laughing at things that weren't funny."

He doesn't flinch from the jab, just nods, like he's earned worse.

"Different now," he counters. "Trying to be, anyway."

The bus pulls up before I can answer. I climb on, find a seat, watch him through the window standing there in the cold, hands still in his pockets, waiting until the bus pulls away to finally turn and walk to his car.

I add that to the file I'm keeping on him. The one I didn't mean to start.