10. Sophia
Chapter 10
Sophia
“ T hese tickets are amazing,” Abigail exclaims when we take our seats on the day of the game.
My cheeks burn. Being here reminds me too much of the recurring wet dreams I’ve been having for the past two weeks, but there’s no way I’m telling Abigail—or anyone else—about them. Unless… maybe I should tell a therapist? I guess I can afford one now, and unpacking my traumatic childhood does sound like a fun way to spend my time.
“Look.” Abigail points at the ice. “Number Forty-Two.”
I can’t help but look, and there Mason is, wearing a hockey jersey that doesn’t make him look bulky, the way it does other players. Instead, the uniform teases me with the promise of him taking it off.
Wait, what? He won’t take it off. Not unless I’m dreaming again.
Hmm. Am I dreaming? The players aren’t naked, but the agility and skill they display on the ice is mind boggling, especially in Mason’s case.
Example: he skates forward, leaving his teammates behind, and then trips over the hockey stick a guy from the opposing team—Number Thirty—put in his way. If that were me, I’d wake up in the hospital with a concussion, but Mason merely drops to one knee (as if proposing) before shooting the puck from that position. And… he scores!
“Did you see that?” Abigail shouts. “He got it right between the goalie’s legs!”
Ignoring my friend, I start watching in earnest, and I’m spellbound when Mason scores another goal.
“That was incredible,” says a nearby fan to another. “He stayed with the puck, pirouetted, went between the d, and then scored between the legs.”
Yeah. It was pretty incredible, and I’m beginning to see that scoring is something Mason is very good at—as well as getting between people’s legs.
The game keeps going, but then Number Thirty smashes into Mason right next to us.
Hey! Is that even fucking legal? Mason might be an asshole, but I don’t enjoy seeing him bashed like that… or seeing anyone bashed, really.
Thankfully, Mason is okay, or so I assume, since instead of falling down in pain, he throws a punch right at Number Thirty’s face, and the crowd erupts in response.
I gasp, my hand flying to my mouth. All I can think of at first is that I saw a glimpse of a real fist. Then I’m petrified because Number Thirty punches Mason back.
Or tries to. With a grace of a figure-skating tiger, Mason dodges said punch and then lands another hit, right in the fucker’s eye. Everyone around us goes wild, with an explosion of cheers for Mason and obscenities for his opponent.
Wait. Why am I angry at Number Thirty all of a sudden? Why do I want to see him in pain? Is this what drove the Vikings—this kind of bloodthirst?
I blame groupthink. The fans clearly want Mason to win.
The stripey-clothed referees arrive on the scene, and I fully expect them to eject Mason and/or Number Thirty from the game, or at least give them a harsh penalty.
Nope. I clearly underestimated the levels of violence considered acceptable in hockey. The refs do nothing to either man and allow them to return to the game as if the recent blows were merely an exchange of salty words.
“Dude,” Abigail says, fanning herself. “If you don’t sleep with him, someone else might.”
She may have a point. To our right, a group of blondes are drooling and ovulating, their vulturous gazes on Mason.
Grr. Now I can relate not only to a regular Viking, but to a berserker as well. Something green is making me want to howl like a wild animal, foam at the mouth, and collect blonde scalps.
Wait, that last one might not be something the Vikings did.
Further stoking my ire, Mason looks in the direction of the blondes—or so I think at first.
Abigail elbows me in the kidney, proving that violence begets violence. “He’s looking for you.”
It’s unbelievable, but it’s true. Mason locks eyes with me and winks.
Winks!
Before I can even process the butterfly effect happening in my belly, a teammate passes Mason the puck.
Whoosh . Mason turns into a human torpedo, careening toward the goalie, sliding into the midst of enemy defense like a well-lubed cock into a?—
“Goal!” that same overeager fan screams nearby, just as the crowd goes wild again.
Okay. It’s official. If all hockey is like this, I just might like it, even if it goes against my pacifist nature.
A bit like Vikings.
The game continues in the same vein, with Mason a rockstar throughout.
By the end, the Yetis win, and the stadium roars in celebration.
“Do you want to go to the locker room?” Abigail shouts into my ear over the racket. “Talk to the team?”
I shake my head vehemently. “They might ask me questions like, ‘What are your plans?’ Not to mention, Mason will try to pressure me to sell again.”
Abigail sighs with resignation. “Can we at least get a drink?”
I nod, and we exit the stadium in search of a bar.
“Bailey’s cookies and cream milkshake, again?” Abigail asks disapprovingly as the bartender sets the mouthwatering concoction in front of me.
I shrug. “It’s the closest thing this bar has to dessert.”
She rolls her eyes. “It is dessert.”
In answer, I take a nice big sip of my drink/dessert and force myself not to wince—the bartender was heavy handed with the alcohol.
“So,” Abigail says after she gulps her low-carb beer or whatever she got. “Did you book the cruise yet?”
I nod. “It’s in a week. Right after finals.”
She frowns. “Aren’t you moving into the mansion around that time?”
I feel a pang of guilt at the reminder. After some deliberation, I decided to live in the mansion, but Abigail insisted on staying in the apartment we’ve shared all this time. It took a lot of arguing, but I was at least able to convince her to let me pre-pay my part of the rent for the remainder of our lease.
“Richard said he’d take care of the move,” I say. “I’ll just put my stuff into boxes after I pack for the cruise.”
Abigail pouts. “I’ll miss having you around.”
“Same. But look on the bright side… You’ll get to sleep on the bottom bunk, or—and this would be an insane luxury, I know—get a normal, one-person bed.”
Of course, she could just get another roommate for the bunk bed, but that idea makes me weirdly jealous, which is silly considering that I have the choice of staying in the tiny apartment with Abigail… at least until she finds a job, which probably won’t take that long.
“Wait a second,” she says, interrupting my thoughts. “Isn’t that…?”
I follow her gaze and nearly choke on my dessert—I mean, alcoholic beverage.
Mason has just entered the bar, along with a crowd of dudes whose faces I recognize from the game.
This is the whole Yetis team, no doubt here to celebrate their win—and they’re not alone.
The blondes I saw earlier are with them, and though it shouldn’t matter at all, for some reason this makes me angrier than a Tasmanian devil whose juicy carrion has just been stolen.
Setting down my drink with a bang, I leap to my feet and head right for Mason.