Status: incomplete
Until Hell Freezes Over
Just Like Miracle
Every little kid, whoever plays hockey dreams of one day hoisting the Stanley Cup over his head after making through the grinding 82 game season and the fast pace play-off games, to make to the Stanley Cup Finals and then win it. In America, kids who have ever seen the movie; Miracle, dream of being American Heroes like the 1980 US Men’s Olympic Ice Hockey team. Some of them never get that chance for one reason or another, but for me stepping onto the for the first ice hockey of the 2010 Winter Olympics was like stepping into that movie. Of course, we weren’t that team, but our unspoken goal was to be great like them. I had never been so moved when listening to our National Anthem before a game, as I was at that moment. I wanted to jump up and scream, ‘I AM AN AMERICAN!’, but that would have to wait until we won the gold medal. How can I be so sure that we were going to win it? I’m not but anything is possible.
“Maxwell, you’re in.” Coach ordered and snapped me out of my thoughts. Out of habit, I got up from my seat on the bench, hopped over the wall, and skated over to my position as Rafalski dished me the puck; I dished it back to Callahan, who shot across to Drury. Chris dumped it back to me, which told me that he wanted me to shoot. Taking the chance, I left a wrister go, but was denied by the goalie’s catching mitt. I scowled, but shrugged it off and followed the play set up by Switzerland down the ice towards Miller; I knew that I would get my chance later on. Their center shot and the save was made, I knew a line shift was coming so I skated back over to the bench to sit next to Zach.
18 minutes and 59 seconds was when the first blood was drawn by Bobby Ryan. The horn’s bellow could barely be heard above the cheers of the fan. This goal was a statement made by us, it meant that we were going to be sticking around until we got to that Gold Medal game and nobody was going to stop us from getting there. I wondered how Bobby felt to score his first Olympic game goal as he celebrated with Chris and me I didn’t know that I would soon find out for myself.
As a hit from Jack forced team Switzerland to cough up the puck, I stole it and drove down the ice. I didn’t need to turn my head to know that Drury was backing me up, but I knew that I was going to take this one myself, I paused, and jammed a slap-shot above the goalie’s. Almost immediately, I was attacked by Bobby, Chris, and Jack, but then I felt another person pile on top of me. I knew it had to be Kaner because we were so used to celebrating with each other that it had almost become second nature. I smiled; widely up at the jumbo screen as it replayed my break away and the announcer call my name through the speakers. I say the American Flag waving, and a couple I Hart Dillan signs. I didn’t see myself as a Hart Trophy candidate even though I had risen to 3rd in the scoring game and had become a great force within the team. I felt that if anyone deserved league MVP it would be Jonathan because he was such a great leader.
As we skated back to the bench, I looked up into the crowd and my gaze settled upon a familiar and comforting face. It was Jon. He smiled and gave me a nod. I knew he was proud to call me a fellow Blackhawk, even after the things he said on the way over to Rayleigh. I smiled back at him and pumped my fist in the air, he returned the gesture. We went to the 3rd leading 3-0, unfortunately Ryan didn’t get the shutout he dissevered, only letting a single shot slip through. He played phenomenal all night and coach was prepared to pull him, but none of us were going to let him because we knew it might have a lingering effect on his next game. We all knew that Ryan wanted to finish this game.
I watched from the bench as the clock hit the one minute mark. We were going to win! Just as soon as that happened Zach went into over drive to steal the puck away and kill time. After succeeding at this he dished it to Patrick, who passed it back and by then time had run out, signaled by the ringing of the final buzzer. With that all of us, jumped out onto the ice to celebrate our victory before lining up to shake hands with Switzerland.
‘Good game,’ frequently repeated between both lines, until I shook hands with the guy, who had checked me with an intent to hurt me even though it wasn’t a blindside I still think that it should’ve been a penalty because it happened behind the play,
“You should play on women’s team.” He growled in broken English, “Women shouldn’t play with men. This is men sport here.” I tried to pretend that I hadn’t heard him, I had a lot of things said to me by the guys in the league but for some reason it hurt to hear his man’s opinion even more because he was playing on his national team. I hadn’t even thought that my presence on the US Men’s team would have an effect on other countries.
