Overtime: A Moo U Hockey Romance

by Kat Mizera

  “Great,” I muttered.

  “Don’t worry,” McHottie said. “I won’t let them get us. Come on.” He took my hand again and the group of us jogged off, going deeper into the woods.

  Technically, I should have known better than to go into the woods with a group of guys I didn’t know, but almost anything was preferable to getting in trouble again for drinking. I was only nineteen, and I’d gotten into my fair share of mischief the last couple of years, but this felt more serious. And for some strange reason, I trusted McHottie.

  I’d gone home to my parents’ house for the holiday break but had come back to tutor one of my regulars, a basketball player who couldn’t figure out basic algebra to save his life. Except he’d stood me up and then invited me to the party at the hockey house. I’d been tempted to drive back to my parents’ house in Brattleboro, but it had been snowing, so I’d decided what the hell? Now I regretted it. Well, not entirely. If I hadn’t come to the party, I wouldn’t have met McHottie.

  Stealing a glance at him, he looked familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. He had dark hair that touched his shoulders and a beard, but his nose was straight, lips full and defined, and his body… Well, I wouldn’t get started on that. I probably shouldn’t have even looked. My inexperienced self had no business checking out his muscular arms or well-rounded ass.

  “Where are we?” I panted. “I live in the dorms and walked to the party, so I can just go home.” I groaned. “Shit. No, I can’t. I left my purse at the party, so I don’t have my keys.”

  “We’re going to need to hang tight until the cops leave,” McHottie said. “Then we can swing by and get our stuff. I don’t even have a coat on.” He turned to me. “Are you cold?”

  “Not yet,” I replied, “but I figure I will be once we stop moving.”

  “We can go this way.” One of the other guys pointed. “It’ll bring us on campus behind the library. I’ve got my key card, so we can get in and hang out there.”

  Thankfully, the library was open twenty-four seven.

  We’d just come out of the woods and were on a path that led to campus when we ran into another group, including my friend Harley.

  “Your mom will kill you if you get arrested,” she said, laughing.

  “How did you know where I was? You weren’t at the party, were you?”

  “I was actually on my way there when I saw the cops. I made a quick U-ey and then figured a handful of you would make a break for it through the woods.” She paused, cocking her head. “I didn’t think you’d be one of them, though.”

  “I just fell in with a group making a run for it.” I glanced over at McHottie but he was talking to a group of guys.

  “Cop car just turned the corner,” someone called out.

  Everyone started to scatter and I glanced over my shoulder to look for McHottie once more. He was moving in the other direction but he turned back at the same time. Yet again, our eyes met and temporarily locked, but then he shook his head.

  “Go,” he said, glancing down the street to where the police car was heading in our direction. As if he somehow understood I couldn’t afford to get in trouble.

  I didn’t know what to do because I really, really wanted to talk to him, but I didn’t want to get caught after we’d worked so hard to get away from the raid at the party.

  “Go!” he repeated, motioning with his hand. He mouthed something else, but I couldn’t tell what it was and before I could open my mouth to ask, he’d already turned and jogged after the others.

  I didn’t get back to my dorm room until nearly four in the morning, since it took almost that long before I could retrieve my purse and room key, but I was restless and tossed and turned a lot. I was spectacularly inexperienced with guys, but the one I’d met tonight had been different. Hotter than hot. Built. And nice. He’d gotten me out of there and then prompted me to get going when we were about to be separated.

  Maybe I was just a romantic teenage girl who’d never had a boyfriend before, but there had been something between us. Our eyes had met across the crowded dance floor earlier in the evening and my entire body had become physically aware of him. I’d seen hot guys before and that had never happened, so this was something else. What it was, I had no idea, but I wasn’t a big believer in coincidence, and the fact that he’d also turned out to be my knight in shining armor, gave me pause.

  Of course, we hadn’t even exchanged names, and Harley hadn’t known who he was either. So the first interesting guy to really look at me had disappeared into the night and I had no way of finding him.

  Just my luck.

  I drove home when I got up, since school didn’t start again for more than a week. My parents lived two hours away from Moo U and I usually went home on long weekends and breaks even though I didn’t want to. They’d bought me an SUV for my eighteenth birthday, specifically so I could come home more often, and though they drove me crazy most of the time, I loved having my own vehicle. Of course, my mother threatened to take it away from me practically on a daily basis, so I had to be careful. That had been one of the main reasons I’d run from the party—she definitely would have taken the SUV if I’d been caught drinking at a party—so I took a minute to breathe as I pulled into the garage of my parents’ house.

  I was bound to have to answer a thousand questions about my weekend and I didn’t feel like it. I also had to work on a big project, which I planned to turn in before spring break so I could coast through the rest of the semester. I’d never coasted through anything in my life, and despite the pressure on me to make a decision about medical school, I had a secret that made me giddily happy. Unbeknownst to anyone, I hadn’t even applied to medical school. My parents thought I had, but I hadn’t and didn’t plan to. I wanted to continue with graduate school and get my Ph.D., but I didn’t know in what field yet, despite my current track. All I knew for sure was that I didn’t want to be a medical doctor.

