Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Len
All hockey arenas smell the same. It’s the ice. The chill in the air. The required snacks on offer. It’s familiar and brings up memories I’d rather forget. I doubt anyone else could’ve gotten me here but him.
Zaiah James.
His name alone brings up a torrent of conflicting thoughts. Ex-best friend’s ex-boyfriend. New roomie. Sweet. Caring. Off-limits.
Heartbreaker.
One thing is for sure, though, I always step outside my comfort zone when it comes to him.
He was at practice when I woke this morning, so I didn’t receive his expertise in dressing or makeup. I ended up copying what we did yesterday. One of the shirts I enjoy wearing paired with leggings. My trusty notebook is completing the ensemble, of course. I’m here to write a story, after all.
I spot Izzy in line for some popcorn, and I wave to get her attention. She calls me over. “We got your seat ready.”
My stomach dips. “Ready?”
“Oh, oh, oh, just you wait. You’re going to wish Z never saved you a ticket. It’s slightly mortifying. I’m glad he goes to school hours away now so my friends don’t have to witness my humiliation.”
I blink, the smile dropping off my face.
She must recognize the look of absolute horror because she laughs. “Yes, it’s that bad.”
What has he gotten me into? Should I run away now?
No wonder he smirked when he told me he had a ticket for me. And the near glint in his eyes last night when he said he’d see me at his game… It all makes sense now. He was pucking with me.
Well, joke’s on him because hockey practically raised me. When Zaiah was watching game tape, it was all I could do to keep my mouth shut and pretend I didn’t know anything. The truth is, my parents brought me home from the hospital in a hockey onesie—a gift from my father’s team. His actual team that he owns .
Yes, my father owns a professional hockey team. A pretty damn good one, too.
I attended practices when I was little. The players treated me like their good luck charm. When I was older, I sat in the fancy owner’s box, staring down at the excitement of competition below. I loved it…until it became apparent that I came second to a stick and a puck.
Absent due to business meetings and long trips to away games, my father missed dance recitals and school plays. My mother must’ve felt the same way because she split when I was two. I don’t even remember her.
So, I started caring less and less about hockey and found writing.
Sirens would be blaring in the background, the crowd cheering, and my attention would firmly stay on the paper in my lap. People would hug and slap hands over top of me, and I still wouldn’t move.
My stomach squeezes as mixed emotions roil through me. It’s been ages since I’ve actually watched a game on purpose, since I cheered for the players on the ice, since I cared about who won or lost.
I offer Izzy a worried smile. “Your brother seems to really love the game.”
“Obsessed is more like it. It’s all he’s ever wanted to do.”
I take a breath, reminding myself that cheering on Zaiah and being with my father in the box are two different things. I’m not giving in. I’m not forgiving my father’s neglect. I’m supporting a friend.
Zaiah talks about hockey like I talk about writing. He’s making his dreams come true out on the ice. Why wouldn’t I support him? Plus, I made a deal with him. He helps me, I help him.
To my right, the concessions worker dumps the popping popcorn, sending a whiff of memories my way. The arena smells like my father’s only love, but maybe it will eventually smell like Zaiah’s hope.
What am I talking about? My hope is that this is the last time I have to set foot in a place like this.
Izzy gets her popcorn, then leads the way to our seats. “So, my brother says there’s nothing going on between you two. Yet you’re here at his game?”
“Oh, yeah, no,” I blurt out. “There’s nothing going on between us. He’s helping me with something.”
“With what?”
I scratch the side of my face, feeling like I stepped in it. I should’ve kept my mouth shut, but I didn’t know what to say. Was wading through his family’s questions part of this deal? Ugh. “Well, I actually like this other guy.”
“Another player?” she guesses.
“God no.”
We turn the corner near the ice, and she laughs. “You really don’t like hockey players, do you?”
I grab the railing, and it wobbles in my hand. This arena is less grand than the one I’m used to, and it’s also a little worse for wear. I’ll note that down for my story…whatever it’s going to be about.
“More like I don’t actually like athletes in general,” I say with an awkward smile. “Competitive sports turn me off.”
She laughs again. “I’m used to seeing girls trip over themselves to talk to Z. I think you’re good for him. Chop down that ego a bit.”
I roll my eyes. “You should see the girls with the football players on campus. They’re treated like royalty. And for what? Because they can throw a ball?”
“Exactly!” she exclaims. “And it’s not reciprocated. I play field hockey and no one cares. No one attends my games except for family members of the other players. No scantily clad hot dudes line up before I get to the locker room, begging me to take them to bed.”
