“The almost three-quarters is wicked important, hey?” I give her a smile that could drop panties down the street in the club I was at the other night with Terrence.
She returns the barest hint of a smile and shrugs. Smokeshow is a tough crowd.
“I’m twenty-two,” the sister pipes in. “You?”
“I’m pushin’ twenty-five. And you two are making me feel like an old, old man.”
This makes the older sister laugh, but the younger one looks at Pam as if telegraphing her extreme need to blow this taco stand.
“I’m studying women and gender studies at UNLV,” the older sister is saying. “Getting my master’s degree now, then I’ll go on to get my PhD.”
She keeps talking, as a couple of others have joined the group. I tune out, honestly, because school was just a means to an end for me. I got my hockey career out of it, and made it work, but this conversation is not holding me. I focus on the younger sister’s hair. The way it flows down her back in sexy, sun-kissed waves. The way it would feel in my hands. God, what was her name? There’s never any need to bother remembering names, but I should commit Kolochev’s sisters’ names to memory. I can’t call them buddy or Kolochev. I should make an effort.
“So,” I say quietly to the younger one, “what are your names again? I think I’ve taken too many head shots. Bad memory lately.”
She squints at me in a way that says she sees right through my bullshit. “Zoya. My sister is Irina. I am sure you will not remember in a moment, Tyler Lockhardt. See, I was barely paying attention to you, but I still remembered your name.”
So Smokeshow’s got sass under that gentle exterior. I like it. I like it a lot. Also? Zoya is a hot name. Flaming hot. Every bit of this chick is hot, including her total ambivalence toward me. Just makes me want her even more. I’ll wear her down, just wait. I am a charming and persistent motherfucker.
I start to come up with something witty to say in response, but Georg’s wife, Pam, squeals in a way that gives me a sense of how dogs feel when a dog whistle blows. She screams something about Viktor and Scarlett’s baby and goes running across the room like a woman possessed, her arms straight out in front of her. She literally grabs the baby from Scarlett’s arms, cooing and nearly in tears from whatever delirium takes over a woman when a baby is nearby.
“Christ,” Georg says in a horrified whisper. “What in the seventh realm of hell was that all about?”
“Baby fever, brother,” I answer.
“No way. Pam and I have talked about this a thousand times. We are both committed to a baby-free existence. She just likes holding the babies, and then she likes to give them back. No changing poopy diapers. No having milk come out of her tits. She doesn’t want any of that.”
“Sounds like maybe you just don’t want any of that. And I get it.”
“No, it is mutual,” Georg insists, speaking a bit louder. “We haven’t decided if we want to have children ever. I would be a terrible role model. Why expose an innocent to my level of immaturity and dysfunction?”
Irina snorts, picking up on our conversation. “I agree wholeheartedly.”
“I do not,” Zoya says, her voice soft but assured. “I think you and Pam would be great parents.”
“On what grounds?” Georg asks with an incredulous laugh.
“You are very different than you were even a year ago,” Zoya says. “You are not drinking. You are stronger on the ice. You have an amazing, smart, educated wife. You both work hard, and you are both committed and loving to each other. You are even helping your sisters further their education. What about any of this seems like it would make you bad parents? It seems like a good home environment for any child, in my opinion.”
Georg’s mouth hangs open. He snaps it shut and rubs the stubble on his chin. I think he might be emotional, the way he looks away toward nothing. Then he shakes his head. “No way. That’s baloney. I’d spawn some sort of holy terror. Or I’d do something dumb to get the kid hurt or—”
“Oh, I see what this is…” Irina interrupts before launching into some psychoanalytical something about Georg and all the reasons he thinks he’d be a shitty dad. Zoya is only half listening—I expect she’s heard all this before—craning her neck to find Pam. I think. Here’s my opportunity.
“Hey, looks like you’re ready to head out. I could walk to you back to campus if you’d like?”
She looks over at her brother and sister, now engaged in a heated conversation. Pam is still off gushing over the baby. Zoya bites her lip, hesitates, frowns. I can see the wheels turning as she mulls over my offer. Smokeshow is wavering.
“Yes, okay. I need to get back. Thank you.”
Boom. I’m in.
Seven
Zoya
GET A LIFE
When we walk out into the night, it is crisp and cool, much cooler than it was when my sister and I left campus. I shiver in my thin tunic top, rubbing my arms for warmth. This hockey player, Tyler, shrugs off his suit jacket and hands it to me.
I gratefully accept, wrapping it around my shoulders. The jacket is huge on me, of course, as he is well over six feet with broad, muscular shoulders. Yes, I noticed this about him. Guilty.
“Thank you. I think I will just call a ride service after all. It is maybe too cool to walk the two miles back to campus, and in these heels.” What was I even thinking?
“I could give you a ride,” he suggests. “My car is just—”
“No.” I shake my head at him. “Thank you for the offer but I will just text my sister to come down and we can Uber back. It makes the most sense, really.” Time to put a stop to this...flirtation...or whatever it is. Agreeing to let him walk me two miles back to campus was stupid. I blame the intoxicating scent of cologne and him clinging to his jacket for impairing my judgment.
