“Oh, no!” Ryan yells out beside me.
“Baby looks like he might throw up again,” Ivanov says.
I roll my eyes at both of them. “I’m not going to throw up.”
“You might,” Roysy says. “You had two helpings of chicken parm.”
Clemmers nods his head and smiles his toothless grin. “It was quite good. Would be a waste for you to puke it up.”
“I’m. Not. Going. To. Throw. Up.”
“If you say so,” Ryan says and taps me on the butt with his stick as he skates away.
“Remember,” Ivanov says as he places his goalie-gloved hand on my head. “Aim for the other team’s garbage can.”
Okay, I do kind of feel like I might get sick. But that’s how I always feel before a game. It’s just pregame jitters. Part of my routine. And apparently, it’s now part of the team’s routine to tease me about it. I guess I really have become one of them.
“Well, look who it is,” Richie says to me and Ryan as we reach the face-off dot at center ice. “If it isn’t the happy couple.”
“McDaniel,” Ryan says, his tone cool and dismissive. “Fancy seeing you here. I hadn’t realized your suspension was up.”
“You knew damn well my suspension was up,” McDaniel spits.
“To be honest,” Ryan says, “I didn’t even register your absence from the last two games. You know, the ones where we beat your team, twice.”
“Fuck you, asshole,” McDaniel says. He looks at me. His eyes are angry, and his skin is flushed red. “I hope you’re ready to fight tonight, Brando. No turtling up again this time.”
A ref blows his whistle and skates between us, creating some distance. “That’s enough,” he says and stares right at McDaniel. “Cool off, or I’ll send you back to your bench.” He then turns to me and Ryan. “And stop instigating.”
Ryan points at McDaniel with his stick. “He started it. All I wanted to do was get this game going. Let my face-off win speak for me.”
“Well, now’s your chance, Christianson,” the ref says and holds up the puck. “Everyone, get into position. This game starts in five…”
Ryan
“Four… three… two…”
The puck drops on “one” and I get my stick on it well before Richie even realizes it’s hit the ice. I send it out behind me to where I know Brandon is waiting. And he’s off like lightning. O’Shea is right in line with him on the left side of the ice.
We beat Minnesota into their offensive zone, but their goalie is ready for us. I shouldn’t be surprised. He’s had three games to figure us out. Three games to get used to my line rushing towards him as fast as we can.
Brandon passes the puck across the ice, landing it perfectly on the tape of O’Shea’s stick. He fakes left, then slides right and releases the perfect wrist shot that unfortunately hits the crossbar, sending a loud pinging sound across the ice.
The puck deflects towards the boards where O’Shea dashes to it and ends up in a wall battle with Minnesota’s biggest defenseman. I skate over to help him out, crashing into the Minnesota player, causing him to lose some of the control he had over the battle.
O’Shea seizes that chance and chips the puck to Brandon, who’s waiting in front of the net. There are three Minnesota players surrounding him, including McDaniel.
But Brandon is quick, and he gets his stick on the puck just enough to flick it past their goalie and into the net. It wasn’t a pretty goal, but goddamn, was it a good one.
Brandon
Over the sound of the goal horn blaring and our packed barn of fans cheering, I can’t make out what Richie is taunting me with.
I can, however, feel his anger when he uses his stick to cross-check me across my chest.
Ryan appears at my side, skating to a sharp stop. He pushes Richie. “That was a dirty shot.”
“What are you? Brandon’s babysitter?” Richie asks. He eyes Ryan up and down.