  Too bad I couldn’t make them understand.

  “Hi, honey.” Mom looked up from where she was typing on her computer. She’d retired from teaching freshman English at Burlington University to write a book, and from what she’d told me, it wasn’t going well. I tried not to ask too many questions, though.

  “Hi, Mom.” I smiled but kept moving up the stairs toward my room.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Homework,” I called back.

  “I was thinking we need to talk about—” she began.

  “Not now!” I yelled back, closing my bedroom door behind me.

  Medical school was her favorite topic and she brought it up at least twice a day when I was home. Not to mention every time we spoke on the phone. It was exhausting and I kept hoping she’d give me a little time to grow up and figure out who I was beyond academics. My whole life to date had been about studying, test scores, and accomplishments. No one ever asked what I wanted, or what made me happy, and sometimes it hurt. What more did they want from me and why was my future their problem? I had a general idea what I wanted and where I was going, but I was only nineteen. I had time. At least I should have had time.

  I didn’t date, I had a limited number of friends, and yet I rarely had time to myself. Mostly I studied or kept up with my students since I was a teaching assistant too. I also tutored part-time, which was really my only source of independence. I made a lot more money under the table than my parents knew about, and I’d been squirreling it away. For what, I wasn’t sure, but it felt good to have something that was just mine.

  “Ellie?” Mom stuck her head in the door and I managed not to sigh out loud, though I definitely did on the inside.

  My mother and I had a difficult relationship. While a lot of mothers and daughters said that, it was intense at my house. I was an only child and not just the family’s little princess, but also a literal genius. I was nineteen and already had two undergraduate degrees, but instead of being proud of me, my parents had professional expectations that were nothing like my own.
/>   “Homework, Mom.”

  “I know.” She came in and sat on the edge of the bed. “I just wanted to see if you’d heard from any of the medical schools you applied to.” Mom wanted me to become a world-famous doctor, maybe with a focus in oncology, where I would potentially find a cure for cancer and win a Nobel Prize or something.

  “Nothing.”

  Duh.

  “You could stay at Moo U and—”

  “I’m not staying at Moo U,” I said quietly.

  Our eyes met and she scowled. “You’ve been preparing for this your whole life,” she said. “I understand you want to have fun and party, like other teens your age, but don’t you see what a waste that would be? You have a gift, Ellie. You’re special.”

  “I’m tired,” I interjected, though it was more a state of mind than a physical issue. “There’s so much more to life than academics and you don’t let me explore any of it. It’s not normal to live like this.”

  “Don’t be a drama queen,” she snapped. “I just told you—you’re special. You have gifts very few people have. Letting you waste your incredible talents with teenage boys and frat house parties, or whatever other nonsense you’re thinking about, would be criminal.”

  “Oh, please.” I managed to keep from rolling my eyes since it always annoyed her and I didn’t need to set her off. “I’m nineteen with two bachelor’s degrees. I’m educated and even employable, so I have time to—”

  “Employable doing what?” she demanded. “Teaching? That’s ridiculous. With your talents, you’ll be chief of staff at some hospital before you’re thirty. You’ll have the most illustrious and dignified career and make all of us proud.”

  “So you won’t be proud of me if I become a college professor or a research scientist at the CDC who discovers a life-saving vaccine or something like that?”

  She pursed her lips. “Well, of course, love, but you have to trust me to know what’s best for you.”

  This time I did sigh and just looked back at my laptop. “Mom, I really do have homework to do. Can we not talk about this over the holidays? Can’t we just be a family for once?”

  She looked taken aback, but then nodded. “All right. I’ll see you at dinner.”

  She let herself out and I closed my eyes. Every time we had this conversation, I wanted to cry. And never more so than right now.

  3

  Patrick

  The first week of classes was usually pretty easy, focusing more on buying the requisite books, checking out the syllabus and gauging how to juggle the workload with hockey. My classes this semester were kind of a bitch, though, and I had five of them. I’d done that by design, hoping to make my course load in my senior year lighter, but now I was regretting it. Statistics was probably going to be the death of me, and based on the dour expression on the professor’s face as he’d given us an overview of the class, I wasn’t looking forward to Tuesday and Thursday mornings at all.

  My sociology class seemed pretty interesting, though, so at least I had that to look forward to, but I was stressed about the semester in general. There were no grades yet, but studying wasn’t my thing and with Coach Keller requesting weekly progress reports, it would only take one fuck-up to get me benched.

  Which was why I was heading to the library on Friday at lunchtime. My two morning classes were over and tonight’s game was at home, so I was finally meeting up with that tutor Paxton had set me up with. I couldn’t risk getting behind, so I was starting right now, at week one, even though it was going to cost money I didn’t have. Paxton and I both worked during the summer to save up for the school year, but it was January and funds were starting to run low. Paying for tutoring was going to suck, but what choice did I have? I couldn’t risk hockey.

  I walked into the library and looked around. Ellie’s text said she had long blond hair, was five foot five, and would be wearing a pink Taylor Swift hoodie. I spotted a blond ponytail on a girl wearing a pink hoodie but she had her back to me so I wasn’t sure if that was her. There was something familiar about her though, and I approached gingerly, wondering why I had a sense of déjà vu.

