Just One of the Boys

by Lexie Syrah

Jesus Christ, Alice. Get your head in the game.

  Or Al.

  Or whoever is holding this goddamn hockey stick right now.

  These first two periods have been absolutely dismal. We can’t keep the puck out of our zone and the Detroit Ice Wolves lead 3–0. But I can’t think about anything except my fight with Xander.

  How did I get in so deep?

  Hey, everyone’s allowed an off day. It should be Hayden, our new captain, carrying the team. But we can’t land a pass between the two of us, and in-between shifts, he keeps looking at me like a wounded puppy. Dammit, he’s a grown man, can’t he take a little joke?

  Except I didn’t mean it as a joke, and he knew that.

  I didn’t mean to discredit Hayden. He really has worked hard this season. But it’s his fault I’m in this scenario. It’s his fault I couldn’t just keep my head down and lay low with the team. Everything is all his fault!

  The whistle blows, and Sacachelli heads to the box for tripping. Great, another power play for them.

  I start to head to the bench when someone gives me a little shove from behind. I swivel on my skates and turn around to see Freddy’s arrogant smirk.

  “Can’t land a pass, eh, Xander? What, too distracted by your pretty boy captain?”

  I clutch my stick tighter. Just ignore him. But I can’t. He blackmailed my brother. “What’s your problem, Freddy? Keep your dumb lies to yourself, or I’ll let all the teams know every injury you’ve ever had in your entire life!”

  He spits and laughs, skating a little closer to me. “Lies, Xander? You’re still trying to deny it? You think I’ll forget all about when you asked out Ben Walker? I’ll never forget that in a million years, you faggot!” He jerks forward and pushes me in the shoulder. “Now that Allie broke up with me, there’s nothing to keep me from spilling your secret. Just you wait… When it’ll hurt the most, that’s when I’ll tell.”

  I’m too shocked to move. Freddy leers at me, waiting for a reaction. But I don’t have anything to give. My mind floods with memories.

  Ben Walker used to be on our hockey team back home. Xander and him were pretty close, but right before we moved, they drifted apart. Is that what happened?

  Is Xander gay?

  I don’t get time to dwell on it because Freddy, angered by my lack of reaction, rushes forward. “Don’t you have anything to say for yourself, Bell?”

  Suddenly, he shrinks back.

  “He might not, but I do.” Hayden skates up behind me.

  Freddy shakes his head but keeps his gloves on. I guess he remembers the last time he and Hayden got in a fight. He grimaces, revealing a smile of chipped teeth. “Better watch yourself, Bell. You just picked the worst fight of your life!”

  Freddy skates away, and I turn to Hayden. He shakes his head. “You gotta ignore him. Don’t let him get under your skin.”

  “Hey,” I mutter, biting down on my mouth guard, “you’re starting to sound like me.”

  “Let’s just focus on landing some passes, eh.” He laughs and smiles down at me.

  But his smile and laugh doesn’t fill me with same happiness it usually does. Instead, it makes me feel…guilty.

  How has this been for Xander? I played hockey because I wanted to play hockey. Because I wanted to prove I belonged here. And my friendship with Hayden…that was because…

  My teeth grind so hard into my mouth guard, my jaw almost locks. I push it back into my mouth and look out at the ice. This isn’t the time to think. This is the time to play hockey.

  The next set starts, and Hayden’s on fire, pushing hard against the Ice Wolves. Evans shoots a powerhouse of a shot that dings off the post. But no matter how hard I try, I can’t sort out my thoughts. Hockey usually keeps my head straight, but I can’t even keep my eyes on the puck.

  Xander is gay?

  Freddy could be lying but…now it seems like everything makes sense.

  Xander is totally gay!

  Why didn’t he tell me? Or Mom? Or anyone? And no wonder he got mad about me spending so much time with Hayden. He’s been trying to keep this secret his entire life and suddenly, I come along and glue myself to the hottest boy in all of Chicago!

  “Heads up, Al!” Hayden calls, and shoots the puck toward me.

