Shoot Your Shot

Chapter Fourteen

Fourteen

Jaylen

I find myself excited to come to the rink every day—a complete flip in optimism from years past when I would pull up to the parking lot as late as possible without risking retribution. My good fortune continues as I find excuses to linger in the hall with Lucy anytime I run into her.

Today, I come bearing a poster from Comic Con. Before I round the corner, I pause in front of a trash bin, second--guessing myself. Is this too thoughtful? It’s an important day, because I am going to ask Lucy to dinner. She’s almost done with the painting and has yet to agree to be my good-luck charm. Once she’s done with the commission, she won’t be hanging around the rink anymore and I can’t let my luck run as dry as her paint. Having her around has clearly helped my game, but having Lucy agree to fully support me all season would give me the edge I need to secure my role on this team.

I think if I can persuade her to come to dinner with me and hear me out, then I can convince her to become part of my game-day routine. I don’t want to give her the wrong impression about us with this poster, but I need her in a good enough mood to agree to dinner. My season comes first; she knows that. I pick up my head and continue down the hall.

Lucy is locked into her art, adding beads of sweat to one of the guy’s temples. My color swap suggestion hardly slowed her down and she’s nearing the end of her project. The mural is beautiful. Everyone looks so realistic, I can’t believe it’s a painting. Lucy has one person left to paint, and it’s the one I’m most anxious to see.

“Hey, Lucy!” I shout as I approach. I hope to get her attention without startling her off the ladder. I’d like to make it through one interaction without a workplace accident. As long as my clumsiness doesn’t carry out onto the ice, I’m not overthinking my embarrassing fumbles too much.

She notices me and slips off her headphones. “I think I liked you better in cosplay,” she says, climbing down her stepladder slowly. She sets her paint tray on the ground and wipes her hands on the butt of her paint-covered denim.

“I’ve still got the costume at home.”

“I bet you’ve got a few others too.”

I hand her the rolled poster. “I got you this from Comic Con.”

She slips the elastic off and unrolls it in front of me. I got it signed by the Avatar voice actors for her. Judging by her smile, she likes it.

“Wow, thank you. This is really cool, but I’m still not going to be your good-luck charm.” She bends over to roll it back up.

Lucy’s shirt is low-cut and the tattoo on her sternum is playing peekaboo with me. I’m worried if my eyes linger on her too long, they will inevitably fall between her breasts. I quickly reposition myself. Resting my hands on my hips, I look up at the mural, admiring her work.

“Looks like you finally have to do me,” I say.

“Excuse me?” she bites.

I point to the empty space up in the top corner. Everyone on the team has a completed portrait on the mural—everyone but me.

“Right. I’ve been putting it off,” she says, eyeing the empty space like it’s causing her as much pain as I am.

“I’m not that ugly, am I?” I’m obviously shamelessly fishing for a compliment and can’t help myself.

“You know you’re not ugly. It’s always been harder for me to paint things, or people, I know personally. It’s hard to separate the emotion from the art.” Lucy moves to her supply station. She tucks the poster into her bag and begins pulling some browns and creams from her pile of paint. She shakes the bottles vigorously.

“That’s probably what makes you such a great painter.” I watch her, like I have the past couple of weeks. She’s really good at what she does, even though she’s complained through the entire process.

“I’m not a painter, remember?” She grabs the chosen paints and starts filling up the tiny divot in her paint tray.

“You keep saying that, but if you work at a tattoo shop, what are you doing here painting this mural?” The first time I tried to ask Lucy about her job, she told me to mind my own business. The last time I asked, she told me she was working her way up to becoming a tattoo artist. I’m still a bit confused because I didn’t know there was a whole process to becoming a tattoo artist; I just thought you did a few shitty tattoos until they started getting better.

“That’s a good question. My boss seems to think part of paying my dues includes murals.” Lucy squats down and fishes through a cup of paintbrushes on the ground, pulling a few out and sticking them in her back pocket.

“Kind of like how I had to wear a diaper and a bib and walk around in the freezing cold in juniors for rookie initiation.” The memory sends a shiver up my spine.

