Overtime: St. Cloud Hockey Series, page 14
“I will, sir.” I clench my jaw and my fists. “I won’t let the team down.”
“Good. Go out there and break their wings.”
Brutal mental image, but it does the trick.
I skate back out to the same side I had during first period. I know I’m closer to her now, but I force myself to keep my eyes on the ice.
Even though number 4 gets checked so hard toward the end of the game that he gets taken away by the medics, even though I make a save during PK that gets the whole arena roaring, we still lose three to two.
I’m so angry at myself that I march into the locker room, change out of my skates and into boots, grab my shit, and head right out to my car, all smelly and wet like a rat. But I can’t be around anyone right now. If Edwards so much as runs his stinking yap in front of me, I’ll probably break his face and get suspended from school altogether.
Plugging in my phone, I find the angriest hard rock band I listen to and drive away. It’s dark out, but the night is clear, not a snowflake in sight. On a Friday night like this, while every St. Cloud student hits the bars or whatever house party they can find, I drive as far away as I can. Away from Coach’s disappointment, from Archie’s eagerness to talk, from my teammates’ exhaustion. Away from Strawberry.
The second I make it to my secret spot, I’ll put in a request to cancel the rest of my tutoring sessions. I already know enough to not flunk my essays. I’ll say hockey has me too busy and that they should assign someone else to her so she doesn’t lose income. And yeah, she’s my neighbor now, but not seeing her on purpose will help. It has to.
It better. I can’t keep playing like tonight. Coach was right all along. My professional hockey career is on the line.
My heart slams against my rib cage as if I’m still in the middle of the game, even though I’m pulling down the back road that leads to my favorite spot by the lake. Here, it’s pitch black, the only illumination coming from the stars in the sky. Normally, I relish in the dark and the quiet, but tonight I’m just determined to be abnormal, huh?
The music cuts off, and I flinch. I ignore the ringtone for a moment because 99 percent of the people who could be calling me right now have to know I’m in my worst mood.
But I glance at the screen on my dashboard. Turns out I’m getting called by the 1 percent.
Pulling over, I turn on my hazard lights and pick up.
“Hey, Aran.”
“Why are you calling me?”
“Geez.” I can practically hear her roll her eyes. “Is this how you should be greeting your favorite little sister?”
“Yes, because you never call me.” It could be because tonight has been a fiasco already, but hearing Olivia’s voice puts me on high alert. “Something’s up.”
It’s not even a question. But she evades it.
“How was tonight’s game?”
“Don’t even try me, Olivia. I know you don’t give a shit about hockey. What is happening?”
“Well…”
“You better start talking right this second.”
“Fine.” She clears her throat. “So, Brooke is taking me to the hospital.”
“What?”
“Deep breaths, big guy. It’s just preventive care. I, uh, may have accidentally sipped from a peanut butter smoothie.”
“You did freaking what accidentally? I will murder that kid—”
There’s a little gasp, and then my sister’s voice sounds annoyed. “Brooklyn didn’t shove the straw in my mouth, you know.”
“He should’ve been watching!”
“It’s not his job!” Olivia takes a deep breath. “Anyway, come to the hospital, because I’ll need an adult. But don’t tell Mom and Dad.”
“The hell I won’t.” I grit my teeth, turn off the hazard lights, and make a U-turn in the dark. “I’ll take care of the paperwork. But then I’m taking you straight home to our parents, who will ground you until you graduate.”
“But—”
“Brooklyn?” I bark.
The boy responds with “yes, sir?”
“You better make sure my sister gets to the hospital alive, because I don’t give a shit if your father’s rich. I will get you.”
“Um, yes, sir.”
I tap the screen to end the call. As I drive away from my spot, my insides turn icier and icier.
CHAPTER 18
MADDIE
“Wow, that was intense.” Wyatt basically has to shout to be heard over the din from the throng of people vacating the arena.
I’m shaky as I follow. I’ve already seen enough clips of hockey games to know sometimes they get violent and the audience revels in it. Like tonight, for example. When Aran socked the Falcon player, the whole place almost went down. Meanwhile, I sat ramrod straight.
I wonder if he gets into fights a lot. One blow, and that’s all it took for the other guy to go down. But, I mean, Aran’s strong enough that he could literally haul me up if I was about to fall, and I weigh two hundred pounds. That other guy stood no chance. And the fact that it took half of the Bolts to hold Aran back gave me chills. I’m not sure whether they were good or bad. It was just the realization that I’ve been treating him as a pal when he’s an untamed, testosterone-filled entity I don’t really understand.
And what little I know of him makes me worry. Because what does it take for impassive, nonchalant Aran Rodriguez to snap like that?
I wonder if he’s okay. I hope his hand’s not hurt. Maybe I’ll text him when I get home.
Wyatt keeps talking, oblivious to the fact that I’m fully in my head.
“Not gonna lie. At first, I was confused. Then I was kinda scared? But then—” He puts emphasis on the last word. “Then, I was kinda excited.”
“Wyatt!” I smack his shoulder, and he chuckles.
“You can’t tell me you didn’t feel anything.”
