Fearing Death

Jordyn squealed excitedly as she ended her phone call from Abby who said that the boys had just landed and Jon would probably be back at the apartment in the next twenty or so minutes. Jon thought it was odd that Jordyn wouldn’t be meeting him at the airport, it was only the second time that had happened. The first time, she was very sick with the flu and he had to practically beg her to listen to Sara when they both said that she couldn’t come along to retrieve him.

Jordyn had been planning this for about a week with the help of Abby. They had spent the past six days thinking of just the right way they wanted to do things. Abby had taken her out to buy the materials and helped her clean up the apartment so that everything would go perfectly to plan.

”Oh, Jord, I just love that one.” Abby smiled as she sat in a comfortable leather chair, one hand poised on her growing belly as Jordyn stood in front of her draped in a light purple satin dress with just a braid of ivory silk below the ‘bust’ line.

“More than the red one?” Jordyn asked, tilting her head as she spun in the skirt excitedly. She never wore dresses like this before in her life and even though she was a fairly prominent tomboy, she couldn’t deny that the dresses made her feel pretty.

“No, this is the one.” Abby insisted. “We can get a pair of cute, strappy ivory shoes, and we’ll go and get your hair done, it will be perfect.” She finished. “Now let’s get that dress to go and find a shoe store!”

Jordyn had a hard time hiding the dress in her closet, she stuffed it in the way back behind her travel duffel, Jon had a very particular cleaning system and was very certain with the way he hung up the laundry.

“Jordyn! Baby girl I’m home! And I brought dinner!” Jon called, kicking the front door shut behind him. “How does Maggiano’s sound? I got you spaghetti and meatballs!” Jordyn scurried to set everything in place. She snuck into the hall, carefully setting the truck down and fixing the sign before she heard the bag of food drop onto the dining room table. At that sound, she carefully maneuvered the little battery-operated car out to the dining room as well. “What is this?” Jon laughed, bending down to grab the tiny dump truck.

Jordyn could hear the crinkle of the bag the cinnamon rolls she settled in the truck.

“I’d like to haul your buns to the Dad/Daughter Dance.” He read before laughing as Jordyn bounced into the room excitedly. “A Dad and daughter dance?” He asked, grinning happily, to which Jordyn nodded eagerly. “Of course I’ll go!” He laughed, gathering his daughter in his arms and squeezing her tightly. “What do we need? A dress? I’ll need to get a tux.” Jon said, plopping Jordyn down in a dining room chair as he moved to the kitchen to grab plates and silverware for dinner.

“Me and Abby got a dress already.” Jordyn grinned at how sneaky she was. “And yes, you need to wear something nice, it’s formal.” She added.

“I haven’t been to something like that since… high school.” Jon laughed. “I’m excited.” He added, setting the plates down and scooping out big mounds of pasta onto the plates, topped with sauce and meatballs and. He put together the small side salads that came with the pasta as well as garlic bread before they could sit down to eat. “Eat up, five more pounds.” He nodded in her direction. Five more pounds, according to her pediatrician would put her in the lowest weight bracket for her age. “So where is it? When is it? Do we need to get a limo?” He asked, making Jordyn even more excited.

“It’s at this hotel by school, I have a sheet with all the details in my backpack.” She smiled, twirling her fork around in her noodles. “It’s February second at seven at the night, it’s a Friday, so we can stay out late.” She wiggled her eyebrows excitedly. “Are you a good dancer?” She asked, tilting her head.

Jon was silent for a moment, February second seemed like an important date, but he couldn’t pin exactly what was going on that day. “No.” He replied honestly, “but I can try.” He grinned, not wanting to rain on her parade. He was dying to get to his iPad to see what was going on that day, but he wouldn’t ruin her excitement or their dinner. “Is this the kind of thing we go to in a big group? With your friends and their Dads?” He asked.

“I don’t think so, they didn’t make it sound like that.” Jordyn replied, picking a mushroom out of her salad and setting it on Jon’s plate.

“Eat it.” He insisted, nodding down at the fungi.

“No.” Jordyn scrunched her nose and shook her head. “You eat it.” She laughed.

“So you got a dress?” He asked, stabbing the mushroom and popping it into his mouth, liking the way she stuck her tongue out at the act. “What does it look like?” He asked.

“You’ll like it, its’ really pretty. I can show you, it’s purpley with this white-colored braid on it.” She tried to explain. “Abby got me shoes, too, and she made me an appointment to get my hair done.” She wiggled in her seat.

“I’ll make sure to get my hair cut… and shave.” He laughed.

