Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

***

The town got smaller
As we intertwined
You pulled me closer
To downtown lights

Nobody sees us
How could they know
That my heart stops
When you're close?

Will you hold me closer
Through those heavy storms?
The world's out of focus
When we are alone

You're all I've wanted
You're all that matters to me

***

The pen scratches against the receipt paper, Joey’s mind a million miles away from the mundane task of calculating a tip. Her thoughts keep snagging on that earlier conversation, the one that had been abruptly derailed by the arrival of Pacey’s extravagantly presented flan.

She didn’t mean to tell him all of that. The words didn’t tumble out in a rapid, incoherent stream of word vomit, so she can’t even excuse it on a momentary lapse of judgment. His body language was just so inviting – elbows propped casually on the table as he ate, his relaxed inquiries gently drawing her out. And why shouldn’t he have asked? Why wouldn’t Pacey assume things were on the up-and-up with that? Because, typically, when one brings a guy home from Christmas, it’s serious. Nobody expects said douchebag to leave her high and dry six hours later. His gaze remained steady as she revealed Eddie was no longer in the picture. It was the kind of attention she’d craved from Eddie, and it was so disarmingly easy to achieve with Pacey. She didn’t have to walk on eggshells around him. Despite her residual embarrassment over that whole debacle, she confided in him.

Pacey absorbed her confessions with quiet solemnity. His nod was slow, his expression unreadable, but his posture conveyed no judgment. The slight furrow in his brow didn’t suggest polite obligation, but deep allegiance to his friend. He didn’t press her for additional information or interrupt her outpouring. He listened, his presence its predictably solid, grounding force.

Joey’s voice grew tighter with each word as the old hurt resurfaced. It’s not that she misses Eddie. Her frustration is directed squarely at herself. How can someone so book-smart sometimes lack such basic common sense? Intellectual prowess doesn’t automatically unlock the vault of wisdom, nor does it translate as having all her shit together, apparently.

She gave Pacey a condensed summary, emphasizing Eddie’s emotional unavailability and her own failure to enforce some self-respect by not ending things sooner. She omitted embarrassing specifics, like having to bribe Eddie with a kiss at the end of the night just to incentivize him to attend that No Doubt concert. She also skipped the part where her suggestion of a movie or bowling outing with the gang was met with a dismissive shrug, Eddie’s eyes never leaving the bar as he wiped it down. Aside from Audrey, he hadn’t met any of her friends, and maybe she’d hoped to prove to him that not all of them exhibited such rudeness and dysfunction. In her defense, she wanted to see how these two facets of her life might coexist. But he’d waved it off, claiming he didn’t need to know her friends and that he was perfectly happy with just the two of them doing their own thing. Joey had rationalized his self-centeredness then, convincing herself that they hadn’t been seeing each other long enough for it to be much of a factor yet, and that his response was understandable considering how poorly his run-in with Audrey had gone. She didn’t take it for the red flag it was.

Once she’d concluded that mortifying little saga, Pacey called Eddie an imbecile. But the look on his face hinted at a more colorful, vitriolic descriptor, like “asshole.” To diffuse her embarrassment from her unexpected vulnerability, she tossed out a lighthearted quip in an attempt to steer them back to their default setting of affectionate antagonism. But Pacey didn’t take the bait. Instead of latching onto the banter, he offered up something equally raw and unguarded. It felt like Pacey meant to imply that Eddie didn’t appreciate her or realize how lucky he was, but the weight of what he said hung heavy over their table, saturated with a noteworthy sense of… regret.

Following that exchange, Pacey’s characteristic charm was replaced by a different gaze altogether. That look. The one that always seems to short-circuit her brain and bypass her higher reasoning skills entirely. This electric awareness sprang up, humming somewhere between their locked eye contact and their hands – which had decided to begin migrating toward each other for some inexplicable reason – until their pinkies brushed. Then, somehow, a few more fingers got involved like unwitting accomplices. Before Joey could fully process how they’d gotten there, their fingers morphed into a loose clasp that felt far too intimate to qualify as accidental. And notably, neither of them made any attempt to dismiss it as mere happenstance.

Joey didn’t know what was happening, but whatever weird atmospheric disturbance was going on between her and Pacey, she knew that – on her end – there was a desire to dive headfirst into the inferno. They existed trapped in that maddening purgatory, suspended between what was appropriate and what she yearned for with all her heart; a realm riddled with a thousand questions while somehow already possessing a profound understanding of what they both were feeling in that moment. A silent tug-of-war between hope and fear played out in her chest as Pacey’s striking blue gaze held her captive. For God only knows how long, they simply stared at one another, a universe of meaning passing between them. Then the waitress arrived with the bill, shattering the spell.  

How long would they have remained like that in their own charged bubble if they hadn’t been interrupted? And where exactly had it been heading? The questions arrived all at once afterward, tumbling over one another with enough force to make her dizzy. Maybe it had simply been a slip; a phantom limb of old romantic reflexes reaching unconsciously toward familiar territory because of some misplaced loneliness or nostalgia, blurring lines they’d deliberately drawn all those months ago. Maybe two people with enough unresolved emotional baggage between them could accidentally recreate intimacy out of muscle memory alone, thereby rendering this intimate physical contact ultimately meaningless. Frankly, Joey would have loved for her brain to pick literally any explanation that felt less emotionally painful.

Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that the flan showed up before either of them had a chance to find out. What good could come from opening that Pandora’s box? Her decision-making faculties have not been particularly reliable as of late, and evenings like tonight only reinforce how much she values Pacey’s friendship – how solid and precious and hard-won it feels after everything they’ve survived. It’s real, and it’s something she’s capable of holding onto. She can’t let something as reckless and immature as jealousy, and something as girly and stupid as unresolved feelings derail everything. To even consider acting on such a thing would be monumentally idiotic.

But even if the universe in its infinite and often inconvenient wisdom had chosen to intervene with the arrival of Pacey’s birthday dessert – cosmic kindness or not – Joey is having an extremely difficult time forgetting the way he looked at her or the sincerity in what he said.

Neither of them had time to truly delve into the implications of what had just transpired, let alone examine the meaning behind it. But it did happen. That fraught silence, his lingering gaze, the subtle tightening of his hand – it didn’t feel like an old habit resurfacing. It felt like a flicker of what had once burned bright enough to burn through everything else, a coal that stubbornly still held heat beneath the ash.

