31. Max
31
MAX
I skate nervously around the ice, waiting for the start of game seven of the Stanley Cup finals. I haven’t been this nervous in years.
I swing my arms to try and get some feeling back into them, tension coiling through me as I prepare for one of the most important games of my life.
“You okay?” Connor asks, skating up to me and clapping me on the shoulder.
I roll my shoulders and sigh. “Yeah, I think so,” I reply, clearly hearing the shakiness in my voice.
“We are going to smash these fools,” Aiden says as he skates past then does a backflip, which makes the crowd explode with cheers.
I roll my eyes and check out Dimitri as he skates over to us. He looks as nervous as me, but then again, he’s always jittery before the first puck drop.
Our lineup consists of the best of the best as we’ve made our way toward the Cup Finals. It’s been a long series, and though I may not share Aiden’s confidence in our ability to stomp all over the competition, I admire his enthusiasm and positivity. I can also appreciate that it’s contagious.
“I’ll be good once we get started,” I tell my friends and teammates.
I watch as they roughhouse a little throughout our warm-up. I really should be more confused about them all dating my sister at the same time, but they’ve always been thick as thieves, and I guess I hadn’t realized just how close they had become with my sister the summer that they hooked up.
No matter how much I might worry about their relationship, I know they’ll be okay. It’s clear that they all adore her.
A lot of women have trouble finding one man to look at them the way these guys look at my sister. Having three smitten with her is quite the feat. I’m grateful she has them.
I glance up at the press box to see my sister seated next to her new cohost, getting settled in to begin her coverage. I’m so glad she’s able to be here to give a play-by-play of this game. This is the pinnacle of everything that I have ever wanted out of my career, but we’ve always been in this together. It would have felt wrong if she hadn’t been well enough to be here today.
“Looks like we’re just about ready to get this party started,” Liv says, and I grin at the sound of her voice.
Her face pops up on the jumbotron as she starts to talk about the figures and facts of the match-up. She looks so beautiful and poised that my heart swells with pride. That’s my little sister, I want to shout to the world as she introduces our team.
“She’s so cool,” Dimitri says, his accent thick as he looks up at Liv on the screen. I’ve noticed that his accent shows up more when he talks about her. He’s even started referring to her with Russian endearments that always make her blush. He won’t tell me what they mean but she knows. It makes me suspicious that they aren’t exactly things you should say in mixed company.
The ref blows the whistle, indicating that the game is about to start. I take my position and breathe in deep.
It’s go time.
Connor immediately gets control of the puck and we’re off. I’ve never experienced our team moving in such harmony before. We get an early lead with a surprise shot, shock on the faces of the other team.
“Early dominance shows a promising tempo being set by the Blades,” Liv’s new cohost says eagerly.
“Indeed,” she agrees. “The Iceman is known for his moves during the initial face-off and he’s definitely brought his A-game today.”
We manage to hold off our opponent for a bit, but soon they get a sloppy shot around our goalie. We should have been better about blocking such a basic play. During our first intermission, I chastise the team for allowing that to happen.
“We can’t afford to be sloppy tonight,” I tell them. “We can’t miss obvious plays like that last one. Our defense is better than that.”
“You’re right,” Aiden agrees. “Let’s go give ‘em hell. We can do better than that.”
Coach then goes over which plays to focus on, gives us a stern pep talk, and then we hit the ice again.
I barely hear the cheering of the crowd or my sister’s coverage of the game. My focus is honed entirely on the space where the puck is, and the people who are in control of it.
We war back and forth throughout the next period, neither team scoring. I can hear the fans starting chants in the stands. It’s louder than ever as both sets of fans shout at their team to do them proud.
I swipe at a trickle of sweat running down my cheek as we all hop off the ice for the next intermission.
“This stalemate is working to hold them at bay,” Coach says, “but it won’t win us the game. We need to start putting in some work. Let’s talk about some plays we need to run during this period.” I watch as Coach lays out a plan on the whiteboard. I think he’s on the right track.
As we hop back onto the ice, I move over to the two men I’m supposed to cover. I draw in a deep breath. Their night is about to become a lot less fun.
I take a nasty shoulder check right away and get slammed into the boards. The crowd gasps. I shake off the ringing in my ears then skate furiously after the man I was supposed to be covering.
“Connor!” I shout to my friend as I cut off the guy who slammed me into the boards. I sling the puck his way, and Connor neatly gets control over it, sending it flying to Dimitri. We pass it back and forth a few times before getting a shot lined up. Dimitri hesitates for just a moment, then sends the puck flying into the net.
The crowd goes wild. I have one second to feel elated before a hard check to my back sends me sprawling onto the ice. I flip over and glare at the guy, the same one who checked me earlier.
“Hey, fuck you, buddy!” I shout at him, scrambling up and heading his way.
“No, man, not this deep into the game,” Dimitri says, grabbing me by the shoulders and dragging me away. “We don’t need you wasting energy on that shit right now. We need you to be able to keep up with the action. Help us win the game.”
I grumble but allow him to drag me away. He’s right, this is the last period, and we need to keep the other team from scoring.
