Melting On Ice

"Hey Em." I momentarily paused in my pitching practice to talk to Dustin Byfuglien.

"Aw! You look so cute in your little uniform!" Andrew Ladd came up from behind and put his arm around Buff as he looked me up and down.

"Why thank you." I said with a fake southern accent. Suddenly, I saw my coach storm over.

"Uh oh." I stifled a laugh as they both plastered their faces with fake expressions of alarm.

"What do you boys think your doing?" My red faced coach looked up at them with fury. "You hockey hooligans think that you can do whatever you want don't cha?"

"Hockey hooligans?" Ladd said, raising his eyebrows. "That's a keeper."

We all burst out laughing except for coach who angrily puckered his lips. "Now that's enough. You can either take your seat, or be dragged out of here by security!"

"Yes sir!" Buff gave him an military salute before turning to give me a high five. "Kick some butt!" he whispered to me. Ladd gave me a quick wave before they both went to go sit down.

He turned to me and I braced myself for the wrath. "Now you listen here missy! We are counting on you and you can't keep getting distracted! Keep your head in the game."

"Yes coach." I turned to share a quick smile with Caroline who was catching for me. I was one of the main pitchers for the Depaul Blue Demons softball team. It was a tough competition because there were several good pitchers on the team, but I was the main pick. I was having an average warm-up today and was sort of getting nervous that I wouldn't do so well in the game.

My nightmare was realized when the game began and I walked the first two batters.

"Come on Emma!" I heard the coach yell to me from the bench. I quickly nodded to him but I felt like I was going to throw up from the embarrassment. What is wrong with me today?

I searched the audience to find 24 Blackhawks staring at me. Wait, 24? Where was Patrick?

I took a deep breath before throwing my next pitch. It wasn't exactly a strike, but the batter swung and hit a line drive right to the second basemen. Apparently the infield had fallen asleep from the lack of action, because they completely missed the ball and the runner got an easy double. I sighed in frustration. I was dyeing out here and they couldn't even make one easy play for me?

My next pitch went wild so the catcher missed it. It took her so long to find it that the runner scored the teams first goal. I buried my face in my glove.

The coach called time-out and stomped up to me on the mound. "I don't know what is going on with you today," he wagged his finger at me as he spoke. "But you'd better snap out of it by the next game. Go sit on the bench!" I avoided the eyes of the boys as I began the seemingly excruciatingly long journey to the bench, but I knew that they were all staring at me.

I hung my head as I sat down. "It's alright sport." I heard Versteeg's voice come up from behind me. "We all have those game." By "those games" I assumed he meant, "those totally suckish games".

"Thanks," I mumbled. "But I'd really rather not talk about it right now." He nodded and scrunched his eyebrows, attempting to think of something else to say.

"Where's Patrick?"

He sighed. "He went to go pick up Amber." Did I forget to mention that Patrick had an extremely obnoxious girlfriend named Amber?

"She wanted to watch the game?" I asked sarcastically.

He shrugged. "Maybe he went to go break up with her."

"Wishful thinking." I snorted. He laughed and rubbed my hair before going back to his seat. I was pretty sure that that was the longest game that I have ever sit through.

Finally, in the last inning the coach let me come up to bat. Patrick had come by now, unfortunately with Amber in tow.

"Alright," Campbell was pep talking me through the fence. "Just imagine the ball with Amber's face on it and you should be fine." I laughed at the image of really hitting Amber's face with a bat.

"Batter up!" I walked up to home plate and let two balls roll by. Being a fellow pitcher, I knew how to make them choke. The next two were low strikes and then she threw another ball. Full count. I looked back at Soupy to see him pointing at Amber's face, attempting to help me out.

Apparently I was all too eager to smack Amber's face because I swung at a ball I had no chance of hitting even if I was 5 feet taller and stood on my tipy toes. I stood at the plate, frozen with anger. Anger towards myself that is.

As soon as I got to the dugout, I slammed the bat down, collected my stuff, and practically ran to Patrick's car. From the passenger's seat I saw him and Amber talking to Kopecky. Amber was obviously not pleased about something. He kissed her quickly and I resisted the urge to gag. I saw Patrick jog up to the car, without Amber. She must've been upset that she had to ride home with Kopecky instead of being in the seat that I had filled.
I refused to look at Patrick and he didn't seem set on forcing me to say anything until we were safely away from the Softball fields.

