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Maybe it’s not the smartest move in the world, especially with our history, but sometimes being rational just goes out of the window. It definitely does around her.
“Ace Brixton is gonna wanna wipe the floor with you tonight if you’re not careful,” Jay ever so tactfully informs me, like I don’t already know. “You gotta be sharper than the sharp.”
“Know it,” I say. “He hates me at the best of times, so I’m sure tonight will be no exception.”
And it definitely isn’t an exception.
There’s hostility in the air the second we get to the stadium.
Straight away, I feel the vibe is very different. And it isn’t because we’re not on home turf. Sure, that helps, but it’s because she’s not here.
I felt alive the other night knowing she was watching me.
More alive than I’ve ever felt.
Fuck.
I do not need to be feeling this way going into this game tonight.
I don’t even want to think aboutnotgetting into the finals.
“You know we’re the favorite to take the finals,” Ty says to me when we’re in the locker rooms. “We got this.”
I give him a look as I finish getting ready. “We better have it,” I say. “Everything depends on this.”
* * *
We get off to a rocky start. Seems like New York has upped their ante.
It seems like each shot we take, we’re blocked at every turn.
Ulrich is luckily on fire in the goals and probably bleeding out from all the shots he’s stopping.We have two reserve goalies on the ready, just in case.
The pressure tonight is insurmountable, to the point where I’ve no idea what it would feel like to actually lose this thing. All I see is the final.
I want it. I want it bad. And so does the rest of the team.
I put my mind into reset. Hushing down the crowd, quieting everything out.
I take some breaths during the second round and put myself into the zone… the zone of winning. I’m not even embarrassed to admit I use visualization techniques.
And I need it now, as we’re losing and we need to rein it in.
Coach Carter hauls us together before the third round and gives us one of his steely pep talks. Even he isn’t doing as much yelling as normal.
As we head back out onto the ice, I hear nothing at all. I see the faces of the crowd, their mouths moving as they chant and cheer, but I hear no sound.
The only person I even want to imagine in the crowd is Emmerson.
With that thought in my head, it’s like a bolt of lightning. Suddenly, things feel a little easier, my body lighter, and my mind not so full of any thoughts in particular.
It shouldn’t feel this way, but strangely, it does.
Suddenly, the game doesn’t appear to be as unwinnable as it did at the end of the second.
I would love to see the look on her face if we got into the finals, and I’m the one to take us there.
With a sense of renewal rushing through me, I stare at my opponent, Ace Brixton. He’s done nothing but slam me around tonight.
