by Naomi Niles
“Okay,” I told Gaz. “I’m gonna focus better now. I’m gonna do better. Just…get everyone else to take it up a notch, and we’ll smash it out of the park.” There was a determination in my tone, a real need to do that, but somehow when I got back into the game,it didn’t quite play out. I was still unable to keep my focus on the practice and the worse that became, the angrier I got. The angrier I got, the worse I played – it was a vicious circle that I couldn’t escape from.
“Miles,” Coach Jordan yelled out over everyone else as practice drew to a close. “Come into my office.”
I hung my head as soon as those words left his lips, knowing that I was in for a whole range of bullshit. I only ever got called into an office for a scream fest and this wasn’t going to be any different…and the worst part was I knew that I deserved it.
“I’m sorry, Coach,” I tried to get my excuses in before he could yell, but it was clear that wasn’t going to happen. He had a whole load of pent up frustration and I was about to be on the receiving on of it no matter what. “I didn’t—”
“Don’t fucking start,” he warned me. “You’ve been fucking up for the last few weeks now. I don’t feel like your head has been in it since New Year’s.”
I thought over his words, realizing that he was right. Things had been different since I met Danielle, and that was starting to affect my career – the one thing that I’d spent my entire life working towards. If I lost that, I wouldn’t have anything. I needed to fucking sort out my priorities, and soon! I might have been wrapped up in Danielle, but it was never going to be forever, and soon enough she would leave.
I didn’t want her to go, and for me to be left with nothing. That would be the absolute worst outcome of this scenario.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize, there is no sorry. Sorry isn’t fucking good enough,” I felt awful, because I knew that he was right. “You need to man up and get your focus back on hockey. Get rid of everything in your life that’s not necessary. No more going out, no women, no booze – period. You’re the leader of this team and we have some hard-ass games coming up. Stop dicking around, all right?”
His words rang deep within me because I knew how true they were. I did need to start concentrating on keeping my career – especially after I fought for it so hard after the Hailey scandal. I feared that was going to screw everything up for me, but it didn’t, so I certainly didn’t want to make that mistake myself.
“I promise,” I said seriously. “I will sort it out, Coach. Things will be different from here on out.”
“The team needs you,” he told me what I already knew, but I nodded regardless, wanting him to see how much attention I was paying to him. “They need you to be their leader, and you always have been that, but this Christmas, something had changed, and whatever that is, I need you to get it back.”
He gave me a curious look, but I did my best to keep my emotions inside. I didn’t want him to know that this was all because of some random chick – he would rip me to shreds if he found out. Especially when he discovered that she wouldn’t even be around for much longer. He would literally kill me for being such an idiot.
“I will.You’ll see a big change in me, Coach, promise.”
With that, he sent me on my way and I hopped into the shower. I was grateful that the boys were already done and gone so that I could have a moment alone to sort my head out. I really needed to rearrange my thoughts, to stop thinking about Danielle – and that was the kick up the ass that I so desperately needed to do that. There was no escaping the fact that she would be gone very soon, so what I needed to do was stop seeing her now.
Urgh, but I really didn’t want to do that. I wanted to be with her, to spend every day with her, and it was honestly gutting that I was being forced to choose.
I wanted some advice, and there was only one person that I could get it from.
*****
“Beer?” Sean asked me across the bar, and I shook my head sadly, not wanting to fuck up right away. I’d been given some advice, and I really felt like it was within my best interests to follow that – at least until the next few games were done.
“No, get me a coke,” I decided. “Coach gave me some shit today about drinking too much and partying too hard, so I need to reel it in before it fucks everything up.”
As Sean handed me my drink, he gave me a weird look. “What’s going on, bro?” He asked curiously. “You seem real pissed off; is it because of the no partying thing?”
“No,” I admitted, sighing deeply. “It’s Danielle.”
“Oh yeah? What’s going on with her?”
“Well, we’ve been getting really close recently, spending a lot of time together, and honestly if things were different I could really see us being together. Like I haven’t even thought about Hailey since she’s been around.” Only Sean could know exactly what that meant. “I don’t know; I guess it’s just screwing with my head a bit, and it’s taking my focus off of hockey. That’s the main reason I got in shit today. Coach doesn’t know that’s what has my focus, but it is.”
“Dude, I have to be honest with you,” Sean responded, slumping back in his seat and giving me an intense look that spoke volumes. “Even if you don’t really like it.”
“I want you to be,” I reassured him. “I need you to be honest. I’m driving myself mental with all of this and I need you to give it to me straight.”
“Okay, well then I think you know that you need to let this chick go.” As he confirmed exactly what I thought he would, I couldn’t stop my heart from sinking in dismay. Of course he was right, and rationally I knew that, but I couldn’t help how I felt inside – there wasn’t anything that I could do about that. “I think that she might be great, and a whole load of fun, but she lives in San Diego, and you live here. There just isn’t any way around that, any way that you can make it work.”
“You’re right,” I muttered as a reply. “I know that, I mean my whole life has always been about hockey, and that’s never going to change. I honestly don’t know why I’ve gotten so wrapped up in all of this.”