When she looked into Pacey’s eyes, she saw the past looking back at her; the embers of a love lived and lost, still alive in spite of everything that had come after. In the space of a shared glance, it was all there again, startling in its immediacy. It came back. At least, in some form. For one breathless stretch of time, every choice that had pulled them apart seemed to fall out of focus, as if distance and consequence had briefly loosened their hold. Underneath the remnants of their romantic relationship, the individual paths their lives had taken, the grounding support of their friendship, and even the ridiculous goatee, she recognized him again. The Pacey she’d loved with all-consuming ardor. 

It came back so fast it almost hurt.

But what does that mean? What is she supposed to do with that?

Even if her instincts are correct, and Pacey had felt that same spark, it doesn’t automatically mean he wants to try again. Joey doesn’t know the details of what happened between him and Audrey, only that it ended badly, and now Audrey seems perfectly satisfied with making sure none of her friendships are on amicable terms right now. Whatever the specifics, the breakup had added another burden to Pacey’s already heavy load. It’s yet another item on the growing list of stressors weighing him down for the past four months, and the last thing Joey wants is to become another complication in his life.

For a few exhilarating moments, she forgot where they were and who they were supposed to be now. Then reality came rushing back in all its sharp-edged complexity.

Once the festivities – including one ginormous sombrero – left their table, an awkward shift took their place. All her doing. Whether that was out of self-preservation or consideration for Pacey, she pivoted them back into the safer waters of casual conversation. She doesn’t want anything complicated to cost him a nice birthday.

Those cowardly days of pretending it hadn’t happened are long behind her. But Joey can’t let one night of familiarity and fun cloud her judgment. She can’t get caught up in old memories just because tonight has decided to ambush her with them all at once. She’s already misinterpreted two romances this year. She doesn’t need to go for the hat trick. She can’t compromise this friendship over a what-if. Too much has happened.

Tonight is not about unpacking all the reasons her love life is a complete wash because Pacey is still in her blood and her heart remains tethered to him. It’s about righting a wrong and giving him a wonderful birthday.    

While she scrawls her signature across the receipt, a ghost of a smile tugs at the corner of her mouth. She hears the classic rock song emanating softly from the overhead speaker with an almost insulting sense of timing and lack of subtlety. With the well-versed poise and professionalism Joey honed serving the Icehouse and Yacht Club’s most insufferable patrons, she tucks her credit card back into her wallet and flashes Pacey her most unbothered smile. Standing across from her, he rocks on his heels. He appears to be studying the air with great intensity, as if he refuses to acknowledge “How Much I Feel” by Ambrosia hard enough, it might eventually take the hint and stop existing.

“Ready to go?”

Pacey backs toward the doorway, that trademark impish smirk returning to his face. It’s that smile that always had a way of getting him into – and surprisingly, out of – trouble, and will be what keeps him perpetually young. “I should be asking you that. How many of the rules do you think you retained from the background noise during all our study sessions?”

“I think I could get a passing grade.”

“You sure about that?”

“No, that’s why I said I think.”

He snickers, holding the door open for her. “I’ll give you a crash course on the way. You’re looking at the certified master of all things hockey.” A satisfied sigh follows, doing nothing for his overinflated ego. “It’s a good day anytime I get to educate you on something for a change.”

“Even today, the most doomed of all days on any given calendar year?” She breezes past him into the cold, catching his sardonic smile out of the corner of her eye.

“Well-played, smart-ass.” The door barely has a chance to shut behind them before they’re already speed-walking to the car. Pacey’s voice carries easily through the frigid air, every word visible in quick bursts of vapor as he launches into his hockey tutorial.

--

Pacey gestures with his free hand as he steers, sketching invisible diagrams in the air like he’s conducting an orchestra only he can see. “It’s called a power play, and it’s a prime scoring opportunity,” he says, turning his head just enough to meet her eyes for a fleeting second before focusing back on the road. “Think of it as a temporary handicap designed to level the playing field… or at least, punish whoever messed up.”

He’s been at it for a while. Five minutes of steady commentary delivered with the calm confidence of someone who is knowledgeable on this particular topic. Six players on the ice unless there’s a penalty –two defensemen, three forwards, one goalie. Roles, responsibilities, basic structure. He fills in every gap before she can even find them, anticipating her inevitable follow-up questions. Pacey answers with patience, unsurprisingly smitten with her inquisitive, relentless pursuit of knowledge.

He cranks the heat as far as it will go, offering Joey an apologetic smile as she holds her gloved hands over the vent. The rental car is decent enough, but it still lacks the one luxury the twenty-first century hasn’t produced: instantly heated engines in the dead of winter. At least his BMW had seat warmers.

If they were dating, he wouldn’t think twice about it. He’d just take her hand, cup it between his, and breathe warmth into her fingers as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

But they’re not.

They’re nearing their destination, the FleetCenter looming larger with every passing block. Eventually, he turns smoothly into the multistory parking garage. The air inside is thick with the exhaust fumes of countless vehicles. He eases the sedan into a vacant spot, the crunch of tires on asphalt echoing in the cavernous space. The engine ticks as it cools, the sound suddenly noticeable in the enclosed quiet. He leaves his keys in the ignition, allowing Joey a few extra minutes of warmth. A quick glance at his watch lets him know they have about five minutes to kill before they should begin walking.

“Okay,” he continues, unbuckling. Her attention is fixed on him with that concentrated, expectant look that suggests she’s mentally filing everything away for future reference, as if he’s going to quiz her on this later. “The tricky part – and this is where most beginners get confused – is the offside rule.” Pacey leans forward slightly, forearms resting on the wheel as he talks. “You can’t just skate into the offensive zone before the puck does. The blue line is key. You cross it with the puck, fine. You cross it without the puck, and you’re offside. It’s about preventing cherry-picking, basically. You know, someone just camping out by the opponent’s net waiting for a breakaway, which would be unfair.”

“So, does that constitute a penalty?”

“No, the play is just immediately whistled dead.”

Joey tilts her head, a thoughtful frown creasing her brow. “What about if the puck is right behind me but I’m carrying it in play, and I skate over the blue line, and the puck comes in after me? Is that okay?”

