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We head out to the third period. First string still has time on the box, so second string lines up as the buzzer starts play. The first two minutes are back to normal play, tempers in check, but when we score, something changes. The penalties come off the board, and our first string start to sub back in, amping up the energy, grudge matches playing out in snide comments and needless checks.
Bryce Barrymore, returned to the game, comes barreling at me several times, taking several fast, sharp shots that I stop easily. After the fourth, he bares his teeth at me, hissing like some wild animal. All I can do is roll my eyes behind my mask, watching the puck as it moves across the ice.
With just under three minutes to go, we score again when Viktor rails a beauty of a snapshot top shelf into their net. The big Russian doesn’t score a ton of goals as an enforcer, but when he does, like tonight, it’s especially timely.
Moments later, a fight nearly breaks out to my right, Bryce Barrymore manages to get through the melee with the puck, flying down the ice at a wickedly fast speed.
Dangerous speed.
Is this fucker gonna slow it down?
He does not.
Rushing at me unchecked, wearing a shit-eating wolf’s grin on his face, the ignorant fool bodyblasts himself into my net.
And me.
I know how to stop a puck, but a full-grown man hell-bent on beating the shit out of everyone on our team?
Not so likely.
I get shoved into the back of my net, the whole arena erupting into a chorus of boos. It’s patently uncool to check or hit a goalie, of which Barrymore is fully aware. So even for a cocky rookie, it’s a complete shock getting blasted in my own net. In my own fucking house.
This kid has a death wish.
Rattled and stunned down on the ice, I try to push back up to my feet, but there’s no space for me to manage it before a violent scrum has formed all around me. My teammates coming for Barrymore was a given; they’re gonna want to spill some blood on my behalf. I can only make out Tyler, Viktor, and hothead Mikhail raging to get at him. The rest are a blur of bodies in a melee exploding out from the blue paint and beyond.
I hold out a padded arm to block myself from the blows being thrown in the fight, but Barrymore shoots out his elbow, knocking my helmet off my head.
The last thing I see is that feral grin of his…and his fist.
* * *
I come to slowly,first with an antiseptic smell in my nostrils. I move my fingers and they feel swollen. As I open my eyes, my vision takes a moment to clear, but only in one eye. I reach up slowly, feeling a bandage over my left eye, the eye that took a straight punch from a rookie’s fist.
Sitting up too quickly, my head spins, and I lean over and vomit onto the floor. It’s just a bit of water, but it still feels wretched coming up.
A nurse appears. “You’ve got a nice concussion,” she says. “Might not want to move too quickly.”
I groan in response, lying back, hands on my stomach as I will my head to stop spinning. When I feel like I can speak, I ask, “My eye? How can I play with only one eye?”
“I’m just here to check your vitals,” she answers as she takes my temperature. “I’ll let the doctor know you’re awake. She can tell you more.”
I lie back, unsatisfied and unsettled, falling in and out of sleep for I don’t know how long. The next time I come to, Billie is there, at my side, holding my hand.
“Hey, handsome,” she says quietly.
“Mmm, beautiiiiful Biiiiillie.”
“How you feeling?” She gives me a soft laugh, probably at my silly greeting. I know I sound out of it, even to my ears.
“Been better.”
“I bet,” she says. “That was a real cheap shot.”Have I ever heard such anger in Billie’s voice? Is that for me?
“Hate that kid,” I say, gritting my teeth at the pain in my head.
“Don’t blame you. Hope he never gets to play again.”