“Because, dude, she’s hot and sweet. Funny too.She’s the best chick that you’ve ever met, and she’s made you forget about your horrible past too, but that doesn’t make her right for you. I know it sucks to hear, but you do need to rearrange your priorities.”
“You’re the only one that could tell me that without me getting mad,” I admitted to him, taking a swig of my drink. “But I know that I needed to hear it.”
At that precise moment, a message beeped up on phone from Danielle, making my heart flutter like crazy.
‘Hey, thank you for last night, that was an amazing date. Can’t wait to see you again soon, Danielle.’
Urgh, it was such a her message – sweet and kind, caring too – but I was going to have to ignore it. I slid my phone back into my pocket quickly, not wanting to even give myself the opportunity to waver. I needed to keep strong, to keep avoiding Danielle, and soon enough she would go back home and we would both move on and forget about one another.
Well maybe not forget, but hopefully move on.
“So, tell me about you,” I turned the conversation back around to Sean, wanting the focus off of me. I knew what I needed to do now, and I just needed to stick to it. There was no need to rehash it over and over again.
As Sean droned on endlessly about his girlfriend, who was clearly very quickly becoming the love of his life, I allowed my brain to wander, to think about where I’d been going wrong with hockey, and the list was absolutely endless. I was normally so hard on myself that it drove me crazy, but I hadn't been doing that recently, which was clearly where I’d been going wrong.
By the time I arrived back in my own apartment, my brain was solely consumed by everything sports. It was as if it had filled my entire brain, so there was no more room for anything else, which was exactly the way that I always used to be. I thought about plays, passes, strategies, becoming excited by
the game once more.
Until my phone started ringing.
As I saw Danielle’s name fill my screen, my fingers itched to answer it, and it took everything that I had within me to resist. I had to really hold myself back because I was so desperate to hear her voice once more, but that was what I needed to do.
Chapter 24
Danielle – Thursday
As I woke up the next morning, the first thing I did was grab hold of my phone, wanting to see if I had finally got an answer back from Miles, but my phone was still frustratingly empty – devoid of missed calls or messages.
I slumped back onto the pillow, feeling that horrible, gnawing sadness consume me once more. Why was Miles ignoring me all of a sudden? It made no sense. It felt to me like we’d had a really nice date, which admittedly was cut short, and then…nothing. No communication, just radio silence, and it was driving me insane. We both knew how little time I had left in Minnesota, and I was under the impression that we both wanted to spend as much time together as possible, but it seemed like I was wrong.
Was I just a piece of ass to him? Someone to have fun with? It hadn't ever seemed that way, but then admittedly, as I’d proven in the past, my judgment couldn’t be trusted for shit, so maybe I’d been fooled all over again.
If that was the case – this would hurt a hundred times worse. I put so much more into Miles than I ever have done anyone else, and it would kill me if it was going to be thrown back in my face.
Then again, what did I expect? I saw firsthand what Marek was like with Cynthia. I should have known from that moment that Miles would do the same to me. They were friends and teammates after all; it made sense that they would all run the same game.
I huffed loudly and glanced over to Cynthia’s bed, hating that it was empty now. She’d gotten back home okay, and was progressing towards making her real life better, which made me happy for her, but I couldn’t help missing her like crazy. Minnesota just wasn’t the same without her, and for half a second, I considered leaving early too, but then I was struck with the horrible thought of sitting in my dorm room alone, without Kim for company, and I shook that idea from my brain. That wouldn’t be any better than this – I would still be left alone with my thoughts, and I wouldn’t have any hope when it came to Miles either.
I didn’t want to leave constantly wondering what if.
I slumped down the stairs to get some breakfast, and was disappointed to see my parents already at the table, glancing at me with annoyance in their eyes. They never bothered to hid that they didn’t like anything that I did, which really pissed me off. I couldn’t understand why they were so bothered, why they felt like they had to interfere, why they couldn’t just love me for who I was in the way that every other mom and dad did.
“Morning,” I muttered, pouring myself a bowl of cereal.
Before I had even parked my butt on the nearest seat, my dad started with the pressure all over again. “Your mother and I are going to a conference today where you can meet doctors in every area of the profession. You should come with us, see if you get any inspiration.”
“No thank you,” I shot back quickly. “I’m never going to be a doctor, so it would be a massive waste of time.” I resisted the urge to roll my eyes and shake my head, not wanting this to turn into a massive argument.
“Why? What else are you going to do today? I haven’t seen you studying once! All you’ve done is party and mess about with that boy. Why not spend at least one day doing something productive?”
“That boy?” I gasped out, remembering my dad fawning all over him while he was here – acting like a crazy super fan. “Dad, I work my butt off at college. You might not think what I do is important, but I do, and I’m very dedicated to it. I’m not going to change my mind about my future whatever you want me to do, so to be honest, going to the conference would be the biggest waste of time I experience all winter. I’m also entitled to some time off, and also some fun. I didn’t see you jumping down Cynthia’s throat for doing exactly the same as me.”