Pacey admires the clarity of her question, the way she’d zeroed in on the nuance. “Not quite. If you’re fully over the blue line before the puck crosses, it’s offside. The puck has to enter first — or you’ve gotta keep a skate on the line until it does. If you’re ahead of the puck when it crosses the line, even by a split second, it’s a whistle. And then it’s a face-off, usually back in the neutral zone.” He watches her process the information, her lips pursed in concentration. Goddamn, she’s pretty. Captivated by the subtle shifts in her expression and the way her eyes sparkle even in the dim garage light, Pacey grips the back of his neck and rolls his head once, feigning that he needs to pop it just to muster some control over himself. “However, if a player goes offside on purpose to kill a play, they get sent back into their defensive zone.”

“And what about icing? I’ve heard that one thrown around.”

“That’s when a team shoots the puck from behind their own red line all the way down the ice, past the opponent’s goal line, without anyone touching it. It’s also a whistle and a face-off back in their own end. It’s essentially a punishment for giving up the puck with no good reason. Like launching a Hail Mary pass that just sails out of bounds. That doesn’t warrant a player going into the penalty box, either.”

Pacey leans back in his seat, granting himself a moment to savor the lingering warmth before stepping back out into the cold. He notices the slight tremor in her hands as Joey adjusts her scarf, and a sudden, protective instinct surges through him. He’s comforted by the reminder that even in the chill of the arena, she’ll be warmer there. Between the packed crowd, the body heat, and the general chaos of thousands of hockey fans screaming in close quarters, the cold won’t stand much of a chance. And if that doesn’t do the trick, Pacey will buy her enough hot chocolate to keep the FleetCenter concession stands in business, even if it means spending the night waiting outside the ladies’ room while she inevitably has to pee every twenty minutes.

“So,” she says after a beat, “what all does warrant the penalty box?”

“Generally, it’s for things like hooking, holding, tripping. Basically, anything that’s deemed unsportsmanlike or dangerous. If a player commits a major infraction, they can get sent off for five minutes, and their team has to play shorthanded.”

Joey nods, comprehending. “Power play.”

“Exactly.”

A soft smile plays on her lips before she momentarily looks away with a hint of shyness. He silently scolds himself for staring at her, immediately resisting the deeply embarrassing urge to keep staring at her. It’s like he’s been hit over the head with a cartoon frying pan. What the hell’s wrong with him tonight? Usually it’s not this difficult. He knows how to rein in all his knee-jerk impulses with Joey. Ever since they came face-to-face in Boston, interacting with her has felt surprisingly natural. He hasn’t needed to yank himself back from things like prolonged hugs, overly fond looks, loose tongues, or lingering stares. But tonight, his self-control seems to have quietly wandered off and died somewhere. It’s like Audrey’s Christmas rant pulled the pin out of the grenade. Or maybe his birthday has turned him into some kind of masochist.

Knock it off.

Then she turns back to him, her eyes glimmering with a renewed interest. “What about the goalie? Does he have special rules?”

“Meh, not really,” Pacey replies, clearing his throat. “He can use his hands to catch the puck, but only within that designated area around the net, called the crease. Outside of that, he’s pretty much like any other player. He can’t just… camp out in the corner with the puck forever. And he can’t be interfered with when he’s trying to make a save. That leads to penalties, usually roughing or goaltender interference. It’s typical for a scuffle to break out amongst the players if an opponent makes contact with the goalie.” He steals another glance at his watch, a slow smile creeping across his face. “All right, I think you’re ready to experience it all firsthand. Brace yourself, Potter.” He pulls the key from the ignition and opens the driver’s side door. “The real education begins now.”

--

They emerge from the parking garage into a wind tunnel. The moment Joey steps out of the enclosure, the brutal cold hits her like a physical blow. It doesn’t seem possible that the temperature plummeted since they left Fajitas and ’Ritas, but under the black sky, the wind feels even crueler, like it’s plunging deeper into the negatives with every gust. The January air is sharp and unforgiving, immediately stinging exposed skin and stealing their breath.

Downtown stretches around them in steel and shadow, the city alive with light despite the hour. Neon signs flicker against dark glass buildings, and headlights smear across wet streets. Traffic hisses along the icy roads while distant sirens echo between the skyscrapers, blending with the muffled roar of the gathering crowd.

The quarter-mile walk to the arena might as well be an arctic expedition. It’s cold enough to make Joey briefly reconsider every life decision that led her to choose a college on the East Coast. Powdery snow skitters across the sidewalks and crunches beneath their hurried steps. Each gust lashes at Joey’s cheeks like needle pricks, biting through scarves, gloves, and layers with relentless precision. The wind tunnels between the buildings while the city lights shimmer off the drifting snow, turning the streets into something deceptively pretty for a place aggressively determined to freeze them alive.

She and Pacey are halted at a crosswalk, forced to stand there and endure the weather that is making her fingers stiffer by the minute. As others gather nearby waiting for clearance to cross the street, she supposes the reason Pacey links his arm through hers and coaxes her into his side is to ensure he doesn’t lose her in the crowd. Whatever his reasoning for it, it feels like permission. So without any thought behind it, Joey tucks her face into the fabric of Pacey’s coat. The soft wool offers a meager barrier against the gale, but it’s the warmth radiating from his chest that offers her the most solace. Her usual resilience has been tested by the elements, prompting her to act on physical urges she’d otherwise suppress. Oddly enough, she doesn’t concern herself with what Pacey’s response will be to this. Not that she’s given the time to wonder, because he doesn’t miss a beat before he instinctively adjusts his arm. His bicep is now pressing gently against the side of her head, creating a protective shield against the wind.

He doesn’t tense at her proximity, nor does he fill the silence with one of his quips. Pacey, by definition, has always been a physically affectionate person. It’s not unusual for him to place a hand on someone’s shoulder when speaking to them, or hip-check someone just to make a point, and he’s always got a hug for those in need of one. On any other day, this type of behavior from him wouldn’t register on her radar, nor would the fact that he’s accepting this current body language as perfectly normal. Because it’s not foreign to her. A childhood rampant with poking, prodding, and flicking eventually evolved into a more tender touch as teenagers. Innocent and platonic, until it wasn’t. But after what happened over dinner tonight, this action feels equally as intimate as it does protective.

His frame is solid; that perfect combination of firmness and softness. Joey wishes they were alone somewhere warmer, where she could close her eyes and let herself pretend that curling into him wasn’t something to overthink, and things like propriety and past mistakes didn’t matter. In such a place, she could pretend that if she cuddled into his warmth and dozed, nobody would hold it against her. She could pretend that such closeness didn’t require justification, and that there was no friendship to risk jeopardizing because the rupture of their relationship had never occurred.

