Chapter 3
Three
Eloise
Anxiety bites at my heels; it’s eating its way through my stomach at the thought of walking into the new locker room.
The locker room of one of my fiercest rivals for the last three years.
The Vancouver Vortex—Winnie Polk and Taylor Matthews—have been a thorn in my side just about every time we played against each other.
I haven’t been the nicest player to play against; I know that. But it’s something I know I’m good at, being aggressive, fighting for the wins.
I can do that for this team, though. I know I can.
Brynn Bailey, Team Captain, a tall, beautiful woman with curly brown hair and freckled cheeks and thick eyelashes that I could get lost in, smiles at me. She stands beside a shorter, red-faced man with thick eyebrows and a thicker accent. “Eloise, welcome to Vancouver!” she says with a smile.
She holds her hand out to shake mine, her palm soft and her grip firm. “We’ve already met, but I’d like to introduce you to our fearless leader, Tommy Lawson.” She grins at the man who scowls beneath his moustache.
“Pleasure to meet you, Coach,” I say, reaching out to shake his hand as well.
He grunts in response, leaving my hand out, and I wonder if I’ve somehow offended him before even starting to play for him. “Coach,” Brynn nudges, an elbow into his ribs, and he shakes my hand. He’s slow to move, eyeing me up and down.
“I’m interested in seeing you on the ice. Go get suited up- your practice jersey is in your cubby.” His voice is raspy, thick with an accent that I can only assume is from out east, and disappears. I watch him walk away and feel a sinking feeling in my gut; the anxiety is getting to me.
Brynn tuts beside me, nudging me. “Ignore him; that was his warm setting.”
I try to smother the need to smile awkwardly. “He has settings?” I ask, I catch her nodding from the corner of my eye.
“Yeah, warm, crusty, and sour,” she chuckles, clapping my back. “You’ll see the other two pretty quickly.”
I try to swallow the bile rising in my throat. “Fantastic.”
“Come on, the girls are excited to have you on the ice with them.” She doesn’t watch the way that I stutter in my steps, walking with her.
She points out the training centre, the gym, the physiotherapists, the office for our nutritionists and the stairs leading up to the social media team and owner’s offices before leading me down a long corridor to the locker room.
I can hear the chatter getting louder the closer we get, and the knots in my stomach getting bigger and more tangled by the second.
Brynn gives me a big smile before opening the door, and the minor bracing I did in the few moments between her smile and the door did nothing to prepare me for it.
It’s loud, raucous laughter from already gelled teammates, and the smell- while not aggressive - is definitely not peachy.
It smells like hockey with an undercurrent of perfumes, each one layering in the air, creating something new.
It’s not home, but it’ll do.
The laughter falls to a hushed silence when people see me following Brynn in, and every tiny step makes me nervous that I’m doing something wrong. That I’m out of place.
“Eloise Harper, as I live and breathe,” A loud voice comes from the side and my blood freezes. “What are you doing in pink?”
“Surprise trade?” I say, trying to sound confident, but it seems more like a question. Winnie, with her choppy pink hair and golden skin, smiles up at me.
“You going to make my life miserable?”
“Old habits die hard, I guess,” I shrug, “But I guess I can try defending you.” She guffaws loudly, strapping up her pads.
The locker room starts to get noisy again, ignoring the way that we all know I shouldn’t be here.
Who knows? I may not come back after this training camp and may instead get picked up by another team.
No, it’s this team or bust.
There’s nothing to fall back on. Calgary doesn’t want me back with Rose in their grips.
Winnie slaps the bench next to her, an empty locker behind it, and looks at me expectantly.
“You’re going to be great,” she mutters when I sit down.
“I liked Rosie a lot, Taylor liked her even more, and they clicked, but I think that she was a little immature in her game. You and Taylor though,” she kisses the air, “Perfection.”
I feel my cheeks getting warm. “We don’t even know if I’ll be here in a week. I could very well be gone after two days.”
“Bull,” she snaps, “You got more going for you than some of these draftees.” She looks around conspiratorially. “There’s no way Coach T will pick one of them over you.”
I mull over her words, starting to get dressed for the ice, and feel her nudge me. “I swear, you’re going to be good,” she whispers.
“Thanks.” My thoughts drift when Taylor Matthews is at the entrance of the change-room.
She looks stunning, lips plump and slightly open and her green eyes narrowed as she looks at me changing into my uniform.
I catch her eye and watch her look away quickly, moving to the opposite side of the room to throw her stuff into a locker.
I try not to let that feed into my anxiety, and yet, it does.
Winnie catches the corner of my eye, looking between the two of us with a smile, and I try not to move.
If I don’t move, I think she’ll ignore me.
“See you on the ice,” she says, getting up and waddling out under the weight of all of her pads.
I can’t imagine wanting to have pucks flung at me like she does. The whole idea makes me nauseous, but she looks ferocious in her pads and skates. Like the brick wall I know her to be.
I think I may be glad to be on her team instead of against her this season.
It was always a pain to try to score on her.
I hear someone sighing heavily on the other side of the room and I try not to look up, because I know when Taylor Matthews is getting huffy.
I’ve heard it whenever we’ve butted against each other in our games.
