Chapter 15 Jack
FIFTEEN
Jack
The next day was packed with hockey practice.
While I loved the sport to death I also longed to be with Tian.
Yes, I was greedy. I knew he was doing the press circuit with his shiny silver medal and his parents.
And I was super happy for him to be getting the accolades that he deserved.
Still, I wanted him at my side whenever I wasn’t on the ice. So yeah, greedy Jack being greedy.
It helped that we’d put in an intense hour on the ice early in the morning to work on getting our lines to gel.
I knew most of the guys here but knowing them and playing with them were two different things.
Starry and I were paired up which was cool.
We’d bonded over our time here listening to each other fart in our sleep.
Plus, he was easy to get along with and knew about Tian and me, which made it comfortable.
I could share the excitement of his medal while bragging how proud I was of him without getting funny looks.
Coach Delaney was a defensive-minded coach, so he was working to construct a team from the net out with a strong emphasis on structure, discipline, and seeking a strong defensive mindset from all five men on the ice.
Lots of drills around neutral zone traps, shot blocking, position over possession, and frustrating our opponents.
This was where Starry and I excelled if I dared to toot my own horn.
We could suffocate the other team’s offense, which forced them to take low-quality shots far from the net.
Coach Delaney, a retired D-man, worked us hard and expected results.
“Remember, our number-one challenge is going to be Canada. Yes, the Swiss, Finns, and Swedes are strong, but they don’t have the firepower that Canada has.
I’m not a pretty man,” he told us at the end of our first team skate, making us chuckle.
He was right. He wasn’t a pretty man. Too many fights and broken noses to be called pretty, kind of like me and Starry.
“I don’t need a pretty win. I’m happy to win ugly.
Keep those Canucks from our zone, grind their pretty boy speedsters down, and always be disciplined.
Now, go shower. You all stink. And meet me and Coach Parkes back here at three to show our support for the women’s team as they take on Germany in their quarterfinal. ”
We filed into the locker room, chatting, and I dived on my phone the moment I could wade through the throngs of sweaty men eager to talk hockey. I ended up having to go sit in a stall in the men’s room for five minutes of privacy.
Jack: Hey, it’s your Jack.
Tian: Hey my Jack. How was your skate?
Jack: Good. Lines are looking sleek; coach is pushing us hard.
Tian: Excellent. We’re having lunch in about thirty minutes at a chic little place Mom found online. Want to join us?
Jack: Yeah, I’d love that. Can we bolt after that to go cheer on the USA women’s hockey team?
Tian: Hell yeah!
Jack: Perfect. See you in a bit. Send me directions.
I raced through the shower, jogging out of the arena with wet hair.
Not a great idea as it was chilly as hell, but a cold scalp would be worth it.
Tian and I were grabbing every minute we could from here on out.
Hockey was about to kick into high gear with games every other day.
Sometimes there were four games jammed into one day, which was insane, but we had only so much time, so it was balls-to-the-wall.
Using a popular app to get a ride, I was at the little restaurant on a cramped side street in downtown Milan in no time.
Tian and his parents were sipping something cold when I arrived.
His mother was delightful, his father funny, and Tian was…
well, Tian was everything. The meal was outstanding.
Fettuccine with shrimp, and cannoli for dessert.
I was stuffed. Tian patted my belly a time or two, but I wasn’t too worried about eating something rich while training so hard. I’d work it off.
With a peck on his mother’s cheek and a firm handshake with his dad, we had to leave them to watch the USA women’s team quarterfinal game.
It wasn’t mandatory to attend the games or events of other teams from your country, but it was a common practice.
Since Tian and I were Team USA, we got in without paying.
There was a seating area set aside, first-come, first-served, which was why Coach wanted us here early.
Tian and I got some looks, nothing too gawky, as we weren’t holding hands or anything like that.
Not that I didn’t want to, but we hadn't even discussed our relationship, let alone what, when, or if we would announce we were dating.