This isn’t how it felt when she used Pacey’s shoulder as a protective shield during their screening of The Ring. So why does it feel different now? Could it be because Jack isn’t here? Because he’s no longer with Audrey? And as long as she’s on this slippery slope of dangerous thoughts, is there anything preventing them from starting over in Boston as she’d always hoped they might?

--

His fidgety nature is textbook. If there’s a surface nearby, he taps it. If there isn’t, he finds something: keys, pockets, his own sleeves, anything that allows motion to masquerade as intention. Maybe it’s an unofficially diagnosed attention-deficit disorder, or maybe it all traces back to a childhood where he constantly had to be on alert for whatever curveball his unpredictable, neglectful, and loose-handed high-functioning alcoholic parents were going to throw his way. Whatever the cause, Pacey’s never been especially gifted at stillness. He’s self-aware enough to admit his energy levels are probably running on a fuel of sugary cereal and morning caffeine, but more often than not, his overstimulated speech pattern, the bouncing on his heels, his erratic drifting from place to place, and the animated hand gestures are a reflexive choice made to distract whoever he’s talking to from pausing long enough to look into his eyes and uncover the fear and insecurity he hides behind the mask of bravado.

That’s not what’s happening right now.

Even if the pedestrian signal weren’t actively prohibiting forward movement, he’d be hard-pressed to mime anything other than a statue at the moment. His feet might as well be encased in cement.

Pacey felt the slight pressure of her head as it tucked into the inside of his shoulder. It’s a comforting weight that anchors him. The sudden contact sent a jolt of warmth through him, and his arm adjusted of its own volition, coaxing her into whatever semblance of his body heat remains; programmed like all the rest of him to take care of her.

In the sixteen months he and Joey have called Boston home, they’ve always had a kind of shorthand for this sort of thing: a shove here, a high-five there, a loose embrace that never required translation.  The day he got back from his summer in California, he playfully bit her arm. Whatever the appropriate decorum was for their circumstances, they abided by those unspoken rules without any issue. Now that they’re both single and no longer trying to orient themselves in their new environment post-breakup, where are their subconsciouses choosing to go from here? Because whatever cosmic forces are operating without their consent seem determined to keep pulling them into physical contact, and if he isn’t careful, he’s going to do something incredibly, irreversibly stupid. Like kiss her.  

Why is it stupid? She’s here, isn’t she? You saw the way she looked at you at dinner. It’s not like you made that up.  

He immediately shuts down the whisper of hope tickling the front of his brain. Because it’s his birthday, and birthdays are reserved for doom, gloom, and misinterpretation. And because – more importantly – he doesn’t have nearly enough confidence in how she’d respond to something like that. With those two very reasonable objections in mind, he files the thought away before it gets him into trouble.

“Just a little further,” Pacey assures her, his voice slightly strained against the wind. He feels her nod against his arm. The wind howls, whipping discarded flyers and bits of debris down the street, and pulling stray hairs free of her scarf. But the immediate zone around them feels strangely insulated, cocooned by their closeness.

Joey’s muffled voice, barely audible against the roar of the wind, speaks from within the depths of his coat. “Your deodorant is working just fine, in case you were wondering.”

A laugh escapes him without warning, and his hold on her tightens unconsciously. “That’s a load off my mind, Potter. Thanks for the update.” Pacey looks down at her. Her eyes are just visible above the fabric of his coat, bright and alert despite the cold. Her cheeks are flushed pink, her lips slightly chapped. A feeling of rightness envelops him, that serene contentment he only seems to find in her presence. It’s a nice moment devoid of complexity; one he can easily place among countless others until the late hours when solitude prompts reflection. That’s when Pacey remembers that it’s precisely those little things – the accumulation of all these seemingly insignificant moments – that created, at least in his bias, one of the greatest love stories ever told. 

“Hey.”

He hums in response, eyebrows lifting slightly at the sound of her voice. “Hmm?”

“During a power play, what happens if the puck goes in from the team that’s short a player? That still counts, right?”

“Oh, absolutely,” he says, grateful for the pivot. “Short-handed goals are huge. Momentum changers. Also just… kind of impressive, honestly.”

She absorbs that, then shifts gears without warning. “Okay, I have to ask something that’s been bothering me since high school.”

He exhales a quiet laugh. “I’m afraid already.”

“What’s the deal with the octopus?”

That draws a real laugh out of him, sharp and unfiltered.

“Who are these people sneaking octopuses into arenas?” she continues, undeterred. “And why is that allowed anywhere in society?”

“All part of Detroit lore,” he says. “Don’t worry, we’re safe from rogue seafood tonight. Michigan operates on its own moral code.”

The words are no sooner out of his mouth when the light changes, and Pacey guides her across the street, his gloved hand lifting almost on instinct to smooth down a few flyaway strands of her dark hair. The drone of their natural repartee proceeds uninterrupted, Pacey adjusting his stride to match hers as they continue on.

--

The difference in temperature inside the FleetCenter hits them almost as hard as the wind outside. One step through the glass doors and the cold disappears beneath a surge of noise, body heat, and the layered scent of popcorn, beer, and melting snow tracks across concrete floors. Above them, massive screens loop highlights from past Bruins games while gold-and-black banners hang from the rafters, disappearing into the dimness near the ceiling.

Pacey exhales beside her. She tugs her hair free from her scarf as she appraises him for a moment while she has him unaware.

His teeth tug at a fingertip on each glove as he peels them off, then his bare, dexterous fingers comb through his windswept curls absently as they walk, trying to smooth down the wild nature of them from the Boston wind. He pushes them back from his forehead only for them to fall forward again a few seconds later.

Joey prefers him this way. No product stiffening his hair into place, no careful effort to make himself look older or more put together than he really is.   

He’d trimmed the goatee recently, which makes it marginally less offensive in her opinion, though she still wishes he’d get rid of it entirely. Not because she buys into the running joke that he’d adopted a new persona along with it.

She misses his face.

The version of him she carries around in her head still looks seventeen sometimes – cocky grin, that quick flash of a dimple, smooth jaw, all restless energy and misplaced confidence. Seeing him now can feel disorienting in small, unexpected ways, as if time passed while she was looking somewhere else. The goatee hides enough of him to dull the comparison.

And maybe that’s why it’s better that he keeps it. Because if she can’t quite reconcile the boy she remembers with the man walking beside her now; if she can’t fully see the boyish face she fell in love with, then maybe it’s easier to ignore how instinctively, stubbornly familiar her reactions to him still are.

