Page 92 of Off The Ice

“I don’t know,” Marissa’s voice sounded, drifting out to where I stood. “She’s just so jittery all the time. I mean, how can she teach a class of kids if she’s so nervous?”

Heat surged through me as I reached some invisible limit that finally set me over the edge.

I was sick of it. Of coming to work feeling self-conscious and out of place when she was around. I was sick of the way she whispered to her friends when I entered a room. I was sick of the way everything she said to me was delivered in a backhanded, condescending manner.

With my heart hammering in my chest, I whirled the corner back into the breakroom, for once ready to hear what she had to say behind the whispers.

For the first time in a long time, I felt angry, and I didn’t have the self-control to keep it at bay any longer. Not when I spent every day nervous about navigating conversations with mycoworkers as if I were still the shy, awkward girl in high school trying to stay out of everyone’s way.

Marissa’s eyes widened as I entered as if she thought I’d been long gone, and the look on her face satisfied the part of me that was so used to running away.

“Have you ever thought that if I’m nervous around you all the time, it’s because you make conversations incredibly uncomfortable to be part of?” I asked, watching as her mouth opened to respond.

“Or have you not realized that making passive-aggressive comments about what I wear, or how much I talk, or how I’m ‘too nice’ is probably the worst way to go about giving yourself a confidence boost?” I continued, letting everything I’d bottled up come out at once. “You don’t have to like me, and you don’t have to be my friend because I’m just here to do my job, and no matter what you say, IknowI’m good at what I do because I love those kids.

“And you’re right. I might not yell at my kids to get them to be quiet, or maybe I don’t have that ‘teacher voice’ you use to scare them into listening to you, but I have managed just fine. So, you don’t need to give me any backhanded advice anymore on how to run my class because you’ve been here longer, or using a louder voice to get their attention, because, timid as I am, those kids respect me. You want to know why? Because I respectthem.”

She stared at me, mouth agape. For once, she was the one with nothing to say.

“What?” I asked, furrowing my brows in confusion. “Did I break the rules of your passive-aggressive game by being too direct? Or was it only fun for you when I didn’t say anything back?”

I waited a minute to listen to whatever she had to say back. When she came up with nothing, I turned on my heel and left, feeling better in my own skin than I had in a very long time.

Chapter Thirty

Liam

Iwas on thin fucking ice.

Figuratively, of course, since the ice beneath my feet was thick enough to hold our entire team, plus my coach, who was currently ripping me a new one.

“Can you give me one goddamn reason why news of this fight you had won’t die down?” Coach’s face was red and furious.

The rest of the team stood in a line beside me, their faces impassive. They respected Coach enough not to step in when he was laying down the law with one of us.

“Because people have nothing going on in their lives?” I responded, bored by the whole ordeal.

Who the fuck cared if people were still talking about it? No one got anything on video as far as I knew. All that was circulating were a few rumored reports from ‘witnesses.’ It didn’t fucking matter.

“Because you make headlines when you so much as take a piss, Brynn!” Coach fumed. “And you sure as hell know that. So it wasyourresponsibility to keep a clean reputation, if not for you, then for yourteam!”

I stared at him. What could I say? That I was sorry? I wasn’t.

“And on top of it all, we can’t even deny the rumors because the reporters are all attesting to the fact that your ass wasn’t in the locker room where it should’ve been for your mandated post-game interviews!”

I exhaled heavily, rolling my eyes. I was twenty-six years old. Not a kid playing hockey for his high school. The stakes were technically higher, but if I showed up and helped bring the Wolves to victory, then what the hell did it matter what I did outside of the game?

“Brynn, you’re a damn good player, and you know that, but goddamn it if that doesn’t bite you in the ass. You think you can do whatever you want because you’re a good hockey player?” Coach’s arms flailed around. “Well, newsflash: the world is full of kids waiting to take your spot. Kids who would jump when their coach told them to fucking jump.”

“And what does that mean?” I bit out, a bit of panic rising in my chest.

This game was everything to me.Everything.

Was he seriously telling me that I had to participate in the media circus and cater to the vultures just to keep my spot?

No one told me that signing with the NHL meant selling my soul to the fucking devil.

“It means you need to work like hell to fix this mess. It means that at that charity gala, you are going to be on your goddamn best behavior. You’re going to be on that stage, smiling and waiting to accept the offer of the highest bidder, you got it?”

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