Page 41 of Let It Be Me
RILEY
“Is that too tight?” Evan, the athletic trainer, asks while taping up my ankle.
I flex my foot and roll my ankle around. “Nope. It’s good.”
He finishes wrapping and hops up from his spot.
“Thank you.” I tell him and head back over to my locker. Locker is stretching it. It’s more of a small open coat closet. I dress out and put on my skates, checking my phone before I lace up and head out to the rink for warm-ups.
Even though this is a preseason game, the fans usually come out in massive groups to watch us play. It’s always better this way. Seeing the fans get pumped for hockey. They love it just as much as we do. And that always energizes us to play better.
I join the guys on the ice and drop down to do my stretches. Even though we do these stretches daily, my muscles still pull tight and I groan when I stretch out my groin and hamstrings.
“Girlfriend here?” Max asks.
“What?” Logan and Noah ask at the same time.
I curse Max in my head for ousting me. “She should be here soon and she’ll be sitting with Momma and Pops,” I move into a hamstring stretch but don’t hear anything from them. “What!?” I ask when I notice them looking at me.
“Back it up. Girlfriend? How is it that Max knows but we don’t?” Noah questions.
“I didn’t tell him. How do you know?” I point my question to Max.
“My cousin works as a valet at Hotel LaRoux and saw you with her in the parking lot. He wasn’t sure since you never said anything. But this just confirmed it.”
If I had my phone, I’d send a quick text to Sarah that we’ve been spotted. “Yes, she’s my girlfriend. No, you don’t know her. And no, she doesn’t have any siblings.”
Logan drops down into the splits. As our goalie he needs to be more limber than the rest of us. “She’s meeting the fam already. That’s a pretty big step.”
“Is that wrong? I’ve never had a girlfriend during the season, so I have no clue how to navigate it.” Spilling my guts on the ice before a game, definitely isn’t the smartest move. But I’m not lying when I say that I’ve never dated anyone during the season. So navigating when to meet the parents is new territory for me.
“Well,” Max starts. “My older sister hid her now husband when they were dating for months. I mean, it helped as she was out of state for college. So coming home to introduce him to us wasn’t exactly convenient.”
“Huh,” I start as I gather the rest of my thoughts. “Well, I think she can handle herself.”
At least I hope she can. Because if it were me and I had to unexpectedly meet my fake girlfriend's parents, I’dprobably freeze like a deer in headlights. But Sarah is tough. She has to be for the job she’s in. And that’s exactly like what our relationship is. A job. Suddenly the idea of us faking doesn’t seem so appealing with the way I think about it. It’s clinical and straightforward. Two things I never would have classified myself as.
The guys and I finish up our stretches and jump in with the rest of the team to do light shooting and defensive drills. After a while, our coach whistles for us to head back to the locker room to dress out for the game. Coach gives us a pep talk. If “Don’t get your asses kicked” constitutes as a pep talk, then I guess that’s it. When we’re dressed out, we all waddle back out to the ice for our roster call.
I’m usually able to block out the noise during this time. Sometimes the crowd calling out or heckling us ruins my focus. But not this time. Last season I probably deserved the call out. This season not so much. The roar of the crowd fuels me and I take a moment to let my eyes wander over those in the crowd.
Noah taps me on the helmet before skating over to Max and doing the same. He skates to center ice and readies for the face off. In the blink of an eye, his persona changes from the Noah I know off the ice and the Noah on the ice. He’s one of the best centers I’ve worked with and he’s quick. Quicker than your average hockey player. My adrenaline is pumping through my veins and it’s as if the game starts so fast that by the time I breathe, we’re up 1 goal.
My line retires for a couple of plays before we’re switching back out in the second period. Florida came out with a fire lit under their asses. Even with this being a preseason game, we’ve been fighting to gain possession more than we’ve needed to. Noah manages to get control ofthe puck before he drives down the ice and with a flick of his wrist, the puck sails into the back of the net.
“Good game tonight, guys,”Anderson says from the middle of the locker room. “We have some things to work on, but for the most part we’re just about regular season ready.”
We all pound our sticks on the locker room floor and cheer.
“Settle down, settle down. Next preseason game is in three days so no practice tomorrow. But, I want you all to do something light to move your bodies. Sitting around and letting yourself get sore doesn’t do any of us any favor. Now hit the showers.”
We all move at once. I set my stick in my locker and unlace my skates to the chatter of Max and Noah making plans.
“Are you sure we can’t convince you to come out with us?” Noah asks.
I groan involuntarily when I tug my jersey and pads off. “Positive. I’ve got a girl and parents to get to.”
I walk towards the shower with their teasing quips in the background. Calling Sarah my girl makes the fake feel not so fake. But it needs to be. It’s fake. We are fake. As much as I drill it into my head, I can’t help but want to screw the rule we set in place. Because every touch, every glance, and every moment spent together blurs the fake to where it feels real. I hurry through my shower, but make sure I’m extra clean and once I’m dry, I throw on some street clothes of black jeans, a gray hoodie, and some black Timberland boots.