Back in the dressing room, Coach addressed us with a pleased smirk on his face,
“Great job tonight, gentlemen and lady.” He nodded to me; it was weird because this was the first time anyone had singled me out. I was usually just counted as one of the guys and all the coaches I had knew that it didn’t both me not to be addressed as a lady. This also brought to mind the hit that had replayed in my head since I had spoken to the Swiss man and his words, reverberated in my ear. I shook it off because I couldn’t begin to doubt myself, not after how far I had come.After the coach had finished, we were allowed to at least get out of our gear before the dressing room was flooded with reporters, gnawing a bit for an interview with one of us. A group of them settled around me, microphones and tape recorders shoved in my face.
“Dillan, how do you think the game went?” One of the men in front asked me.
“As good as expected, we won which is always a good thing. The team played great together, especially for not ever having played together as a good. I think that is important in the long run if we get into the tournament.” They all nodded, I never could understand why they did that.
“Could you describe, take us into your perspective when you scored during the second period?” This time it was a fair haired woman, who questioned me. I starched the back of my neck, out of habit and nodded,
“Um… Well, Switzerland, at the time, had been working in our zone before Jack finally managed to get one of them to cough up the puck. I was just positioned, right there, and was able to recover it and drive it down and score on them.”
“How is it compared to playing in the NHL?” A voice from my left asked.
“It’s not that much different, besides playing by the international rules. It’s pretty much the same.” I shrugged.
“How does it feel to be playing in the Olympics?” A Canadian reporter asked me, this time. I could just tell by the accent in her voice.
“I think every little kid at one point dreams of being an Olympian. In 2008, my best friend’s younger brother was inspired by Michael Phelps and began swimming much more competitively than he had been before. In 2004, a movie came out that gave me the drive to be where I’m at today. That movie was Miracle. When I saw it, I knew that was what I wanted. I made it one of my goals. Today, I felt like I obtained it as I stepped onto the ice before the game. I felt like I was in that movie. I thought it’s just like Miracle.” It seemed as though they hadn’t expected me to give such a complete answer. It may have stunned them a little, but I knew my American Hockey history like someone would know there Canadian Hockey history. Taking the hint that I was done, they moved on. Once they were gone I changed into my Team USA uniform and plopped back down into my stall as I waited for Kaner and Parise to finish up so that we could get some good seats for the Canada-Norway game. I, then, remembered that I had brought beads.
“Hey, does anybody want beads?” I asked, standing on the bench, holding my bag of beads.
“You would.” Rafalski snorted, as I began throwing the necklaces to some of the guys who wanted them. I suck my tongue out at him in response. Patrick actually pulled his shirt up to his neck as if he was showing off his man boobs and yelled,
“Pick me!” I laughed and tossed him a handful. These weren’t the traditional colors. I bought red, blue, and silver ones so that it would match our clothes. I had conventional colors back in my suitcase, that I had bought during Super Bowl weekend. What I support anyone in the NFC, especially the Saints because they had never won the Lombardi Trophy before and they had earned the nickname: the Aints because of it. I also knew that there would probably be a party later so we need to be as decked out as we could without hopping on a plane and going down to New Orleans for the night.
Our seats for the game were perfecto as my Nonna * would’ve called them. Ryan Kessler, Miller, Jack, Bobby, Brookzy, Zach, Patrick, and I were all sitting right behind Canada’s bench, so that we could bang on the glass and holler at them with ease. It was no secret who we were. Patrick, Zach, and I were all were Uncle Sam top hats. I honestly had never felt more patriotic in my life with a red and blue star painted on my cheek and red, while, and blue finger nails. We wanted to make sure that Team Canada knew we were here to stay because after all they were the favorites to win the tournament. Brian was holding my camera and was instructed to take as many pictures possible during the game and us because I wanted to something to post on Facebook and for memories for when I was old and gray and couldn’t play hockey anymore.
During warm-ups Kaner and I pounded on the glass in an attempt to get Seabs and Duncan’s attention. Which worked because as soon as Duncan recognized who is was, he doubled over because he had begun to laugh so hard. After recovering from his laughing fit, he skated over to talk with us.
“What’s up with the get up?” He asked us, “You’re supposed to be supporting us.” I ran my index finger from the corner of my eye to my cheek bone and faked a sad face,
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know that we were Canadians now, did you Kaner?” Patrick shook his head and stuck out his blue tongue at him. He had eaten a blue-berry Airhead in the locker room.
