Fly With You

A few days after the Blackhawks had clinched a spot in the Western Conference finals due to the game winning goal from Jamie Houser, the Vancouver Canucks had been determined as their opponents. When the schedule came out, and the Canucks received the home ice advantage, the Blackhawks had immediately packed everything up and traveled north and west to British Columbia. Eric and Penelope had decided to tag along with their dads for the four days they’d be in Canada, and of course Jonathan had been more than happy to spend more time with his daughter after she’d been away at school for a whole year. He also knew how much she loved the rivalry of the Blackhawks and the Canucks, almost as much as she loved the Blackhawks’ rivalry with the Redwings.

Adam Burish, of course, had not shut his mouth about beating ‘those goddamned Canucks’ since he had found out his young team would be playing them again, much like he and Jonathan had twenty five years before. Though, that had been a second round matchup and not a Western Final. Either way, for the second year in a row, it had only taken the Blackhawks six games to defeat their hated rivals in Western Canada.

With the first game of the series the next night, the team gathered at the hotel, having a big meal together with the management, the coaching staff, and anyone else who had accompanied the young team to Vancouver; Jonathan Toews, Adam Burish, and their two children included. Jonathan watched with narrowed eyes as Penelope laughed with Jamie a few seats down from where he sat next to Adam and across from Eric. “I don’t think I like that kid,” he commented, watching his daughter’s movements carefully and Jamie’s movements even more carefully.

“Relax, Captain Serious,” Adam laughed, making the man next to him roll his eyes at the nickname he was unable to escape. “She’s nineteen and an adult.”

Jonathan nodded, digging his fork into his food as Penelope’s laugh floating through the air and hit his ears, making him smile. Maybe, he just needed to relax. She and Jamie had hit it off, and clearly, he made her laugh. That was reason enough to give the kid a chance. Plus, he had single handedly gotten his team into the Western Final. He was probably alright, after all.

After the meal was done, the younger kids on the team decided they wanted to ‘hit up the hotel pool’ for a few hours. All of the management, most of the coaching staff, and some of the older players opted out of going for a swim before the mandatory ten o’clock curfew, but some of the adults decided to stick with the young team to make sure none of them killed themselves before the game the next night. Adam had decided a swim would do his tired body some good, and before Jonathan could excuse himself to his room, the Wisconsin native had declared the two of them chaperones, making Eric and Penelope laugh as they headed up to their rooms to change.

“You coming for a swim with us?” Jamie asked, catching up to walk beside Penelope. She shrugged, slowing down to let him catch up.

“I guess my dad is,” she laughed, “so it looks like I am, too.”

Jamie smiled as they stepped onto the elevator with her dad, Adam, and Eric, all standing in silence until they reached the twentieth floor where the team was staying. “Nelly, you have the key to our room, right?” Eric asked. “I forgot mine.” Jamie shot Penelope a confused look, as he realized she’d shared a room with Eric rather than her dad. Jonathan laughed when he saw the young player’s curious look, making a mental note to thank Adam’s son for his question later, knowing that Eric Burish actually did have his room key in his back pocket.

“You moron,” Penelope laughed as she and Eric headed toward their room. “I’ll meet you down there, Jamie!” she called to him, making him smile and start to head the opposite direction of his own room.

Jonathan and Adam shuffled into their hotel room, grabbing the swimming trunks from their luggage before they quickly changed. Jonathan caught his appearance in the mirror of the room, a small frown adorning his features as he looked over his once young, fit but now forty seven year old body. While he was still muscular and toned, he selfishly found himself longing to be younger. At least he wouldn’t be so damn tired and sore all the time, something Jonathan had found came with age and his former profession no matter how good of shape you stayed in.

“I miss my twenties, too, Tazer.” Jonathan laughed and glanced at Adam, who like him had inevitably aged. “I think we stayed in pretty good shape, though. We can still turn women’s heads… for old men.”

“The last thing you need to be concerned about is women, Burr. Your wife would kill you.”

Adam let out a loud laugh, thinking of his feisty, hard-headed wife. “Yeah, I know she would, but sometimes the attention’s nice, you know?”