"Your just like Niemi."

"No I'm not." I forced the words out bitterly. "He's an amazing athlete and I-" I paused. "Well you saw the game. Half anyway." I gritted my teeth to control myself. I didn't need to get into a fight with Patrick right now.

"First of all, I meant you both had a short temper." I punched him roughly in the arm. "Ow!"

"Sorry, there was a punch bug." I rolled my eyes and looked out at the city. There had to be at least one in all of this traffic.

"And two," he said while he rubbed his arm. "Just because you had one bad game doesn't mean that you are a bad player. I mean I'm not saying it's not okay to be upset. Every time that we lose and I feel like it's my fault, I cry myself to sleep at night."

I couldn't help but laugh at that. "You're such a liar."

"So?" he shrugged. "It made you feel better didn't it?"

I thought about it for a minute. "Yes, your pain does make my day."

"Gee thanks, your such a good friend." He said sarcastically.

"Please, you know you love me."

"You wanna go grab a bite to eat?" He asked.

"Sure." I leaned over the seat to grab my bag that I had thrown in the back seat. "I have a change of clothes with me."

"Cool we'll just stop at my apartment real fast so you can change."

I smirked at him. "You just love saying that don't you?"

"What?"

"My apartment[i/]." I watched him as he turned the wheel down his street.

"Your just jealous."
* * *

"What are you wearing?" I walked out of the bathroom now wearing a Blackhawks shirt and jean shorts.

"What?" I assessed his outfit that consisted of giant sunglasses, a hat that shaded most of his face, and a brown trench coat.

"You look like a creeper! Why are you wearing that?" I walked over to him and started unbuttoning the coat.

"Stop, stop!" He yelled, backing away from me. "Do you want to have a nice relaxing dinner or one filled with screaming girls?"

"Please, don't flatter yourself." I rolled my eyes. "Besides, I won't be able to be relaxed with you wearing that! It's creeping me out."

"Well your just going to have to deal with it." He said as he ushered me out the door. He drove us to a little restaurant called noodles & company, that specialized in, you guessed it, foods with noodles. He ordered the macaroni and cheese and I got the spaghetti.

"I like your Blackhawks shirt." The cute looking waiter said as he walked up behind us with our food.

"Thanks." I smiled sweetly at him. His name tag read DEREK.

"I have the same one in black."

"Cool." I heard Patrick bite back a laugh at my sad attempt of flirting.

"Who's your favorite player?" he asked as he set my food down in front of me.

"Well I've got to say Jonathan Toews." I said to successfully tick Patrick off. I could feel him roll his eyes through the sunglasses.

"Yes everyone loves a good captain." I watched as Patrick stab his food overaggressively. "But I'm more of a Patrick Kane guy myself."

I opened my mouth in fake shock. "What a coincidence! He is too!" Derek and I both looked at Patrick.

"Emma." He whispered quietly.

"It's okay Patrick, there's no need to be embarrassed. He likes you!" I smiled a victory smile at him that met his scowl.

"H-he's" Derek looked in panic at me. "Y-your Patrick Kane!?"

Patrick stuck his hand out for Derek to shake in defeat. "Always nice to meet a fan." There was a hint of sarcasm in his voice that Derek didn't seem to notice.

I sat back, satisfied in my chair. "That's right. Hey are you busy tomorrow? Maybe you could come to practice with us and meet the rest of the team!"

Both of their faces looked at me in disbelief.

"You're kidding!" Derek looked between Patrick and I.

"She'd better be" Patrick said through his teeth.

"Trust me it's no problem just give me your cell number..." I slid a napkin toward him as Patrick sent me death shots. His hand shook as he quickly scribbled it down. As we walked out into the parking lot, I waved the number in his face. "Looks like all these years of friendship are finally paying off for me Patrick."

He scowled at me. "I can't believe you did that."

"Why not?" I hopped into the passenger seat of his car. "If we would have had a hot blonde waitress you would have been cool with it."

"This is different" he insisted. "He was totally into you."

"Even better." I smiled.

"This means war Emma." He said as we pulled out.

"Emma: one; Patrick: Zip"