Page 2 of Your Sharpest Edge
Back in Russia, I was a second-rate player. My rival, already recruited by an American team, was a constant reminder of where I wasn’t. The sting of his success pushed me to work harder. When I was seventeen, I decided to move to Los Angeles, chasing a dream that seemed almost impossible.
“Coach Santana will make you a star,” I’d heard. His reputation was legendary in fine-tuning pro-skaters. The first day of training, he’d looked me over with a critical eye. “Skate harder, Popov,” he’d shout. “You want to play pro, you’ve got to earn it.”
I’d collapse into bed every night with aching muscles and blistered feet. College classes were a blur between practice sessions. Two years of grueling work, and here I was, standing in front of Coach Crew, ready to join the Blades after the draft.
“Ready to meet the team?” Coach Crew asked, breaking into my thoughts.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I said, a grin spreading across my face.
We walked into the arena together, the familiar smell of ice and sweat welcoming me to my new life.
“I believe you know one of the other starters?” Coach Crew asked.
“Yeah. The captain, Dimitri Sokolov, and I actually grew up in the same town.”
Dimitri was a year younger than me, and we were the only two people from our town who’d ever made it big.
“Good. Good,” Coach said and then walked me down the hallway in the back of the arena where the locker rooms were.
“These are the tunnels...” He droned on about what the arena looked like, but truthfully, all these places looked the same once we were beneath the stands.
They were big concrete structures only there to entertain the masses. I had to give this place credit, though, because it was cleaner than most since the arena was brand new.
We finally found ourselves in front of the home locker room, where Coach pushed the doors open. I was the last to be recruited and, therefore, the last to arrive at our first practice. Well, there were other reasons, too, but Coach had already chastised me about those.
Last night in Anaheim, I decided to explore my options, and I can’t say I regret trying out the dating scene here. Living in Los Angeles, nestled near the city on a college campus, being part of the hockey team made meeting women easy. If I wanted to fuck, all it took was a snap of my fingers, and my dorm room would have a line out the door.
But when I joined the Blades and moved to Orange County, I wondered what the dating pool would be like. I was told a lot of older women were looking for a hot, younger guy in this area. While sure, I appreciate a good MILF from time to time, last night, I wanted to see what else this place had to offer.
Needless to say, the bar near my apartment had plenty on the menu. However, this morning, the woman I met seemed a bit too attached, despite my clear communication that I was only interested in something casual. Hence why I was a few minutes late to practice.
As we pushed open the doors and entered the locker room, it was buzzing with energy. The walls were painted with gold and black, the Blades team colors. Black lockers lined the walls, and the concrete floors were spotless, which wouldn’t last long.
“Everyone,” Coach said softly, and not a single person turned around over the chirping of conversations around us.
This was going to be a long year. There was absolutely no way this guy was going to be able to scream out directions during a game if he couldn’t get the group to be quiet. After another feeble attempt from him, I stuck my fingers in my mouth and blew loudly, which got everyone’s attention.
Coach Crew looked over at me. “Thank you,” he responded softly before turning toward the rest of the group. “I wanted to take a second to recognize Alexsey Popov, our final team player, before we head out to practice.”
There was a resounding “Hear! Hear!” from the team.
“It’s just Alex,” I added and tipped my head at them before I found an empty spot in the corner of the locker room.
I got my gear on, quietly minding my own business, before I heard someone’s skates wobble over to where I was.
“Strange seeing you here,” someone said with a familiar Russian accent as I looked up from the wooden bench.
I stood up and gave Dimitri a hug. We may have been rivals back in Russia, and he may have been a better player than I was, but there was a familiarity in knowing someone you’d grown up playing with.
“Hey, man,” I said as I sat back down to lace up my skates.
“Can you believe this?” he asked, gesturing to the locker room.
I shook my head. Truthfully, I never imagined my life outside of the tiny town I grew up in. Moving to the big city was an adjustment, and then being shipped off to a foreign country when I couldn’t legally drink out here was a massive change. Coming to finally play pro in a national hockey league actually felt like the most normal thing that's happened to me the last few years.
“Crazy,” I mumbled, struggling to tighten the laces.
Annoyance bubbled up as my superstition made me believe that taking my skates to a new shop for sharpening had ruined them, convinced they’d tampered with the laces and tightened them too much.