Sometimes I hear it in my dreams, but that– no, stop, bad Eloise, don’t think about that.
She’s a potential teammate.
And she hates my guts.
I shouldn’t feel weak in the knees for her.
I shake my head, throwing on my skates and tying them quickly before going down the tunnel to the rink.
The fluorescent lights make the ice reflect back on me, burning my retinas for a second before they adjust. It glistens back at me, calling to me, and I have to suppress the shudder of excitement that runs up my spine.
The first glide of my skate against the ice makes me realize that this could be home.
It’s comforting to know that as I start my warm up; laps around the ice before stretching.
Slowly, the rest of the team and hopefuls start to make their way onto the ice.
I catch Brynn walking slowly, chatting with Taylor, and I duck my head.
People start coming beside me, dropping and working on their hip stretches.
I look over at Coach Tommy, who seems to be watching me with a glint in his eye, before ducking my head yet again.
I shake my shoulders as I get up, trying to loosen up and feel the ice beneath my skates before standing in front of him and waiting for the rest to finish with their warm-ups.
“You’re prepared,” he says, “Off-season conditioning?”
I nod. “I wanted to be ready, upped the workouts last week knowing I was going to be here.” He grunts again, heading back to his coaching staff, and I try to shake off the last of my nerves while waiting for practice to start.
The rest of the team is still chatting, taking their time with warm-ups, and I feel a pang in my chest at the realization that I have to interact with new people.
I know some of them from school – playing with or against them – but I’m older, and this is a pretty young team all things considered. The youngest players I didn’t even play with in my college career.
“Alright, ladies,” Coach snaps, clapping to get our attention.
We all stop and look at him. I catch sight of some of the draftees.
They look like they’re about to shit their pants.
Brynn catches my eye over their heads and gives a small smile.
“We’re going to have long days and hard nights.
Expectations are normal - do your best. If you’re not up to scratch, you’re going to be cut,” he looks at his clipboard.
I bite my cheek to keep from grimacing at the thought.
“We’re going to be running a few drills and ending the day off with a scrimmage.
We’re testing lines, seeing who works well, blah blah, you know the deal.
” He makes a face and turns to his team for a minute.
“Right, we’re running stop-start skating drills first, head to the goal line. ”
We’re there in an instant, the whistle blows and we’re off.
I’m gliding across the ice as fast as possible, rushing forward and stopping on a dime before going back and doing it again.
It’s a quick and brutal drill that has a few people already dropping away when we reach the other side of the rink.
I’m one of the first people there, with Brynn and Taylor close behind.
Winnie is on the sidelines with the other two goalies and their coach working away at their reflexes.
Someone nudges me, and I smile at them. I think it’s Aurora, but we don’t have time to talk before Coach Lawson has us running another, and another.
We’re almost an hour into practice before he has us slowing down. There are several buckets on the sides of the ice that players have thrown up into, and I’m fortunate that I’ve been able to keep everything down.
Not for his lack of trying, I assure you.
He keeps making humming noises, hemming and hawing at some of the things his team brings to his attention, and every bit of it sends a thrill down my spine. I so badly want this to work.
I need this to work.
I don’t know what I’d do if hockey weren’t where I ended up.
“Right, take five and then we’re going to do one v ones!” He shouts.
Brynn nudges me towards the bench, and I realize that my legs are near jelly-like consistency.
We guzzle some water down, barely able to talk, and I try to snap up an energy gel before we’re back on the ice.
Coach calls the pairings. The first two skate up and run the drill. She’s successful with her goal.
Then it’s Brynn, and she’s blocking the net from another player, and Brynn’s successful in stopping the goal.
“Harper and Matthews,” he calls, and I stop short.
Taylor also looks particularly pissed off at the thought of facing off with me, but I push through it.
It’s not the end of the world; we’re going to have to interact at some point if we’re to be a successful team.
I just wish it weren’t him forcing us to interact, that’s all.
I skate to the face-off dot, waiting for her to do the same, and I can see the sneer on her face from here. She looks stormy as she settles down for the face-off.
“Good luck,” I say, and she narrows her green eyes, not saying a thing before the puck is dropped and we’re scrabbling for it. It’s such a scrabble that we eventually fall over each other to get the puck.
Her fist jabs my side, and I’m holding on to her to help her get off of me.
At least I thought I was, then she punches me again and I realize that this was all just a ploy.
I push her off and scramble to get up, trying to be quick and get it as far away from the net as possible, but she starts to chase after me.
She’s skating tense, ready to check me away from the puck, but I do a quick stop and turn, narrowly avoiding her.
As soon as I cross the blue line, the whistle is blown, and she crashes into me. I grab hold of her to make sure that she doesn’t fall over. “Get off of me!” she snaps, and I push her back.
“Don’t run into me and then I won’t have to keep you from falling,” I hiss, skating back to the bench. Brynn looks like she’s sucking on a lemon, and Lawson is unreadable, but his face seems a bit redder than it was before.
He doesn’t say anything to me or Taylor, instead just calls the next group up.
My cheeks are burning in embarrassment as I settle along the edge of the ice.
Maybe this was a mistake.