Chapter 5

I stared in at the mess that was my bedroom before turning my gaze onto Harmony. This was her fault afterall. I hadn't pulled every article of clothing out of both of our closets and discarded them in various places in my room. She looked back at me and sighed.

"It's official. You have nothing to wear tonight," she announced, glancing back at the mess.

"Nothing? I really have nothing in this pile that would work for a hockey game?" I asked.

"Oh, you have plenty of things to wear to a hockey game. You just have nothing to wear to dinner with Sidney after," she explained

I fought the sound of disgust threatening to leave my mouth. The thought of spending time with Sidney made me sick. I'd been hurt by him and it'd be easy just to stay away from him, but I couldn't do that. I had to show him he couldn't treat people that way and get away with it. I had to fight the urge to make a face and sneer in disgust when his name came up. I was also going to have to think of a way to not do those things in his presence.

"You do realize you're talking about your clothes as well, right?" I checked. She rolled her eyes at me.

"I'm not saying the wardrobe sucks, I'm saying nothing works for the purpose of tonight."

I glanced back at the piles of clothes once again and decided that Harmony knew better than I did. Half an hour later I found myself at the mall following Harmony around as she picked up a variety of pants, shirts, leggings, and dresses to hold them up to me. In the middle of our search I felt my phone viibrate and pulled it out, grimacing at the name that popped up on the screen. I debated ignoring the call and realized that it would only get worse if I didn't answer.

"Hi, mom," I greeted. Harmony glanced over at me and made a face that echoed exactly how I felt.

"Bryce, I'm glad I caught you. How are you?" she asked.

"I'm fine. How are you?" I returned. I didn't care how she was. I just wanted to know what she wanted, and I wanted to know quickly. The quicker I could get off the phone with her, the better.

"I'm still going." She gave me her typical patented response, complete with the dramatic sigh at the end. "I was calling to see if you were planning on coming home for Thanksgiving."

There it was. There was the reason my mother was calling me. I cringed at what she said, wishing I hadn't answered the phone right now after all. The last thing I wanted to do was go home to Cole Harbour for Thanksgiving, let alone ever again. My brain immediately began to try to come up with an excuse.

"I hadn't really thought about it....." I couldn't even finish my sentence before my mother cut in.

"The whole family is coming over, and I just thought it would be nice to have you there. They haven't seen you in so long and I know your aunt and uncle would love to talk to you."

I suddenly felt guilty about consciously avoiding calling home so I wouldn't have to discuss Thanksgiving. I'd been hoping to just avoid the conversation altogether. I didn't want to go home. I didn't want to see my family. Now I felt like I had to.

"I don't know. Harmony and I are starting to look for places for the restaurant and once we find a location everything else is going to start happening quickly."

"Oh, you're still going to attempt that restaurant business?" I heard the annoyance and the dismissal in her voice. She'd disapproved of my decision to partner with Harmony on this from the start.

"Yes, Mom, Harmony and I are going through with our plans." She gave an overdramatic sigh again.

"I guess I just thought that you would come to your senses and go to medical school." I rolled my eyes.

"I was a math and economics major, not a biology or any other equivalent major."

"Then what about law school? It'd be great having two lawyers in the family," she suggested. I fought back the urge to yell at her.

"I'm not great at debating. Look, I'm busy. I'll check on flights tomorrow and let you know when I can come in. I'll only be able to do a couple days at most."

"I suppose a couple of days is better than nothing."

"Great. I'll talk to you later. Bye, Mom." I hung up before she had a chance to say anything else. Harmony popped up in front of me with a smile on her face.

"I found it," she announced, holding up an outfit.

A few hours later Harmony and I were picking up our tickets and passes at will call. We wandered around the arena searching for our seats before finding them nearly back where we had started. Feeling like fools we made our way through the crowd to them and sat down just in time for the lights to dim and the teams to skate out.

About two and a half hours later Harmony and I were joining the mass exodus leaving the arena after a Penguins victory. We paused at the top of our section and pulled out the passes that had been left with the tickets. They didn't come with any directions, and we just stared at them stupidly like they would magically tell us what to do.

"Do you need help?" an accented female voice asked.