I can’t. Because it’s wrong of me to admit that, yes, Aran’s intensity does things to me. Those chills might’ve been what Wyatt is talking about. Maybe my lizard brain wondered what Aran is like when he uses all that sheer power for something else. When those deep eyes of his are looking at you like he wants to eat you up. Just not in an angry way. I dig my face into my fluffy scarf when I feel heat traveling up my neck.
Wyatt checks his phone. “Anyway, thanks for keeping me company while I waited for my date to be done with practice.”
“Well, thanks for the emotional support, I guess.”
“See you later, Maddie!”
I wave at him, and we part ways in the parking lot. My head still churns as I get in my car and drive home.
Yeah, so I’m as attracted to Aran, like he and I are magnets of opposite polarity. Who isn’t? At least half of the stadium probably swooned too. But this changes nothing. He’s still completely out of my reach. And more importantly, he’s my friend. How awkward would things get for him, for Ryan, and for everyone else, if I start drooling over him?
I’ll just have to drool in private. Forcing myself to ignore this hasn’t helped at all.
I get home and climb the four floors with relative ease now that I’ve been living here for a month. The apartment is dark, cold, and silent as a tomb. Ryan and the Strikes had an away game, so she’ll come back home pretty late.
“Should’ve watched that one. But no, you had to choose the home game because it’d be easier that way,” I mumble to myself as I ease off my winter clothes.
Easier my behind. I chose the home game because Aran was playing in it. And now look—I’m home alone, my blood is still roaring in my ears, and I want to cry.
Pulling my phone from my bag, I decide to at least attempt to be a good friend. I find Aran’s contact near the top of my list on the text messaging app.
Me
Hey, are you okay?
I hesitate a little but hit send. Friends are allowed to be concerned about each other. And their primary function is giving encouragement when needed, right?
But maybe Aran doesn’t want any. In fact, I spend about five minutes checking to see if he’s at least read it, and nothing.
After pouring a tall mug of tea, I trudge to the couch and fire up my laptop. I’m in the perfect mood to write the first truly dramatic scene that happens in chapter ten of my hockey romance book. I finally started it a couple of weeks ago, and between talking about the sport so much with everyone, the skating non-date, and now this, I’ve had plenty inspiration to churn out one chapter after the next.
I let my mind transport me away from this weird feeling in my chest, and I immerse myself in what my characters are experiencing. In this chapter, the hero sees the heroine with another guy—who later turns out to be her brother—and gets disproportionately jealous. It makes him realize he has feelings for her, even though he swore to himself he would never love another woman after his ex.
Some readers live for the happy moments, the domestic bliss, the spicy scenes. I live for the angst that makes my chest twist. That makes me wonder how they could possibly get together against the odds.
In romance books, the happy ending is guaranteed. Not so much in life.
As I write some stream of consciousness about what the hero is feeling, keys jangle in the door and I hear it open.
“Hey! How come you’re here by your lonesome?” Ryan locks the door back up and adds, “I thought you’d be at O’Malley’s with everyone.”
I lift my head for the first time in—and here I check the clock—two hours. Wow. My spine cracks as I stretch.
“Um, no. I don’t know if they were in much of a mood to celebrate.”
Her eyebrows go up while she unzips her coat. “Don’t tell me the losers lost?”
I smile a little. Even though they get along well, and there sure are enough couples between the teams, the Strikes and the Bolts still give each other crap like this on a daily basis.
“Well, I wouldn’t call the Bolts losers, but yeah, they didn’t win tonight.”
“Huh. You should’ve come to watch us instead. We beat the Sirens five-nothing. It was almost embarrassing.”
“Next time I’ll definitely go watch you.”
Ryan grabs a sports drink from the fridge and heads over to the couch, plopping beside me. “I bet they’re drowning their sorrows at O’Malley’s. Wanna go? Some of my girls are hitting it up too.”
“And you?”
She leans her head back on the cushion. “I don’t know. I really busted my ass in the game.”
“I’d rather stay home,” I say in a mumble, running my hands across my laptop’s keyboard as if I were cleaning it.
“How come?” She cracks one eye open. “I thought you’d be eager to do book research about what happens after a team loses.”
My lips curve, but with little humor. “I don’t think it’s the best moment for that. The Bolts seemed pretty down about the loss, and after Aran got into a fight, I just don’t know how—”
“Whoa, whoa. What?” She screeches, sitting upright with a lot of energy for someone who is supposedly exhausted. “Aran what?”
“Got into a fight.” I add, “At the game, I mean.”
“I want all the details.”
I relay them as well as I can, which isn’t much, because she asked me if Aran got a penalty, and I don’t even know how to respond to that. I didn’t understand a lot about what happened after that.
“Dude, this is big.” Ryan lifts her hips to fish for her phone in her back pocket. As she sends furious text messages, she says, “Aran never gets into fights. I wonder what happened.”
“Never?”
“No. He’s so stoic he might as well be a robot.” A crease appears between her eyebrows. “Huh, he’s not responding to me either. Archie says he hasn’t seen him since the game ended. Apparently, he walked out of the locker room without even showering.”