  Somehow I manage to stick it. I’m pretty sure this is the first time I’ve touched the puck all night—

  My bones shudder as I slam against the boards. A crack rings through the arena as the Plexiglas crumbles with the impact. Blinding pain shoots through my body as I smack against the ice, feeling shards of glass rain down.

  Black spots dart in front of my vision. I hear people screaming, but it’s muffled, like I’m underwater. There’s a flurry of movement around me.

  A face appears.

  Hayden.

  “Al! Al! Are you okay?”

  There’s only one answer I can give. If I’m not okay, it means I’m injured. If I’m too badly injured, they’ll take me to medical. They’ll take off my jersey and see who I really am!

  I squeeze my eyes shut. Pull it together, Bell. I open my eyes and manage to croak, “I’m fine.”

  I try to piece together the blurry shapes around me. Both refs and the linesmen are here, and my whole freakin’ team—and they’ve surrounded Freddy, like a pack of lions around a baby wildebeest. Of course it was Freddy who checked me.

  Check? It felt like a freight train. He hit me hard enough to shatter the glass.

  “I just need to get to the bench.” I sit up. Pain rips through me. “J-just help me up.”

  Hayden grabs me under my arms and helps me to my feet. I bite down on my mouth guard to keep from calling out. As we skate toward the bench, I look back to see all the trainers and first aid responders have gathered around the broken glass.

  “Some of the fans are hurt,” Hayden says. “They got cut by the glass.”

  Madison paces nervously on the bench and a wave of relief washes over me. I’ll go with her while all the trainers are distracted.

  I step onto the bench, staggering. My chest feels like it’s about to rip open with every breath.

  Coach grabs my arm. “How you doing, kid? What do you need?”

  Two of his giant moustaches waver in front of my face. I try to focus, but all I can do is nod toward Madison.

  She rushes forward and hooks an arm around me. “I’ll look after him and make sure everything is okay!”

  Coach nods, and we head toward the back.

  “Al, wait! Are you okay?” Hayden jumps over the bench and heads toward us.

  “We’re fine, Tremblay,” Madison says sternly. “Concentrate on the game.”

  Hayden looks like a lost kid, staring helplessly at me as we round the corner into the back rooms.

  As soon as we make it to the training room and lock the door, I collapse onto the medical bed and unravel. Tears flood down my face, and I cry out.

  Madison’s hands are all over my body, feeling my head, neck, arms. When she gets to my ribs, I scream.

  “You’re hurt,” she shudders. “I need to get the doctor.”

  “No!” I shout. “They’ll find out.”

  She sets her jaw, and I can see the unease in her eyes. “I need to take a look.”

  Carefully, she removes my helmet, jersey—my beautiful new jersey—skates, and equipment until I’m just in my black compression pants and top. Slowly, she sits me up so she can remove my tight undershirt.

  I look down. A giant red bruise scrawls its away below my breast.

  “Shoot, Alice,” she whispers.

  Loud bangs fill the room as someone hammers on the door. “Al, are you in here?”

  Hayden. He sounds so worried.

  Madison lets out a breath and walks over to the door. “Uh, the doctor is just doing an examination. Al’s fine.”

  Hayden bangs on the door again. “Well let me in! Why is this even locked? Hey, Al! They’re taking a break to clean up the glass!”

  Madison shoots a look at me. Damn,
he’s persistent.

  I cough and lower my voice, grimacing at the pain. “I’m good, man. Just, uh, go beat the Ice Wolves!”

  “Let me in! You got hit so hard—”

  “Tremblay! Get back to the game!” Madison snaps. “The doctor needs to concentrate.”

  A moment passes, and then footsteps echo. My heart sinks. Out of everyone in the world, he’s the one I want here with me now.

  She walks back over, her eyes dark and narrowed. “You’ve got massive bruising. You may have broken a rib.” I stare blankly at her until she says, “You need to go to the hospital.”

  “No, I can’t!”

  She sits beside me and smoothes down my hair. “Shush, don’t worry. I’ll go tell Coach it’s nothing serious, but I’m going to take you to the hospital to make sure you don’t have a concussion. Once we arrive there, you can check in as Alice Bell.”

  I nod. Some morphine sounds pretty good right now.