  “Excuse me, are you…” My voice trailed off as familiar blue eyes looked up at me.

  We both froze. It was the chick from the party and, great fucking balls of fire, she had on a Taylor Swift hoodie.

  “I’m Ellie.” She stared at me for a moment, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Are you…”

  “Patrick Graham.” I held out my hand with a teasing grin. “Also known as the guy who helped you escape from the cops.”

  Her mouth opened as recognition slowly dawned. She stared at me a little longer, her hand resting in mine as our eyes remained locked. “It’s really you… I mean, you cut your hair and shaved off your beard… Wait, now it all makes sense. You’re Paxton’s twin. That’s why you looked so familiar but with the beard and long hair…”

  I chuckled. “Yup.”

  “You left before I could get your name.” Her tone was soft but it felt like a gentle admonishment.

  “You needed to get out of there.” I sank into the chair next to hers. “I told you I’d find you.”

  She frowned. “You did?”

  “You didn’t hear me?” I cocked my head a little. “After I told you to go, I called out that I’d find you.”

  “I knew you said something but couldn’t hear it.” She smiled, dipping her head almost shyly.

  “So, uh, hi.” I felt silly all of a sudden. “I guess I found you. I’m Patrick.” Geez, we’d already introduced ourselves. How lame was I?

  “Ellie.”

  Our gazes met and there it was, that weirdly intense connection. I didn’t understand it because even though I thought she was beautiful, Paxton had been right that she wasn’t my usual type. She wasn’t wearing makeup today, making her look a lot younger than she had at the party, and kind of innocent. She was a girl-next-door type while I typically went for the big-city-hottie types, but something happened every time we saw each other. Even now, without the benefit of alcohol and the party atmosphere, the air was charged with intensity.

  “I feel like we should get a do-over from the other night,” I said after a minute. “I was going to ask you your name, maybe get your number…”

  “Way too much excitement for all that,” she said with a laugh.

  “Never jumped off a deck before?” I teased.

  “Definitely not,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t know what I was thinking… I could have broken my neck.”

  “I wouldn’t have let you fall.”

  “Somehow I knew that.” She cocked her head. “I don’t know why I knew it, but I did.”

  “Sometimes you just know.”

  We were staring at each other like lovesick puppies or something. The last time I’d gazed into a girl’s eyes without jumping her bones was high school. This was stupid. The whole reason Paxton had hooked us up was so she could tutor me. I wasn’t supposed to be thinking about her bright blue eyes or pink lips. Or what she might look like naked.

  Shit.

  I tore my eyes away and fumbled to dig out my schedule. “Anyway, now that we’ve found each other, these are my classes: Sociology, Statistics, Global Business Practices, Marketing Management, and Database Management.”

  She nodded. “Okay, well, business isn’t my thing, but I’ve heard those classes aren’t bad, so I can teach you study skills that will help you keep up with them. On the other hand, based on what Paxton told me, I’m guessing Statistics is going to be the bane of your existence.”

  I chuckled. “Yup. Sociology seems like fun, but stat is the class stressing me out. I’ve put it off as long as I could, but I’ve got almost enough credits to graduate so I had to take it.”

  “Aren’t you a junior?” she asked.

  “Yeah, but I started off with some AP credits thanks to my super-anal twin brother, and that got me ahead. Also, I’ve taken a class each of the last two summers, which put me a little more ahead. Technically
, I’ll only need three classes next year to graduate.”

  “Then why are you taking so many now?”

  “Because I have a pending contract with the Las Vegas Sidewinders and if I decide to go pro at the end of the school year, I still want to be close enough to getting my degree, even if I have to take one online class per semester while playing professionally. That’s also why I left a couple of easier classes for the end.”

  “You’re thinking of leaving school early?”

  “I want to get my degree, but my dad is pushing me to go pro, so I don’t know what I’m going to do.” I paused. I barely knew this girl and I was already telling her things I rarely even admitted to myself, much less a stranger.

  “Sounds like me,” she said quietly. She was staring down at the piece of paper with my schedule on it, tracing little circles on it with her finger, her voice thoughtful. “My parents want me to go to medical school but I want to stay in grad school and get a Ph.D. Personally, I want to stay as far under the radar as possible and stay away from people as much as possible as well. I was much happier doing research. My degrees are in biology and computer science, and the ultimate goal is to eventually get my Ph.D. in something like biotechnology. Then I got way off course with this damn computer science graduate program… And my mom isn’t on board for anything.”

  “You’re a doctor either way, though, right?” I asked curiously.

  “Well, medical doctor versus doctor of philosophy, and I honestly have no interest in seeing patients. I want to do research, work in a lab, maybe do a little teaching, but only at the college level. Not, like, high school or anything.”

  “I get that,” I responded.

  “Anyway.” She cleared her throat, as if she’d just realized the serious turn our conversation had taken. “You’re done with classes by 10:45 or so Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and by one o’clock on Tuesdays and Thursdays. What’s your practice schedule?”