Give Nova a kiss for me
Nia
Z, your niece is twelve
If I give her a kiss, she might decapitate me
Zhuri
You’re the worst
Nia
Love you, baby sister
I set my phone down and press the palms of my hands over my eyes.
In just one hour, everything in my career has changed, and as optimistic as I always try to be, I’m nervous right now…
two
Zhuri
IfeellikeIcouldthrow up.
I can usually keep myself calm and collected, but I’m so wary of this new direction for the league. And I still have no idea who my teammates are going to be.
I take my time getting ready for today’s press conference. I wear my hair down, natural and curly. My black dress is skin-tight, hitting just above my knees, and I pair it with a gray plaid blazer and black pumps.
The upside to always having to dress up before and after games is that I have quite a collection of nice clothes I can wear to events like this.
I meet up with Bet and Isla when I get to the arena. We run into a couple of our other teammates, Aili and Venda, who join us on our walk to the media room, where Sean is holding the press conference.
“Are you three as pissed off as we are?” Aili asks through her thick Finnish accent.
“Pissed doesn’t even begin to describe my feelings,” Venda grumbles.
I sigh. “Well, we certainly aren’t happy about it. I would have thought, too, as the captain, that I’d get a little advance warning, but I found out at the same time as everyone else.”
“I’m so fucking nervous,” Isla says worriedly, and Aili and Venda drape their arms around opposite shoulders.
“Icy,” Venda starts, “I guaran-fucking-tee that you’ll have a spot on the Comets.”
Isla throws her head back and groans. “Am I that obvious?”
“Yes,” Bet chuckles. “We’ve played with you for years. We know you better than you do, Icy.”
“I think we could use some positivity, Z,” Aili adds. “Whatcha got for us?”
My job as captain of the Dragons involved putting a positive spin on everything and hyping up our entire team. It comes easily enough to me since I’ve always been a positive, happy person.
My wariness right now, though, makes that difficult even for me.
I dig deep and come up with something fitting for us.
“Never give up on the things that make you smile,”I assert. “Hockey is everything to us. It’s our happy place. We can’t let a change in how we play take away from our love of the game. Let’s go in with our heads held high and make lemonade out of lemons.”
Elisabet rests her head on my shoulder. “We can always count on Z to give us some cheesy, uplifting quote.”