“Whatever, you’ll be wishing you were Canadians when we beat you guys in a couple days and then move on to take the gold.” I just rolled my eyes in response because I knew that anything I wanted to say would be held over my head if we didn’t back it up. Instead, I asked him,
“Is Jon gonna get to play? I heard from him the other day that he wasn’t sure if he was gonna get a lot of playing time.” Duncan nodded because he knew that their coach had talked to Jon about it as well.
“Yeah, he’s gonna play. He’s just got to earn how much time he gets like everyone else. With the exception of Crosby, everyone knows that the Golden Boy doesn’t have to. Nice goal by the way” He noted and everyone laughed, but we knew that Sidney had to work just as hard as the rest of us, in fact I bet he worked harder than a lot of us.
“Thanks, tell him to come over here. I have something that I want to tell him.” A flash of realization struck his face, he gulped but then went on to go get Jon, who out shooting on Luongo.
*General POV*
“I have something I want to tell him.” Rang in the ears of the boys on the team that were involved in Crosby’s plan to get them together, they were worried that this might ruin it. On the contrary Dillan and Jonathan had met, while they were in Crosby’s room.
*Flashback*
Jonathan wiped his face with a towel after he had gotten done with his work out, he was walking down the hall to tell cafeteria, so that he could grab a quick snack before heading up to his room for the night.
“Did you not get invited to Crosby’s little pow-wow, either?” Her voice range in his ears as he began to walk out the door with a banana-nut muffin, it cause him to stop dead in his track and almost drop the muffin.
“No, I didn’t even know that he was having one.” He replied, turning around in the direction which her voice had come from. The room was dark and he could barely see where she had seated herself at a table for two on the far side of the room. So mustering up some confidence, he began to walk over to where she was sitting, “How’d you know about it?”
“Oh, Crosby came over to my room while Zach, Patrick, and Jack were hanging out in mine and Pat’s room, watching Jersey Shore.” She explained, “He asked if he could borrow them. I didn’t question any further because that meant that I could take a shower without having to worry about Kaner being there when I went to go get my bed clotes.” This made Jonathan laugh, he knew that Kaner would so try to peak on her even if they were like brother and sister.
“Mind if I take a seat? Or are you expecting someone?” He asked her, he didn’t want to intrude upon her and the Russian’s private time. He felt like he was losing her every time he saw her with Malkin.
“No, I couldn’t find him, so I bet he’s with Crosby. Have you noticed that they are as inseparable as Kaner and you, Tazer?” She mentioned, sipping on her cup of herbal tea. She told him that she always had to drink it before she went to bed otherwise she wouldn’t be able to fall asleep. It was one of her cute habits that Jon had grown to love about her. Before their fight, they used to stay up and talk like this before going to bed and he missed it.
Jonathan smiled because he knew that it was probably true, it’s had to separate line mates from each other, especially, when they spend so much time during the season together both off and on the ice.
“Why is it always Kaner and Tazer and not the other way around?” Jon inquired because he didn’t understand why everyone put the curly haired boy’s name in front of his.
“I don’t know, I guess it just sounds better than way, plus it’s alphabetical.” She informed, leaning forward to get a packet of sugar, but Jon had already beaten her to it.
“Sweet and Low, right?” He asked, after she had paused to take it from him. She nodded, slowly before grasping the pink packet with her tiny, but slim fingers. After letting it’s content mix in her drink, she looked at him curiously,
“How did you know which one I like to put in my tea?” Jon shrugged, but answered her directly,
“As line mates, we should know what the other likes.” She nodded, accepting his answer, but Jon continued, “Look I’m sorry about getting mad at you and telling you that you don’t take hockey seriously. I was out of place, who am I to decide how someone deals with things on the ice or not. You just frustrate me to no end; I have never met someone like you before.”
She looked shocked by what he had just said, she had never met somebody as dedicated or as serious as him. It was something that she missed about him, but didn’t like either. She had told herself if she ever truly wanted to be happy with not just the Hawks, but with him, she would have to accept him as he was.
“What are you saying, Tazer?” Those weren’t the words she wanted to say but they had come out anyway.
