Like A Daydream (New York #2)

Andrew

He looks up at the clock from his spot on the bench as the Rangers send the puck flying up the boards. Coach is yelling at the top of his lungs, orders that the team can’t hear from how loud the fans are and how loud the action on the ice is.

“Short shifts!” Coach yells, voice cracking over the noise of the crowd. “Forty seconds. ”

He’s reminding them of his original call when there had been five minutes left in the game, but now the final minute is ticking away and they’re down by one to tie it and send them into overtime. This is a must-win game to force a game five and start a dramatic comeback.

He woke up this morning and dry-heaved into the sink before getting ready for morning skate in Seattle, where they were playing the championship.

People had bought tickets, gotten rooms, flown across the country to watch them, and they had gone into the first period determined not to let their fans down .

They had been playing at a level he hadn’t seen from them in a long time, and as their captain that says a lot. He sees them at their best and at their worst, whether that’s on the ice or on film afterwards.

When he had looked at each of them in the locker room this morning he had known in his soul that this team could win a Stanley Cup.

“Go!” Coach yells, and Andrew is on his feet, hopping over the boards and yelling for Petrov. Petrov skates toward him lightning fast to get off the ice in time, and Andrew doesn’t stop to hit his shoulder the way he normally does.

The second he hits the ice he’s off, moving to open space while covering who he’s supposed to. He never stops skating, making sure his guys can get to him when they need to pass him the puck. Careful to stay onside when he’s over their line.

He’s a defender, has played defense for his entire career, but that hasn’t stopped him from scoring when he can, or at least getting the assist. He’s one of the highest scoring D-men in the league for a reason.

“Here, here, here!” He yells, skating as fast as he can to get to open ice .

He’s tired, they’re all tired, and it’s showing. The Rangers are outskating them as the puck moves around the ice and hits the blade of his forward, Griffin Oher’s, stick.

Oher hits the puck into the space just in front of Andrew.

He gets possession, breaks away from the defense line and suddenly it’s just him and the goalie.

It’s a perfect scenario.

He lines up the shot, raises his stick, hits the puck. It’s the miracle goal that’s going to get them into over-time and then they’ll claw their way back to a victory.

The shot goes wide.

The clock goes off.

The Stanley Cup dream dies.

The crowd starts chanting something that sounds like “ Fuck you Fisher !” and he collapses onto the ice.

Andrew shoots awake with a gasp, cold sweat dripping down his forehead. He breathes through his nose, out from his mouth, trying to slow his heart rate before he looks up into the dark of his room .

What did his therapist say last week?

Five things he can see: night stand, book he was reading, blankets, hands, lamp.

Four things he can touch: blankets, arms, face, hair.

Three things he can hear: sirens, breathing, his dog’s nails on the floor.

Two things he can smell: sweat, laundry detergent.

One thing he can taste: the salt of his panicked tears.

He’s in his house in Raleigh, a place he hasn’t left in the two weeks since he had blown their chances at a title.

Beyond team things, he’s been holed up inside, , retreating to the deepest parts of the house so that people with long-lens cameras wouldn’t have a chance of seeing him.

He’d even had his agent pick up his groceries for him because for some reason, he needed to eat.

His phone is turned off across the room, silent in the dark of night .

His breathing is slowing down, and his heart isn’t racing anymore.

He releases a heavy sigh, feeling the tension leave him even though the memory stays.

A few times in the past few days, the relief of waking in his own house as the panic subsides has made him cry, but he doesn’t feel the familiar burn of tears coming on.

His year-old sable German Shepherd, Roscoe, leans his chin on the edge of Andrew’s bed and looks up at him with sad eyes.

“I can’t live like this anymore,” he says, more to himself than to Roscoe. He hits his hand against his mattress so the dog knows he can jump up next to him, and he lays back into his pillows, pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes.

Their season is over, and there isn’t a ring on his finger. They won’t be engraved onto the Stanley Cup. His existence on the team is probably in limbo at this point. He doesn’t want to leave this team, they’re his home.

Raleigh is home. Has been since he’d been drafted out of college in Boston, spent two years on a farm team, and then moved there.

He’d left his whole life behind to chase his NHL dreams .

