Chapter 71 Choosing Her
LIAM
The locker room door slams shut behind me.
The noise from the rink dulls instantly, replaced by fluorescent buzzing and the hollow echo of my own breathing.
“Ava. Ava, stay with me.”
I lower her carefully onto the bench, shrugging off my gloves with my teeth, ripping my helmet off and tossing it somewhere I don’t care about.
Her head lolls slightly.
My heart punches against my ribs.
“Hey,” I say again, softer now, thumb brushing her cheek. “Open your eyes.”
Her lashes flutter.
A faint sound escapes her lips. Not words. Just air.
Thank God.
The team doctor bursts in seconds later, followed by a trainer carrying equipment.
“What happened?”
“She passed out,” I snap. “She’s burning up.”
They start working immediately.
Thermometer. Pulse check. Questions.
“When did the fever start?”
“Has she been hydrating?”
“Has she been sleeping?”
I answer everything. Every detail. When she woke up sweating through the sheets. When she tried to brush it off. When she insisted she was better this morning.
The thermometer beeps.
The doctor’s expression tightens.
“She should not be here.”
I already know that.
I already feel that.
They bring in a stretcher.
The sight of it twists something inside me.
“I’m going with her.”
“You have a game in two hours,” one of the trainers says carefully.
I look at him like he’s spoken another language.
“Do I look like I care?”
Silence.
No one argues.
As they lift her onto the stretcher, her fingers weakly clutch at my jersey.
It’s barely a grip.
But it’s enough.
“I’m here,” I tell her immediately, walking alongside as they wheel her toward the exit. “I’m not leaving.”
And I won’t.
Not for a championship.
Not for media.
Not for anything.
We push through the service hallway, away from cameras, away from noise.
And that’s when her father appears again.
He must have followed.
“Is she—”
“She needs a hospital,” I cut in. My voice is sharp enough to cut glass. “She never should’ve been here.”
His jaw tightens.
“You think I don’t know that?”
Something in his voice cracks.
And that stops me.
Because this isn’t the controlled, authoritative man from his office.
This is a father.
Scared.
We walk in strained silence until we reach the ambulance bay.
Paramedics take over.
They load her in.
I climb in without asking.
Her father hesitates only a second before following.
The doors slam shut.
Sirens ignite.
Inside the ambulance, everything is bright and sterile. Monitors beep. Oxygen mask. IV line.
I sit close enough that my knee presses against the stretcher.
Her hand finds mine again.
Weak.
But deliberate.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers, barely audible under the siren.
My throat tightens painfully.
“For what?”
“For messing up your game.”
The words hit harder than anything else today.
I lean closer, my forehead nearly touching hers.
“You think a game matters right now?”
Her eyes are glassy but focused on me.
“You worked for this.”
“And I’d walk away from it without blinking if it meant you were okay.”
That isn’t dramatic.
It’s fact.
Silence settles heavy between us.
Across from me, her father watches.
Really watches.
He sees the way I hold her hand like it’s something sacred.
Sees the way my entire body is angled toward her.
Protective.
Unwavering.
The ambulance slows.
Hospital lights flood through the back windows.
They wheel her out quickly.
Doctors take over.
“Family only,” a nurse says firmly.
Her father looks at me.
There’s a pause.
A decision.
“He’s family,” he says.
Three words.
Simple.
But they land like thunder.
I don’t react.
I don’t gloat.
I just follow as they wheel her through the doors.
Because titles don’t matter.
Only her breathing does.
They take her back for evaluation.
Flu complications. Severe dehydration. Exhaustion layered over a body that never fully recovered.
“She pushed too soon,” the doctor explains later.
I nod.
I know.
I should’ve stopped her.
But loving Ava has never meant controlling her.
It means standing beside her.
Even when she’s stubborn.
Even when she’s wrong.
Hours pass.
I ignore the flood of texts from teammates. From Coach. From media.
The game starts without me.
I don’t check the score.
I don’t want to know.
I sit in a plastic chair beside her hospital bed.
Her father stands near the window, arms crossed, silent.
Machines hum softly.
Her fever finally starts to break near midnight.
Her breathing evens out.
Color slowly returns to her face.
When she wakes up fully, groggy but alert, her eyes find mine immediately.
“You stayed.”
Like it was ever a question.
“Always.”
She squeezes my hand.
Weak.
But real.
Across the room, her father clears his throat.
“I was wrong.”
The words are steady this time.
Not defensive.
Not reluctant.
“I thought you were a distraction,” he says, looking at me. “I thought you were reckless.”
I don’t interrupt.
“I see now that you’re the only reason she pushes herself this hard. And the only reason she feels safe doing it.”
He steps closer.
“I can’t promise I won’t worry. That’s my job. But I won’t stand in your way again.”
There’s no dramatic handshake this time.
No tension.
Just something honest.
I nod once.
“That’s all I needed.”
Ava watches us, eyes shining with something softer than fever.
Relief.
Understanding.
Maybe even pride.
The championship game will be talked about for weeks.
They’ll speculate why I left.
They’ll debate commitment and priorities.
Let them.
Because sitting here, holding her hand while her heartbeat steadies beneath hospital lights?
This is the only win that matters.
Not the roar of a crowd rising to its feet. Not the scoreboard glowing like a digital god handing down judgment. Not the headlines that will dissect my choices tomorrow morning.
None of it.
And as I brush my thumb gently across her knuckles, tracing the faint curve of her fingers where the IV tape pulls at her skin, I know something with absolute clarity.
The world can flash its cameras.
It can cheer or criticize.
It can build ice kingdoms and watch them melt.
But I’m never letting her fall alone again.
