“I’m surprised we didn’t have to take you to the hospital for dehydration.” Shelby shakes her head.
“Can we please focus on Sofia for once?” Shelby redirects.
“Yes, can we,” Clarabella agrees. “Sex on a scale of one to ten?”
I look at the three of them, putting my hand to my stomach. “He was my first kiss,” I admit, breathing out and looking at the ceiling to blink away the tears that have now crept up on me. “My first everything, really,” I whisper as I walk around the desk, avoiding looking at them. I’m not sure I can stand them looking at me and seeing the pity in their eyes. “Needless to say, I’m not working with them.” I finally look at all three of them and they just look at me and nod.
“If they call you back,” Shelby says, getting up, “I’ll take it.”
“Do you really think that he would come back?” Clarabella questions me and all I can do is shrug my shoulders. “Okay, he came today but did he know he was meeting you?”
“I don’t think so,” I answer honestly. “They filled the doc out online and all correspondence was done through the main email address, so there isn’t a fixed name on there,” I say, putting my hand in front of me. “Either way, that was my one and only appointment I will do with him.”
“Or,” Clarabella suggests, “you show him that he means jack shit to you and plan him the best fucking wedding of his life.”
“How is that going to help her?” Shelby asks the question I almost asked.
“Think about it.” Clarabella smiles. “Every single time he thinks of his wedding, he is going to think of her.” If I have to admit it, I think it’s genius, but I won’t put myself in that position. “It’s up to you.” She gets up. “And no more sweet tea, your face is already flushed.”
I take a deep breath. “I guess we will see if they call or not.”
matthew
I huff as I skate off the ice, taking one of my gloves off while I unsnap my helmet. Making my way down the red hallway toward the locker room, I place my stick outside of the door along with all the other ones. Walking into the room, I pick up a bottle of Gatorade from the tray in the middle of the room before I head over to my spot on the big, long bench and place my gloves on the small square shelf above my name. “I was dragging my ass out there,” I say, trying to get my breathing back as I sit down on the bench and unscrew the cap.
“I think we were all dragging out there,” Jeff observes from beside me. He takes off the jersey he has on and tosses it in the big bin that is in the middle of the room, right beside the team logo on the carpet.
“Beginning of the season is always like this,” I say to Jeff as the locker room fills up with the guys who have come off the ice. Everyone sits down at their place as they get their energy back. “At least we don’t have a game tonight.” I put the Gatorade beside me before leaning down and untying my skates.
I’ve been playing hockey since before I can remember. I think there is a picture in my parents’ house of me on skates at a year old. I could barely walk but my father laced up my tiny skates and skated with me. I always knew I wanted to play hockey. I mean, coming from the family I came from, it was a given. My grandfather was a hockey god, to say the least. He literally still has records that no one has beaten. My father played hockey. My uncles and most of my cousins all play professional hockey, so it was no surprise that I wanted to do it also. I just did it a bit different from my cousins. I got drafted when I was eighteen. Not first like most of them, but it didn’t matter to me, because no matter what number I went, I was going to finish school before playing. It was something my father and I decided together when I was thirteen. I would be drafted and then get a degree in business. I played hockey in college where I recorded twenty-two goals and nineteen assists in thirty-six games. I was at the top of the standings. When I came back the second year, I dominated even more, with thirty-two goals and fifty-seven points in thirty-one games.
Needless to say, when I finally got my degree and graduated, I went straight to the NHL. Luckily for me, Carolina drafted me, so I didn’t have to move far since I went to school here. In March before I graduated, I signed an entry-level contract and finally suited up in April for the farm team. I scored two goals and one assist in that game and quickly was called up to play my very first NHL game. It took me three games to get my groove and I finally scored my first ever NHL goal. I still remember to this day how it felt, like I made the family proud. It was so hard growing up and walking in everyone else’s shadow, having to prove you belong there, and not that you were there because of the dynasty you grew up in. I slip on my slides and put my skates under the bench before fully undressing. I hear some conversation all around me, but now that I’m not on the ice, my mind wanders. It takes me right back to yesterday. Right back to seeing Sofia again.