Starry waved us over, so we sat beside him. I gave Tian a fast intro to our team and our head coach before settling back to watch an amazing game where our women’s team won big and moved onto the semifinal round in three days against France.
After the game, we spent some time in the Olympic Village, had dinner with a few other hockey players, and then had to go our separate ways.
I managed to steal a kiss from Tian, in a damn men’s room, before heading to my room.
Sneaking a kiss sucked, big time, but until we had our lives figured out, we were playing things super low-key.
Not getting laid was supposed to be good for an athlete, they used to say.
Pent-up aggression and all that silliness.
No one really believed that nonsense anymore, but I wouldn’t mind a tiny bit of extra belligerence heading into our opening round.
In a way I felt sort of bad for Latvia.
I wasn’t sure if it was the old BS about backed-up semen making you more combative or if it was the rush of being in that navy blue with red- and white-accented sweater, but I was taking no fucking prisoners.
Coach D wanted defense; he was getting defense.
Starry and I were knocking men off their skates like they were bowling pins, and we were the red, white, and blue balls.
Since I did have blue balls, it all fit.
We were up three-nothing in the first period.
The shift to NHL-sized rinks worked fine for us as we were used to the smaller size.
The European teams were still trying to adjust to not being able to execute the fancy passing plays that wider ice allowed them to run.
Also, and this was fun, the smaller rink favored physical play.
Latvia seemed to be having trouble with the North American intensity of hits, so we were causing more turnovers, which frustrated them and led to more penalties.
Case in point was taking place now. Andris Ozios was about to lose his shit. I could see it in his eyes as he tried to throw a hip check into Starry, which missed by a mile. I chuckled as I skated past, tossing out a chirp as I whizzed past him, picking himself up.
“And I thought missing the broad side of a barn was just an old saying,” I said around my mouthguard. I’d not been sure if Ozios would even understand me, but when his stick found its way into my skate and I hit the ice hard, I had to assume that the forward for Latvia spoke English.
I got to my skates, smiled at the Latvian arguing with the ref, and made my way to the bench for a sip of cold water and a round of ass pats from my teammates.
Short tempers made for stupid mistakes. We could hear the Latvian coach shouting at someone, not sure who, as I didn’t speak Latvian, but probably me, the ref, or maybe the gods.
Whatever, I slammed down some water, gave my head coach a wink, and skated back out for my forty-five seconds of fun.
We had some firecracker forwards on our team, the best of the best, and within ten seconds we were in the Latvian offensive zone swarming their beleaguered goalie.
After a blistering shot from a young forward I only knew as Peppy from Dallas, the puck bounced off the goalie’s chest as I used my weight to gently maneuver a Latvian defenseman out of the way.
Things then went a little tits up, as the Brits say.
I spied the puck lying in front of the Latvian’s goalie’s legs in the blue ice.
With a player on my back, literally, I flopped to the ice to try to poke the puck through that gaping five hole.
The guy on my back was not having it. The goalie was not having it.
I, on the other hand, was having all of it.
I swiped at the puck as another body crashed down on me and watched from my vantage point of cheek pressed to cold ice as the puck skittered through thick pads to just inch over the line.
Goal horns blew, fans roared, the guy on my back drove his elbow into my right kidney.
Then he hit me with a fist. Right in that same poor kidney.
It hurt big time. Like hurt so big I nearly blew my cookies.
Whistles blew and whoever it was got the boot from the game, according to the refs yelling at whoever to leave the ice.
There’s no fighting in the Olympics, not that cheap shots to a man’s renal organs was a fair fight.
I got to my skates, sore as hell, but gladly took the back poundings from my teammates for that goal.
My flank was on fire, but I was not going to let a little jab take me out of this event.
They’d have to scrape me up from the ice in those bright snow shovels the ice teams use to get my old, battered ass off this ice.
I did take a small sit, just until my next shift, to drink some water.
“Now that was ugly hockey!” Coach yelled as he thumped my shoulder sending hot flashes of pain down my side to my rib and hip where the bruise was probably already forming. “Well done, O’Leary. I want to see more of that dedication and grit, men!”