“What I’m saying is; all the quirky little things that you do and say make me like you even more. You’ve gotten under my skin so much that I can’t let you get away. I think that I’m starting to fall in love with you, Dillan.” He was pouring out his heart and soul to the only woman; he had ever given the power to crush all of his hopes and dreams. Dillan was shocked by his revelation; her lips began to curl into the smile that Jon had grown to admire before she answered him,
“Jonathan, I’m already in love with you. I think I have been since you took me out to cheer me up after my dad died. I just didn’t realize it until after the fight when I talked with Claire. I denied it at first but I knew deep down that she was right.” This was a big step for her; she had never been one to attach herself to someone to allow them into her heart because she was afraid of getting hurt. Jon smiled, widely at her as he reached across the table to take her hand in his. They just looked into each other’s eyes for a while, searching to see if they were telling each other the truth. In them, they both knew that the other wasn’t lying and that this was destiny.
*End Flashback*
“Hey, Maxi, what can I do for you?” Jon smiled as he skated over to the bench and noticed that the Russian wasn’t with her today.
“I just wanted to say, ‘good luck, make me proud, and I’ll be cheering for you.’” She smiled back, leaning closer to the glass, and then she pressed her lips to her palm and blew him a kiss. He caught it and pretended to place it on his cheek.
“Thanks, Dillan.” And with that Jon skated away with a wink.
Patrick and Zach looked at each other and then between their two friends wondering if they had actually witnessed what they thought they had seen. Dillan, then looked away from Jonathan after he had glided away to go into the locker room before the game was to start.
“What?” She asked, confused as to why they were looking at her that way. Zach and Patrick shared a look before Patrick answered,
“What the hell was that about?” She just shrugged and looked out onto the ice which was now being smoothed down by the Zamboni machine, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Patrick was going to prod her further but Zach placed a hand on his shoulder which was enough to make the younger man stop.
*Dillan’s POV*
‘Damn it! They totally just saw that, it looks like they’re on to us maybe I should tell them.’ My inner thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voiced shouting,
“Dilana RaeAnne Maxwell, that goal you made was totally awesome!” I groaned because I knew there was only one person alive that knew my full name.
“Claire! I thought I told you not to use my full name in public anymore!”
"You're name is Dilana RaeAnne? This is gold!" Patrick annouced, making everyone else laugh.
"Don't you even think about it, Kane!' I warned, sending am enraged glare at him. He flinched in bracing himself for an jab to the ribs.
"Two for flinching." I commented, jabbing him twice with my index finger before leaning back to enjoy the game.
"Um, hello, aren't you forgetting someone?" A familiar voice questioned from behing me. I smiled, widely becausee I knew exactly who that voice belonged to.
Ashton Gearhart....
“Maxwell, you’re in.” Coach ordered and snapped me out of my thoughts. Out of habit, I got up from my seat on the bench, hopped over the wall, and skated over to my position as Rafalski dished me the puck; I dished it back to Callahan, who shot across to Drury. Chris dumped it back to me, which told me that he wanted me to shoot. Taking the chance, I left a wrister go, but was denied by the goalie’s catching mitt. I scowled, but shrugged it off and followed the play set up by Switzerland down the ice towards Miller; I knew that I would get my chance later on. Their center shot and the save was made, I knew a line shift was coming so I skated back over to the bench to sit next to Zach.
18 minutes and 59 seconds was when the first blood was drawn by Bobby Ryan. The horn’s bellow could barely be heard above the cheers of the fan. This goal was a statement made by us, it meant that we were going to be sticking around until we got to that Gold Medal game and nobody was going to stop us from getting there. I wondered how Bobby felt to score his first Olympic game goal as he celebrated with Chris and me I didn’t know that I would soon find out for myself.
As a hit from Jack forced team Switzerland to cough up the puck, I stole it and drove down the ice. I didn’t need to turn my head to know that Drury was backing me up, but I knew that I was going to take this one myself, I paused, and jammed a slap-shot above the goalie’s. Almost immediately, I was attacked by Bobby, Chris, and Jack, but then I felt another person pile on top of me. I knew it had to be Kaner because we were so used to celebrating with each other that it had almost become second nature. I smiled; widely up at the jumbo screen as it replayed my break away and the announcer call my name through the speakers. I say the American Flag waving, and a couple I Hart Dillan signs. I didn’t see myself as a Hart Trophy candidate even though I had risen to 3rd in the scoring game and had become a great force within the team. I felt that if anyone deserved league MVP it would be Jonathan because he was such a great leader.