  “Let me unbind you before we go. The pressure on your ribs could restrict your breathing.” Madison’s cool fingers carefully remove my tight bondage. I clamp my hands against the side of the bed. Damn, Freddy really got me. How could I not see him for who he was? A complete asshole who would blackmail his girlfriend’s brother.

  Guilt seeks deeper into me. My poor brother.

  Goose bumps raise on my skin as Madison grabs a roll of gauze and lightly wraps it around my breasts and ribs. She stands back, admiring her work. “That should do until we get to the hospital. I’ll go tell Coach.”

  “And grab my bag,” I say. “I have my hoodie and phone in there.”

  Madison nods and leaves the room, locking the door on her way out.

  I guess I’ll have to let Mom know I’m in the hospital. She’ll freak out that I got injured, but as long as this doesn’t interfere with the Ice Ball, I think I’ll manage to survive this.

  I squeeze my eyes shut. This is okay. I will be okay. At least my head feels normal now, and I didn’t break a wrist or ankle. My ribs will heal and I will play again.

  But Xander—

  The lock clicks and the door handle turns. “That was fast, Madison. Did you remember my bag—?”

  My voice stops. It’s not Madison standing in the doorway.

  It’s Hayden.

  …

  Hayden

  I can’t think straight. It’s not that there are no thoughts in my head—there are too many of them. And none of them make any sense.

  I got the keys from Coach to go check on my teammate. My friend. Al Bell.

  But that’s not Al, sitting on the bed.

  It’s a girl.

  She wears tight black Bauer pants and nothing on her top, except a loose bandage—across what is very clearly a chest.

  Al doesn’t have boobs. Al doesn’t have legs like that. Or a voice like that.

  Memories flash across my brain. Have I ever seen Al in anything besides his jersey or sweats and a baggy shirt? Is this even my friend?

  “Get out!” the girl screams.

  But I don’t. I step inside.

  “For fuck’s sake! Close the door!” That voice. It sounds like Al now, that familiar nasally shriek. I close the door behind me, but I can’t take my eyes off the person in front of me.

  While it’s not Al…it is. The same scruffy hair, the big gray eyes, that deer-in-headlights gaze. His jersey, pants, and skates lie on the floor.

  “What’s going on?” I say. There’s anger in my voice. She doesn’t respond. “Who are you?” I snap.

  She looks down. “I-I’m… I’m Al Bell.”

  “Al’s my teammate. Where’s the real Al Bell?” I look around, as if my friend I saw getting hauled off the ice will suddenly appear.

  “You’ve never met him!” she shouts. “My brother’s name is Alexander Bell. He broke his leg right before the season began, so I pretended to be him. So he wouldn’t lose his spot on the team.”

  I look at this stranger in front of me. None of this makes any sense. My body trembles with an anger I didn’t know I was capable of. It hums under my skin like a living thing.

  All the time I’ve spent with my friend Al…he’s been a girl. I shake my head and refuse to believe it. I’ve spent almost every day with Al for the last few months. I would have known! This has to be some sort of sick joke, and my friend, the real Al, is going to come out and laugh.

  But as I look at the girl in front of me, I know I’m wrong.

  She’s the real Al.

  “So…you’ve been lying to me this whole time?” I spit and put a hand on the door. “You’re a liar.”

  “I’m Alice,” she says. Her face twists in pain and she clutches her side. Suddenly, she falls forward and before I even know what I’m doing, I lurch forward to catch her.

  She grimaces and shudders against my touch.

  In my arms, she seems so small, so fragile. “Alice,” I repeat, eyes searching her face, only inches from mine. Alice Bell. My dream girl from the hotel room.

  “Y-you,” I gasp, “you manipulated me.”

  A sad, terrible realization settles on me. This whole time, every moment I’ve spent with Al Bell, the person I thought was my best friend, has been a lie.

  “Hayden, it wasn’t—”

  I put her back on the bed. She bends over, whimpering slightly. It hurts to look at her, but I can’t seem to tear my eyes away. “I brought you to meet my family…I told you about my parents…”

  “I-it wasn’t a lie,” she says through gritted teeth.

