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God, I fucking hate him. My body trembles with rage and humiliation, but I refuse to let him see that it’s getting to me. I am not a victim, not anymore.
I get back in the game, racing after the puck and blocking a pass. I turn to hustle back up the ice, making it about halfway before I slam into a hard body. A shoulder gets me in the middle of the chest, and my face hits his helmet. White hot pain explodes across my face as my ass hits the ice, blood gushes from my nose and tears fill my eyes.
“Fuck!” I cup my face and lay on the ice for a second. There are whistles blown and people yelling, but I can’t see shit. I can barely fucking breathe! I think he broke my fucking nose!
From the sounds of the yelling and grunts, a fight has broken out, and I’m pissed I can’t get my own shot in at Chad’s fucking face. EMTs come out on the ice and pull my hands off my face. One of them shoves some gauze against my nose, and I yell as the pain intensifies.
“That fucking hurts!”
“How’s your neck?” a male voice asks, pushing on my neck.
“I’m fine,” I growl as I push his hands off and sit up. The crowd cheers, and I pull my gloves off so I can wipe my eyes enough to be able to see. Four of our guys and five of the other team are in the penalty box, and I can’t help but smile despite the blood dripping down my chin. Preston, Jeremy, Willis, and Carpenter are looking unamused behind the glass but, fuck, I love those guys.
I’m helped up, still holding the gauze to my face, and I leave the ice for the back where I can be looked at closer. On my way off the ice, I see Coach Williams screaming at a ref and Chad with a towel pressed to his forehead in the penalty box.
Scott, one of the assistant coaches, pulls my skates off, and I sit on the gurney for the EMTs.
A man with black hair pulled back in a man bun takes the gauze and looks at my nose.
“Yeah, that’s broken,” he tells his partner. To me he says, “Lay back, you’re going in.”
I drop my head forward to hang from my shoulders. “Come on, man. Just numb it up and reset it.”
“Absolutely not.” He shakes his head, and I huff. Fuck’s sake. “Can I get a change of clothes?” I holler at Scott who gives me a thumbs-up and heads back into the locker room. I’m sure he’ll meet me at the hospital. I don’t know how he got tasked with medical duty, but he’s always the one who goes when someone gets hurt.
In the ambulance, I take my jersey off one arm so they can get my blood pressure, I’m asked a hundred questions, and they call it in to the ER. Maybe once they release me, I can sneak upstairs to see Paul since I won’t be back in time to play the rest of the game anyway.
The ER is busy since it’s a Friday night, and I’m already frustrated. The blood on my shirt gets some looks, and it’s starting to itch as it dries on my skin.
I get moved to a bed, and the EMTs leave to go back to the game. A nurse comes in with a folded sheet and gown.
“Can you get changed yourself, or do you need assistance?” She looks a little frazzled, so I don’t try playing with her.
“I can do it.”
She puts them on the foot of the bed, and I start stripping out of my gear. Now that the adrenaline is fading, my face hurts like a bitch. It’s still bleeding pretty good too, so I get blood on fucking everything before sitting back down.
I push the call button on the bed when blood starts running down my arm.
The nurse opens the curtain, takes a look at me, and without a question grabs more gauze. She tosses it on the bed, then puts gloves on and takes the dripping pads from me and disposes of them in the biohazard container.
She asks me another twenty questions, then tells me the doctor will be in to see me in a minute.
Dr. Nora Prow comes in and cocks her head at me. “Hello again.”
I nod at her as she puts on gloves, asks me the same questions I’ve already answered twice, then takes the gauze from me.
“Okay, we’re going to get the ENT doctor in here to take a look at you.” She puts the gauze back, takes her gloves off, and leaves my bed.
It’s hopping in here, but luckily, they don’t make me wait long. Another doctor with a mop of curly dark hair comes into the room putting on gloves.
“Hello, I’m Dr. Gray. I’m the ear, nose, and throat doctor. Can you tell me what happened?”
I groan but tell the story again while he takes a look at my nose and feels around, then presses on my forehead, cheeks, and eyes.
“Okay, let’s get a CT scan,” he says to the nurse I didn’t notice come in. “If that comes back clear, we’ll set this and use a Rhino Rocket to stop the bleeding.”
She asks something I don’t understand, and he agrees.
