Page 31 of Snowballed

We walk the six blocks to the hockey house. It’s already bumping inside. Noah is in one corner of the living room, surrounded by women. Of course. I’m happy to see it’s not my teammates who are getting sucked in by his pretty face and huge ego.

“Zoe,you’reat a party?” my brother yells out. I appreciate the way he calls attention to my hermit status in front of everyone.

Rocky grabs my wrist. “C’mon, let’s get a drink.”

“I can’t drink. I have to drive home.”

“One drink. Then you can switch to soda,” she says. “You need to kick it up.”

“Kick back, you mean.” I usually don’t bother correcting Rocky’s little slang mistakes, but this one is an opposite.

“Yeah, baby. Kick back. Right on.” She goes full Austin Powers as she opens the fridge and hands me a pink can. This is typical of the hockey house, where they probably buy “chick drinks” by the case. Not that these guys need alcohol to score because they’re already hockey gods.

I trail Rocky for a bit, but then end up talking to other people from our team. And while I’m waiting in line for the bathroom, I meet this sophomore from a farm in Minnesota, and we get into a really interesting discussion about agriculture.

“Soybeans are taking over corn as the number-one crop,” Martin tells me. There’s a tap on my shoulder, and it’s Rocky.

“Excuse us for a moment,” she says to Martin and drags me away. “I was so happy to see you flirting, and you’re talking about crops? Zee, do you not know how to party?”

“I’m enjoying our conversation,” I protest. “We both are. Besides, he’s a sophomore. I’m not going to date him.”

She looks back at Martin, who is watching us. “Why not? He’s tall and not bad looking. But you need to make a move. Maybe ask him to dance.”

The living room has become a dance floor with a mix of EDM and hip-hop blasting from the speakers.

I shake my head. “I’m leaving soon.”

Rocky scrunches her nose. “At least stay until midnight, Cinderella.”

Which gives me another twenty minutes here. I hug Rocky and return to Martin.

“Everything okay?” he asks.

“Yes, fine. Rocky and I play hockey together,” I say.

“Oh. You’re on the Moo U hockey team?” he asks.

“Yes. Do you play hockey too?”

“Well, for sure. I mean, pretty much everyone does back home. But I’m not good enough to play college like you.”

Is he complimenting me? I can’t even tell, which is why I’m better off talking farming than anything personal. I look towards the dance floor and see Noah, with Helen draped all over him. A total player, just as I suspected.

“Umm, do you want to dance?” Martin asks.

“Sure.” I like dancing, and this will make Rocky happy.

“Zee. Thought you didn’t do parties,” Noah calls out to me.

“Guess you don’t know everything.” I channel my inner toddler with Noah, and it’s embarrassing.

The music ends right away. As we stand there awkwardly, Noah detaches himself from Helen and comes over.

“Hey. I’m Noah Goodwin.” He sticks out a hand, and Martin introduces himself.

“Martin, I need to have a word with my girl, Zoe,” Noah says. He leads me off the dance floor.

“Your girl?” It implies a level of intimacy we do not have.

---