Connor has control of the puck again and he’s practically teleporting around the ice, dodging players left and right. He shoots the puck at the net, but the other team’s goalie bats it away easily.
Another of our players recovers the puck and tries again but is denied. As Connor gets back to the puck, I see the player who slammed me to the ground skating rapidly toward him.
“Oh, no, you don’t!” I growl out, skating as fast as I can toward my friend and the guy who is out to take him down. I manage to get in the way of his assault on Connor at the last moment, but he crashes me into the boards. I tumble along the hard surface, bashing my face against the ice as I fall.
Blood instantly starts pouring from my nose and I see stars. I slither along the boards clumsily, trying to get my footing, blinking hard as I try to see what’s going on around me. I hear the whistle blow as I try and clamber to my feet again, noticing that we’re down to the last minute of the game.
After the medic stuffs some cotton in my nose to force the blood to clot, play begins again.
“Connor, bring it back down to score!” I shout as I skate past him.
I watch Connor pivot and guide the puck back toward the goalie.
No one notices as I come up behind the players. “Connor!” I call out as I get close to the net.
Connor glances toward me, and I wink at him. We’ve done this little trick many a time to goalies and it always works. I drop my stick like I’m ready to take the puck from him, and the goalie’s attention swings over to me.
The grin on Connor’s face is huge as he winds up, then slaps the puck into the net.
The fan go crazy, the arena so loud that I hardly hear Connor as he comes back around the net and crashes into me, jumping and shouting at the top of his lungs.
We’re instantly swarmed by the rest of the team and Coach, who are also screaming and shouting. My heart swells with pride despite my slightly blurry vision and the blood pouring out of my nose.
“We did it!” Aiden yells, executing yet another backflip and skating wildly around our team, all clustered in the center of the ice.
“We did it,” I whisper, looking up at the jumbotron. Liv is looking down at me, a smile that could light up all of Boston on her face.
“They did it!” Liv shouts, her voice ringing out over the arena. “The Boston Blades have won the Stanley Cup! They managed a shake-up victory that will go down in the history books as the kind of result you can expect from a team who focuses on teamwork above all else.”
The team whoops and hollers, skating a clumsy circle around me. I think about how much Liv’s connection with my three best friends helped influence this victory. Without her, we probably wouldn’t have gotten to this moment of triumph. She really is the glue that holds us all together, making us better than we could ever be apart.
The Cup ceremony begins, and after a brief speech from the NHL commissioner, it is handed over to Coach. Connor grabs it immediately, kissing it and hoisting it high above his head. The crowd goes wild again as tokens of their affection—hats, stuffed animals, and flowers—start raining down onto the ice.
I take my turn hoisting the Cup into the air, leaving a bloody handprint on the silver surface as I pass it along. That seems fitting since blood, sweat, and lots of tears got us to this moment.
“There’s nothing better than an underdog story,” Liv is saying as we pass the Cup around between us. “And there are few underdog stories more compelling than the story of the Boston Blades.”
Liv’s cohost has made his way down to the ice. He heads over to me, mic in hand.
“This is a moment that will surely go down in history,” he shouts over the still roaring crowd as he holds the mic out toward me. “Do you have anything you’d like to say about your team?”
I grin at him. “We’ve all worked so hard to make this happen,” I say. “We’ve survived adversity, the doubt of the industry as a whole, and personal strife to come back stronger than ever and win this game. I want to thank my entire team, whom I love like brothers, our coach, who pushes us to be our best each and every day, and my sister, who has stood behind me since childhood, and this team from the start.”
The crowd cheers in response, and I look up at Liv, who is still in the press box. She gives me a big thumbs up, and I return it.
“I have something I want to say.” I look over my shoulder and see Aiden pushing through the rest of the team to get closer to us.
“I have something I want to say to Liv,” he says as he gets closer to the mic. I swallow hard and look up at my sister, not sure what is happening. She’s leaning against the railing, staring down at Aiden with a frozen expression on her face.
“Olivia Winters,” Aiden begins as he stares up at her, “you have made my life better every day since we were kids. It’s taken me a long time to realize this, but my life is only worth living with you in it. Will you marry me?”
The crowd immediately starts cheering and clapping, and everyone turns to look at Liv. A spotlight shifts to her, revealing her shocked face. I realize that she’s crying as she grips the railing.
Her gaze flickers to me and I shake my head a little. No, I didn’t know about this , I say to her with that silent gesture.
She takes in a deep breath before turning to pick up her headset off the table beside her. When she turns around again, she’s smiling.
“Aiden Campbell, I would like nothing more than to be your wife. Yes, I’ll marry you.”
A new round of cheering explodes throughout the arena, and the whole team starts congratulating Aiden, clapping him on the back and shouting well wishes.
“Are you cool with this?” I shout to Dimitri and Connor over the noise.
Dimitri nods and looks at Connor, who nods as well.
“He’s honestly the easy shoe-in when talking about husband material,” Connor says with a grin.
I shake my head and smile. “As long as you guys are all happy, I’m happy.”
“We’re happy,” Connor assures me with a smirk, looking up over my head at Liv, who is grinning down at us with tears slipping down her cheeks.
“We’re all really, really happy,” Dimitri adds.