“Take you to bed?” a female voice echoes.
Izzy peers up at her mom. “Talking with Lenore about the injustice of female versus male sports and how they’re looked at like gods and I might as well be a lesbian.”
“I would love you no matter what,” Mrs. James remarks in all seriousness.
Izzy scoots down the line past Zaiah’s parents, and his mom reaches out to hug me again. She smells of flowers and vanilla…and bacon. She must have made breakfast this morning. Probably better than the oatmeal I scarfed down while staring at my clock tower notes.
“Fancy meeting you here,” his dad says, putting his hand gently on my arm when I walk past. “You may continue your boy-bashing. Don’t mind me. I’m a girl dad, too.”
I snicker, but then I stare down at what’s waiting on my seat for me.
My seat is covered in Bulldog blue, complete with a seat topper with a cushion and a huge symbol of our school mascot, the Bulldog. In the seat is a cowbell; a wiry, blue wig; and a Warner hockey shirt.
I’ve seen these types of fans before from the box. They’re uber fans, and they’re crazy.
Izzy nudges me with her elbow. “Aren’t you so glad my brother made you come?”
I peer up. The three figures next to me are now wearing the wiry, bright-blue wigs, transforming from three normal people to fanatics in an instant.
“We wanted to ease you into it, dear.”
Mrs. James adding a nice sentiment onto the end of that remark doesn’t make up for what’s about to happen. I could refuse…
At that moment, someone bangs on the boards protecting the crowd from rogue pucks. I startle, then glance over to find Zaiah waving at me, his mouthpiece in hand. With his helmet tipped up, the mischievous spark in his eyes is evident.
“You fucker.”
Izzy throws her arms around me, her laughter like tinkling bells. “Oh, I knew I was going to like you.”
Zaiah skates backward, giving me the biggest grin. “I think you mean pucker .” I never knew what kind of smile would be considered shit-eating, but I’ve seen it now. I could describe it with ease if I ever needed to.
I pick up my notebook and point to it. “Watch what I write,” I yell, trying to threaten him, but I’m about as ferocious as a caterpillar. My words don’t dissolve the pure enjoyment on his face. If anything, they make it worse.
“Maybe there’s still time to kick him out,” Izzy quips.
Her mother gasps. “Don’t say that. Can’t you see how much happier he is now?”
Izzy leans in conspiratorially. “Don’t let him win. We’ll exchange numbers, and I can tell you all the little things that get on his nerves.”
“You’d do that?”
“Happily.”
“I’m going to take you up on that,” I murmur as I pull the wig over my head. I know I don’t have to wear it. I could simply sit and bury my head in my notebook, and if it was only Zaiah asking, I might tell him to kick rocks, but his family… I sigh, thinking at least it will be hard to recognize me with this wig on. Not that it matters. The seats in the stands are barely occupied. Only a few students, some family members—as Izzy said—and a cluster of people from the community made the trek to see the game. It’s easy to pick the different segments out.
A line of younger girls on the opposite side of the ice, most definitely high school aged, hold up signs. Exactly the type of girls Izzy and I were talking about. Probably falling all over themselves to get the attention of an older hockey player.
“Zaiah calls them puck bunnies.”
Oh, I know . They ran rampant around my father’s arena. His team has a strict “no fraternizing with puck bunnies” rule. In fact, one of the crudest fan signs I’ve ever seen was held up by a cluster of twenty-something women: “I’ll kiss my friends if you score, 17.”
The more innuendo the better. Thinking about it now, after talking with Zaiah yesterday, those comments are disrespectful to how much work players put into their sport. I’m sure on some level they love it. They can get an easy lay and a confidence boost, but don’t tell me pro players are actually settling down with puck bunnies. The girls let themselves be used, and the players do it because they can.
I jot down a note about that. Seems like I could write a detailed story about putting athletes on a pedestal. Definitely won’t be the topic of Zaiah’s story, but in the future, maybe. I’d already touched on it in my Warner University football scandal articles, so I know there’s a lot more to be explored there.
Then again, I’m not writing about sports long-term. It is the last thing I want to write about.
I mentally cross off the idea when the announcer comes on. The players don’t even get a grand entrance with their names called. They just line up to start the game. Pretty sure introducing players isn’t only a pro-level thing. They should announce the starting lineup at the very least.
Zaiah takes his spot right in front of us as a winger. The guy lining up across from him is already jawing, but he gets his because as soon as the whistle blows, Zaiah checks him hard.
Izzy and I must have similar bloodlust because we laugh maniacally, even capturing the attention of the guy who was the brunt of Zaiah’s check—now sprawled out on the ice—and I follow suit when she jumps to her feet.