“Just don’t let this get out of control.” She rubbed in front of her ears, signaling that sometimes his sideburns could get pretty nasty. Jon got a pretty big kick out of that and he threw his head back with a laugh. It was late when they finished up dinner, Jordyn hopped on the couch and Jon cleaned up in the kitchen before he could slip away unnoticed to his bedroom. Grabbing his iPad and powering it on, he quickly flicked through the months on his calendar and his heart sank into his stomach when he saw that February first, second, and third were highlighted in red. Red meant out of town and top priority according to his agent.

It was the weekend that he and Patrick were flying to New York to do a huge photo shoot and interview for their consecutive covers on Sports Illustrated. Jon knew that there was no way he could get around it. He turned the iPad off and shoved it down into his dresser, not wanting Jordyn to come across the information accidentally.

Going back into the family room, he saw Jordyn asleep on the couch, it was half past ten and she needed to wake up early for school in the morning. Which meant that he needed to wake up early as well to bring her. Scooping her up into his arms, she hardly protested, cuddling softly into his body as he brought her down to her bedroom.

He didn’t know how he was supposed to tell her that he couldn’t go to the dance. He knew that it would absolutely break her already scarred heart.

•••

Surprisingly, Jordyn had been to more away games than home games for as long as she had been with Jon. She pulled her Patrick Kane sweater on that night, over a small, long sleeve Under Armour to keep her warm and a pair of dark jeans. She was quiet, and somber.

Jon had broken the news to her two days ago that he wouldn’t be able to go to the Dad/Daughter dance at her school. Jordyn was heart broken, just as Jon knew she would be.

”You can’t go?” She whispered after he sat her down, trying to explain that he had something very important and out of town. “How am I supposed to go to the Dad/Daughter dance without my Dad?” She said, trying to keep her immediate tears of disappointment at bay.

“I’m so sorry, Jordyn, I want to go so bad, but there is no way I can get out of his, I’ve called everyone I can to try and reschedule and there’s just nothing I can do.” He felt terrible, he felt like someone was stomping on his stomach, cracking his ribs. “I’m so sorry, but I can call Uncle Davey, or I can call Grandpa, I know that either of them would love to take you.” He insisted, reaching out to brush her hair away from her face, feeling even worse as she moved from his reach.

“I don’t want to go with them.” She muttered. “I want to go with you.” And finally, she couldn’t keep her tears in any longer. She was embarrassed that she would have to go back to school and listen to her friends talk about it, while she would shrink back from conversation. She’d return her dress and shoes, they wouldn’t get to go in a fancy limo or dance the night away like her friends would.

“Babe, tell me what I can do to make it up to you.” Jon pleaded. He rarely saw this expression of disappointment on Jordyn’s face, and it killed him that it was his fault she looked like that.

“Nothing, it’s fine… there will be… other dances.” She mumbled, knowing full well that the only father-daughter dance was this year. “I’ll have Abby bring me to the mall so I can return my dress.” She whispered, brushing her tears away from her cheeks with the backs of her hands as she got off the couch.

“Jord, you don’t have to do that, keep it.” Jon insisted.

“It’s fine, I won’t really have any reason to use it now.” She said before disappearing down the hall to her bedroom. Jordyn didn’t want to be rude, and she knew that Jon felt bad, but she just wanted something normal in her life for once, something that she could do with her friends that she could talk about at school. No last minutes trips to Colorado, no photographers hunting out her lacrosse practices, no paparazzi spreading their pictures in magazines. Just something normal.

She should have known that normal was never in the mix for she and Jon.

Two days later, Jordyn tried to at least act like she wasn’t quite as disappointed, but it was hard to listen to her friends at school talk about their dresses or the restaurants they would go to before the dance, or what songs they hoped would be played.

“Ready baby girl?” Jon asked from her doorway. He had only recently woken up from his nap, during which, she finished her homework for the night and eaten a snack.

“Yeah.” She replied gently, grabbing her iPod and sticking it in her back pocket before pulling on her warm, black boots. Jon weakly smiled at her before she could brush past him, walking to the front door after punching in the alarm code.

They stood awkwardly in the elevator, Jon looking ahead at her reflection in the mirrored doors as she looked down at her feet.

“Hey, how about some dessert money?” He grinned, handing her a five.

“It’s fine, I don’t really need it.” She replied softly, denying him. He frowned even deeper as he stuck his money back into his pocket. Sometimes he wished that she could be happier with material things. Jordyn was the kind of a girl that would pick fishing with her Grandpa and Uncle over flying to a private island any day. He loved that she was so down to earth and wouldn’t easily let their affluent lifestyle go to her head, but he sometimes wished that he could get her something new and shiny just to see her smile again.