“Actually, Cynthia partied a bit, but I often saw her with her head in a text book too – maybe if you’d been around, you would have noticed that.”
I pushed my chair back nosily and left the room in a huff, stalking back up to the safety of my bedroom. How dare my dad speak to me like that? It was almost as if he didn’t know me at all! I paced my room for a while, allowing the anger to stew within me, so much so that by the time I heard the front door shutting and my parents going out, I felt like I needed to get outside to burn off some of the energy that I’d stored up inside.
I grabbed hold of the ice skates, without even thinking, and headed out onto the lake outside. I just wanted to focus on something that would take all of my attention away from my problems, and since it was damn near impossible for me to even stand up on the ice, it felt like the best way to do that.
At first, I fell a few times, struggling to maintain my balance, but the more I put into it, the quicker it started to make sense to me, and in the end I was managing to get myself right across the rink without tumbling even once.
As I did it more than once, a sense of pride filled me, and I found myself bordering on ecstatic. I was so excited to have developed a new skill, especially as it was my original link to Miles, and in my pure joy, I grabbed hold of my phone, wanting to tell him. I wanted him to know that all of his hard work had paid off, and that I had it cracked, but then I looked at my still-blank screen, and I remembered that for some reason, he didn’t want to talk to me.
I knew in that moment that I was done with ice skating for the day, so I slowly and sadly made my way indoors. I wasn’t one to normally drink in the afternoon, but I felt like I needed something to take the edge off, so I grabbed a beer from the fridge and slumped onto the couch.
I clicked the TV on, wanting to lose myself in something for the moment, but as luck would have it, the channel was already on some sports channel that my dad must have been watching anyway, and the game that was playing featured Miles’s team.
I held up the remote, wanting to instantly switch it off, but something had me captivated, and I couldn’t quite do it. I found myself wanting to watch him, despite the sadness that was coursing through my veins.
Could this have been the reason that Miles hadn't been in touch?
Maybe he’d been so distracted by hockey that he hadn't even had the chance to check his phone yet. Maybe he hadn't wanted to be distracted by me again.Maybe there was some very innocent reason, and I was just overreacting.
I wanted to believe those positive arguments, I needed to have some form of hope to cling onto, but I also didn’t want to be naïve.
I needed some advice. I needed to speak to Cynthia.
I grabbed my phone and dialed her number without even thinking, wanting to hear her voice. As I waited for her to answer, I kept my eyes trained on the screen, noticing what a monster he was on the pitch, and I couldn’t help but feel impressed. He was good on the day that I saw him, but this was something else – he was playing a million times better!
“Hello?” Cynthia answered, sounding lighter than air. All of the stress from her time in Minnesota was long gone, and it sounded like she was really working towards a positive future for herself. “How are you doing, Danielle?”
“I’m good,” I lied, not wanting to delve right into it. “How are you?”
“I’m much better now,” she told me honestly. “I have all my stuff back from Derek’s, and actually seeing each other wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. It seems like all the pain subsided during my time away, so we could just be adults about it.”
“Well that’s good,” I murmured idly.
“And I went back to work today – that was good. It felt right to be back in the hospital; it helped me to put everything behind me.” She paused for a second, before jumping right into what I wanted to talk about. “How are things with you anyway? Is Miles still behaving himself?”
“Erm…I don’t kn
ow,” I admitted. “I’m a bit confused right now.”
“Tell me about it,” she said, making me feel a little more relaxed about jumping right into my story.
“I don’t know, I just…” I tried to think of the best way to start this, but it had all become scrambled in my brain. “We were having such a nice time, hanging out, dating, hooking up, and then yesterday he just didn’t answer any of my calls or texts. I haven’t heard from him at all.”
“Well, what happened the last time you saw him?” she asks curiously.
“We were on a really nice date, and I wanted to go back to his, but he said he had early practice…and that’s it. I thought it was normal, so I didn’t pay too much attention to it, and he is playing a game right now…do you think I’m overreacting?”
“Look, you’re going to be back at college again soon enough;maybe it’s time to stop worrying so much about what he’s doing and what he’s thinking.” She sounded so rational and put together that I couldn’t help but listen. “I can’t tell you what’s going through his mind, but I can tell you that you’re going to be out of one another’s lives soon. It’s time to remember that this was just a fling, just a bit of fun, and now it’s time to get home, back to real life.”
“You’re right,” I nodded as I replied. “I know you are, I’m just acting crazy.”
“Nowhere near as crazy as I did with Marek,” she tried to reassure me. “At least Miles is actually a semi decent person. Marek is horrible. He has been nothing but a douche bag.”
“Has he been back in touch?” I gasped in surprise, not expecting this at all.
“Erm, well I did message him to tell him that I’m not pregnant after all, just because I wanted him to know, I felt like it was right, but I got a whole load of abuse back, so I blocked his number. I have no reason to speak to him now, and he has no reason to contact me either.” Wow, she sounded so wise, so put together, and I couldn’t wait until I got to that part myself. “I just want to forget about him now, and move on. You’ll get there soon enough.”