“Go Bulldogs!” she yells.
I don’t scream, but I grab the cowbell.
Oh dear Lord, what am I doing?
The guy from the opposing team glares, but that has me shaking the thing faster.
“Girl,” Izzy starts while we sit back down, “are you sure you don’t care?”
“That guy was a dick,” I say under my breath.
Izzy’s father leans in on the other side. “Can confirm that guy was a dick.”
I smile sheepishly, which makes him beam. Izzy, however, laughs so hard she grabs her side. “My parents don’t care if you swear,” she finally gets out. “Not really. Not since we’ve gotten older, anyway.”
“As long as you don’t sound like a trashy teenage dirtbag,” her father remarks, waving a white-and-blue pom-pom.
I peer down the line and notice they all have pom-poms, but… “Am I the only one with a cowbell?”
“Think of it as an initiation,” his mom calls out from farthest away, her full focus still on the ice. “One of us has to do it, and you drew the short straw.”
“I didn’t even draw a straw.”
“Neither did we,” Mr. James says as he jumps to his feet. I glance over at the ice to find one of our players making a run for it toward the other team’s goal. He’s out ahead of the pack.
“We need the cowbell!” Zaiah’s mom yells.
Welp, if they say they need the cowbell, they need the cowbell . I grab it and jump to my feet, shaking that thing like I’ve been doing it all my life.
The player dekes once. Twice…
He shoots, and before I can even tell if the puck went into the net, the siren goes off, and we may be the only ones having a party, but we do the damn thing.
Blue-and-white pom-poms shaking, cowbell ringing, all four of us scream our heads off.
I don’t even realize it’s Zaiah who scored until he turns toward us while celebrating with his team. I’m mid jump, mid hugging his sister, the cowbell going off like I’m calling everyone to dinner in a three-mile radius, when his gaze flashes our way. Instead of skating to wherever he needs to be, he makes his way to us. I can barely see his face, but he blows that kiss to his mom that he promised, and then he moves his stare to me. “You watching, Len?”
I shake my head. Cocky little…
Izzy eyes me suspiciously, her eyes narrowed as I pick up my notebook. “He wants me to write something favorable for the paper.”
“Yeah. That must be it,” she says, sounding less than convinced.
She turns back around, and my stomach somersaults. This is…fun. Really fun, actually. Butterflies fill my insides, and it’s cold in here, but that’s not the reason for the goose bumps spreading over my skin. Being here is like seeing an old friend, but even better because that friend is on its best behavior, is dressed immaculately…and looks like Zaiah James.
Is it possible I miss hockey?
Nah. It has to be something else.
Oh shit. My stomach tightens. After all this time, I couldn’t still think about him like this, right?
“This is insane,” I mutter to myself. Watching an innocent hockey game shouldn’t bring up this many mixed emotions. From my father to Zaiah, it’s like a tornado runs rampant inside my brain.
For the next period, Izzy distracts me from my thoughts, chatting to me about field hockey, interspersed with comments about the game. I put my analytical mind behind and go with the flow. His parents want a cheering partner, so that’s what I do. Besides, I kind of love swinging that cowbell during fast breaks, steals, and fights—especially if Zaiah is involved.
At one point, I peer over to the player’s box to find him watching, helmet off, his sweat-soaked hair plastered to the crown of his head, the ends curling by his ears. For a moment, I’m blindsided by the same feelings that surged inside me when I was dancing on that table and he was staring up at me. The initial rush, the flip-flop of my belly. All I could do was look on in disbelief that I grabbed his attention.
Like present day, the moment only lasts a few seconds, but it’s enough to admire the stubble on his jaw, his easy smile, and dimples. I’ve never met someone with dimples before. They were a romance novel myth, but not anymore. He’s a cover model come to life.
He winks at me, and then his coach calls his line to get back out on the ice. He secures his helmet, grabs his stick, and steps over the barrier, skating away like nothing happened.
Just like when Trish stole his attention, disappointment surrounds me. I had his interest for point three seconds and then bam , something better came along.
It doesn’t matter now , I remind myself. We’re only roommates. Clearly. Or maybe leaning toward the friend side. I could deal with that because no matter what Zaiah does, one thing is clear: He’s a good person.
He gets the break away again, and we all stand. This time, #9 takes a direct approach and puts it in the net once more.
Before he even celebrates with his teammates, he peers over, and makes a writing gesture in the air, then points at me. I can’t see his face from behind the helmet, but he must be loving this.
He’s a golden boy…only no one on campus knows it yet.