“No, because that sounds like something you would actually enjoy.” Lucy has a laugh at my expense.

She’s not wrong; the bib did come in handy. It’s hard to eat on a moving bus without getting any sauce on your dress shirt.

“I, on the other hand, hate this. I haven’t painted since… It’s been a long time, but I really want my boss to offer me a tattoo apprenticeship, so I’m trying to show her that I can reliably finish a project.”

“Looks like you won’t be hanging around here much longer since you’re almost finished.” My stomach starts to knot.

I knew my time with Lucy was running out, but I had hoped she would have agreed to be my good-luck charm before the mural was complete. We’re down to one last face, and I’m not sure I’m going to be able to convince her to indulge me.

“You’re not going to make any more suggestions to Anna, are you?” Lucy rolls her eyes at me and climbs back up the ladder to get started on my portrait.

“Again, I’m sorry about that. I needed to buy myself more time with you.”

“I can’t lie—I’m not looking forward to buying my own coffee again.”

“If I had your number, I could continue bringing you coffee,” I say as harmlessly as I can. I’ve been casually trying to give Lucy my number all week, and every time she laughs at me like it’s the punch line to a joke I didn’t make.

“You’re really not going to drop this whole lucky-charm thing, are you?” Lucy uses a larger brush to mix the brown colors on her tray.

“I need you, Lucy. To wish me good luck, of course.” I sound so desperate that I physically cringe at myself. “Let me take you out to dinner this week.” I’m practically begging her to hang out with me, but I don’t ever want to go back to the way I was before. For years I felt so weak and hopeless that it was frustrating and impossible to play through. I felt so guilty over what happened in my second year that I could never consistently play good hockey. Now that I am, I’m going to do whatever it takes to keep it going.

“That sounds like a date.” Lucy raises an eyebrow, peering down at me over her shoulder.

This girl must have some really shitty exes because she will not let up on reminding me of the fact that she’s not looking for a relationship. Luckily, I’m not proposing anything serious. A casual text here and there, maybe a friendly in-person hello when convenient.

“It’s not. It’s a business dinner. An expensive one. I promise.”

“Wait a minute,” Lucy says as she stares down the long hall toward the ice and then back at me. “There’s no practice today. Why are you here?”

“I forgot something in my locker yesterday and I came to grab it.” I didn’t, but I also didn’t want to tell Lucy that the only reason I showed up today was to see her and give her the poster. This could be my last chance to convince her to hear me out, and with another big game coming up this week, I can’t risk messing up my hot streak.

“If you’ve got nowhere to be, get over here.” She descends quickly down her ladder and waves me over. She squares my shoulders up to hers and stares at me inquisitively, then the paint palette, then the mural, then back at me again.

“What are you doing?” I swivel my head around, checking to see if anyone is around the rink today.

“Hold still.” She mixes a drop of yellow into her creamy brown paint, creating my exact hue. “Perfect,” she says under her breath.

I don’t care about how my portrait turns out anymore; I’m focused on her and her heart-shaped mouth. She smells so good, and I bet she tastes even better. “Yeah,” I whisper back.

Being this close to her knocks all the air out of my lungs. When did my legs cement themselves to the floor? I need to back off before I scare Lucy away. She looks at me, staring into my eyes with a focus so intense I wonder what she’s noticing. It doesn’t matter. Getting her to agree to be my good-luck charm is the only thing that matters right now.

“I should grab that…thing,” I say, stumbling back. My brain is able to get my legs to stumble off into the locker room, safe from Lucy’s seductive pull.

Alone in the room, I collapse like a runner crossing the finish line, catching my breath.

“Jaylen!” Lucy calls out to me. I stand up straight, forcing myself into a casual stance. “I need to get your eye color right…” She falls silent once she gets inside the locker room. She looks around in amazement. “I’ve never been inside one of these before,” she says, wandering in.

Lucy is headed toward the center of the locker room and is about to step on the team crest woven into the carpeted floor.

“Watch out!” I launch my body at her, shoving her out of the way, but I land on our logo in the process.

