2nd Intermissions

I guess I seemed pretty distraught, because Angelina had offered to stay with me until I needed to board a plane to St. Louis with the team. I kept my phone close by all day, just in case he called (which he didn't) and Gina treated me to movies and food at her house.
While we were there, her sister stopped by to drop off the clothes she had borrowed recently. Natalia stayed a while, and my spirits were drastically lightened when I was serenaded by the two sisters who rarely got along. I caught on to one of the little dances they were doing to a song I normally wouldn't listen.
"Hop up out the bed, turn my swag oooon." We moved our hands like we were turning up a dial.
After the song ended, Natalia asked, "You know who I could see dancing to that song?"
Angelina and I piped up with, "Who?"
"Brent Sopel."
Angelina rolled over from her position on the floor and groaned. I sat back on my heels and replied, "You know he's married with kids, right?"
"Yeah, but admit it- that would be hilarious."
Just then the image in my head appeared, of Brent Sopel hopping up out of bed, turning his swag on. The image left me clutching my stomach, gasping for air between my laughs.
"See?" Natalia asked Angelina. Gina shrugged and motioned to the clock. "Its round about that time, Sam."
It was my turn to groan and Gina offered to drive me to the airport, seeing my bag was already in her car. Before we left, her sister leaned out of her car window, shouting, "Give Sopeybuns my love!"
I turned to Gina as she started the car and vowed to not speak a word of her sister to any of the guys.
"Kane would be all over that mountainous cleavage she has going on." I agreed with her wholeheartedly and she kept me entertained and my mind off of Adam's strange actions.
Until, of course, I had to board the plane. I took my usual seat next to Troy Parchman and he asked how my New Years was.
"Well, I was sick yesterday, and I'm sick today. Happy freaking new years." I sat down in my seat, putting my purse between my feet.
Eager propped his arms up on the seat in front of me, twisted around like he usually was.
"Hey doc, I didn't see you at the party last night."
I shrugged and offered him the same answer as I told Troy.
"Have you been growing out your hair, Eags?" I added, noticing his short mop of blond hair.
"Aw, so nice of you to finally notice. Aren't women supposed to be like, really good at that?" At this, Troy Parchman snorted.

We could have taken a bus down to St. Louis, but they wanted us there early so they could get a full night's sleep before the game tomorrow night.
I thought about my sorry predicament (lying in a hotel bed because of my job on a Friday night. New Years Day, for crying out loud.)

I checked my phone to see if I had any texts from Adam and found myself becoming distressed from his lack of communication.
Pulling out my pajamas and getting ready to sleep everything away, I heard a knock on my door.
Opening it up, I was greeted by two tall men in shutter glasses, pushing themselves into my room.
I realized who they were while they thrashed around to a song playing on a phone that one of them held high. The two men clearly didn't know any of the lyrics, but they had their own little dance party while I stood near the now-closed door, arms crossed.
I recognized the tune Tomas Kopecky and Antti Niemi were dancing to, the same tune Adam had sung to me yesterday.
The song finally ended with more fist pumping and spins.
I clapped and Kopecky slid the shudder glasses down the bridge of his nose and Antti used them to pull his lanky hair back.
"You like?" Tomas asked, putting the phone back in his pocket. I nodded, still giggling.
"Tomas convinced me to go around to all the rooms like that." Antti said, clearly embarrassed once the music stopped.

"No, you guys- that was exactly what I needed. That was hilarious." I leaned against the door.
"We were gonna head over to the bar and grill across the street with the guys, want to come?" Kopecky's accent was heavy, and Antti nodded his head behind him, trying to convince me.
I shrugged and said, "Why not?" While I followed the group of hockey players across the street, I thought about Kopecky and Niemi. They were inseparable like Sharp and Burish, but between the two foreigners, it was a closer bond. You could tell they were looking after each other and I was glad they accepted me as their friend.

