Page 49 of Offside

Things just weren’t progressing anymore–Landon was holding Sam back at a certain point because he wanted Metal. He missed Metal too much, and I missed him too much–it was the perfect storm.

The plan evolved to maybe trying to make Metal distance himself from him, to make room for Sam, but that also went out the window from the first call. I couldn’t hear Landon cry like that and ask me for the most basic thing in the world and not just give it to him.

I was so in love with him that I needed to find a way to keep feeling it.

So the plan evolved one more time.

Wait him out until we met and just pretend it was a surprise to me, too.

Yes, not my proudest moment, but it was the only way I saw this working out for me. I could try and make him get there on his own, too, but then who knew how he’d react?

This worked out the best because then no one was keeping anything from anyone.

We found out together and dealt with it together.

“Shit–sorry,” I grumbled, bumping into Sean–my replacement Landon– again.

“It’s good, man,” Sean beamed, unaffected by the fact that we kind of sucked.

I missed Landon on a lot of different sides.

It was just practice, but Sean and I needed it. We’d been playing okay for the most part, but I wanted to be better. I wanted Landon to have the playoffs to actually come back for, and right now, it didn’t look so good for the Sharks.

We were fighting for the bottom wildcard slot–that was pretty embarrassing. We’d been holding on to one of the top three spots all season, but Landon got hurt and then Jayden.

Banning tried to pair me with Shane while Jayden was out, but that went pretty badly for both of us.

He was too used to Jayden, and I’d found my stride with Landon, so we were both suffering with rookies.

Sean and I reset with Wes and Drew, trying again to make something out of nothing here. We crouched down and set up for our fake puck drop.

It was meant just to be practice–almost no contact.

The puck dropped, and a center shot it back to us, sending us off. Sean and I were doing okay with passing and doing okay with shooting, but we just didn’t trust one another to be where we needed them.

Sean should have been to my right, but I didn’t trust it. I stopped too quickly and tried to realign–to go fill the space he should have been in–but I should have just trusted him.

We crashed into one another again, only this time it was a hard hit. We both went down fully, but mine happened in a beautifully clumsy way that involved twisting my ankle and falling on it.

A sharp pain shot up through my ankle, my foot feeling almost numb when I screamed out. My toes wouldn’t move, and even trying was making it hurt so much worse–I didn’t need the medic to tell me what I already knew.

I just broke my fucking ankle.

In practice…because I couldn’t just trust my partner.

“You fucking dumb ass,” Landon laughed, head tipped back, and so much amusement in his face that it almost made me not feel so dumb if it was making him smile that much. “You just missed me so much you had to injure yourself?”

“Just wanted more time off with you, buddy,” I joked, hitting his non-injured leg with my crutch playfully. The action only made him start laughing more. “Just shut up and invite me in to watch something–standing sucks right now.”

“I bet it does,” he snickered, waving me in past him to the couch.

Landon was set to start going back for no-contact practice on Monday, which only made this injury more amusing to him. I really just needed to deal with Sean for a little while longer.

And now, I was out for the playoffs, and Landon would have to run with Sean.

“Hope I’m not interrupting any private time,” I mused, dropping to his very comfy couch with my leg propped up.

“Nope,” Landon hummed, popping the end. “They’re at work right now, so I’ve been getting a few texts every couple of hours, but none since this morning, which is weird.”