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“Oh,wedo.” Madison’s smirk makes me want to grind my teeth together. “But not our perfect big sister. She has a different set of standards.”
I turn my attention away from my sisters and back to my dishes. They’re clean now. I could dry them off and put them away, but I open the door to my tiny dishwasher and load the plates and cutlery into the bottom rack. My movements aren’t graceful, and I bang two of the plates together, lucky that nothing chips as I add detergent and slam the appliance closed.
Two sets of honey-brown eyes are staring at me when I turn back to face them. Identical shit-eating grins aimed in my direction.
“It’s been a long day,” Hayley says, covering her mouth and the fakest yawn I’ve ever seen. “I have a neuro exam coming up and need to do some more studying.”
“And I’m going to go binge-watch bad reality television until I pass out,” Madison says, and then they’re up and moving toward the front door as if they can’t get away from me fast enough.
Hayley pulls the door open and Mads turns around before she follows our sister into the hallway.
“What’s the name of that place where we got our nails done?” She glances down at the chipped polish on her fingers. “I need a new manicure but couldn’t remember where we go.”
“JJ’s on second,” I tell her, pressing my own hands flat against the quartz countertop. “You have to call them, Mads. They don’t take walk-ins.”
My little sister twists her mouth to the side, not quite a pout, but not thrilled with the news that she’ll have to pick up the phone and call someone. Spoiled brat. And I’m the one who spoiled her.
“Fine. I’ll call them in the morning. It’s what, like twenty dollars?”
“You can grab sixty from my wallet.” I tell her and her face morphs into a sweet smile as she reaches for my purse and grabs three crisp bills.
“You’re the best, Tris. I love you most!” She calls as the door slams closed behind both her and Hayley and I lean forward to press my forehead to the cool stone.
I don’t let anyone at work walk over me the way I let my babies do, but I can’t help it. It’s always been my job to take care of them. To spoil them. To love them. I spread my fingers wide, feeling the chill seep into my skin. They’re still in college, still focusing on their educations. I can’t shove them out of the nest while they’re preparing for the rest of their lives.
But I do have the urge to call them back and tell them they were wrong. I didn’t hate Vic from the start. There was a time when I liked him. When I looked to him first. Then I gave him a chance and he left me stranded. Chris has made his choices clear. Vic’s the best option right now, for this project, but I’d be a fool if I wasn’t worried that he’d let me down again. I’d be a fool to trust him again. Forgive, but don’t forget.
I’m no fool.
“Keep your head up, Spaeglin. God fucking dammit.”
I pop my mouth guard down and chew on the rubbery end to avoid laughing as the rookie gets slammed at the blue line. My co-captain doesn’t drop his head into his hands, but it’s a near miss as the kid lies sprawled across the ice, arms spread wide, helmet askew. He held onto his stick even as his skates left the ground after the rough hit from Gage.
“Someone should check his head.” We’ve all been through the concussion protocols enough times that we can distinguish between an emergency that requires calling an ambulance and one that just needs a trip to the ER. “We’re already down Haine for the foreseeable future. Can’t afford to lose the rookie, too.”
Robbie grunts but makes no move to go over the boards to check on our teammate.
Normally this kind of thing wouldn’t be our responsibility, but practice ended a good hour ago, and I know for a fact that the trainers didn’t stick around. Marge, the sweet lady who handles our accommodations when the team travels, has a cake in the main office for her sixty-fifth birthday and the staff descended on it like starving hyenas. There’s a handful of players who stay behind after practice is called. Coach put the fear of god in us during our first official team meeting—don’t even think about getting injured doing dumbass shit—but I think he knew better than to tell us not to skate. It would be like telling us not to breathe.
There’s a reason guys like me, Robbie, Spaeglin, Ahlstrom, Maroni, Ólaffson, and Gage have made it as far as we have. Part of it is talent. I don’t say that to sound arrogant, but balancing on blades thinner than an inch wide takes a certain amount of natural skill. Part of it is luck. Most players are big guys, and I don’t just mean muscles. We’re tall. We’re built solid. Sure, you get the occasional teammate who stands under five foot nine, but you’re just as likely to have a teammate over six foot seven. Zdeno Chára had to get a special exemption from the league to play with a longer-than-regulation stick. He’s six foot nine. The National Hockey League only offers exemptions to players over six foot six. Even I’m an inch shorter than the requirement.
The rest of what gets us to the ice? Passion. For skating, for the ice, for the speed, the hits, the energy of the crowd… A lot of grueling hours go into training to be any kind of professional athlete. Talent and size alone don’t change the love we need to have for the game. So, no, Coach knew better than to ban the team from the ice during off hours—he played almost a decade with Ottawa, Dallas, and Buffalo, so he knows—but we’re not supposed to be doing anything dumb. Like playing two v two just because we can.
“Oakes,” I eye the kid still splayed out on the frozen surface. “He could be unconscious.”
Robbie grunts and his dark brows pull together as he leans his weight on the butt end of his stick.
He points out over the ice just as Spaeglin’s arm twitches, gloved fingers closing around the shaft of his stick. The kid crunches up to sit, a feat difficult in hockey pants and pads, and shakes his head like a dog that just dove into a questionable body of water to chase a stick.
“Getting up doesn’t mean he didn’t have his bell rung,” I say as the rookie levers to his feet.
It doesn’t look like he’s all that steady, but even from forty-five feet away I can see the kid’s blinding grin. If the idiot took out his mouth guard out, he’s just asking for future implants. I don’t care how good our dental plan is, and okay; I care, but I’m not losing any teeth I don’t have to.
“He’s fine,” Robbie says, as Gage loops around to offer a fist bump to the teammate he just flattened
“Slow to get up,” I say. “You know as well as I do, Mark would have him run through at least the twenty-four-hour protocol for that alone.”
We don’t have a game for two more days, but missing practice isn’t great either.