The concourse moves like a current around them. Fans in jerseys crowd shoulder to shoulder beneath bright concession signs and glowing advertisements, their voices overlapping into a constant roar that echoes off the walls. Somewhere deeper inside the arena, the low thud of bass-heavy music vibrates through the floor. Every few seconds, a burst of cheers rolls outward from the seating bowl whenever something appears on the Jumbotron.

Pacey checks the section number on his ticket again as he threads them through clusters of people who stop abruptly in the middle of walkways or veer off toward concession lines with no warning at all. The arena is already loud enough to feel disorienting, all echoing footsteps and overlapping conversations, the kind of sound that doesn’t sit in any one place for long. Joey trails close behind him, two fingers hooked tightly into the sleeve of his coat, holding on like it’s the only fixed point in a space that refuses to stay still. Every time the crowd compresses around them – someone brushing past, someone cutting between them – her grip tightens, nervous that the next surge might be the one that pulls them apart.

Inside, the building feels even more enormous than it did from the outside. Hallways branch in every direction, staircases are packed with fans climbing toward higher sections, and ushers wave people along efficiently.

Joey keeps her eyes fixed on the back of Pacey’s shoulder as he guides them forward, trusting the shape of him to cut a path through the chaos. Each time the flow narrows and the density of bodies encroaches, her fingers tighten again to fight against the tide of strangers.

At some point, without breaking stride, Pacey glances back and notices the way she’s still holding onto his sleeve. A second later, it happens so naturally she almost misses it at first – just a minor adjustment mid-step, like he’s correcting his balance rather than making a choice. And then his fingers are there, threading through hers with an easy certainty that doesn’t pause to ask for permission. Less than half an hour ago, those fingers had been brushing hers tentatively.

Together, they move deeper into the arena, past open entrances where flashes of bright white ice appear between rows of seats, the scrape of skates growing clearer with every step.

“This way,” he says over the din, giving her hand a light squeeze before steering them toward a vendor.

Joey’s brow pinches slightly, but she follows his lead into the line of awaiting customers. A corner of her mouth lifts when she catches him absentmindedly humming the Powerpuff Girls theme under his breath. It’s delightfully random and so perfectly on brand for Pacey that all she can do is smirk. Drawing attention to it would make him stop, and where’s the fun in that?

When he comes to a stop, he turns to face her. “I’ll be right here if you need to use the bathroom,” he says, hooking his thumb just to his right where a ladies’ room resides. “Otherwise, I’m just grabbing a couple things. When in Rome, right? You have to get merch or memorabilia when you come here. It’s a rite of passage.”

“Giant foam finger?”

He expels a short laugh. “Hardly. Why do I get the feeling we’d end up just trying to stick it in each other’s eyes?”

“We? I think you mean you.”

Pacey chuckles again, that low, warm sound that does strange things to Joey’s insides. “My purchases will be strictly practical.” Suddenly, he stills. His gaze drops just slightly to where their fingers are still intertwined. It’s subtle, but she sees it: the slight widening of his eyes upon realizing that he’s still holding her hand and has had no easily explainable reason for doing so for at least the last forty-five seconds. He lets go; not abruptly or unwillingly, but carefully, like he’s setting something down he didn’t realize he was carrying. His thumb brushes lightly along her knuckle as he does so, and Joey feels the lingering trace of contact even as he’s sliding both his hands into his coat pockets. A tight smile follows, and the awkwardness arrives quickly after that.

She tucks her hair and clears her throat, masking her disappointment with a short, breathless chuckle. “I think I will try to use the bathroom. Wouldn’t want to get lost trying to find it later, or for you to miss part of the game walking me back.” She backs away from him, her pulse quickening when she swears she sees a flash of reluctance cross his expression, and then she asks herself, not for the first time tonight –

What is happening between us?

--

He handed over his card, surprised by the speed of the transaction. Once everything is bagged, Pacey scoops up the merchandise, and thanks the vendor before stepping aside to patiently wait for Joey. It’s probably only another minute or two before she emerges from the ladies’ room. She scans the immediate area, her eyes quickly landing on him leaning against a wall, fingers drumming lightly in time with whatever music is bleeding through the arena speakers.

“So what’d you snag?” she asks upon her approach.

Pacey lifts the bag slightly. “Just a couple of t-shirts, and something for you.” The plastic crinkles as he reaches inside, his fingers brushing against soft fabric. He pulls out a black Boston Bruins winter hat, complete with a fuzzy pom-pom and the iconic spoked “B” emblazoned on the front. “For the cold walk back to the car.”

Joey’s face illuminates, her soft smile spreading as she reaches out to swat his arm. It’s more affection than protest. “You didn’t have to do that, Pacey,” she says, though there’s genuine appreciation in her eyes as she takes the hat from him and runs her fingers over the soft knit. “You’ve certainly thought of everything.”

“Well, if this weather insists on your frostbitten ears and tangled hair, it’ll have to go through my wallet first,” he quips, tucking the bag under his arm. “Now, according to this ticket…” He pulls the crumpled stub from his pocket, “…we’re somewhere in the vicinity of Section 301, Row 5.” He points towards the balcony seating. “It’s high up, but we’ve got a great angle. We’re perfectly aligned with center ice.”

Together, they weave their way through the crowd. The scale of the FleetCenter is impressive, the stands rising steeply in a sea of black and gold already dotted with cheering fans. Pacey keeps a steady, easy pace, his shoulder occasionally brushing against hers as he moves beside Joey. In turn, she leans slightly toward him, her steps mirroring his as their comfortable synchronicity resumes. They’re fleeting, unconscious gestures that don’t hold any of the intensity of their hand-holding or walk from the parking garage to the arena earlier. But that doesn’t mean the butterflies are currently dormant.

They finally locate their section, a row of seats nestled high enough to offer a commanding view, yet close enough to feel the energy of the game. Pacey courteously holds out his hand for Joey’s ticket, then gestures for her to go first towards their designated spots. As they settle into their seats, the distinct smell of popcorn reaches his nostrils. He leans forward, resting his forearms on his thighs to leave the armrest available for Joey, and sighs contentedly.

“So,” she says, pulling her newly acquired hat over her head, “what’s the verdict?”

“On what?”

