I looked up, nausea quickly replacing my rage at the scene in front of me. I hadn’t noticed the silence which had descended over the crowds.
“Get the fuck off me!” Yanking myself free, I sprinted over to Felix, the medical team already assessing him, the stretcher getting ready to take him off.
I dropped to his side. His leg was sticking out at an unnatural angle, his arms thrown over his face contorted in pain and I gavesilent thanks that he was awake, which meant it was unlikely to be a head injury - or at least no serious concussion.
“Felix. Buddy, fuck, I’m so sorry. I’m with you.”
I got pushed to the side by one of the physicians as they continued checking him over, preparing him to be lifted.
“Crawley, move out of the way!”
I slid back, bumping against Jasper, and we watched our teammate lie there on the ice as half a dozen officials tended to him. I picked up his helmet which was lying by my skates and held onto it.
“Okay, on my count, lift him,” Doctor Beaumont, the team’s head physician, ordered his crew. “One, two, three.”
The backboard was slipped underneath Felix and he was strapped in, before they once again lifted him, placing him on the stretcher. The crowds clapped and the players on the benches banged their sticks against the boards as he was wheeled off.
I turned to the boys who were standing right next to me, their faces etched with the worry I felt deep in my belly. “This is bad. This is so fucking bad.”
Jasper dropped his head. “Yeah.”
We slowly started skating back to the bench. I looked around. “Where the fuck is Walls?”
“He was sent off. He’s in the locker room - match penalty,” replied Cooper.
“Good.”
“But you did too,” someone mumbled from behind me.
My head whipped round. “What?”
Before he could answer, Coach grabbed me, holding the back of my neck, checking my face and staring at me. “Crawley, you okay? You hurt?”
I shook my head. “I’m good, Coach.”
“Good, go back to the locker room and cool off.”
Fuck the locker room.
“I’m fine. Where’s Clevs?”
Coach narrowed his eyes at me in assessment. “He’s being loaded into the ambulance.”
“Can I go with him?”
“No,” he said in a tone that didn’t want messing with. “Go back to the locker room and get changed.”
“What about Walls?”
“He’s with the doctors. Looks like you broke his nose.”
At least that was something. I took perverse joy in knowing I’d provided some form of payback.Bitch.
“Good. I’ll do it again.”
“Drew! Locker room.Now. I’m not going to repeat myself.”
The buzzer went off, indicating the end of injury stoppage. Coach left me to sort the new lines for the remainder of the second, and I stormed off down the tunnel, ripping my jersey over my head, throwing it on floor somewhere. My shoulder pads followed, launched across the locker room as I kicked the doors open and threw myself down on the bench.