  “Yes. It was.” I turn my back on this stranger. “You need to go to the hospital.”

  “M-Madison’s taking me.”

  I laugh. “You really thought this thing through. Fake girlfriend, fake name. Fake friend. You must have thought I was an idiot.”

  Somehow, she staggers off the bed and hobbles toward me. “Hayden, wait. I…I, um…”

  I look down at her. She seems so tiny compared to me in my skates. What could she possibly say to explain all this? To justify lying to me all this time? Yet, deep down, a bubbling hope rises in my gut that maybe she’ll be able to, that she’ll tell me she didn’t mean to make me a fool. Maybe there was some truth to our friendship after all.

  “Yes…Alice?”

  “You can’t tell anyone.”

  “What?”

  “No one can know I’m a girl. Please!”

  My stomach sinks. Here I am, falling for her tricks again. How could I have thought she would be worried about what I would think? I may have thought Al Bell was my friend, but this stranger is concerned with only one thing. Herself.

  My hands tighten into fists, and I have to look away. “Whatever.”

  “I couldn’t tell you,” she says finally. “I couldn’t trust anyone!”

  “Except Madison?”

  “That was…different.”

  “Save it,” I spit. “I don’t care.” I stare right into those damn familiar eyes and feel disgust rise in me. “You kissed me!” I avert my eyes, unable to look at her when I say it: “You kissed me!”

  “That was a mistake…you weren’t supposed to be there! Besides, you were drunk and you kissed me!” Her face flushes red.

  So none of it meant anything to her. And now she reveals what she really thinks of me: just some drunk hockey player in a hotel room. “I bet you and Madison had a great laugh about that. Sad, pathetic Hayden Tremblay. I bet you thought sitting in the snow in front of my parent’s ice rink was hilarious too.”

  “No,” she says, and her voice cracks. “I didn’t mean to get so close to you…to take it so far.”

  I close my eyes, suck in a deep breath, and then take a good long look at her. I can’t see my friend Al anymore. I can’t even see the girl from that hotel room, the one whose kiss always lingered in the back of my mind. I don’t see anyone at all.

  “Well, Alice Bell,” I say, “I’m sorry I was such an inconvenience to you.”

  Her lips curl into a snarl. “None of this is about you, okay
? You don’t understand. Just, please, don’t tell anyone.” She grabs my hand. “Please, Hayden.”

  And it comes back to that. The true reason she’s upset. Not that she lied to me for months. I wretch my hand away.

  The door clicks open and Madison walks in. She looks frantically between Al —Alice— and me.

  I mutter under my breath, “Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me.” I walk to the door. “It always would have been.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Alice

  Madison locks the door and looks over at me. Her eyes are wary, as if she could break me with just a look. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I say, surprised at how calm my voice is.

  This is me, I think. This is the Alice I remember. The girl who was totally fine after watching Freddy cheat. The girl who watched her dad leave, then never cried a day after. The girl who can take hit after hit after hit on the ice and still get back up.

  The other Alice, the lost one who sobbed on the bathroom floor after Hayden kissed her, and the distracted mess out on the ice a few minutes ago…well, there’s not a trace of her left inside me.

  There just isn’t room.

  Crying has never solved anything, and that distracted mess got hurt after being slammed up against the boards.

  As Madison helps me put on my hoodie and sweats, I catch her gaze. She’s staring at me as if there’s something wrong with me. Like, something wrong on the inside.

  I take a few deep breaths as we make our way out of the arena. So what if Hayden found out my secret? It’ll be okay. I’ll call him. We’ll have a long talk. He’ll understand. He was just so riled up because a game was on. He’s always like that during a game—edgy and unreasonable. After the game, I’ll convince him to keep Xander’s secret. My secret.

  He’ll understand.

  He has to understand.

  …

  Hayden

  They’ve replaced the Plexiglas, bandaged up the injured fans, and now we’re due to resume play at any moment. Our team sits on the bench, tapping our knees anxiously. We’re all eager to get this over with. Five minutes left in the game and we haven’t even scored a goal.

  Murmurs drift over the bench. A teammate out. They keep asking me if he’s okay. What are his injuries? Will he be back next game?