“Okay, I can wait until she gets down here, then.” Tyler does not seem the least bit discouraged by my refusal to go with him.
I send the text to Irina and Pam, then open the app to request a ride. “It says the car will be ten minutes.”
“Damn, usually the cars don’t take so long,” Tyler says in that now recognizable Boston accent. The word cars comes out as cahs. I like it, I think, then mentally give myself a shake-down for liking anything about this arrogant hockey boy who is very clearly only interested in getting in my panties. I may be innocent about sex, but it does not mean I am naïve. “There must another event tonight or something else going on.”
“It is okay. It will give my sister a moment to get down here.”
We stand in awkward silence for a few minutes. I start to open my mouth to tell him he can go inside, that I will be fine, but then he asks, “What do you like to do for fun, Zoya Kolochev?”
“For fun?” I’m caught off guard by the question, as no one else tonight asked something so…personal. About me. “Well, I like yoga. And I paint occasionally. “I am not very good, but it is calming. I also volunteered at a local animal shelter back home in Russia. I could do that here, I suppose.”
I sense that none of those hobbies are on Tyler Lockhardt’s list of “fun things.” He has a gravelly voice and looks like walking sin. I know he is exactly the wild and undisciplined man my father wants me to stay far, far away from. And I would be happy to do so, honestly, if the car would just come already. Though there is that teeny, tiny piece of me that finds him slightly alluring.
“Painting, yoga, and animal welfare. All respectable uses of one’s time.”
“What about you?” I attempt making small talk with him. “What do you like to do for fun?”
“Ah, well, nothing as noble as what you just listed,” he chuckles. “I would be happy to take you out and show you the city sometime, though. Since you’re new to the area.”
“Oh, that’s very kind of you, but no, thank you.”
“No, thank you?” By the incredulous look on his face and the raised eyebrows, Tyler Lockhardt must be used to getting his way most of the time.
“It is just that I really hoped to get a break from all things hockey while I was here. You see, my father is a hockey coach. My brother and my cousin, Boris, have played for a long time. We traveled all the time when I was younger, to and from their games. So much hockey in fact, I really want very little to do with the sport now.”
“Well, we don’t have to talk about hockey at all. There are plenty of other things to check out here—”
I shake my head again. “Sorry. No. You seem like a nice enough guy, Tyler, but I just think we have nothing much in common. I have lived my life around hockey, and now I will avoid it if I can. Your job involves lots of games and a lot of travel. I wish you the best with it, but I am not interested in that…lifestyle in my life right now. I hope you can understand.”
Tyler looks dumbfounded. Thankfully, this conversation is over because my sister walks out of the arena just as the car pulls up at the curb. The problem of turning him down has been solved for me.
I inhale one last time before pulling his jacket from my shoulders and handing it back to him.
Why did you just do that?
Without a word he takes his jacket and steps down from the curb to open the car door for us. Irina holds up a pen and does a little dance before writing her number on Tyler’s hand.
“Call me sometime, Tyler. We’ll go make mischief together. I need a recommendation for a good tattoo artist. And someone to hold my hand when I’m getting it done.” She kisses him on the cheek before sliding into the seat next to me.
As the door shuts, I say, “Slut.”
“I heard that it is Tyler who is the slut.” Irina nudges me in the shoulder. “Just my type.”
I roll my eyes at her. “He will forget your name before he walks back inside. Why let him use you like that?”
“Oh, don’t be such a nun. And who says it’s just him using me? You don’t need to be so prim and proper all the time. It’s just sex, Zoya. And Tyler is super hot. Who wouldn’t want to take him to bed?”
“Well me, for one. I have never taken any man to bed, and I certainly will not start with a fuck-boy hockey player.”
For some reason, this just cracks my sister up. She laughs and laughs, but her only words are, “Get a life.”
I am done talking about it, so I keep silent for the rest of the ride back.
But my sister’s words stick with me and I cannot shake them off. I was sent to America to get an education. That is my purpose, and yet often when I speak with Irina about my choices and dreams, I sense that she looks at me with sympathy in her eyes. As if I’m so different to her that I’m somewhat… less. Not as outgoing. Not as interested in sleeping with a super-hot man. Not being me. Is that what she means? Am I that uninteresting?
Get a life. That is what I thought I was doing.
Eight
Tyler
KEEP IT MOVIN’
Smokeshow totally shut me down.
Damn.
Guess it’ll have to be Irina, then. She’s hot, too, so that’s fine, I suppose. We’ll go out and get her tattooed, and then I’ll get her into bed. Score one for America. And, you know maybe a couple of scores for Russia, too. The female orgasm is real, and I'm generally an avid contributor to the cause.
I throw my jacket over my shoulder and catch the gentle trail of Zoya’s perfume. I breathe in a deeper whiff and feel a stab of something unpleasant hit me right in the upper chest.
Weird.
The lush floral fragrance sticks with me all the way back up to the mid-season press party for some reason. Maybe because I keep turning my head toward my shoulder and sniffing for it. The scent of Zoya Kolochev on my jacket is way more addicting than it should be. This I know.
Big Brother Kolochev accosts me right off the bat.
