Epilogue
WREN
"I can't take this anymore." Sinclair gripped my hand so tight it hurt. "I can't watch." She didn't take her eyes off the ice.
Neither did I. Nor did I take my hand from hers. It would hurt later, but I barely felt it now. All of my attention was on the players who skated down below the team box, eyes on that little black puck.
"This is so intense," Elenna whispered. She sat on the other side of Sinclair, brown eyes wide, her hands still in her lap. I hadn't seen her wring them once since Nicholas' death. Him dying seemed to have unlocked something in her. She was finally able to relax and get on with her life.
This was the only unfinished business the team had. The Demons and the Koalas both had an equal amount of wins in the division. The Demons had hoped to take out the Goodall cup last week, but the Koalas won in overtime.
Tonight's game was do or die. Not literally, thank fuck. We'd all had enough of that to last a lifetime.
Elenna squealed with excitement as Tiger slammed the puck to Orion, who put it into the goal, evening the score. "A goal on Tiger's assist." She did a little dance in her seat, which I joined in on after a moment.
"It's going to go into overtime," Sinclair said. "I really can't watch." She put her hands over her eyes but peeked between her fingers.
The guys had a couple more minutes and two more shift changes before the horn sounded for the end of the third period. Sinclair was right, they would go into overtime.
"We can't say it's not exciting," I said.
"Are you saying you haven't had enough excitement for one lifetime?" Sinclair looked over to me and lowered her hands.
"Outside the arena, I have," I agreed. "Inside, there's always room for more."
The guys headed off the ice for a break before overtime. They wouldn't get any shifts when they went back on. They'd go on playing until one of the teams scored.
"To think, they’ve gone from being the worst team in the AIHL, to being this close to winning again," Elenna said.
"Because of Aidan," Sinclair said reluctantly. "And Lex."
"And because of their unity," I added. "Next year will be interesting." The AIHL was expanding, adding more teams from all over Australia. Some minor teams, some major. I’d bet they’d all be hungry to prove themselves.
"It will," Sinclair agreed. "We can all focus on hockey and living our lives.”
"The guys are going back on," I said.
We all held our breaths while the players got back into their positions, each of them with concentration etched on their features.
The puck dropped and Coast was quick to take possession.
Like I was watching a tennis match, my eyes went back and forth as the puck went in and out of our defensive zone.
After a few minutes, the players were all becoming visibly tired, but none willing to concede a millimetre.
As if to prove the point, Javey snuck the puck past the opposition and over to Bray.
"Come on, come on," I said under my breath. If he got this in, scoring the winning goal of the finals, his head would be enormous, but I wanted this for him. I wanted it for the team.
As if he was merely skating around at practice, Bray tapped the puck in front of him. He fainted to the left before splitting to the right and smashing the puck right into the basket. It flew into the back of the net before coming to rest on the ice.
The entire arena erupted in cheers and shouts and singing.
I found myself in the middle of a hug with my two best friends, all of us crying and laughing at the same time.
"They fucking did it," Sinclair said. "They won!"
"Yeah, they did," I agreed. They actually did it.
The Dusk Bay Demons won the cup. The celebrations were going to go for weeks.
I couldn't wait. I wiped away tears of pride before we all headed down to the ice to congratulate our guys.
Wren here—thank you for reading! If you’d love a sweet bonus scene, you can find that here. If you need more hockey, check out the up and coming Opal Springs Ghouls in Pucking Hearts Collide.