We all sat at one big booth, and I was crushed between Antti and Tomas.
"I need spaaace!" I cried, trying to spread my arms, and just ended up spreading them across the table. The hockey players chuckled and I glared at a couple who were making fun of me. It really was like being in high school again- being accepted into a big group of guys. Granted, the hockey players were different then the football playing jocks of my high school years, but sometimes their traits reminded me of the good days.
"Sharp is whipped!" Ben Eager said, making the whip noise while flicking his wrist.
"You look like Indiana Jones!" Versteeg commented, pointing at Eager with the neck of his beer.
The bickering didn't end and then they turned their attention to me, Hjalmarsson stating to the guys, "She was subjected to the European Invasion earlier." Clearing meaning the mini-dance party Kopecky and Niemi had brought into my room.
"Don't even! That was great!" I defended the Slovak and the Fin.
"Thanks, Doc!" Antti, who had downed three beers by now, stretched, resting his arm on top of my head.
I moved my dome around, trying to get his arm off, but he kept it on.
"I think you're doing it wrong, Annie!" John Madden said, chuckling at his own joke and the nickname for Niemi.
"Hey, hey- HEY MADDEN!" Hendry called from the other side of the booth.
"What?" He took his attention off of Antti and his arm, still on my head.
"Isn't it past your bedtime, old man?" Hendry clearly thought he was a real comedian, but Madden retorted, "Don't make me come over there and beat your ass, kid!"
Sharp asked me, "So what's going on with Bur?" The small group that had been told the debacle by Sharpie quieted, waiting to hear my answer while Madden and Hendry were still throwing jokes at each other.
"I don't really know," Antti's arm retreated, sensing my change of mood. "He hasn't called me or anything." I looked down at my hands resting on the table, and I started to fiddle with my class ring.
"I'll try and find out what's been going on with him, eh?" Sharp punched me in the upper arm, clearly wanting to change the subject and cheer me up.
Kopecky's phone started to ring and the two men I was between started to thrash around, arms waving to the music. I was jostled between to the two dancing Europeans, and I couldn't help but to laugh.
Finally, Madden admitted that it was past his bedtime, as well as all of ours. I had to help Antti carry Kopecky back to the room and settle him in bed. I laughed and looked around their hotel room. "Well this is cozy." My room was bigger then theirs, if only by a couple square feet.
"Don't make fun of us- it is quite cozy!" Antti motioned to the room around him.
I chuckled and was about to leave, but Niemi insisted that he walk me to my room, that was four rooms away.
"I actually called Tomas, when you started to get sad. No fun if Doc is unhappy."
I giggled, finding it hard to not think that Antti's accent was adorable.
Once I was alone in my room, settled into my pajamas and bed, I saw I had a missed call from Adam.
Instantly feeling guilty about having fun with a bunch of his friends and thinking about Antti in a somewhat-romantic way, I called him back.
"Hey, you've reached Adam, leave a message and all that good stuff." I heard his gruff voice and the guilt hit me in my lower stomach when I left a message.
"It's me. Call back when you can."

I fell asleep before I could ponder longer on why I felt so guilty when it was him that was avoiding me.
Eating only a small breakfast before I got on the team bus for the early morning practice, I settled into my seat near the front, next to Troy Parchman again.
"Don't you ever want to sit somewhere else?" He laughed, and I before replying, I realized that my only other option was Pawel, and he didn't seem to enjoy my company as much as Parchman did.
"Of course not!" Putting on an amused look that didn't suit my mood, I sat back and watched the buildings pass while we drove to the arena. When I realized that the only other person (excluding the players) that I could sit with was Pawel. I never really made friends with the other guys, and just making eye contact with the coaches intimidated me.
I heard an upbeat techno song from the back of the bus and stifled a laugh. Troy looked at me confused and I shook my head saying, "You don't even want to know."