“Stay away from my sisters, Lockhardt.” He’s literally pointing his finger right into my face. “I am not kidding.”
I put my hands up. “Dude, I was just helping them get a ride home. Chill out. The younger one was bored out of her mind.”
“My sisters are not for your entertainment,” he says, then makes the universal two-finger signal for I’m watching you. “I want them far, far away from guys like you.”
This cracks me up. “Guys like me? May I remind you that before you met your wife, you were exactly the same. We went out together, dude. I know what you did. And you might have been even worse than me, if we’re really analyzing behaviors.”
“That may be the case, but I still don’t want you near my sisters. Don’t even look at them. They are off limits. O.F.F. Got it?”
I can’t help but roll my eyes at this guy. All protective when, not too long ago, he would’ve screwed two hot chicks faster than you could order a value meal at McDonald’s. It wouldn’t have mattered if they were the Pope’s daughters. It wouldn’t have mattered if they were any other NHL player’s sisters either. He had no moral fiber, and yet he attacks mine. Hypocrite. Lucky for me, he won’t be able to guard them at every turn, but I’ll appease him, given I have to play with him and he’s a bitch on the ice when he doesn’t get his way.
“Whatever, bro. I was just being a gentleman. There are plenty of fish in the sea.”
Pam wanders back to Georg’s side, finally, but he’s still in a complainy mood. “You were supposed to give the girls a ride home.”
“Sorry. I got distracted by tiny, pink human. Baby Alex was just too sweet to resist,” Pam says dreamily.
Georg isn’t having any of it. “Well, they had to get a ride service. And they had to hang out with Tyler Numbnuts for a while.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t all that bad. Tyler can be quite charming when he wants to be. And they are adults, Georg. They’re capable of riding two miles in a taxi cab.”
“Well, you said you would do it.”
Pam gives him big eyes. “Well, I’m not your personal assistant. You could have driven them home yourself, too. I felt like holding the baby, and I do what I please, thank you very much.”
“My father told me to keep an eye on them.” Georg just can’t let it go.
“Your father is an overprotective, old-fashioned man. The girls are grownups now and they’re looking for freedom. They need room to explore. They’ll be fine.”
“Tell my father that,” Georg mumbles under his breath.
This marital spat is boring. And fucking uncomfortable with me standing right here listening to it. Things like this are reason numero uno that I will never, ever fall in love or get in a relationship or whatever. They don’t even notice when I drift away from them.
I head back over to my tree trunk of a best friend. He and Scarlett are cooing over their baby, who they named after both of their fathers. Alexander Michael is his name and I made sure to carve it in stone in my brain. Friends and family, I make an effort for. Alex is a cute baby as babies go. Probably gonna be a brick shithouse like his dad. I swear, the guy is a stone façade until he’s around his kid. Then he turns into a really fucking large pile of mush.
“How was that?” Vik asks smugly.
“Georg was pretty clear about his feelings. Which means I got good and briefed! about how I need to stay away from his sisters.”
“I told you so.”
“Yep, you told me so, big guy. Georgie doesn’t want his sisters defiled by icky hockey players.”
“Well, family should be off limits anyway,” Scarlett chimes in. “I think I’m team Georg with this one, Tyler. There are plenty of bunnies who will hop right onto your carrot with very few repercussions. Certainly, they won’t have the family baggage that those two would. You should just shake it off and move on.”
I narrow my eyes at her. “I will remember that, Red, the next time you want me to cooperate on some dumb-ass social media thing.”
“Oh, don’t be such a sore loser. You can’t have every pretty girl you see. Jesus, Tyler, let it go.” Vik stands there and smirks as his wife scolds me. No help from either of them coming my way on this.
Whateva.
Now I’m salty. Not at Red. I mean, I get it. Stay away from sisters and from family in general. Fine. But I’ve had enough of this party and this monkey suit. I’ve sure as hell had enough of being told to back off from the Kolochev sisters. I don’t act any damn different from any of these other assholes, yet I’m the one getting told to step away and keep it movin’.
I need to get out of here.
I’ll start banging my head against the wall soon if I don’t get somewhere with low lighting, willing women, and plentiful alcohol. See there? I’ll just go find myself another tall, brunette distraction.
As I told Georg, there are plenty of fish in the sea.
There are, yes.
But fuck. It’s not going to be so easy to forget the one who was wearing my jacket tonight. Smokeshow.
Dumb-ass move giving it to her, because, shit, she smells fucking fine.
Move along now, Locksey. Time for some fishing.
Nine
Zoya
PERHAPS YOU NEED A TUTOR?
February
“Kak nash rebenok?” my mom squeals through the phone. Her face looks pixelated due to the time difference and likely poor cell coverage from where she’s at. Still, I am happy to see her.
“English, Mama,” I remind her. “We all need the practice. And I am not a baby.”
“You are still your mother’s baby,” my father scolds, standing behind her shoulder. “Are you being good? Staying away from the party crowd?”
“Of course, I am, Papa. Irina is another story, though.”
“As always,” my dad says. Then he mutters, “Bol’shaya problema.”
Big trouble. Well, he’s not wrong there.
Smokeshow: A Hockey Love story Page 4
