Chapter 15
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
CHARLIE
“We’re going to go out there and crush them, right?” Captain Fensworth said as she stood atop a bench in the center of the full locker room. Charlie and the rest of Team Canada all pounded their hockey sticks against the ground in a cheer.
Charlie could not let themself articulate all the emotions swirling within them.
Nervousness, yes.
A complete sense that they needed to win or else, check.
A deep desire to impress both her family and her lover. Yep.
“Let’s do this,” Campbell roared and the rest of the team followed suit as they walked out of the locker room and towards the ice.
The game started the same way all Charlie’s games did—an anthem, a staring down of the opposite team. She caught Blake’s eyes, and her best friend stuck out their tongue at them.
Classy as always.
Charlie shook their head, but smiled despite herself.
When the buzzer sounded, Charlie moved to the right behind the captain, aligning herself perfectly to run their well-rehearsed play after the faceoff. It worked, and Charlie was in possession of the puck, moving towards the American net.
The rest of the period moved in a blur, both teams playing more aggressively than normal. When the overhead buzzer signaled the brief intermission between game periods, all of Team Canada became fussy in their locker room.
“We need to score.” Plaker shook her head from where she sat next to Charlie.
“I know. Those bastards weren’t letting me get an edge in,” Charlie said, thinking not only of the impressive saves by the goalie, but also the bodychecks from the last twenty minutes. They rubbed their right shoulder as they thought about it.
“Clearly, aggression isn’t going to work,” Coach said, drawing a hush from the rest of the players. “We need to bait and switch them, make them think we’re tired so they let their guard down and then come back even harder. Campbell, will you be able to stop the puck at the net?”
Regina nodded. “Trust me, that will be a breeze.”
“Good, let’s do that.”
The team cheered, and Charlie guzzled down the energy drink they were nursing.
They were tempted to check their phone and see if Olive was watching, but they knew that would be pointless; she must’ve been watching.
As much as Charlie had been avoiding Olive, it was not without good reason.
Once they won this game, Charlie would tell her how she felt.
Deep feelings, insecurities, relationship traumas and all.
“You mind if I take down your bestie?” Plaker asked Charlie, snapping them out of their musing.
“Mind? I insist you do. They could stand to be taken down a peg or two.” Charlie laughed, already imagining Blake’s indignation at losing.
“Perfect.” Plaker cracked her knuckles with the words, a determined glint in her eyes. It was almost scary.
“Remind me never to get on your bad side,” Charlie said, and shook their head.
“You think you’re on my good side?” Heather raised her eyebrow.
“Wow, and here I thought we were finally becoming acquaintances.”
“In your dreams,” Plaker said.
“And in your nightmares,” Charlie quipped back.
The players near them all laughed.
“Wow, Charlie, I had no idea you were this funny,” Tam said.
Heather cut in before Charlie could think of a response. “Team bonding does fall to the wayside when you spend the entire training season in bed.”
“Guilty,” Charlie finally said, hoping it came out as cocky as they wanted it to. Why deny what was an obvious truth?
Charlie was starting to finally accept that perhaps it wasn’t such a bad thing to have something to look forward to outside of the game.
While losing today would certainly be horrible, it would not mean the end of the world.
Having other things to strive for actually made it easier.
They would give it their all, and if their all wasn’t enough, they would try again.
Eventually, the team made it back out onto the ice, all of the players determined to take the gold medals home. Charlie was first out on the ice and got into position to square off against Blake. Blake had a cocky grin on their face, and Charlie blew a kiss at them.
“Prepare to lose,” Blake mouthed at them, their mouth exaggerating the words so Charlie could read their lips behind their mask.
“You wish,” Charlie mouthed back.
When the puck dropped and the captain let the other team surge towards their goal, it took all of Charlie’s self-restraint to play defensive instead of offensive.
Though she cleared their puck a few times, she was not as aggressive as she normally would be.
It was odd trying to pretend that she was not capable of driving play, and she was relieved as Campbell stopped shot after shot.
As she line-changed to sit on the bench, she watched the plays continue. Coach Brady looked back at Charlie and gave them a clear nod. Charlie tapped the players near them, and they all smiled in agreement. It was go time.
Now on the ice, Charlie moved in time to their beating heart.
It was this rush that Charlie loved about the game, the feel of the ice beneath their feet, the quick maneuvering around each player, the drive to the goal.
When Tam passed them the puck, Charlie had the perfect lane to the goal.