The St.Louis Blues were out for blood tonight, and the referees were blind. Someone elbowed Kane in the face, right at center ice, and no penalty was called. Ben Eager came up to the plate to defend our team's integrity and pummeled the shit out the offender. His knuckles were bleeding, so Haviland sent him back down to me.
When he sat on the table and extended his hand, palm down, I couldn't help but to gasp. While rushing to the cabinet for alcohol and gauze to clean it with, I asked him, "Why do you have to bleed so much?"
I came back and cleaned off the mass of quickly drying blood off of his hand. Eager just chuckled, reiterating the whole fight to me while I attempted to get a good look at the wound. I sighed, seeing two scrapes that bled a little, and one gash across the meat of the outside of his middle finger. "Did you hit his helmet?" I asked him, cleaning the cut.
He hissed when the antiseptic burned the infection causing bacteria away and finally replied, "Yup."
Stitching the wound, I glanced up at the digital clock in the corner of the away locker room, which glowed in red numerals, how many minutes were left in the period.
"I'm going to wrap this in tape. Don't get into another fight, the refs will call a match penalty if they see the tape." He nodded dutifully, but I knew he didn't hear me.
"How do you know that, doc?"
I just sighed, pressing more gauze to the wounds, a bit more for padding and taped his knuckles up.
"There you go, big guy." He hopped off the table and went on his merry way.
Later in the second period, Sharp had gotten checked by another guy, and his skates left the ice. Enraged that the refs had not called that penalty either, Cam Barker enforced the rules with his fists and suddenly, my meager little office was becoming busy.
While I evaluated Sharpie for any injuries, I told him, "I'm surprised we're actually scoring. It seems we're doing the ref's jobs tonight." Sharp chuckled and was in good spirits when I dismissed him with a clean bill of health.
Before the third period ended, I laid out some ice packs that I knew Versteeg would need (he got his head ground into the ice). I heard commotion from the tunnel and knew that they had won, without even looking at the final score.
The guys rumbled in like a testosterone storm, cheerful with the win, but pissed that the referees had not done their job. Sure enough, Kris Versteeg came in, holding the side of his head.
"I feel like killing those guys." He said in way of a greeting.
I offered him some motrin and the ice pack and he smiled his thanks before leaving.

Feeling empty without a call back from Adam, we returned home on the plane that night, needing a full night's sleep before facing the Ducks at home tomorrow.
What a great way to spend a Sunday, I thought to myself as we got off the plane, everyone saying goodbye until tomorrow. Niemi walked with me, his bag slung over his shoulder.
"Hey friend." He approached me, waiting at the exit for Angelina to pick me up.
I realized that I had never called her and threw myself back into the wall.
"Are you okay?" He asked, clearly confused.
"I just realized I don't have a ride home."
"Its okay, I'll drive you home. Come on." He led the way to his car.
"Thank you so so so much, Antti." I said, while following him.
Of course, he had an SUV, like all the other guys, and he tossed my bag in the back.
Settling myself in the passenger seat, I tilted my head back and sighed.
"Tired?" He asked, letting the car warm up.
"Like no other." I admitted, adjusting the vents so they blew the warm air in my face.
Once he started to drive, I found myself glancing at him while I gave him directions.
His normally tense and disinterested look was replaced with something much more relaxed. Then I noticed his eyes. They were the eyes of a Siberian husky, and just as alert. The iris was lined with dark blue on the outside and around the pupil, but inbetween was a pale winter sky blue.
"Why are you staring at me? Do I have something on my face?" He chuckled nervously, turning onto my street.
"No, I just noticed how gorgeous your eyes were."
I saw the dark red creep up his pale ears and don the tip of his upturned nose. Laughing, I thanked him for the ride and grabbed my bag out of the back.
"Hey, wait!" Niemi called to me, rolling down the window.
"Yeah?" I leaned my arm on the open driver's side window.
He pulled his phone out of his jeans and asked for my number. I pushed Adam and his strange actions to the back of my head and nodded, putting it in his phone.
I noticed that he waited to drive away until I was up in my apartment. I dropped my bag onto the floor beside my bed and collapsed into it, falling asleep instantly.