Chapter 4
Anya
Between an exceptionally awesome game the other night—where we shut out the opposing team four to zero—the brutal practice yesterday, and training the new captains, Coach decided the girls deserved a break, cancelling practice for the day.
Some of them went out last night and partied with a bunch of the local, professional football players who had also won their game.
They always take up residence in the same bar after every win, and unfortunately, they’re not losing this year.
It’s been the talk of the campus and the team, but I have no need for drinking .
. . or football players, but with the news of not having to practice today, some of the girls took full advantage of sleeping off whatever they got into.
They keep trying to convince me that football players aren’t that bad, but all the ones I’ve ever met act like neanderthals. All obnoxious muscles, thinking they're God’s gift to humanity, like they’re somehow better than all of us common humans. I can’t help but roll my eyes at the absurdity.
I suppose they’re not as bad as the male hockey players I’ve met though, so there’s that. Any time I meet a professional hockey player I’m far more intimidated than I like to be. These men are the best in our sport, and they carry this predatorial aura that I can’t put my finger on.
Cancelled practice aside, I don’t know how long I have with unlimited access to the ice, so I can’t justify a day away.
The idea of hockey not being what I do every day splinters my heart.
I’ve tried to sit down and think of my future without hockey.
My mind just goes blank, refusing to even consider a life without it.
I still have no idea what I’ll do with the management degree I’ve nearly completed, but at least I know that it gives me a wide variety of options.
I really should start researching where I’ll go and what I’ll do after graduation, but that makes the idea of not being able to continue doing the thing I love most, feel all the more real.
You know what absolutely is not helping at-freaking-all?
The fact that the holiday seasons are approaching. I spend a ridiculous amount of time in the “Ber” months hiding in my house avoiding anything holiday related.
For a kid who grew up with parents who only had a child because it was the socially appropriate thing to do, but didn’t actually want to be parents, holidays suck.
There were no costume shopping and trick or treating in October.
No family turkey meal where we go around the table and say what we’re thankful for in November.
And there was certainly no love at Christmas like in the movies.
There was a tree that they paid someone to put up while I was at school, and there were wrapped presents beneath it that I’m sure their secretaries bought and prepared.
I can only remember one Christmas morning when they were even home and sat with me while I opened presents.
Now, as a college student, I watch each year as my teammates, along with the majority of the campus, clear out and head home to be with their families for the holidays.
Coach tried to get me to join her family festivities when I told her about my situation the first year I was on the team, and she complied with my request to never ask again.
It’s only November, and already people have begun to put up Christmas decorations. I know I should just let people enjoy the things that make them happy, but it’s hard to be happy for the rest of the world when you feel like you got cheated.
Sighing as I plow through the locker room doors, the quiet of a day off is slightly unsettling. The hum of the fluorescent lights above me is the only sound, other than my thundering heart.
Why is my heart pounding all of a sudden?
Quirking my head to the side, I take inventory of my body. I know I’m irritated but not that much. I wasn’t running, and all I’ve done since entering is plop onto the bench so that I could kick my shoes off and replace them with my skates.
Trying to ignore my erratic heart rate, I continue with the routine, thoughtless process of lacing my skates. Once finished, I rise to my feet, placing my hand against my chest to keep the wild organ from bursting out of my rib cage.
Hyperaware of the strange reaction my body is having, I move across the locker room to the door leading to the rink. Once through the door, I make a noise somewhere between a gasp and a shriek.
Lying dead center on the ice is a man.
A nearly naked man that I suddenly worry is dead, because why else is there a man lying on the ice without his clothes on? I’m only a bit settled by not seeing any sign of blood, because again, why would a man be lying on the ice?
Gliding towards where he lies, there’s a strange tugging feeling deep within me, but I can’t seem to pinpoint where it’s coming from.
Worried about what’s happening to my body, and the possibly dead body, I have to get a hold of the situation.
I’m not new to dealing with weird men, I know how to talk to guys like him.
Getting closer on the ice, I speak loudly, hoping to rouse the man.
“Hey you! What are you doin’?” Yes, that is masterful, Anya.
The obscenely large man stirs a bit. He lifts his head, his eyes looking confused like when you nap too hard and forget your entire life for a minute upon waking. He’s beautiful.
When consciousness creeps back into his features, an even more perplexed look crosses his face before his eyes widen in something that looks like awe. My heart stutters. Oh my gosh, was that a heart palpitation? What is wrong with me?
I thought he was beautiful mid-sleep on the ice—nearly naked, mind you—but when a brilliant smile overtakes his face, I find myself unable to breathe.
Shaking myself from the stupor he’s caused me to fall into, I ask, “Who are you and why on earth are you sleeping on my ice?”
Can someone get hypothermia from lying on the ice? How long has he been in here?
Completely unperturbed by my questions, he moves into a seated position, crossing his massive legs as he stretches his arms high above his head. I unabashedly allow my eyes to trail every inch of his ridiculously muscled body. This man is built like a military tank, making it hard not to drool.
Maybe there’s something to be said about the male species after all.
When my eyes make it back to his face, there is an ornery and knowing smile plastered where his sleepy grin had previously been.
Blushing, I divert my eyes and suddenly find the laces of my ice skates very interesting as he gracefully climbs to his feet. Massive feet that walk smoothly, into my line of sight, not slipping in the slightest.
I consider questioning him again, but he lifts my chin until our eyes meet. I don’t understand why my body has the strange desire to melt into his touch, craving more. I’m not used to being touched like this, or the intensity in his eyes.
Eyes that are so black I can’t find his pupils even with my eyes volleying between each of his.
