“You’d better haul your ass to the therapy room, Lee Lee,” Connor calls out, grinning like an idiot. “Markham’s coming for your spot. Guy’s a damn brick wall out there tonight.”
I shoot him the finger without looking his way.
“Put that away before the cameras catch you, you fuckin’ idiot,” Coach barks from down the bench.
Properly shamed, I mumble an apology and turn my focus back to the ice.
The game’s a war zone—back and forth, hit for hit. Washington ties it up in the second period, and the energy in the arena spikes.
After the break, the Reapers stormed out, fired up, and nailed a clean, beautiful goal early in the third.
The bench erupts.
The crowd loses its mind.
For a second, it feels like momentum is finally on our side.
But it doesn’t last.
A scuffle breaks out in front of the net, gloves hit the ice, and before I know it, one of our guys is sent to the box while Washington gets a power play. They capitalize fast, slipping onepast our goalie and evening the score again, and we’re right back to a tie game with only about seven minutes left on the clock.
Now, seven minutes is forever in a game like this. Anything can happen in that amount of time. This is the time when players lock in, when time seems to slow, and crazy shit starts to happen.
I’ve seen it. I’ve experienced it.
But something feels off tonight. The ref’s calls have been garbage all game, and it’s not the first time I’ve noticed it. When he misses a clear tripping call on one of theirs, then dares to whistle iton us.
I’m on my feet before I even realize it, shouting across the ice for blood.
“Open your eyes, ref!” I yell. “What kind of backwoods bullshit is this!”
Again, Coach is yelling for me to calm my ass down, but I’m not the only one losing it.
Our guys are going crazy, screaming in the ref’s face, yelling at the Washington players.
Gloves are coming off, then helmets, then there’s another full-blown fight. It takes a long time to get everyone separated, for the officials to review footage, and for the right call to come.
And after all of that, we end up two penalties a piece, and the game gets reset.
Five minutes left, and the faceoff goes Washington’s way, but Markham swoops in and takes the puck right off of their second-string forward. He wings it to the midline, where our center,Max Knight, grabs it, takes off, faking a pass to Nik and looping around the goalie’s back for a score.
The placeeruptsagain, so loud it makes my ears ring, but we’re up by one goal, and there are only three minutes left on the clock.
Our players engage in full-scale defensive maneuvers, just trying to hold off a determined Washington offense that’s throwing everything they’ve got at us.
When the final buzzer sounds, the arena is electric, buzzing with that raw, wild energy that only comes from a hard-fought win.
The guys are shouting, sticks slamming against the boards, gloves in the air.
I’m so fucking pissed that I wasn’t part of this win. This is what it feels like to be part of a winning team, one that might actually be good enough to get to the playoffs.
I turn back to Coach, who does not look happy about the win, despite the confetti raining from the sky.
My suspicions about thrown games are confirmed in his expression, a mix of nausea and fear.
We were supposed to lose tonight.
He and Nik share a long, weighted look as Nik leads the team around the arena for their victory lap. He looks like he’s led a coup, not just a winning game during the regular season.
