On Thin Ice (editing again)

Chapter 5- Let's Try Emotionally Detatching and See How That Goes

Assigned seats were a bitch. 

Razor was trying not to emotionally attach to anything lately, but it was so hard when Blaze was always right there. It had gotten to the point where you could cut the tension between them with a knife. The last person he wanted to see right now was Blaze but he had to since she sat right next to him in Physics. There was no avoiding it.

He refused to let himself believe it but he had been feeling hurt. He didn't want to believe he let my walls down enough to be real with her, to be genuine. He wanted to forget that he had exposed his heart to her, even if it was just a little bit and she didn't even give a shit. He came to the realization that he wanted her to care, because he cared. As much as he didn't want to.

She jumped into her seat the second the bell rang and her long locks of chestnut brown flipped all around but settled nicely on her head. She was wearing a baseball style shirt with some hardcore band's logo on it, ripped jeans and her right shoe was untied. She absentmindedly picked at her nail polish as she took notes, chewing on the end of her pen.

Today was the day that the official hockey tryouts were scheduled. Razor was fidgety, the practices they were having were just some preseason training for the guys already on the team. The tryouts were for newcomers, and he couldn't help but think about if she was going to try out for the team, and it bothered him all day. It's not like he could just ask her if she was trying out, because they still weren't speaking. 

She had gotten really good at hockey really quickly. There was a spot for her, if she wanted it; Coach Michaels had been pretty clear about that. She was a strong skater and was eager to learn, and it was killing Razor not knowing if she was going to give it a shot. Jared and Austin, even though they were still pissed at Razor, decided to pop the question to her during class. 

"Hey, Blaze, babe, are you going to tryouts tonight?" Austin asked from across the room. Razor would have said it differently, but she responded to Austin in a way she had never responded to Razor.

"Nah, probably not. I'm nowhere near your level, I don't have any gear, and I don't want to spend a whole season being harassed by Razor." She smiled, giving Razor a death glare in the process. 

This just infuriated him. He thought she had changed a little bit but it was just his own fucking feelings getting in the way of what was really in front of him. He thought they had made progress, but she was angry and he couldn't even blame her. He just hated how she talked about him in front of everyone. Razor pushed his feelings away to where he couldn't feel them any more, not knowing they would hurt much worse when he got the chance to feel them.

"You know what you are?" Razor spoke to Blaze.

"Oh, DO enlighten me." Her tongue piercing clicked against her teeth. Her tone challenged him, and he wasn't going to back down from that.

"You're a total snake. " He snapped back in disbelief. How could she talk to him in anger in one second and with friendship to Jared and Austin in another?  She was angry at him for doing a total 360, but she was doing the exact same thing to him.

"I can say the same for you, except for the fact that you're not a snake, but a coward hiding behind too much hair gel and fragile masculinity."

With that, the class reacted to her response before their teacher turned their attention back to physics. 

Later that night, before tryouts started, Blaze was getting ready to leave the ice rink with her brother. Austin and Jared ran out, talking to Dallas and then all about tryouts, making it clear she was trying out. She made it clear that it wasn't happening. The coach made it clear that it was.

"You win this time." She muttered to me. "But don't get me wrong. I'm not doing this for Razor or some sort of bet, or to give any of you any satisfaction whatsoever."

She laced up her brother's skates and got a helmet and a stick from the coach, while her brother Dallas sat on the bleachers, watching intensely. Razor walked up and sat with him, still in all of his gear.

"Maybe if she makes the team, I'll have someone to practice drills with!" Dallas spoke up with enthusiasm.

"Hey, bud. You've got me!" Razor answered. 

"Yeah yeah, but I live with her. Plus, I can win a fight against her. I probably couldn't beat you, and I wouldn't want to try."

After some small talk and after some of the other guys went, Blaze stepped out into the mostly smooth ice. Austin, Jared and Razor, secretly, were just glad she was doing this, even though she probably wouldn't make the team because of the other, more experienced guys.

Her tryout honestly wasn't what anyone expected. She didn't really know the ropes of the game yet so she was using logic to shoot and stick handle while skating around. The team could tell she's watched a lot of hockey from Dallas's practices, and from that she could apply some skills.Taking the variables into consideration, she did really well but it bothered Razor how she still had a shit attitude about it. He could tell her heart wasn't all there. But, from what they were all seeing, they were willing to bet she would change her mind, at some point.

When tryouts were done, she talked to Coach Michaels. It looked like he was happy, knowing she could pick up the game fast. Dallas knew that she was a little embarrassed, since the other guys were actual hockey players.

"Is she a perfectionist?" Razor asked Dallas.

"You could say that. I mean, she's not a neat freak or anything, but if she's going to do something, like try out for a hockey team, she's going to give it her all. She wants to be good at this, even though she doesn't like it that much."

"Where did she get her skills from, then?"

"I force her to watch hockey with me."

"That explains it."

Razor looked back over and some of the underclassmen were talking to her. Her facial expression said she wasn't too happy about talking to them, since she thought they would make fun of her. Her body language changed slightly, and it was easy to tell that they were saying good things to her.

She slightly smiled while walking away from them and towards Dallas and Razor. She sat down next to her brother and ran her fingers down the sides of the blades, wiping the ice chips from the metal. She dried them off with the fleece skate covers and tucked the laces back in before handing the skates back to Dallas.

"Remind me again why you guys made me try out? I think I made the team, and I'm not ready for that."

"Because we wanted you to try out and see what you could do." Razor answered. Dallas continued.

"I mean, if you make the team you can always work with me on drills and stuff like that. I bet Razor can help you, too. No worries, it'll be fine. You probably won't be on the starting line, so we're not pressuring you into being the best on the team. It'll be fine." Dallas replied.

"I hope so," She answered, grabbing her jacket and keys. "I'll be in the car, come on out when you're changed, Dallas."

Razor left the hockey rink with mixed feelings, for if she had made it onto the team that would change everything. They would be near each other every day, for practice, for games, for team dinners, for fundraising, for everything. He knew that he needed to do some self-reflection, because Blaze's comment to him in physics hit him hard. Maybe he really was hiding behind hair gel and fragile masculinity. But, he couldn't stand her! How could they ever be on the same team together?

Razor went over to Allie's house and spent most of the night with her. His friends were right, he got caught up in Blaze's world so much that he was completely ignoring Allie, and he was trying to mend that relationship before it fell apart just like everything else. But even Allie could tell that Razor's mind wasn't all there. He was with her physically, but he was thinking about Blaze. He found himself thinking about her a lot lately. Allie could tell and sent him home, not wanting to waste her time around a guy that didn't care either.

Razor needed to emotionally detach completely and find himself. With emotionally detaching came the risk of losing everyone in his life who had stayed around that long, but that was a risk worth taking. Razor knew that he would lose everyone if he didn't.