“Hey, Matthew,” I say, and he turns around.

“Oh hey, Stevie, how are you?”

“Good, good, you know, getting my hockey on.”

Matthew laughs. “That’s good. I hardly know what I’m doing here.”

“Are you here with friends? I mean, obviously,” I say, reddening, “but I mean, who are you here with?”

“Uh, Ava and Antar? Do you know them? Also, of course, Jamie and Mitch,” he says, referring to a couple of guys he’s hung out with since we were kids. There was a year or so there where I used to do stuff with the three of them all the time: watch baseball games, movies, play board games and goof around. And then we just grew apart, I guess.

“Nice. Yeah, I know those other two. Ava and Antar; they’re in our homeroom, right?”

“Yep. What about you?”

“Oh”—I wave my hand—“Paige and them.”

Matthew nods a few times, and the corner of his mouth turns up. “Well, look at you—hanging out with the ‘cool kids.’” He’s busting my balls.

“What? No!” I say, while he laughs. “Seriously. They’re nice, if you get to know them.”

“Ah, I see.” He smiles as I make a face. “No, really, I believe you.” The woman at the stand clears her throat, and he turns to make his order.

When the game ends, I wander around the arena. There are cardboard containers on the floor with ketchup smeared on the inside of them, fries hanging out like tongues, puddles of beer that creep all the way under the first rows of seats, where it will be hard to mop. People are milling about, coming down the stairs in clumps of coats and purses, shouting to friends across the way, to other fans, to themselves. I look across the ice and see Lottie and Paige sitting alone on the rival side, midway up the stands. Their arms are linked and Paige is resting her head on Lottie’s shoulder. They are moving back and forth to the echoing music that pumps loudly and incoherently in the arena as the players head into the locker rooms and fans vacate the stands. Someone bumps into me, and I stumble, putting my hands out against the Plexiglas. I stay there, momentarily frozen, looking through the scratched window at the scuffed, smudged vision of my friends.

I leave the arena alone. People are stumbling around outside, drunk and laughing. I hear someone barfing in the darkness around the side of the building. It is a desperate, lonely sound.

*   *   *