As we skated back to the bench, I looked up into the crowd and my gaze settled upon a familiar and comforting face. It was Jon. He smiled and gave me a nod. I knew he was proud to call me a fellow Blackhawk, even after the things he said on the way over to Rayleigh. I smiled back at him and pumped my fist in the air, he returned the gesture. We went to the 3rd leading 3-0, unfortunately Ryan didn’t get the shutout he dissevered, only letting a single shot slip through. He played phenomenal all night and coach was prepared to pull him, but none of us were going to let him because we knew it might have a lingering effect on his next game. We all knew that Ryan wanted to finish this game.
I watched from the bench as the clock hit the one minute mark. We were going to win! Just as soon as that happened Zach went into over drive to steal the puck away and kill time. After succeeding at this he dished it to Patrick, who passed it back and by then time had run out, signaled by the ringing of the final buzzer. With that all of us, jumped out onto the ice to celebrate our victory before lining up to shake hands with Switzerland.
‘Good game,’ frequently repeated between both lines, until I shook hands with the guy, who had checked me with an intent to hurt me even though it wasn’t a blindside I still think that it should’ve been a penalty because it happened behind the play,
“You should play on women’s team.” He growled in broken English, “Women shouldn’t play with men. This is men sport here.” I tried to pretend that I hadn’t heard him, I had a lot of things said to me by the guys in the league but for some reason it hurt to hear his man’s opinion even more because he was playing on his national team. I hadn’t even thought that my presence on the US Men’s team would have an effect on other countries.
Back in the dressing room, Coach addressed us with a pleased smirk on his face,
“Great job tonight, gentlemen and lady.” He nodded to me; it was weird because this was the first time anyone had singled me out. I was usually just counted as one of the guys and all the coaches I had knew that it didn’t both me not to be addressed as a lady. This also brought to mind the hit that had replayed in my head since I had spoken to the Swiss man and his words, reverberated in my ear. I shook it off because I couldn’t begin to doubt myself, not after how far I had come.After the coach had finished, we were allowed to at least get out of our gear before the dressing room was flooded with reporters, gnawing a bit for an interview with one of us. A group of them settled around me, microphones and tape recorders shoved in my face.
“Dillan, how do you think the game went?” One of the men in front asked me.
“As good as expected, we won which is always a good thing. The team played great together, especially for not ever having played together as a good. I think that is important in the long run if we get into the tournament.” They all nodded, I never could understand why they did that.
“Could you describe, take us into your perspective when you scored during the second period?” This time it was a fair haired woman, who questioned me. I starched the back of my neck, out of habit and nodded,
“Um… Well, Switzerland, at the time, had been working in our zone before Jack finally managed to get one of them to cough up the puck. I was just positioned, right there, and was able to recover it and drive it down and score on them.”
“How is it compared to playing in the NHL?” A voice from my left asked.
“It’s not that much different, besides playing by the international rules. It’s pretty much the same.” I shrugged.
“How does it feel to be playing in the Olympics?” A Canadian reporter asked me, this time. I could just tell by the accent in her voice.
“I think every little kid at one point dreams of being an Olympian. In 2008, my best friend’s younger brother was inspired by Michael Phelps and began swimming much more competitively than he had been before. In 2004, a movie came out that gave me the drive to be where I’m at today. That movie was Miracle. When I saw it, I knew that was what I wanted. I made it one of my goals. Today, I felt like I obtained it as I stepped onto the ice before the game. I felt like I was in that movie. I thought it’s just like Miracle.” It seemed as though they hadn’t expected me to give such a complete answer. It may have stunned them a little, but I knew my American Hockey history like someone would know there Canadian Hockey history. Taking the hint that I was done, they moved on. Once they were gone I changed into my Team USA uniform and plopped back down into my stall as I waited for Kaner and Parise to finish up so that we could get some good seats for the Canada-Norway game. I, then, remembered that I had brought beads.
“Hey, does anybody want beads?” I asked, standing on the bench, holding my bag of beads.
