Missing one pass was shit, but missing three was borderline incompetent. Yet, whatever was up with the puck tonight, it just didn’t seem to go the way anyone expected.
Luke missed a shot, giving the other team a window to steal the puck. Despite Alfie and Chuck’s best attempts, it left the line shaken, one assist missing the next. By the time my line hit the ice, we were eager to make a difference. Unfortunately, the difference we seemed to be making was for the other team.
With Olssy centering us, we should have done better, but all we managed was to watch him get slammed into the boards, the puck escaping far too easily.
“Fuck,” I heard myself swear. The noise around us, filling the arena, allowed me to focus more on the game. But that wasn’t enough.
We did our best to come back strong.
After winning the face-off, my pass to Olssy was good, solid. He took off with it, pivoting around the opposition like a champ. His shot on goal was a failure, though, with two of the Furies’ players skating right at him and forcing his advantage away.
With Chase on the right wing, we managed to pass the puck between us long enough to do a nice swing to Olssy. He even drove around the goal, keeping the puck beautifully. But that was the end of our recovery, as he had to chase the puck out to center to even keep it.
It was a shitty way to end the second period. We all slunk back to the locker rooms. The pep talk was okay but it was far from amazing. The point was clear - claw it back in the third or we’d all be going home to lick our wounds.
Luke’s line was the first back out again, playing for all they’d got. It worked at first: a failed trigger by Clancy on the opposing team gave Luke the opportunity to take the puck all the way to their goal. Unfortunately, that was where things turned.
Checked from behind into the boards, any advantage Luke had was lost. The Furies drove the puck back over center with great success, only failing to execute a shot because the puck bounced. That seemed to be the last bit of luck we got.
Forcing the puck back up the board, Peterson, the opposition’s center, drove the puck towards our goal. The attack was relentless, blocked once and then twice by Vayna but to no avail. One more quick shot and a second chance opportunity from the center and the sirens went off.
After that goal, we struggled to recover. Our front play fell apart, turning into a desperate attempt to defend. While there weren’t any more goals, it was a close call on a number of occasions.
By the time the third ended, we were all exhausted. It was a loss. The only thing we could be grateful for was that it wasn’t a bigger one.
It sucked to lose on home ice and it was hard not to wish for all the appropriate congratulations and handshakes to go quicker. When we finally could skate off the ice, it was a relief.
Losses always sucked, but they sucked especially when leaving thousands of home fans disappointed.
JUNE 23RD, 2011
In general, I didn’t think of myself as a particularly nervous person. Tonight, though, even I had to admit that my nerves were getting the best of me. It was the night before the draft, so no one could blame me for being nervous. My chances were good. In fact, they were very good. But that didn’t mean that it felt any less stressful.
There was no specific team I wanted to go to, but of course, I knew who the first ten picks were. I was hopeful I’d go in the first ten, at least! There were other, arguably better, players to pick, but there were also worse ones. But I wasn’t stupid, I had read the articles out there about me. I was a solid choice.
It just didn’t stop me from being nervous.
This was going to decide the rest of my life! Kind of!
“Jessie, you need to do a better job at distracting me,” I informed her from where she was reading a book on the couch. Normally, I enjoyed the way Jessie just did her own thing quietly while we hung out, but this wasn’t going to cut it tonight.
From the calm way Jessie looked up, I doubted she’d really been as absorbed in her book as she had seemed. “Okay.” Her acceptance of the job of distracting me was reassuring. Even though she knew how important this was to me, it was helpful to have her treat it like just a normal night.
“What kind of distraction do you want?” she asked. “We can do something fast and energetic, so you’re too busy to think about tomorrow, or we can do something relaxing.”
“I’m going to need to hear what both of those options are in more detail,” I decided. My first instinct, of course, was to pick the fast and energetic thing. Relaxed didn’t sound distracting, but then, I did trust that if Jessie thought it could be, she might very well be right. Jessie was a pretty good judge of things.
Still, I needed to hear these options before a decision was made.
“Well, we could go for a run,” Jessie suggested. “You’re faster than me, but I can set you challenges as we go, that ought to tire you out.” Jessie was pretty good at setting physical challenges. It was something she’d picked up from cheerleading, and she was right that she could help me use up all my spare energy.
Setting her book down, she walked over, curling up beside me on the couch. “As for something relaxing, we can watch one of those terrible movies Mitch loves. It’s hard to be stressed out when you can’t stop laughing.”
Both options felt like they held promise. If it had been anyone else but Jessie, I doubted a movie would help. But watching things with Jessie was usually pretty relaxing. Right now, though, I wasn’t sure even that would be enough.
“Can we do the run first?” I decided. “And then try the movie.” Both together sounded like the best option. “You’re probably right that tiring me out might be helpful.” And Jessie could watch out for my form so the stress didn’t make me run too hard or something.
With a nod, Jessie flowed back up to her feet. Now that she was serious about training to take dance at college, even I noticed that she moved a lot more gracefully. It took me by surprise, sometimes, because I still remembered when we’d both been kids who bounced more than we did anything else.
“Yeah, I brought things for both options,” she assured. “Let me just change into running stuff.”