Harmony and I glanced up to see a very pretty brunette looking between the two of us. I'd never seen her in particular before, but I knew who she was. She was a hockey wife, or at least a girlfriend. You could tell by the way she was dressed and in the way she carried herself. The girls that dated the players had always been easy to spot for me, mostly because I'd looked nothing like them. They'd avoided me like the plague back then, like my chubby and ugly would rub off on them.

"You wouldn't happen to know where these get us, would you?" Harmony asked. A blonde, walked up behind the brunette and glanced down at the passes in our hands before checking us out suspiciously.

"Yeah, we can show you," she offered. We thanked her and followed the two of them to an elevator where we had to show our passes to get on.

"I''m Veronique and this is Heather," the brunette said, offering her hand. Harmony and I took turns shaking their hands.

"I'm Bryce and this is Harmony."

"So who gave you the passes?" Heather asked. Harmony and I exchanged glances, obviously feeling the same way. Were we really being interrogated right now?

"The golden.....Sidney," Harmony corrected herself as I shot an elbow into her ribs. Veronique and Heather raised their eyebrows at the exchange.

"Sid?" Veronique questioned, like she hadn't heard us. I nodded and she dared another look at Heather. "I'm sorry, he just never has anyone here except for his family. I assumed you were with Max." I didn't understand, but the snort Harmony gave made me wonder what that had actually meant. I figured Max meant Maxime Talbot, but I had no idea why that was funny.

"We're not pucks. Bryce grew up down the street from the gol.....Sidney," Harmony explained.

I suddenly understood and I could feel my cheeks turning red. Had I gone overboard on the outfit tonight? I glanced down at my brown slouchy cowboy inspired boots, dark skinny jeans, and off the shoulder t-shirt. I didn't think I looked that slutty. I glanced over at Harmony who, reading my mind, gave me a small shake of her head.

Thankfully the elevator doors opened just then and halted any further conversation. Harmony and I followed the two girls to the doorway of a room that already had other people in it. We both hesitated at the door before deciding to just wait in the hallway. We leaned against the wall and talked quietly to each other, doing our best not to draw attention to ourselves.

I saw a few guys begin to walk towards the room a little while later and figured they must be Sidney's teammates. Each one glanced over the two of us, trying to figure out if they knew us or not. While I looked calm, cool, and collected on the outside on the inside I wanted nothing more than for Sidney to get there so we could leave and I could get this night over with.

Finally after watching couple after couple walk out of the arena, I spotted Sidney coming around a corner. He was looking over his shoulder as he walked, talking to someone behind him, and I took the opportunity to point him out to Harmony. She narrowed her eyes at him, like she was studying him. When he turned to face us there was already a smile on his face.

"Hey, Bryce, I'm glad you could come," he greeted me when he reached us. "You must be Harmony." She gave him a small, skeptical smile before taking his hand in hers, her eyes still narrowed at him. She was playing the part perfectly.

"It's nice to meet you," she told him, no hint of sincerity in her voice. Sidney didn't seem to notice.

"So what were you thinking for food?" he asked, looking between the two of us.

"I think we're both up for anything," I replied.

"I know the perfect place. I'll drive and then just bring you back to your car after, if you'd like," he offered. I nodded and we followed him outside.

Once we were seated at the tiny hole in the wall, well hidden Italian restaurant, Harmony continued her act. She played the protective and skeptical best friend perfectly, grilling Sidney on everything from his childhood to his personal life in the last few years to his intentions in "rekindling" a relationship of any kind with me. Honestly, it was hard not to crack up multiple times. Sidney, however, took it all in stride.

"Harm, please. We're just neighbors catching up," I told her, putting a stop to the questioning after a while.

"I'm sorry, you know me. I'm protective of my friends," she apologized.

"How'd I do?" Sidney asked, one eyebrow raised curiously. Harmony gave him a once over before giving him a big smile.

"You passed.....for now."

The rest of the night went well, conversation flowing. Harmony quit playing her part and started acting more like herself. By the time we were back in Sidney's car and he was driving us back to ours, we were all laughing together like we were old friends. Before driving away, Sidney told me he'd call me later and I gave him a wave as he pulled out of the parking lot.

"I'd say your plan is well on it's way," Harmony told me with a laugh as we got into the car.

"You think?" I asked.

"Oh, yeah."