Jonathan laughed, too, slipping his sandals on as he silently agreed with the older man. As the stepped out from their hotel room, they saw their kids just outside their door waiting for them. Like Jonathan and Adam, Eric wore his swimming trunks and a tee shirt, but Adam was sure his still somewhat scrawny son wouldn’t be taking it off as he swam, especially surrounded by incredibly muscular, young hockey players. Penelope’s eyes were practically glowing at the prospect of being in the water, despite the fact she would be in a pool and not the ocean. As she adjusted the dress-like bathing suit cover she wore, the four of them headed town to the pool were they assumed everybody was already.

Penelope’s eyes immediately landed on Jamie as they walked into the giant room that housed the rather large indoor pool. He sat on the edge of the pool in just his trunks, his feet dangling in the water, laughing with his teammates. She bit her lip and turned toward her dad, Adam, and Eric where they had claimed a table as theirs. Jonathan grinned at his daughter before slipping his tee shirt over his head as Adam did the same.

“How excited are you to get in the water, our little mermaid?” Adam asked, laughing as Penelope tugged her cover off, revealing a pretty, floral bikini.

“I was planning on coming for a swim before the guys brought it up, so yeah, I am,” she said, running her hands through her hair as she made her way toward the edge of the pool. “Oh, shit, there’s a diving board!” She grinned, quickly moving toward it as she realized the pool was not an ordinary hotel pool, reaching twenty five feet at its deepest.

Adam, Jonathan, and Eric jumped into the pool as Penelope climbed her way up to the ten foot in height diving board. “Is she good at that kind of thing?” Jamie asked, swimming toward the three of them.

“She won state in high school in diving,” Jonathan answered, but there was still a nervous grimace on his face.

“You’re going to kill yourself!” Eric called, watching as his best friend moved to the end of the board, jumping slightly and testing the board’s springs.

“Calm down, E,” she laughed. “I’ve got a lot of life ahead of me!”

Jonathan shut his eyes tightly as he felt a pang in his heart at his daughter’s words. Most days his Nelly was a happy reminder of her mother and the time Jonathan had been lucky enough to spend with her, but there were times, much like then, when she said the exact same thing her mother had years and years before, only making Jonathan’s breath catch in his throat and a pain rip through his body.

They had been floating in Lake Michigan together, having just met minutes before. Delia was smiling widely as she moved with the gentle waves, her blue eyes studying Jonathan’s face. She had asked him how old he was, and upon finding out he was twenty four, she had called him a baby and told him he had a lot of life ahead of him. Returning the question, her answer was what his daughter’s words had sent him back to.

“I’m a baby, too. I’m only twenty one. I’ve got a lot of life ahead of me too, I guess.”

He felt a nudge on his back, and he snapped his eyes open to realize his daughter had already dove from the board and was swimming around with Eric and Jamie. He glanced to his side to see Adam giving him a curious look. “What’s wrong, man?”

“Penelope is so much like her mother that sometimes it’s hard for me to even look at her, Adam,” the former captain barely whispered, moving toward the edge of the pool and pulling himself out of the water. Adam frowned and followed after his former captain and one of his best friends. Wiping his face on the towel at their table, Jonathan sighed. “She’s says the same things her mother said, she acts the same way. It’s hard to handle sometimes.”

“I never really got to know Delia,” Adam frowned, having already been in Dallas for a few years when Jonathan had met the blond beauty. “But I know how much you loved her—” he started to say.

“Love her, Adam. I still love her, just as much as the day we got married, or the day she gave birth to Nelly… maybe even more.”

Sighing, Adam ran a hand through his hair, not knowing what he could say to comfort his friend. He knew how Jonathan felt about Penelope’s mother, and how he worked so hard every day to keep her happy when he didn’t need to. He had met her only a few times, but it was enough to know that she was happy just being with Jonathan. She didn’t need all of the things he gave her, the things he did for her; she just needed him, and that was why she had given up her life of travel, her life of wandering, and her life of roaming to stay in Chicago and settle down with him. It was him, and it always would be.

For Jonathan, it was always Delia, too. While Penelope sometimes naively asked her father why he never moved on and found someone else, Adam knew that there was no getting over or moving on from the love his friend had for that woman. Maybe, by hearing about her parents’ love story, she’d understand that just as much as anyone who knew Jonathan and Delia—and saw how much they loved each other—did.