“Oh no,” I say, jumping back. “It’s bad luck to walk on the team crest.”

“Then why put it on the floor? That’s dumb.”

Lucy finds my name on the locker nameplates and begins digging through my cubby. She pulls out my jockstrap and holds it up in both hands, laughing to herself. I don’t usually let people touch my equipment because it’s bad luck, but she’s been known to have a lucky touch, so I let it slide.

“Didn’t know you guys were strapped like that,” she says, peering through the straps with a judgmental gaze.

“You think a puck to the head hurts, try blocking one with your dick.”

“I’m sure you’d be fine. You’d probably hurt the puck.”

What does that mean? Is that sexual or an insult? I can never tell with her.

Lucy hooks my jock back up and starts snooping through my toiletry bag: tape, mouth guards, wax, some candy. It’s mostly a hockey junk drawer.

“What’s this?” She pulls out a tiny white package, no bigger than a to-go salt packet from a restaurant.

I reach for her, shouting a dramatic and lengthy “Don’t!” But I’m not quick enough. She brings it up to her nose and gives it a generous sniff.

Her head snaps back and her eyes shoot open. “Woo!” she says like she’s possessed.

My warning comes seconds too late. “It’s smelling salts.”

“Everything is tingling! God, I feel so awake! Wooo!” Her whole body gyrates like an invisible Hula-Hoop is looping around her hips.

“You good?” I ask, apprehensively. She looks like she’s just been brought back to life with a defibrillator.

“Woo! I’m great!”

“Are you sure? You keep doing that Ric Flair thing. And your eyes look particularly crazed, even for you.”

“I’ve never been better.” She discreetly smells it a second time, tossing her head back after a long sniff. As she breaks out into a coughing fit, I wrestle it out of her hands and toss it in the trash.

“We should get out of here before you accidentally break a mirror or something,” I say, slipping between her and my locker belongings.

“Fine, but only because I’ve just been hit with newfound motivation to finish my work and I’m worried if I stop moving my heart will explode.”

On her way out of the room, Lucy stops by the team crest again, lifting her foot and watching me panic for a moment before she playfully hops right over it. She laughs to herself, power walking out of the locker room and back to her workstation. I struggle to keep up with her new pace.

“That dinner, does it come with dessert?” she asks, picking up her paintbrush.

“Of course.”

I will buy her the whole menu if it means playing well. There’s so much pressure in professional hockey to never miss a game—even if it means personal sacrifice.

I’ve played through broken bones, sprains, and cuts, but the death of Cam was a wound I should have properly treated before returning to the ice. I was still young and had too much to prove to willingly remove myself from the game and travel back home for the funeral service.

Cam and I grew up playing youth hockey together, and I still think of him every time I step on the ice. We drifted apart after high school when our lives went in completely opposite directions. I was drafted by the New York Skyliners and became a professional hockey player getting to live out my childhood dream every night, while he got involved with the wrong people and into some really bad things. We kept in touch a bit throughout my first year, but I didn’t make much of an effort to stay close. I still have a bunch of unreplied texts from Cam sitting on my phone. Sometimes I think about sending a message back, but someone else probably has that number now.

I was still riding the high of my breakout rookie season, looking to follow it up with a career second year in the league and avoid the sophomore slump, but instead got a call from my mom telling me Cam died. Overdose. And I couldn’t make the funeral service because I had a game that night. So, while everyone back home mourned the death of Cam, I hammed it up for twenty thousand screaming fans. Signed autographs on my way out of the building like I was somebody.

I tried to justify what I did by making up for it on the ice, but my game kept getting worse and worse until I could feel my career slipping through my fingers. I’ve finally got a grip on it again, and I’m not letting go this time.

“I’ll go, but I’m coming with my list of demands,” she says. Her voice shakes me back to reality, and her reply is so unexpected that it takes me a second to process.

“So, you’ve already thought about it,” I say with too much excitement in my voice.

“Maybe. Now if you don’t mind, I should really finish doing your face.”

She’s facing the wall, but from my angle, I can see her slight smirk.