“You would.” Rafalski snorted, as I began throwing the necklaces to some of the guys who wanted them. I suck my tongue out at him in response. Patrick actually pulled his shirt up to his neck as if he was showing off his man boobs and yelled,
“Pick me!” I laughed and tossed him a handful. These weren’t the traditional colors. I bought red, blue, and silver ones so that it would match our clothes. I had conventional colors back in my suitcase, that I had bought during Super Bowl weekend. What I support anyone in the NFC, especially the Saints because they had never won the Lombardi Trophy before and they had earned the nickname: the Aints because of it. I also knew that there would probably be a party later so we need to be as decked out as we could without hopping on a plane and going down to New Orleans for the night.
Our seats for the game were perfecto as my Nonna * would’ve called them. Ryan Kessler, Miller, Jack, Bobby, Brookzy, Zach, Patrick, and I were all sitting right behind Canada’s bench, so that we could bang on the glass and holler at them with ease. It was no secret who we were. Patrick, Zach, and I were all were Uncle Sam top hats. I honestly had never felt more patriotic in my life with a red and blue star painted on my cheek and red, while, and blue finger nails. We wanted to make sure that Team Canada knew we were here to stay because after all they were the favorites to win the tournament. Brian was holding my camera and was instructed to take as many pictures possible during the game and us because I wanted to something to post on Facebook and for memories for when I was old and gray and couldn’t play hockey anymore.
During warm-ups Kaner and I pounded on the glass in an attempt to get Seabs and Duncan’s attention. Which worked because as soon as Duncan recognized who is was, he doubled over because he had begun to laugh so hard. After recovering from his laughing fit, he skated over to talk with us.
“What’s up with the get up?” He asked us, “You’re supposed to be supporting us.” I ran my index finger from the corner of my eye to my cheek bone and faked a sad face,
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know that we were Canadians now, did you Kaner?” Patrick shook his head and stuck out his blue tongue at him. He had eaten a blue-berry Airhead in the locker room.
“Whatever, you’ll be wishing you were Canadians when we beat you guys in a couple days and then move on to take the gold.” I just rolled my eyes in response because I knew that anything I wanted to say would be held over my head if we didn’t back it up. Instead, I asked him,
“Is Jon gonna get to play? I heard from him the other day that he wasn’t sure if he was gonna get a lot of playing time.” Duncan nodded because he knew that their coach had talked to Jon about it as well.
“Yeah, he’s gonna play. He’s just got to earn how much time he gets like everyone else. With the exception of Crosby, everyone knows that the Golden Boy doesn’t have to. Nice goal by the way” He noted and everyone laughed, but we knew that Sidney had to work just as hard as the rest of us, in fact I bet he worked harder than a lot of us.
“Thanks, tell him to come over here. I have something that I want to tell him.” A flash of realization struck his face, he gulped but then went on to go get Jon, who out shooting on Luongo.
*General POV*
“I have something I want to tell him.” Rang in the ears of the boys on the team that were involved in Crosby’s plan to get them together, they were worried that this might ruin it. On the contrary Dillan and Jonathan had met, while they were in Crosby’s room.
*Flashback*
Jonathan wiped his face with a towel after he had gotten done with his work out, he was walking down the hall to tell cafeteria, so that he could grab a quick snack before heading up to his room for the night.
“Did you not get invited to Crosby’s little pow-wow, either?” Her voice range in his ears as he began to walk out the door with a banana-nut muffin, it cause him to stop dead in his track and almost drop the muffin.
“No, I didn’t even know that he was having one.” He replied, turning around in the direction which her voice had come from. The room was dark and he could barely see where she had seated herself at a table for two on the far side of the room. So mustering up some confidence, he began to walk over to where she was sitting, “How’d you know about it?”
“Oh, Crosby came over to my room while Zach, Patrick, and Jack were hanging out in mine and Pat’s room, watching Jersey Shore.” She explained, “He asked if he could borrow them. I didn’t question any further because that meant that I could take a shower without having to worry about Kaner being there when I went to go get my bed clotes.” This made Jonathan laugh, he knew that Kaner would so try to peak on her even if they were like brother and sister.
“Mind if I take a seat? Or are you expecting someone?” He asked her, he didn’t want to intrude upon her and the Russian’s private time. He felt like he was losing her every time he saw her with Malkin.