I scratch my head. So maybe Aran was leaving the place at the same time as I was. But I didn’t see him in the parking lot. Doesn’t mean we were parked nearby, though.
But if he doesn’t respond to his best friends, he obviously won’t respond to me either.
“Um, do you think he’s okay?”
“Yeah, I’m sure he’s fine.” Ryan tosses her phone onto the couch and tries to smile, even though her brow is still creased. “Sometimes he disappears like this and then returns as if nothing happened. Archie and I think it’s when he gets too overwhelmed by something.”
“You… think?”
Sighing, she says, “Yeah. Because the dude just doesn’t talk.”
“Meaning,” I muse aloud, “that something did happen during the game.”
“Probably.” Her phone pings, and she picks it up. “It’s Mark. Oh! He knows what triggered the fight.”
We glue our eyes to her phone screen, watching as Mark’s three dots appear and disappear as he types.
Marky boy
A Falcon douche spewed some racist bullshit at Aran
After that first text, he adds another one with quotation marks around what the opposing player said. I blink really hard and read it again. Ryan draws in a sharp breath. Something inside me snaps.
“What?” I jump off the couch, pointing at the phone in her hand. “I will murder that asshole Falcon!”
“Um, Maddie—”
“How dare he—” I interrupt myself with a gasp. “No wonder Aran punched him in the face. That’s the least that little asshole deserves!”
“Wow, I’ve never heard you cuss before.”
I clamp my hands over my mouth, eyes wide.
Ryan’s face twitches like she wants to laugh. Instead, she clears her throat. “Unfortunately, players fling about all sorts of distasteful slurs during games. Aran’s been called worse before.”
“So.” I wince a little. “If crap like that is so commonplace, then why did he snap?”
“I don’t know. And now I’m a bit worried. Archie sounded like he was too.”
Slowly, I lower myself back to my seat and check my phone again. Aran still hasn’t read my text, but I send him another one.
Me
We’re worried about you
I hope you’re okay
Say *grunt* if you are
But even after more attempts from the three of us during the course of the night, he doesn’t respond.
CHAPTER 19
ARAN
Mom sets a staggering plate with the chunkiest cachapa on the planet in front of me. It’s like a thick corn pancake stuffed with a slab of queso de mano and several layers of ham and is drizzled with nata—which I know is also called cream, though it doesn’t taste the same when I think about it in English.
I’ve been camping out at home ever since picking Liv up at the hospital after they flushed out her gut. That was probably enough punishment, to be honest. But then I yelled at her some more in the car just in case. And then our parents freaked out when I arrived home, basically carrying my little sister in, and presented them with a brand-new hospital bill.
Needless to say, she got grounded. And because our parents hover very high on the neuroticism scale, they kept her home from school yesterday. And because Luz is also the textbook definition of intense, she threatened to drive over when she found out about the whole thing. To save her the hassle, I volunteered to stay home for a few days so I could keep an obsessive eye on our sister.
That, and so I could avoid my life for a bit.
But the back and forth between school and home is getting old. And maybe because I’m also done with acting like a freaking child.
Liv glares at my plate, as if upset that her portion is so much smaller. Not that she could eat all this. I mean, shit, I’m not even sure I can. But Dad blesses our meal, and I dig in.
“Are you sure you’re feeling okay?” Mom asks Liv.
My sister hasn’t said a word to me in days, but she does respond to Mom. “I’ve told you a million times already. I’m fine. I don’t need all of you to guard me like dogs.”
“Of course you do,” Dad says with a gruff voice I inherited. “You and Luz are delicate.”
I wouldn’t exactly use that word for either of them. Stubborn, reckless, and a danger to themselves? Sure.
Olivia rolls her eyes and sags against the chair. I keep stuffing my mouth with food, because anything I say would bring everyone’s bad mood up to my own six.
Mom reaches over and pats my hand with her much smaller one. “I’m so glad we don’t have to worry about you, Aran.” Dad nods in silence to second that.
Right. I’m the solid, dependable one. The one who doesn’t break. The one who doesn’t need anything, ever. I’ve always been proud of being my parents’ most low-maintenance kid. That’s also why I came home for a few days. I knew they’d be too fussy about Olivita to even ask me why I was here. Unlike Archie, who’s tried to corner me before or after every practice, or unlike some of the others, who have been blowing up my phone.
Except being home didn’t dial my shitty mood back to a manageable level. If anything, I feel worse. I don’t want people to fuss over me, but I also don’t want them to pretend I’m okay. I just don’t freaking know what I want.
After breakfast, I toss my duffel bags into the back of my car and slam the door shut. I turn around and almost jump, because Mom stands on the curb beside me, quiet as a ghost.
“Can you take your sister to school this morning?”
I wrinkle my nose. But I note the lack of please and thank you, just as Strawberry would’ve pointed out.
“Why?”
“So you can make up.”
I sigh and run my hand over my head. My hair’s getting longer and my patience is getting shorter.
“Fine.”
She reaches out and instinctively, I lower myself so she can pat my cheek. “Gracias, mijo.”