She adjusts the pom-pom, then nudges him with her elbow. Her eyes are bright and expectant. They dart from his face back to the rink and then to him again, a silent question hanging in the air and a playful challenge in her posture. She’s all leaning energy, a coiled spring of curiosity, her head tilted just so, as if waiting for him to acknowledge the transformation. Amused, all he can do is stare at her with a soft smile, hopelessly enthralled with this free-spirited, dorky charm of hers that he adores so much.

“Do I pass for a Bruins fan?” She sits before him with big, hopeful eyes and an exaggeratedly animated smile.

He folds his lips together, his gaze sweeping over her before he ultimately shakes his head. “No. You’re not nearly jaded enough.”

Joey’s brows knit in a feigned childish frown.

“Boston fans exhibit a certain… shall we say devil-may-care attitude…”

“Yeah…”

He tilts his head. “Fräulein, you don’t.”

Her scowl deepens, and for a second she looks properly offended, until – just as quickly – a thoughtful pause flickers behind her eyes, like she’s reconsidering her approach.

Then she flips him off with both hands.

He nods once, approvingly. “That’s the spirit. You’ll fit right in.” He has to swallow a laugh when a father and son – the boy being no older than nine, Pacey would wager – walk past in the row in front of them, and Joey’s eyes widen as she immediately shoves her hands into the front pocket of his hoodie. “Before they bring down the lights,” he says, changing topics, “did you want to get that second picture?”

Her smile could bring weaker men to their knees. And as Joey reaches for her phone, huddles close to him, and snaps a photo with that beatific grin of hers, Pacey isn’t entirely convinced that he isn’t one of those men.    

--

The atmosphere is electric. Joey’s never experienced anything like it in person. Pacey looks perfectly at home – his dark hair tousled, his eyes sparkling with anticipation. The arena lights dim, plunging the rink into a dramatic twilight. A hush falls over the crowd. Then, a roar erupts as the video board flashes highlights, accompanied by a thunderous anthem that vibrates through the building. It’s sensory overload; mayhem designed to ignite the spirit and unify the masses under a single banner.

At the first strains of the national anthem, heads bow, hats are removed, and faces turn toward center ice. The final note fades, and with it, the last vestiges of calm. The pandemonium returns when the players take the ice, the reverberations throughout the arena setting the stage.

Then the referee drops the puck, and Joey’s first in-person NHL game officially begins.

--

The energy inside the FleetCenter felt different from the start, restless and impatient in the way only Boston crowds could be after a bad loss. Less than twenty-four hours earlier, the Bruins had been shut out by Ottawa, and nobody in the building seemed interested in watching another quiet night. By warmups, the crowd already carried that edge. Fans were leaning forward in their seats, banging fists against the glass, expecting a response.

The Bruins gave them one almost immediately.

Just under four minutes into the first period, Columbus took an early penalty, and the building sharpened with expectation. Boston’s power play unit moved the puck around the zone with confidence, forcing the Blue Jackets’ penalty killers into a scramble. Joe Thornton planted himself near the slot, and when the pass came through traffic, he snapped it past the glove before the goalie could fully square up. The red goal light flashed, the horn erupted, and seventeen thousand people came to life all at once.

The sound inside the arena became physical after that. Boots stomping against concrete, towels whipping through the air, the low, sustained roar lingering long after Thornton skated by the bench signaling gratitude to his right winger and his defenseman for the setup.

For a while, Boston controlled everything. They skated faster, hit harder, and kept Columbus pinned in their own end for long stretches. The Blue Jackets goalie faced waves of black-and-gold jerseys crashing toward him shift after shift, and even early on, it had the feel of a game where the dam might eventually break.

Still, Columbus found a way to answer late in the first. With just seconds left before intermission, a Blue Jackets center slipped into open ice and beat the Bruins’ goalie to tie the game 1–1. The goal muted the arena for a moment with the kind of collective groan that rolls through a crowd already irritated by a recent loss.

Pacey is still muttering about it when he returns to their seats, handing Joey her beverage. “Do you think the curse has boomerang-esque repercussions? Like, hypothetically, if I weren’t here, would the Bruins be winning right now?”

Joey gives him a pointed look as she takes the soft drink from him. “I think it’s a little self-involved to assume that your birthday has any bearing on the shortcomings of these players. Doesn’t their skill or lack thereof tonight play any sort of factor here?”

“Yes,” he acknowledges, releasing a patient breath, “but, you see, the curse hasn’t always implemented its cruelty at random. It acts based on what my hopes and fears are.”

She raises a brow at him skeptically, but chooses to humor him. “Such as?”

“Well, I deliberately turned off my radio on my way to the office with the intent of driving as carefully as possible because I didn’t want to be in possession of another totaled car, and I still almost died.” Joey emits a huff of amusement, silently affirming his point. “My fifteenth birthday, I was so paranoid about getting attacked by that godforsaken rottweiler again, that I refused to ride my bike past that house to pick up my cake at the convenience store. So, what happens? A runaway grocery cart scratched the cruiser, and I was grounded for two weeks.” He pauses, as if this is all airtight logic. “Now, you might be saying to yourself, ‘those are just strange coincidences,’ but is it coincidence, or cosmic spite?”

Joey folds her arms, a corner of her mouth quirked. “I’m sure there’s a real humdinger you’re going to conclude this diatribe with.”

Momentarily thrown, he blinks at her, his expression caught between annoyance and reluctant amusement. She presses her lips together to keep from smiling outright, one brow arching slowly in challenge as her eyes gleam with quiet satisfaction at having knocked him off balance.

“There is, in fact,” he replies, smirking despite trying to appear affronted. He sets his drink down, using it as an excuse not to meet her gaze. He softly adds, “I wanted more than anything to get accepted into Roxbury or Bunker Hill so I could be here with you.” The shift in tone lands quietly between them. “The day before I heard back, I even went into the guidance counselor’s office to follow up and make sure I covered all my bases. She said I had. That I pursued every option that was realistic and available to me. That there was no harm in hoping.” Pacey slowly drags his hands down the length of his thighs as he leans back in his seat, then finally summons the courage to flick his gaze over to her. He immediately wishes he hadn’t. What he sees reflected there isn’t pity, but loss. Which is almost worse. The sadness in her eyes is almost more than he can bear. Then Joey takes a short breath and straightens her posture to project an aura of strength, her features softening in understanding.

“Not that any of this matters now, but, um…” She licks her lips and utters softly, “When that happened, my disappointment was for you, Pacey. I was never disappointed in you. If I ever made you believe you disappointed me, then I am truly sorry.”