Jessie knew where everything was in my house, so I left her to it while I changed into better shoes to run in. Meeting up by the door, she grinned at me. “Okay. Your first challenge is to give me a head start while you do twenty push-ups, then catch up.”
“Alright.” I nodded. That was pretty easy and also pretty standard to the sort of challenges that Jessie set. It was warm enough outside for me to do it there, which is what I told her. That made it easier for Jessie to count down. And for me to see which direction she’d run. I had made that mistake before.
Once she’d given us the ‘ready set go’, I dropped to the ground to do the push-ups, focusing on my breathing as I did so. It hardly took me long before I could dash after Jessie. She was a lot faster than she had been at the start of her training, but she still wasn’t a match for me and my long legs.
Tapping her on the shoulder, I grinned. “Tag.”
Turning her head, she grinned back. I slowed my pace a little, running fast enough to make Jessie stretch herself to keep up with me but not so fast she’d run out of stamina. Over the years, we’d gotten better and better at this, running together in ways that worked for us both.
“Tell me what you’re thinking about,” Jessie urged. It was a good tactic; it was harder for me to run and talk than it was for her to run and listen.
“I was thinking about how we’ve learned to match each other’s paces when running,” I answered, repeating literally the thing I had been thinking. I slowed down my run a little, just so I could both talk and run. “It’s nice,” I added. It wasn’t something we’d actively discussed, but both of us did adjust to the other’s exercise routine when we did it together.
Of course, this did also mean that I hadn’t been thinking about the draft, but just like when someone told you not to think about something, my mind instantly wen
t to it. “Well, now I’m thinking about the draft,” I admitted.
I expected Jessie to tell me that was no good, to set me another challenge. “What about it?” she asked. I raised my eyebrows, even though running side by side meant she could hardly see the gesture.
“I mean, what are you feeling?” Jessie asked. “Excited? Nervous? Maybe talking about it will help get some of it out.”
“Nervous, definitely,” I answered instantly. I’d been thinking about being nervous for most of the day, it seemed almost ridiculous to think that I could have felt anything else. But then, I did also think about being excited. “Yeah, excited, too.” The nervousness was almost overpowering but I was excited.
The prospect of what this draft could bring, what my future might look like depending on the draft... it was something to look forward to. I knew I was going to get drafted, that wasn’t really in question.
“How do you feel?” I asked instead. “I mean, wherever I end up, I’ll have to move. No teams in Rio Rancho.”
Jessie gave me a look which clearly communicated that she hadn’t brought me on a run to talk about her feelings.
But she did then give in. Thinking about something outside of myself was definitely going to help with keeping my mind off my nerves.
“No BFAs in dance in Rio Rancho either,” she pointed out. “It’s going to be weird, living in different places. But we’ll make it work. Won’t we?”
My instinct was to say ‘yes’ straight away, but I knew better than to make blind promises. Jessie wouldn’t expect that. Her question, there was no doubt, was a serious one that she expected a truthful answer to.
“We will do our best,” I answered confidently. Being long-distance friends wasn’t something we’d ever had to do, not outside of summer camps and stuff, anyway, and that was different. It would be weird not to talk to Jessie every day, so I imagined I’d still want that.
Giving her a grin, I was tempted to bump my shoulder against Jessie’s but it probably would’ve led to both of us falling over. “Video calls and visiting, we can do that. And we’ll meet up back here in summers. Unless you’re busy performing, of course!” My summers were going to be less busy, I imagined.
Even the thought of performing made Jessie’s eyes light up. It had taken her years to find the one thing that brought her joy the way hockey did for me, but now that she’d found it she was every bit as committed as I was.
“If I’m performing, you’ll fly out to see me,” Jessie informed me, grinning back. “You’ll be earning NHL money, you can afford tickets to wherever it is I’m living.”
She slowed, causing me to slow, too. “Are you excited? For being a real adult?” she asked. “I am. But I’m nervous, too.”
Again, the question made me pause and think. “I’m scared,” I admitted. It wasn’t something I’d say to anyone else, but Jessie was my best friend. She was the one person in the whole world who I could never ever lie to. And the truth was that I was scared. Living away from home was scary!
“I think I’ll miss the zoo,” I commented. “And the dogs. How am I going to live without pets?” It maybe wasn’t something everyone worried about but for me, animals were such a big part of everything I was that I couldn’t imagine not having them.
As we began to circle back towards home, Jessie nodded. My muscles felt warmed up, looser than they’d been when I could feel the tension of the day running through me. “I’ll miss Hannah. And all my friends. And you.”
I liked being listed separately from the rest of Jessie’s friends. I knew she loved the other girls she cheered with, but it meant a lot to know that I was still different. I was still her best friend!
“But we’ll have video calls, and you can visit the dogs and the zoo every summer,” she reminded me. “And I hope we’ll both make new friends, too!”
“Sure, but not new best friends,” I informed her. “You have to promise to not make a new best friend!” I demanded, albeit jokingly. Jessie and I had been very lucky in the friendship we’d developed. And truthfully, it was impossible to imagine anyone else ever replacing her in my life.