My knees buckle under the intensity I find in them.
He catches me by the small of my back, holding my body against his.
Where his hand lies, and our bodies touch, it feels like thousands of tiny static electricity zaps pricking at my skin.
A gasp escapes me and I’m feeling an array of things I’ve never felt before, and don’t think I could describe them if I had too.
They’re all flying through my body so quickly in rapid succession, that I don’t have time to even process them.
My type A brain wants to freak out, but there’s something deep within me telling me to just go with the flow for once in my freaking life.
I swear he can read my mind because the moment I have the thought, he leans further into me and tentatively sweeps his lips across mine.
In an act completely unlike myself, I swing my arms around his neck, pulling his face towards mine, and kiss him like my life depends on it.
None of this is logical in any way, but I can’t find it in me to care at all. Kissing him feels like maybe hockey isn’t the only thing I could have in the world. Maybe my uncertain future doesn’t look so bad with someone like him as part of it.
What’s happening to me?!
That weird tugging within me that pulled me towards him now feels like it’s wrapping around us, trying desperately to keep us together. It’s exhilarating and terrifying and I realize that the world around me smells oddly like warm gingerbread cookies.
When our lips finally part, we’re both panting, and the rational part of my brain finally overrides whatever just happened. I shove his chest, jerkily skating backwards away from him.
The distance feels strangely painful, like now that I’ve kissed him, I can’t stand to be without him. The myriad of emotions flying through my body threatens to send me into a panic. My breaths come quicker. I can feel myself starting to lose control as a spiral works to form.
Without notice, he rushes me and wraps me in a secure embrace as he takes long, dramatic breaths in and out. My body is able to do what my mind hasn’t caught on to yet, and my breathing matches his as my heart rate slows away from the anxiety attack.
“Thank you,” I say at the same time he apologizes.
Searching my brain for the reason he apologized, I give up and ask, “Why are you sorry?”
He rests his chin on top of my head, and the movement settles something within me, bringing an otherworldly level of peace. “For touching you without your permission, but I didn’t know what to do.”
I shake my head against him. He’s still wrapped around me, and I can’t find a reason to pull away. “It’s not like you accosted me. You calmed me. Thank you.”
Afraid to feel the same pain of being without him that I experienced after our kiss, I allow myself to stand here and hold this stranger that makes me feel . . . alive.
“So, is there any chance I could take you to dinner?” he asks almost sheepishly.
Gently pulling myself out of his embrace, I skate away from him again, reminding myself that there’s something weird happening here.
“I don’t know. Are you gonna tell me why you snuck into my rink?
And while you’re at it, why you were sleeping naked on the ice?
” I ask, skating slow circles around him.
His head remains on a swivel, not taking his eyes off mine.
He scratches the back of his head in embarrassment, an oddly attractive blush creeping up his neck.
“About that,” he begins, visibly searching for the right words in his head.
“Okay, first, I wasn’t naked. I kept the important stuff covered.
” He emphasizes his point by waving his hand towards his crotch, dragging my gaze to the area before I have the mental awareness to snap my head back up to his eyes.
“And I was really hot and needed to cool down. I’m from .
. . way up north and it’s been a bit of an adjustment for me here. ”
There seems to be a lot missing from his explanation, but I didn’t sense any dishonesty.
His voice remained clear, he maintained eye contact, and his body language remained open.
My mom was a psychologist, and while I hated her profession because it always meant more to her than I did, there were still things that you couldn’t help but learn about human nature.
“How do I know you’re not some kind of crazy person?” I stop with my hands on my hips after realizing I’d been slowly skating closer to him, unable to avoid the strange internal need to be near him.
His eyes wander to the ceiling, considering my words, and lifting a single blond eyebrow. “Well, I guess you don’t. But would there really be anything that I could tell you right now that would change your mind?”
He definitely has a point.
He nods and walks towards the large doors at the end of the rink where I notice his pile of clothes lying. For some reason, the sight of him walking away from me has my heart trying to leap out of my chest in order to remain with him.
He begins to dress in front of me, like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I struggle to maintain eye contact and not let my gaze wander again when he suggests, “How about you let me give you my number then? We can talk, and once you decide I’m not too far off the reservation, then you can let me take you to dinner. ”
He says everything so matter-of-factly, like it’s inevitable. I’d usually be put off by the amount of confidence he said that with, but it seems to fit him. I don’t know why I think I know that. There’s something about him I can’t shake.
I skate half the distance toward where he’s walking back onto the ice, still barefoot. He’s now dressed in a pair of deliciously low-hung black shorts, and an Arizona Rays T-shirt as he holds his hand out for my phone.
Throwing caution to the wind, I allow him to take it, feeling a strange vulnerability waiting as he taps on my screen.
A minute later he stops tapping on my phone and pulls his out of his pocket which had just gone off.
“Texted myself so I could save your number.” He smiles and the brilliance of it threatens to once again take my breath.
He hands my phone back. I accept it numbly as I watch him walk back to where his slides lay, slipping them on and walking toward the door. “I’ll text you, Popsicle,” he says, tossing it over his shoulder, acting again like this is the most natural thing.
Popsicle? I laugh to myself, shaking my head.
As the door swings shut, I look down at my phone in my hand to notice he didn’t put his name in my phone. All he put was “My Man” where his name should be.
I shake my head again and gaze around the giant rink that’s never felt as empty as it does since the moment he left. I stand there dumbfounded and unsure of what to do with myself.
Somehow, I know my whole life just changed in those moments with him . . . and I don’t know what to think about that.