He shakes his head in reassurance, offering her a rueful smile. “The curse was responsible for the timing of the news, but the fault was mine. If I’d had your kind of ambition in high school, it wouldn’t have been such a grind to the finish line. I might’ve had a shot. But truth be told, Jo? I’m not that disappointed with the outcome. Not anymore.”

She smiles at him weakly. “I’m glad you ended up in Boston after all.”

“Me, too.” A quiet, uncomfortable chuckle slips out of him as he drags a hand over the back of his neck, and looks toward the ice instead of her. “Although, I gotta admit, part of me still feels like an imposter half the time. This success sort of fell right into my lap, didn’t it? None of it was earned. I look at you, Dawson, our friends – and I see the drive you all have to make your dreams happen, and what did I do?” His mouth twists faintly. “I got off easy. Took the shortcut. I feel like I found a side entrance and wandered in unnoticed.”

“Pacey…” She studies him for a moment. “It shouldn’t matter how these doors opened for you. You’re the one sustaining it. Look at all you’ve accomplished.” She gestures toward him like the evidence is obvious. “You’re talented. You work ridiculously hard when your heart is in it. I’ve never met someone with your creative genius. I always believed you had the potential to blow us all out of the water one day. That you’d be the talk of our high school reunion. You’d walk in with your full head of hair and some critically-acclaimed Forbes profile dissecting your business empire.”

A corner of his mouth tips up. “It’s cute you think I’d ever come to our high school reunion.”

“I’m being serious.”

“I know, and I appreciate it.” He sighs, looking at her skeptically. “You don’t think this is undeserved? Because even though I’m good at what I do, there are still days when it feels like I got away with murder. Like one day the universe is going to rear its ugly head in my direction and remember that things like this aren’t supposed to happen to Pacey Witter.”

Joey chews her lip, laughing to herself in that self-deprecating way that grabs his attention.

“What?”

“It’s just…” She tucks a strand of hair back unnecessarily beneath the edge of her hat before looking at him again. “Did Audrey ever mention that we weren’t really getting along before you guys broke up?”

His brow furrows. “Not really. She complained about that bartender guy you were hanging out with, but that was about it.”

Joey winces slightly. “Yeah, well… it wasn’t just Eddie. Or the drinking.” She hesitates, then exhales. “The reason she was spending so much time with Jack and Jen over me is because we kind of got into a fight. She was venting to me about you. About how much you were working. How she felt like you were prioritizing your job over her. And then she got mad at me when I stuck up for you.”

Pacey’s expression stills. Warmth floods his chest. She defended him?

Her smile is shy, almost apologetic. “I knew I should’ve stayed out of it, that she wasn’t seeking my advice on the matter. But it bothered me. I thought she should’ve been more supportive. Everyone should have been more supportive.”

“Thanks, Jo.”

They exchange prolonged wistful smiles, but before he can read into their meaning, a familiar guitar riff emanates from the speakers, and his face contorts instantly into a playful grimace. “Oh no, quick!” he exclaims, springing upright so abruptly that Joey startles. He leans over her seat and clamps his hands over her ears like makeshift earmuffs. “Go to your happy place. Don’t unleash your violent hatred for this song on the poor, unsuspecting public.”

“Pacey, stop it,” she laughs, trying unsuccessfully to shrug him off.

“You have such a bright future, Joey. Don’t make the eleven o’clock news,” he begs dramatically. “You’re better than that!”

She smacks his wrist, and he plops back into his seat, still chuckling. “I don’t hate this song,” she argues.

Pacey stares at her incredulously. “Oh, you absolutely do. Don’t you remember that bar we went to about a year ago with everybody? This chart-topping number…” he says, pointing to the ceiling as the chorus to “Kryptonite” by 3 Doors Down swells overhead, “…came on, and you’d think someone waved a tissue covered in snot in your face. You proceeded to groan about how much you despised it. So much so that you left the room. I’ve seen perverted jokes receive less derision from you.” He snickers, reaching for his drink.

“It wasn’t the song, per se,” she admits, rolling her eyes. “It was the timing of it.” When he gives her a puzzled frown, she adds, “This song reminds me of you. My overreaction might’ve been overcompensating for the fact that I was still… missing you.”

The words pummel him like a sucker punch to the gut before he can brace for them. For a second, everything around him dulls beneath the weight of that admission. The arena lights, the song, the fans laughing in the row behind them – they’re all muffled beneath the sudden rush of blood filling his ears.

Still missing you.

His smile wilts almost invisibly, but his body betrays him in smaller ways. His fingers loosen around the paper cup resting near his knee. His shoulders – always so loose around her lately – stiffen before he consciously forces them to relax again. He swallows once, hard enough to feel it scrape down his throat. Because there it is again – that dangerous, impossible thing he keeps trying to outrun whenever she looks at him too softly or laughs at one of his stupid jokes too long.

A flare of hope. It shows up right on cue; uninvited, insistent, and far too loud. He hates how quickly his mind moves after that; how instantly it wants to dissect her words for hidden meaning, wants to hold them up to the light and ask if she understands what they do to him and whether she knows that one sentence can still unravel him this completely after everything.

He keeps his eyes trained ahead, toward the blur of players skating lazy circles before the period resumes, but his focus has long since abandoned the ice. Somewhere near center rink, a Bruins defenseman collides hard into the boards to a roar of approval from the crowd, but the noise barely penetrates, because all he can think about is that she missed him. The realization slips cleanly through the cracks of him, prying apart pieces he’d spent months trying to board shut.

Because he thought…

She’d been so weirdly fixated on Dawson and Jen. She dipped her toes back in the dating pool. When he’d floated the idea of getting her a waitressing job at Civilization, she turtled up at the notion. Every sign seemed to point toward the same conclusion: she’d moved on. In spite of all of those things, he hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that he and Joey had been connecting more lately. They were talking like they used to – affably, but openly. Gone was all the awkwardness and bullshit that haunted them at the end of their senior year. She’d listened to him ramble about food and work and actually seemed impressed by what he’d built for himself, and that was after the dramatic revelation of Dawson and Jen’s hookup made a casualty out of nearly every one of his courses. And he missed her. He still loved her. There was clearly still chemistry between them. She was excelling at Worthington. He was climbing up the ladder at Civilization. Had enough time passed? Were they growing together? More importantly, were they growing in the same direction? He spent the next two weeks asking himself whether or not it was wise to open that door again. They spent some time together over Christmas break in Capeside, each escaping their respective houses a few times due to cabin fever. When he handed her a hot chocolate, their fingers grazed, and his Spidey-senses told him that the flush in her cheeks wasn’t entirely weather-related. Alas, there was no way to know for sure unless he talked to Joey. So he tested the waters carefully, trying to gauge where her head might be.