And now, twelve years later, he’s in bed, nose buried in his dog’s fur as he tries to calm the racing of his heart again. Slow his mind back down and out of the spiral he’s been edging for the last two weeks.

Roscoe presses his paw into Andrew’s shoulder, tilts his head with inquisitive eyes.

“I’m alright, bud,” Andrew says, mustering a smile. “I’m alright.”

Roscoe sighs, stands up, turns three times and then lays down, stretching so the entirety of his back is pressed against Andrew’s side.

He supposes he could call home, but his dad is more than likely still grieving the loss, his dream dying with Andrew’s, and his mom would just ask him to come back for a visit. His dad had never made it to the NHL, even though he had been good enough.

His parents had had him instead, a happy accident, his mother had told him once. It never stopped Andrew from missing the longing in his father’s eyes as he watched Andrew’s career take off .

Andrew loves his parents but Minnesota just isn’t where his life is anymore. He’d had spent half of his adult life wondering if his dad resented him, or if he was just happy to see his son live the dream he’d never been able to.

He’d left at seventeen for Boston University and hadn’t looked back since. His career has carried him across the country and back again, to the Olympics once, before he had decided North Carolina was the only place he wanted to be.

Sure, playing for the country had been great, but not when he could pull on red and black and know it was his team.

Andrew starts counting in his head, mumbles a prayer, and finally, finally his breathing slows again and he falls asleep.

He sleeps until ten, and drags himself out of bed so that he can get to PNC Arena on time for their last team meeting before their vacation starts.

The last two weeks had been a circus between media stunts and interviews, and he’s looking forward to not having to think about hockey for a little while .

Which is a thought that he never would have imagined having at the beginning of the season. He’s lived and breathed it for so long, it’s who he is.

But this… this has taken a toll on him that he had never thought possible. It’s been a constant mix of grief, disappointment, anger, and anxiety, and he’s nervous to even walk into PNC in case he gets triggered.

He definitely should have brought Roscoe, but it’s too late now. He’s already in the player’s lot, F150 parked next to Petrov’s Benz.

Two of his teammates are out on injury, getting surgeries and going through recovery in the off-season. His friend, Catalina, had always told him that they only get paid so much so they could take care of their injuries.

It’s a little cruel, but probably accurate. He’s been lucky that he’s only had to have one. He’s also lucky that that means there are two less people he’ll have to face when he walks into the locker room.

A few of them are still seething that they lost the Cup, and Andrew doesn’t blame them in the slightest. If he hadn’t been so busy having constant panic attacks, he’d probably be mad too .

Andrew doesn’t look at any of them as he walks in, bag over his shoulder, baseball cap pulled low so they can’t see how bloodshot his eyes are. Contrary to popular belief, this hasn’t been easy for him, either.

It’s probably been the hardest two weeks of his life, and he had once been a Division One athlete at Boston University.

Even with the sleeping pills his therapist had prescribed him, he hadn’t slept a full night in two weeks. The boys didn’t need to know that. Didn’t need to see him as more of a failure than he already is.

He’d already cost them too much.

And the press has been constantly reminding him of it, as have the podcasts, and the fans who have decided to single-handedly ruin any sanity he had left.

He can’t even walk down his driveway to get his mail because people have practically camped out at his gate, waiting to harass him as soon as he shows his face.

His driveway is almost a quarter of a mile long, set back away from the road, and now that this has happened he doesn’t hate it the way he used to .

No one offers him a greeting, and he doesn’t give one in return, just pulls his locker open and starts taking his gear out piece by piece. Helmet, gloves, pants, socks.

Wondering with each one if this will be the last time he gets to be here. In this room, with people he genuinely loves.

Coach Landry steps through the door and the low rumble of conversation that had started comes to a stop.

Landry had been in the NHL for almost twenty years before stepping into a coaching role, and there had been rumors that he’d gone full WWE on a teammate with a chair in the locker room when he’d played.

When he stepped into the room, you paid attention.

Andrew turns, sits on the bench, keeps his head down as Coach starts to talk. His teammate, Mikhail Petrov, settles in the free space on the bench next to him, and Andrew can feel his Alternate Captain’s eyes burning a hole into the side of his face.

“You good, Drew?” He asks, voice quiet .