“Is he usually this good?” I whisper to Tess.
She smirks at me. “Mhm, but he’s not usually devoted to one particular fan after.”
Toward the end of the third period, Cole streaks down the ice with only one defenseman he’s demolished all night to beat. This is his chance for the hat trick. Dillon lived for those nights.
I did too.
The nights when he’d tell me I was pretty (in an unconventional way)—maybe even take me out on an impromptu date. Obviously, I don’t expect any of that from Cole, but if heiscoming home with me tomorrow (something I still highly doubt) than it would be cool if he was in a good mood. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him in one.
He feigns left, cuts right, and then leaves the puck behind? What is he doing? Without missing a beat, a defensemaneveryone has been calling Moose glides to the puck. He rears his stick back and slams it down the goalie’s throat.
Instantaneously with the shot, a human battering ram comes out of nowhere, charges Cole, and levels him, sending his helmet flying off his head and his body crumpling to the ice.
Air evacuates my lungs with the contact as if I’m the one who got hit.
Get up. Get up. Get up.My body hums. I stand up to get a better look as my knees shake terribly. Tessa grabs my hand and does the same.
Get. Up. Be okay.
A brawl breaks out on the ice. Mayhem. Probably. I’m vaguely aware of the action, still focused on Cole. One of his teammates reaches out to help him up. Red streaks down the side of his face.
Be okay.
For the rest of the game, Cole remains off the ice. My legs rattle with a restless energy I can’t explain. Not ten hours ago I was threatening to push him into the ocean, and now I’m seconds away from storming the locker room and demanding to see him.
“You good?” Tess asks, putting her hand on my thigh.
“No,” I say before I have time to censor my answer. “I mean—I’m?—”
“A concerned little girlfriend?” Tess teases.
Ten hours. That’s how long it’s taken me to go from “I’d like to kill Cole” to “Touch him and you die.” It took what? One brush of his mouth against my knuckles and a goal scored in my honor (it was a really good freaking goal) and suddenly I’ve caught feelings?
No. I’m not going to be that girl again—I refuse to fall for questionable men just because they give me attention.
The final horn sounds. Tess grabs my hand and pulls me along. “We’re going to go congratulate the boys and check up on Cole.” She yells over her shoulder to my mom.
The closer we get to the area where moms, girlfriends, and other friends and families are waiting, the more I feel like I shouldn’t be here. I never checked with Cole if this was okay. I didn’t check to see if he had someone waiting for him he’d rather not introduce me to.
“We shouldn’t be here,” I whisper to Tess. “Cole might have someone he wants to see and I’ll be intruding.”
“He never has anyone here, it’s fine,” she says, fixing her hair in her selfie cam.
“It’s too girlfriend-y.”
“Natalie, your hands are still shaking from the hit. You can lie all you want, but I know you want to see him, so stay. It’s fine.”
Slowly, Cole’s teammates trickle out of the room and down the hallway to meet their significant others with open arms back near the rink.
One by one, the person waiting for them flings their arms around the player’s neck and lands a kiss or two on them.
Okay, now I know I really shouldn’t be here.
“Oh, there he is,” Tessa says. I pick my head up, but the man coming down the hall isn’t Cole. It’s Moose. Tessa bounds to him, and he picks her up and swings her around, burying his mouth into her neck. Someone else approaches shortly after, one of the team assistants, I think. He stands to the side of the embracing couple and looks at Tessa like she hung the freaking moon.
Because, well, she does and apparently this guy has good sense about him. Moose and her aren’t an official couple, but he holds her in a similar fashion—like she’s precious and he doesn’t want to let her go.
What is it like to be held like that? To be looked at like you’re someone special?