The hospital room is quiet in a way that feels sacred. No commentators. No whistles. No flashing lights. Just the steady rhythm of a monitor, soft and reassuring, like a metronome keeping time for her heartbeat. For mine.
Her fingers twitch faintly under mine.
I lean closer.
“I’m right here,” I murmur, not because she asked, not because she looks afraid, but because I need her to know it lives in me now. Permanent. Unshakeable.
Her breathing has evened out. The fever has broken enough that her skin no longer burns against my touch. There’s still a fragile exhaustion to her, like glass that’s been heated and cooled too quickly, but she’s here. Awake. Present.
And that is everything.
I look at her face the way I never get to when the world is watching. No cameras. No reporters measuring reactions. No expectations. Just her. Stripped down to the quiet version of herself. The one who doesn’t need to be sharp or stubborn or composed.
Her lashes rest against her cheeks.
Her mouth softens when she sleeps.
She looks younger like this. Not weaker. Just unguarded.
My chest tightens again, but not with fear this time.
With something heavier.
Something rooted.
Because today could have gone differently.
The image of her collapsing on the ice replays without permission. The way her clipboard hit first. The way her body followed. The split second where everything felt suspended before gravity claimed her.
I press my jaw tight, forcing the memory away.
She’s here.
That’s what matters.
A quiet shuffle draws my attention. Her father is still in the room, though he’s given us space. He stands near the window, staring out at the parking lot lights like they might offer him answers.
For the first time, he doesn’t look like the man who controls rooms.
He looks like someone who almost lost something irreplaceable.
He catches me looking.
There’s no hostility now. No challenge. Just something resigned and almost raw.
“You missed the game,” he says quietly.
It isn’t accusatory.
It’s observational.
“Yeah,” I reply.
He studies me for a long second, then nods once.
“They won,” he adds.
That surprises me.
A strange, distant relief flickers through me. Not because I regret staying. I don’t. But because I know how much it meant to the team.
“Good,” I say simply.
He exhales through his nose, almost like a quiet laugh at something only he understands.
“You didn’t even check, did you?”
“No.”
Another silence. Not heavy this time. Just reflective.
“She would’ve hated if you stayed for her and they lost,” he says.
A corner of my mouth lifts faintly. “She’s going to hate that I stayed no matter what.”
That earns the smallest hint of a smile from him.
And for the first time, it doesn’t feel like I’m standing across a battlefield from this man.
It feels like we’re both just standing guard.
Over the same person.
Ava stirs.
Her fingers tighten weakly around mine, and both of us move at the same time.
“Easy,” I murmur, leaning forward. “You’re okay.”
Her eyes open slowly, hazy but aware. She looks at me first.
Always me first.
“You’re still here,” she says softly.
There’s no surprise in it now. Just confirmation.
“Yeah.”
Her gaze drifts past me, landing on her father.
For a split second, uncertainty flickers there. Old tension. Old habits.
But he steps forward before she can retreat into them.
“I’m here too,” he says, voice gentler than I’ve ever heard it.
Her throat works as she swallows.
“I didn’t mean to—” she starts.
He cuts her off with a small shake of his head.
“You don’t have to prove anything,” he says. “Not to me.”
The words settle in the room like something fragile and rare.
Her eyes shine faintly, but she blinks it away.
I feel the shift in her hand. The way her grip steadies. The way something in her relaxes that has nothing to do with fever.
And in that moment, I understand something I hadn’t fully grasped before.
Today wasn’t just about her pushing herself for me.
It was about years of wanting to be seen as capable. Strong. Independent. Unbreakable.
She’s always carried the weight of expectation like armor.
But armor gets heavy.
And even the strongest people need somewhere to set it down.
Her eyes find mine again.
“You’re going to get so much crap for this,” she whispers.
I shrug lightly. “Let them talk.”
“They’ll say you chose me over the team.”
“I did.”
No hesitation.
Her lips part slightly at that.
“I’m not something you choose over everything else,” she says, a flicker of stubbornness returning.
I lean closer, lowering my voice.
“You’re not a sacrifice. You’re the reason.”
She goes quiet at that.
Because she understands the difference.
The team is my career. My passion. My drive.
But she’s the reason I have the fire in the first place.
The reason I push harder.
The reason wins feel bigger.
The reason losses don’t destroy me.
Her father watches the exchange without interrupting. And whatever doubt he had before, it isn’t in his eyes anymore.
Just recognition.
The monitor continues its steady rhythm.
Outside the window, the world keeps moving. Cars pass. People walk in and out of sliding glass doors. Somewhere, highlights from the game are already being replayed on screens.
But in here, time feels contained.
Protected.
I press another gentle sweep of my thumb across her knuckles.
Grounding myself in the warmth of her skin.
The world can flash its cameras.
It can cheer or criticize.
It can build ice kingdoms and watch them melt.
It can decide who’s committed and who’s distracted.
It can write whatever story it wants about me.
But I know mine.
And it isn’t written in trophies.
It’s written in moments like this.
In hospital chairs that dig into your back.
In hands held through IV lines.
In choosing someone when no one is watching.
She shifts slightly, wincing.
“Hey,” I murmur. “Rest.”
“You’re not leaving?” she asks again, softer this time. Not doubting. Just wanting to hear it.
I lean down, brushing my lips gently against her forehead.
“Not now. Not ever when it matters.”
Her eyes close, a faint smile touching her mouth.
And as she drifts back to sleep, still holding my hand, I sit there and let the truth settle fully into my bones.
I can skate faster.
Shoot harder.
Win championships.
But none of that means anything if she’s standing alone on the sidelines, swaying.
So I won’t let her.
Not on the ice.
Not in a hospital room.
Not anywhere.
Because this?
This is the only win that matters.