There were guys on the team who I was close to, sure. But there was no one quite like Jessie. I couldn’t imagine there ever being. I felt pretty confident that she felt like that, too.
“Of course not!” Jessie agreed, looking shocked at the idea that she would ever make another best friend. “Best friends forever, right?” I nodded. It wasn’t something we’d ever said out loud, and it made me feel a sort of ache somewhere under my heart.
But a good ache, if that were possible.
Jessie clapped her hands, calling my attention back to her beside me. “Time for another challenge,” she announced. “Run back to that big tree and go all the way around it three times. Then you can catch up to me.”
“Alright, alright.” I nodded, focusing on her challenge. It was a surprisingly effective way of distracting me. Which, of course, Jessie had known. This was precisely why she was my best friend forever. As I ran towards the tree, Jessie ran away. It wouldn’t take me too long to catch up with her, but it’d still be some effort.
Jessie was a pretty great friend. And tomorrow, she’d be there, watching me get drafted wherever I ended up going.
PRESENT DAY
The energy in the locker room after the game was low. Where normally there was chatter, everyone was quiet. Whatever words were exchanged felt almost muted. Losing was no one’s favorite, and the comedown that our bodies went through from the physical adrenaline rush was huge.
When we won, it was euphoric. But when we lost, it felt worse than anything.
A heavy sort of feeling sat on my chest. My muscles ached in a way that a victory would have made feel good. But this didn’t feel good. I felt tired, both physically and emotionally.
There was some press we had to do, but, thankfully, Luke took care of most of that. The rest of us just got ready to go home and lick our wounds. We’d be back for the afternoon skate tomorrow when, no doubt, the coach would tell us how we could have played better. No one was ready to take that constructive criticism tonight.
So for now, we got to go home.
Knowing that I was going home to Jessie was about the only positive of my night. She’d know we lost, I was sure she would’ve watched it, which meant that I wouldn’t have to go over the game with her. Instead, maybe we could just watch a movie or something.
The idea that I got to go home and have Jessie there to comfort me was so pleasing that it made my heart ache. I shouldn’t rely on her so much, I knew that, but right now, all I wanted was not to think about what a fuck up tonight’s game had been.
Luckily for me, Jessie knew me well enough to know that that’s what I’d want.
The house smelled of delicious food when I got in. Without even realizing I’d been hungry, my stomach rumbled in response. Walking through to find Jessie having already dished up, I smiled softly.
“Hey,” I greeted, petting the dogs as they’d rushed over to say ‘hi’. “Thanks for cooking.” She didn’t have to, of course, but I truly appreciated it. Coming home after a shitty night to some delicious food made by someone who cared about you? Yeah, that was pretty nice.
Jessie’s smile reminded me of the Pumas in the locker room. There was something subdued about it. Jessie hadn’t been playing, hadn’t experienced the same physical comedown that we all had. But maybe she felt a little like our fans did, disappointed that her team hadn’t succeeded.
And, of course, she knew how it would have affected me.
“You’re welcome,” she said, a bottle of wine in one hand and a corkscrew in the other. “I knew you wouldn’t be home for a bit, so cooking gave me something to do with all my energy. We can eat whenever you want.”
“Now is fine,” I promised. “But... maybe on the couch instead of at the table? I could use some...” I didn’t quite say ‘cuddling’ but it was the word that came to my head first. But that wasn’t right. Jessie and I... well
. We had shared a bed twice now, the second time not accidental in the way it had been the first time.
It had felt just as nice, though. We’d woken up spooning, neither of us mentioning it. I supposed that like me, Jessie didn’t know what to say about it. What I did know was that I wanted more of that comfort, more of Jessie just being there with me.
Jessie nodded, pouring out a glass of wine for herself and then gesturing to do the same for me. It wasn’t often that I drank after losing a game. I’d always taken the warning to heart that you shouldn’t drink alone. Tonight, I wasn’t alone, so I let Jessie pour me a glass, then took the plates through to the couch for her.
She followed, hopping on one crutch while she held her glass in the other hand. She’d made a lot of progress in the weeks since her accident, but I knew it frustrated her that it was taking so much time.
“Do you want to put some TV on?” Jessie asked. “Maybe something where it won’t matter too much if we miss bits.”
“Yeah.” I nodded, glad for her suggestion.
Thankfully, Jessie took charge of finding something for us to watch. She didn’t ask me things, just letting me eat the food she’d made. It was delicious. When I told her as much, Jessie gave me a smile that seemed to light up her whole face.
It took my breath away.
I managed to hide it against my glass of wine, the way her smile made me want to smile back. Even now, even when my body was shattered and my mind disappointed, Jessie’s smile was impossible to resist.
The movie she picked was easy to watch, nothing complex. It was something we’d watched as kids and I vaguely recalled the plot. By the time the credits rolled, I could feel the tiredness seeping through me. An unstoppable yawn escaped and I shot Jessie an apologetic look.
“Just tired and well fed,” I assured her.
“Good.” She chuckled. “Well, good that you’re well fed. And being tired is hopefully nothing that a night’s sleep won’t fix.” Despite the tiredness, it was hard to imagine getting upstairs and going to sleep.
Friend Locked (Salt Lake Pumas) Page 12