“No, I couldn’t find him, so I bet he’s with Crosby. Have you noticed that they are as inseparable as Kaner and you, Tazer?” She mentioned, sipping on her cup of herbal tea. She told him that she always had to drink it before she went to bed otherwise she wouldn’t be able to fall asleep. It was one of her cute habits that Jon had grown to love about her. Before their fight, they used to stay up and talk like this before going to bed and he missed it.
Jonathan smiled because he knew that it was probably true, it’s had to separate line mates from each other, especially, when they spend so much time during the season together both off and on the ice.
“Why is it always Kaner and Tazer and not the other way around?” Jon inquired because he didn’t understand why everyone put the curly haired boy’s name in front of his.
“I don’t know, I guess it just sounds better than way, plus it’s alphabetical.” She informed, leaning forward to get a packet of sugar, but Jon had already beaten her to it.
“Sweet and Low, right?” He asked, after she had paused to take it from him. She nodded, slowly before grasping the pink packet with her tiny, but slim fingers. After letting it’s content mix in her drink, she looked at him curiously,
“How did you know which one I like to put in my tea?” Jon shrugged, but answered her directly,
“As line mates, we should know what the other likes.” She nodded, accepting his answer, but Jon continued, “Look I’m sorry about getting mad at you and telling you that you don’t take hockey seriously. I was out of place, who am I to decide how someone deals with things on the ice or not. You just frustrate me to no end; I have never met someone like you before.”
She looked shocked by what he had just said, she had never met somebody as dedicated or as serious as him. It was something that she missed about him, but didn’t like either. She had told herself if she ever truly wanted to be happy with not just the Hawks, but with him, she would have to accept him as he was.
“What are you saying, Tazer?” Those weren’t the words she wanted to say but they had come out anyway.
“What I’m saying is; all the quirky little things that you do and say make me like you even more. You’ve gotten under my skin so much that I can’t let you get away. I think that I’m starting to fall in love with you, Dillan.” He was pouring out his heart and soul to the only woman; he had ever given the power to crush all of his hopes and dreams. Dillan was shocked by his revelation; her lips began to curl into the smile that Jon had grown to admire before she answered him,
“Jonathan, I’m already in love with you. I think I have been since you took me out to cheer me up after my dad died. I just didn’t realize it until after the fight when I talked with Claire. I denied it at first but I knew deep down that she was right.” This was a big step for her; she had never been one to attach herself to someone to allow them into her heart because she was afraid of getting hurt. Jon smiled, widely at her as he reached across the table to take her hand in his. They just looked into each other’s eyes for a while, searching to see if they were telling each other the truth. In them, they both knew that the other wasn’t lying and that this was destiny.
*End Flashback*
“Hey, Maxi, what can I do for you?” Jon smiled as he skated over to the bench and noticed that the Russian wasn’t with her today.
“I just wanted to say, ‘good luck, make me proud, and I’ll be cheering for you.’” She smiled back, leaning closer to the glass, and then she pressed her lips to her palm and blew him a kiss. He caught it and pretended to place it on his cheek.
“Thanks, Dillan.” And with that Jon skated away with a wink.
Patrick and Zach looked at each other and then between their two friends wondering if they had actually witnessed what they thought they had seen. Dillan, then looked away from Jonathan after he had glided away to go into the locker room before the game was to start.
“What?” She asked, confused as to why they were looking at her that way. Zach and Patrick shared a look before Patrick answered,
“What the hell was that about?” She just shrugged and looked out onto the ice which was now being smoothed down by the Zamboni machine, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Patrick was going to prod her further but Zach placed a hand on his shoulder which was enough to make the younger man stop.
*Dillan’s POV*
‘Damn it! They totally just saw that, it looks like they’re on to us maybe I should tell them.’ My inner thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voiced shouting,
“Dilana RaeAnne Maxwell, that goal you made was totally awesome!” I groaned because I knew there was only one person alive that knew my full name.
“Claire! I thought I told you not to use my full name in public anymore!”
"You're name is Dilana RaeAnne? This is gold!" Patrick annouced, making everyone else laugh.
"Don't you even think about it, Kane!' I warned, sending am enraged glare at him. He flinched in bracing himself for an jab to the ribs.
"Two for flinching." I commented, jabbing him twice with my index finger before leaning back to enjoy the game.
"Um, hello, aren't you forgetting someone?" A familiar voice questioned from behing me. I smiled, widely becausee I knew exactly who that voice belonged to.
Ashton Gearhart....