Ryan glares at me.There’s a bit of blood on his jersey, but I don’t know where it’s coming from.A lump is already forming on his chin, and there’s a bluish tinge to his cheek where I connected first, but no cut.“But you’re with her?”
“Keep your gaslighting ass away from her,” I spit out, blatantly ignoring his question as I skate toward him again, but the linesman yanks me back.“She’s better than you.”
He looks equal parts confused and fuming.“Whatever.Fuck off, asshole.”
I turn to the ref.“He started it.”
“Yeah, well, you both look guilty to me,” he mutters and shakes his head.
“Go get stitched up, and then you can sit your ass in the box, Richard.For five.”
“Five?”
He points.“Do you want a game?”
I snap my mouth shut and touch my face.My fingers come away wet.The blood on his jersey was mine.Apparently, that glancing blow Cordon managed broke skin.Fuck.I hate when that happens.Now it won’t look like I won.I get to the bench, and one of the trainers hands me a towel.“Callan, sit in the box for Theo.Our resident thug.”
Coach winks at me.Callan jumps over the boards to serve my penalty as I waddle on my skates down the tunnel to the medic room.It’s a teeny laceration that only needs butterfly tape to hold it together, and then I’m back in time to see us score on the four-on-four (because Cordon also got five).On my first shift back, he’s out there too, so I do what I do best.Chirp.
“You like the weather in Ohio?”I call out as we line up for the face-off after our goal.
“What the fuck?I’ve never been to Ohio, asshole,” he barks back.
“It’s where the Thunder’s farm team is,” I tell him helpfully.“And if I were the coach, I’d be sending you there after tonight.”
“Bite me, Richard.”
“No, thank you.You probably taste the same as you smell—like moldy cheese.”
Later in the game, I tell him he’s got the skinniest legs in the league.I ask him if he fits in his little sister’s figure skates because his feet look small, like his hands.And his brain.I tell him he’s the reason God created middle fingers.All my old chirps come flying out of my mouth every time I’m in earshot of the dickhead.My teammates are grinning and snickering, and their game is elevated with their moods.Even some of the Thunder players are having trouble hiding their smiles.
By the third, when we’re up 4 to 1, they put him out there against me again.I smile at him, and he scowls.“Hey, Cordon!”I say as we wait for a TV timeout to end.“Do your parents know you’re living proof two wrongs don’t make a right?”
“Hey, Ry!What the fuck did you do to unleash full-metal-Richard?”His teammate Cappernique asks Cordon.
“I haven’t done shit,” Ryan says, still scowling at me.
“He treats women like shit,” I call out.“And I’m a feminist, so I don’t tolerate that bullshit.”
“He’s got a thing for my ex, apparently,” Ryan grumbles, and I stop skating away.I know I can’t skate closer to the bench because it will start a war, and the refs will blame me.But I don’t skate away.
“The ex you gaslighted and treated like garbage?”
“I was a fucking teenager.”
“I was one once, too, but I wasn’t a piece of shit.”
“No, you were too drunk, probably,” Cappernique calls out in his heavy French Canadian accent.
“Richard, go skate somewhere else for fuckssake,” the ref barks out, gliding to a halt in between me and the Thunder bench.He glares, so I know he’s truly sick of my shit tonight.
I don’t want to take any unnecessary penalties, so I blow the Thunder bench a kiss and start to skate away.But they aren’t done.Cappernique uses his native language to his advantage, knowing I’ll understand, but the American ref won’t.
In French, he yells, “Heroes don’t out people, Richard, you're drunk.”
I bristle.I don’t feel as much anger as I do shame, but then I hear someone answer him in a menacing growl, calling out in French, “You refuse to wear a pride jersey, Cappernique, so I’ll take Richard as an ally over you any day.Now shut your fucking hole, or someone might stick their dick in it.”
“Everyone stop with the French, or I’ll give you all penalties,” the ref yells, and I skate toward the person who spoke up—Xavier Gagne.