They faked left, but shot to the right and the puck slid smoothly into the net.
The stadium erupted in cheers, and Charlie did their obnoxious cheer. They didn’t stick their tongue out at Blake, so that in and of itself was a major win too.
At the end of the period, though Team USA managed to score, all hope was not lost. They were evenly tied two goals each going into the third round, and if there was a need for overtime, Charlie was sure that they would win it.
Back in the locker room, the jovial mood of the first intermission was over as everyone sat in silence. There were whispers and chirping, of course, but the mood was one of intense concentration.
To distract themself from the stress, Charlie tried to think of what Blake was doing in their locker room, the teams finally separated as they played against each other.
They were probably obnoxiously joking away the stress, or texting their new boo. Charlie wasn’t quite sure what Blake was up to these days, as they were clearly more distracted by their own love life and trying to secure the win for Team USA, but she was sure they’d hear about it soon.
Tam chose that moment to start chirping at Plaker, and never one to miss an opportunity to dunk on her, Charlie tuned in to that. Far too soon, it was time to go back out onto the ice for the last period. Evenly tied, that both sides played with more desperation than earlier.
Charlie had no thoughts of anything but the game, the way they needed to skate, the way they needed to pass the puck to Plaker or Fensworth at exactly the right time, the way in which they silently prayed that Campbell kept blocking any attempts at goals.
Back on the bench, Charlie was starting to get a bit panicked.
There were only a few minutes left of the game now, and they really did not want to go to overtime.
They were sure that the teams could handle themselves well in overtime, but the risk of losing was much higher then.
At least if they scored a goal now, they could hopefully score more and widen the gap.
With only three minutes left on the clock at a TV timeout, Charlie glanced at Coach, as did most of the other players on the bench. Campbell and the rest of the players that were out on ice had come to their bench now, crowding around the coach as they listened to his direction.
“We’ll need to pull you from net, Campbell. It’s a risk but let’s try this play to get that goal. If we get the puck across the blue line, do you think we can make it?”
This question was directed more to Captain and Campbell than Charlie, but they nodded determinedly, just as the players being directed did.
“Great, let’s do this. Bring it in.” Coach placed his hand out, and the rest of the team joined him in a mini huddle.
“Canada!” the players all shouted as they geared up to go back to the ice, Charlie now replacing Rosemary.
“Fancy seeing you here,” Blake yelled to them as they skated up.
“Prepare to lose!” Charlie yelled back.
Though they usually weren’t the type to chirp, they couldn’t resist. They could taste victory, it was that close.
When the puck dropped, Captain made quick work of securing the puck for their team.
Plaker and Charlie forechecked hard, making sure the puck stayed in the offensive zone while they figured out the best way to score.
With all six of Canada’s players out near the Team USA side, they were evenly matched out on this side of the ice, though it still took some work to keep the puck moving and away from Team USA.
After taking a shoulder check into the sideboards, Charlie gritted their teeth.
She’d had enough. This was their game to win, and they were going to do it.
It didn’t help that the player that checked them was trying to chirp at them, teasing at them about their lucky streak.
I’ll show them lucky, Charlie thought as they broke up a battle on the boards with Fensworth, rescuing the puck from where it was trapped between Charlie’s skates.
Skating back towards the American goal, they knew they’d have to get lucky.
They skated close to the goal, too close to comfort really, where they knew that their trusted sidekick would be.
As predicted, they stilled as Plaker shot a puck towards the goal.
Charlie acted on instinct as the puck rebounded off the white net and back towards them.
Thunk! They hit the puck with all their might, and the stadium faded away as they waited with bated breath to see whether the puck would go in. The world was silent as the puck glided by the goalie’s skate, sliding smoothly into the net.
“Holy shit, you did it!” Fensworth was saying to them. The cheering was deafening, and Charlie couldn’t think past the helmets and padded uniforms enveloping them as they skated towards the bench to hop off the ice.
They watched the last thirty seconds of play from the bench in still silence, shocked as they watched the rest of the players on the ice work equally hard to make some sort of play for the goal, but it was clear in the American team’s movements that they were defeated.
The game was done, over, and Charlie still couldn’t believe it.
Charlie Lajoie scored the winning goal.
She did it.
Despite everything, even their father’s negativity, their distraction, their worry about the future, despite it all… they had accomplished what they wanted to do.
And Charlie knew exactly how they wanted to celebrate.