When he gave her a ride back to Boston after Christmas break, he’d walked her to her dorm room with the intention of asking her to hang out that night. They could talk. And he did ask her. Except Audrey had been unexpectedly sitting there in their dorm, so it seemed rude not to invite her along. He found his moments, his tactic being subtle approaches. He lingered in her space a beat too long. He let flirtation creep into conversations under the cover of plausible deniability.

She didn’t take his bait.

So, she didn’t want the job at Civilization where she’d be working in proximity to him. She didn’t take the hint about going out with him to talk about them – or Audrey was her convenient diversion, her way of gently shooting him down. And she didn’t respond to his physical closeness.

Pacey accepted the strikeout gracefully. He was disappointed, but not defeated. He and Joey were in a good place. It made sense to him that she wasn’t ready or that she wouldn’t want to go there.

But, as it turns out, she was missing him after Christmas. And suddenly he feels like the world’s biggest idiot. If he had just talked to her instead of acting like a chickenshit who tiptoed around their energy because of… what, pride? Fear? The possibility of making her uncomfortable or accidentally detonating this good thing they had going between them? If things were as solid between them now as he believed them to be, it wouldn’t have mattered. They would’ve bounced back from that.

No, Pacey, I don’t think going out on a date would be a good idea.

That’s all it would’ve taken. He would’ve been embarrassed for misreading the situation, but he would’ve made a completely unrelated joke within thirty minutes to defuse the tension, and they would’ve been fine.

Instead, they both stood on opposite sides of the same feeling, secretly missing each other. Pacey’s thoughts spiral faster from there. Did she not trust him not to hurt her again? Why would she have encouraged him to pursue something with Audrey? Was she over him by that point? And what had he done or failed to do that would’ve made that the case?

Pacey has about fifteen new questions, and no answers.

Joey notices something is off. Not because his expression has changed dramatically — he’s always had that skill of masking hurt beneath humor and deflecting vulnerability before anyone can touch it. But Joey has known him since he was six years old. She knows his smaller tells: the slight tension in his jaw when emotion catches him off guard, the way his gaze fixes too intently on something meaningless whenever he’s trying not to look exposed, and the subtle inward retreat he does when something wounds him deeply enough.

Her eyes linger on his profile for a moment, softening with quiet concern. Then, almost timidly, as if she’s afraid too much tenderness might spook him, she reaches across the narrow gap between their seats and rests her hand on his knee. It’s just one squeeze, but it’s grounding; not demanding anything from him or asking him to respond. Only there to reassure him.

She thinks he feels guilty, that this is about feeling responsible for the heartache she carried from missing him. She has no idea how much further it goes.  

The pressure of her hand eases something sharp inside his chest while simultaneously making the ache there deepen. His breath escapes slowly through his nose, uneven despite his best efforts, and he dips his head slightly, pretending to adjust in his seat so she won’t notice quite how much that tiny gesture affected him.

You know what the problem with remembering everything is? You remember everything. It means retaining all memories and information, not just important things like birthdays and anniversaries, but useless things, painful things. And those deeply personal experiences embed themselves inside like shrapnel, refusing to be forgotten.

You remember that first time she fell asleep on your chest on the boat, pretending she wasn’t tired because she wanted to keep talking to you. You can vividly recall the color of her eyes – that hypnotic, shifting kaleidoscope of brown, green, honey, and gray – you’ve never seen another pair like them, not even her mom’s. Every variation of her laughter lives on in your mind, as does the way she’d sing confidently – and badly – to songs she only half-knew.

You remember the way she’d look at you after saying something ridiculous, waiting for your reaction; already smiling before you spoke. And then those moments became part of your code. Inside jokes layered on top of older inside jokes until the two of you are practically speaking a language nobody else understands.

Sadly, you remember every fight because memory is cruel like that. It preserves the wounds along with the miracles.

But what sometimes sucks the most? You remember the beautiful stuff in unbearable detail. That first kiss she initiated after she helplessly whispered your name, like she was confessing to a crime. You remember how she looked that night – hair pinned up, black strappy shoes, her mother’s bracelet – and the agony and rightness of holding her on that dance floor, both of you convinced it was going to be the last time you ever touched each other. And you remember how that definitely wasn’t the last time you touched each other. You remember how she looked standing in the beach house at two in the morning, wearing one of your shirts and nothing else, illuminated only by the light of the moon. You remember thinking that if there was a heaven, it would look like that.

You remember each halcyon day aboard True Love, when the rest of the world stopped existing beyond the edge of the water and time became measured only in kisses, conversations, and the slow rhythm of breathing beside each other with your toes in the water. You remember how she slept, and how sometimes you’d wake before her just to watch the dawn paint her gold, and you’d think, I’m going to spend my entire life loving this person, aren’t I?

You recall the nights she kissed you like she was trying to memorize you, and what she looked like the precise moment her orgasm overtook her – that hitch of breath, the tremble of her thighs beneath your hands, her composure unraveling until there was nothing left but instinct, trust, and breathless surrender. You remember the soft twist of sheets afterward when she curled against your side, the lazy way her fingers traced invisible patterns on your skin, and the peace you felt knowing there was another human being who had seen every fractured, vulnerable part of you and chose to stay.

And you remember things like shitty birthdays, all the instances you let each other down, and that the only reason that you’re not with her right now is because you stopped talking to her like this.

They say that time heals all wounds, and it does – but the problem with remembering everything is that memory reopens them. Memories don’t die when the relationship does.

She’ll laugh in your passenger seat, dazzle you with her intellect, casually level you with a perfectly timed compliment – or sarcastic barb, depending on how inflated your ego’s gotten that day – and undo you entirely.

Remembering everything means you carry all of it forever: every touch, every word, every version of her from every age. And you simply deal with the exhaustion of separating it all, place them in their proper storage bins, and accept who she still is to you.

Beside him, Joey lets her hand linger on his knee for one more second before she withdraws it. Then she turns her attention back toward the rink and the game restarting beneath flashing lights and roaring fans, giving him the dignity of not watching him process what she’d just done to him. But he can still feel the ghost of her hand on his knee. And for the rest of the face-off, Pacey stares at the ice without comprehending a damn thing happening on it.