Page 29 of Back Outside Edge

"Two. Brother and sister, both younger."

It takes a few minutes of inane conversation, but eventually he looks less pale in the reflected light of my phone flashlight. At least, until a pounding on the door makes Stefan let out a startled little scream. He recovers quickly, glancing at me, and I do my best to pretend I didn't hear anything. "Ist jemand da drin?" The voice is loud, gruff. The repairman?

Stefan and I exchange a look. "Um... Yes?" I answer, half yelling.

"Scheisse," the voice responds, a bit softer. Then, louder again. "Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"

That one, at least, I've picked up over the past few days. "No. Just English." Well, and French, if you count Stefan, but most people I've run into speak English.

"We're repairing the elevator? Half hour, maybe an hour. Are you ok?"

Stefan lets out a little moan, and I reach over to grip his arm. "You'll be ok, I promise," I say softly, then add to whoever is on the other side of the metal door, "Yeah, we're fine. Thanks for the update. I do have a plane to catch in a few hours, though, so—the sooner the better? If possible?"

"Ja," he answers curtly, before everything goes silent again.

Stefan moans again, and I scoot a little closer to him, leaving my hand on his arm. Damn it, I just got him calm. "So what are you doing the rest of the week?"

Understanding my strategy by this point, Stefan begins a very long, rambling description of what he's planning to do. When it peters out, I feel him shift, and when I glance over, he's turned to face me. “The room will be lonely without you,” he says softly, and even in the near dark, his eyes bore into mine.

My heart squeezes, the familiar pressure in my chest returning. He's in this situation because he was following me back to our room instead of going off to do his own thing, and he's still saying he'll miss me? “Stefan.” My voice comes out quieter than I expected, more tentative. “I'll miss you, too.” I turn to face him as well, our knees touching, the phone dropping to the ground when I bump it, light now shining up toward the ceiling. Aren't people supposed to look creepy when underlit? Stefan looks hotter, more angular.

His eyes may be shadowed, but they're gazing straight into mine. “We'll keep in touch, right? Stay friends?”

“Of course. What are your plans for the next couple of months?” I didn’t mean to sound like I’m suggesting a visit, but when the words are out, I don’t regret them. I’d love the chance to see him again.

To taste him, if he’d let me. Neither of us is looking for a relationship; I don’t need to ask to know that. We’re too busy, too preoccupied with training, too distant. I don’t do them in the first place.

But—we could have fun, practice together at my rink. I could bring him back to my crappy little apartment.

The idea of what we could get up to there is appealing enough it sends a little shiver through me. Stefan, in my apartment. In my bed.

Well, crap, now I'm hard again, sitting on the floor of a stuck elevator. Cliché, much? Can he see? The tight joggers I'm still wearing are very, very bad at hiding things like this, but the lighting is so weird...

Luckily, his eyes don’t flick down; instead, I think he looks pensive, which at least means he's not terrified anymore. “I'm going to tour around Europe a little while I'm here. Head home in a couple of weeks, probably. Hop back into training.”

“That's not giving yourself a lot of time off.”

He shrugs, unconcerned. “Can't be too ready for next year.”

It's blatantly untrue. He could overtrain, hurt himself, wear himself out before the season starts. I let it go, again. He's an adult, knows his body, has a coach who—well, a coach who pushes him even harder. Maybe that last is less useful than it could be. His father was an Olympic gold medalist himself, though; he has to know what too far looks like.

“What about you?” he asks, the words almost blurring into one as they come out too rapidly.

Why? I don't think he's freaked out about the stuck elevator anymore. His hands aren't clenched. “Oh, I'll mostly be catching up on all the school work I've missed.”

“Wait, are you in college? How come I didn't know that?”

I can feel his eyes penetrating me, and I smile into them with a shrug. “I have no idea. It's not a secret. I guess it's not exactly been my top priority this week. What about you?”

“Oh.” He looks down, and in the weird light, his growing blush is more obvious. His fingers start tracing circles on his thighs, and I tense. Now he's looking down, he can't miss my hard-on. Damn it. He doesn't give any indication he's noticed, though. “I decided to wait on college after the last Olympics. Focus on my skating, you know.”

"Yeah, I get it. I did that for a couple years before the last Olympics." Though it didn't work out for me. Down, down. Come on... The memory of my failure is usually enough to sober me right up, but with Stefan so close, his scent surrounding me, the near darkness—my hand still on his arm. Crap.

I drop my hand quickly, and his head turns, tracking the movement. “What do you study?”

It's such an innocuous question, given the direction of my thoughts, it takes me a moment to gather my control. Straining to look unaffected, I sigh. “Sports management. I have no idea why I thought it was a good idea, or what I’m planning to do with it.”

“Do you graduate this year?” His voice holds genuine interest, which warms me as much as anything else he’s said. Not that I need any added warmth.