He was rather certain she wasn’t mad at him, she knew that he had a very demanding schedule, but he knew that she was disappointed, and that hurt even more than her being mad. He knew that he would have to do something special to make it up to her, because he knew how much the dance meant to her. Especially because he wanted Abby to stop sending him those hopeless glances after she took Jordyn to return the cute dress and shoes she had gotten her for the dance.

He leaned down and gave her a sweet kiss on the forehead as they arrived at the locker room.

“Good luck.” She wished him half-heartedly. He gave her another shaky smile before Abby could whisk her away to the concourse and he could enter the locker room.

“Jordyn still upset?” Patrick asked as he sat in his stall, lacing up his skates.

“Yeah.” Jon nodded, sitting in his stall beside his friend quietly.

“Don’t worry, you’re wonder-Dad, her superhero, I’m sure you’ll think of something.” Patrick patted him encouragingly on the shoulder. “You always do.”

“I hope so.” Jon sighed with another slow nod as she stared at the logo in the floor absentmindedly.

Upstairs, Jordyn was settling into a seat beside Abby, her head resting against Abby’s shoulder while Sara played with her growing hair from the row behind her. The two women in her life were especially excited for her first dance, but now they knew just how sad she was over the fact that she wouldn’t be going. Abby even offered for Jordyn to take Patrick, but Jordyn politely declined.

”I’d rather not go than try and explain why my Dad can’t be there all night.” She explained sadly after Abby offered up her husband for the occasion.

The game against the Washington Capitals started at seven on the dot, and Jordyn tried as hard as she could to be in high spirits; it was obvious to anyone in the United Center that the young captain’s mind was elsewhere. The first period had flown by, and Jordyn had shared a sleeve of hot salty fries that they dunked in vanilla ice cream while the zamboni resurfaced the ice.

Jordyn also periodically stole from Sara’s drink, half Sprite, half lemonade while the men took to the ice again for the second period. The Blackhawks were up two to one and were seeking to gain a stronger lead.

The puck was dropped and everything seemed to happen in the flash of a second.

Jon and one of his opponents slammed bodies in the corner of the ice, fighting over the puck, the collision sending Jon’s helmet right off his head. The forward in the white jersey gained possession of the puck and as Jon bent down for his helmet, a split second after the whistle had been blown, a player donning a white number eight slammed into Jon forcefully from behind, sending him head first down to the ice.

Half of the crowd started screaming obscenities while the other held it’s breath as red liquid collected on the white ice.

“Dad!” Jordyn ran down the few stairs to the glass, placing her hands on it as she watched Jon’s eyes roll back up into his head before his eyelids could close. “Dad! Get up!” She shouted, panicking as her heart raced in her fragile chest. “Get up!” She started to bang on the glass. “Daddy get up!” Hot tears flooded her eyes as several personnel rushed out onto the ice. “Get up!” She wailed, the few spectators gasped around her as they realized who she was, and their hearts instantly went out to her. “Get up!” She whimpered softly, hands clutching at the glass as her voice cracked.

Patrick was the first off the ice after he knew that the paramedics had been called and Ovechkin had been immediately removed from the game. He kicked off his skates in record time and simply shed his jersey and upper pads, leaving on his Under Armour and breezers as she stuffed his feet into his tennis shoes - running up to the concourse.

No one stood in his way, asked for his autograph, or called his name as he ran down the aisles to where Abby was comforting Jordyn who had crumpled to the floor in front of the glass. He immediately scooped her up into his arms. He wanted to worry for his closest and dearest friend, but he knew that this is what Jon would have wanted him to do.

They loaded into his truck, Sara trailing after them very shortly after double-checking with the team’s trainer as to what hospital Jon would be taken to. Sara held Jordyn as she sobbed uncontrollably.

“I was mad at him!” She wailed. “I was mad at him and he got hurt. Now he thinks I’m still mad at him!” She whimpered. “I’m not mad! I was just sad! Is he going to be okay? He’s going to be okay, right?” She hiccupped terribly. It seemed no one had the answers for her. “Patty! He’s going to be okay, isn’t he?” She began to hyperventilate as Sara attempted to calm her down as well as she could.

“He’s going to be okay, Jordyn.” Patrick lied. He didn’t know that Jon would be okay, but Jordyn needed reassurance.

The truth was, Patrick needed someone to tell him that Jon was going to be okay.