“Wanting to help is fine. Losing yourself in the process isn't.” She sat down next to me on the bed, and I could feel the shift from athletic trainer to friend happening in real time. “I need you to promise me that you're taking care of yourself too. That you're not putting his needs so far ahead of your own that you forget you matter.”
The words hit harder than I'd expected, and I had to look away before she could see how much they'd landed. “I'm trying.”
“Try harder.” She stood up and grabbed her medical bag, all business again. “You're cleared to play. Physically, you're in great shape. Mentally, you need to get your head out of whatever spiral it's in and focus on the game. The Wolves need their captain today, not a guy who's too busy worrying about someone else to lead.”
“I know.”
“Good.” She headed for the door but stopped before leaving, turning back to look at me with an expression that was equal parts concern and determination. “And Rook? If you need to talk about any of this—the guy, the past, whatever—I'm here. Don't let it eat you alive just because you think you're supposed to handle everything alone.”
She left before I could respond, and I sat there in the quiet hotel room trying to figure out how the fuck I was supposed to lock all of this down long enough to get through Game One without my head betraying me.
The arena wasa wall of noise the second we hit the ice for warm-ups, thousands of Montreal fans screaming themselves hoarse before the puck had even dropped. The Maples' home crowd was infamous for being loud and hostile and absolutely relentlesswhen they smelled blood, and I could feel the energy pressing down on us like a physical weight.
I went through the warm-up routine on autopilot—skating drills, passing patterns, a few shots on Saint to get my timing dialed in—but my brain kept slipping sideways into thoughts that had nothing to do with hockey.
The puck dropping for real snapped me back into focus, but the static didn't disappear. It just got quieter, humming underneath everything else like white noise I couldn't fully tune out.
The Maples came out fast and aggressive. I read the play developing and called for a line change, but I was half a second too slow and they capitalized on it, forcing Saint into a save that should have been routine but felt too close.
“Tighten up!” I shouted to the bench, but I could hear the frustration in my own voice.
Their center was fast, mouthy, and talented enough to be dangerous when we gave him room. He chirped at me during a face-off, grinning like he knew exactly how to get under my skin.
“Heard you guys barely made it past the first round last year,” he said. “Guess we'll see if you learned anything since then.”
I won the draw and sent it back to Dmitri without responding, because engaging with trash talk when my head wasn't in the game would only make things worse. But the comment sat there anyway, adding to the noise already crowding my brain.
The first period dragged on in a blur of missed chances and defensive scrambles that made my jaw ache from clenching. We weren't playing badly, exactly, but we weren't playing well either. The Wolves needed to come out swinging in this series, and instead we were barely holding even against a team that was reading us too fucking easily.
I kept drifting. Kept losing half-seconds to thoughts that had no place on the ice.
A hit from behind knocked me into the boards hard enough to rattle my teeth, and I came up swinging before I'd fully registered who'd delivered it. The Maples' defenseman backed off with his hands raised, grinning like he'd accomplished exactly what he'd set out to do.
“Easy, Captain,” the ref warned. “Keep it clean.”
I skated away before I could do anything stupid, but the anger was useful. Better than the drift. Better than the static eating up space in my head while we were supposed to be taking control of this game.
Coach pulled me aside during the next whistle, and I could see the concern in his expression even before he said anything.
“You need to lock it down, Rook.”
“I know. I'm working on it.”
“Work faster.” He clapped me on the shoulder and sent me back out, and I felt the weight of his words settle over me like a challenge I couldn't afford to fail.
The Maples scored first midway through the second period on a deflection that beat Saint clean, and the arena erupted into noise so loud it felt like the building was shaking. I watched the goal light up and felt fury rise in my chest.
This was unacceptable. We were better than this. I was better than this.
I called the team in during the next stoppage, pulling them close enough that I could see every face clearly.
“Listen up,” I said, and my voice cut through the noise with enough authority that everyone went quiet. “We're playing scared right now. We're reacting instead of dictating, and they're eating us alive because of it. That stops now.”
“They're fast—” Finn started, but I cut him off.
“So are we. They want to play physical? We'll play physical right back.” I looked around the circle, making eye contact with each of them. “We came here to take Game One and prove we belong in this series. So let's stop fucking around and do it.”
The energy shifted immediately, and I could see the resolve settling into their expressions. This was what they needed—not panic, not hesitation, but a captain who believed they could win and was willing to drag them there if necessary.
