Keep Your Girl Out of My Shoe Cabinet, Your Wife

Viviane sat on the table in the Penguins locker room. Her feet dangled in the air and her fingers drummed on the surface. The long wavy hair was pulled up in a messy bun, her slender body clad in jeans and a tunic.
Summer had come to Pittsburgh and the season had ended in a never ending game 7. It had taken 3 over time periods to finally break the tie and determine whether Pittsburgh or Buffalo headed to the Stanley Cup Finals against Detroit.
The last night had been a long one. When Viviane picked Sidney up at the airport he was quiet. He didn’t say a word when she pulled herself into his frame to welcome him home. He didn’t say a word when his team mates said good bye and he didn’t say a word when he sat in the nursery watching his 15 month old son sleep. When he finally went to bed he just laid down in his side of the mattress pulled Viviane onto his chest and stared at the ceiling.

The first time she heard him speak was when he faced the local media this morning. He, Marc-André and Dan Bylsma gave a big press conference and every other player was available in the locker room. Soon the cameras and reporters cleared out. The players packed up their stuff and said good-bye to each other. It was clean out day. Many faces would return in late summer, some would leave and new one’s were added. Sidney had just signed a multi-million dollar, 5year contract that ensured the family a stable future in the city they had gotten to love. Players and reporters passed her by, gave her a nod, handshake or hug.
After a while it was just Viviane and Sidney. He stood in front of his locker, his back facing her. His bag was packed. The multiple pairs of skates, the protection gear, the pants, the different gloves. The jersey’s the team gave him to take home were neatly folded on top of it. Slowly he picked up every stick with his number on it, held it against the light and tested its stability on the floor. Those who passed his test were quickly taped together. Reluctant he leaned the package against his stall and turned around.
It was over.
Another season in the book, another season that hadn’t put an additional Stanley Cup Ring into his collection.
He looked defeated. In a really slow motion he lifted his head and their eyes locked. Sidney walker over to her wrapped his arms around her and rested his forehead on her shoulder. His well-grown play off beard ticked against her smooth skin but right now she couldn’t care less. Trying to comfort him she ran her hand over his back and felt him relax.

“Can we just go home?” he asked after a while in a low voice.

Viviane leaned back forcing him to look up.

“Where else would we go? I mean we have to pick up Ani at some point but…” Anakin spent the day at the Lemieux’. Nat and the girls were wrapped around his little finger and were happy to take him in while the couple did their errands.

“No I mean like ‘home’ home. Cole Harbour. I want to get away from the attention for a while.”

Viviane smiled. “Canada sure is the place no one pays attention to Sidney Crosby.”

“No… I know… but I just… I miss home. Let’s got there for a week or two. Just sleeping in. Cook whatever we want, do whatever we want. Our moms miss Ani.”

“Hey… hey I understand. That was a joke… I’ll call Tiffany and we’ll reschedule. It’s no problem… we still have months… I’ll try to get us a two or three week break okay?”

Sidney smiled for the first time in almost 24 hours.

“That sounds amazing.”
His hands moved from her waist to her butt and pulled her off the table so she landed on her feet in front of him.

“Let’s go.” He mumbled while cupping her face and pulled her in for a short but sweet kiss. “It’s time to go home.”

Viviane just nodded, grabbed his jerseys and the sticks. Sidney threw the heavy hockey bag over his shoulder and reached for his wife’s hand to lace his fingers with hers. Saying goodbye to some workers they saw in the halls, they walked to the car, stored the gear in the trunk and headed home.

“Nat asks if they can keep him a little longer.” Viviane said looking up from her phone’s screen when they pulled into their drive way.

“Sure” Sidney agreed.

She walked towards the trunk but he just shook his head.

“Leave it in there… I don’t want to see any hockey stuff right now.”

“Of course.” She smiled.
After changing Viviane found Sidney in the kitchen raiding the fridge. When he found the ice cream in the freezer he smiled and sat down on the counter relishing every spoon full. She stood by the door and watched him.

“Really?” she asked after a while and laughed. His eyes snapped open and he nodded.

“It’s so good… do you want some?”

“I can’t… you know that.” She answered and looked into the fridge for something she allowed herself.

Sidney shook his head, set ice and spoon down and slid of the counter grabbing both of her wrists nailing her against the fridge.

“Vivy look at me. You are many things but not fat. You don’t have to watch what you are eating. You can have some ice. Here see I eat ice cream. I just had 5 table spoons of sweet, sugary, creamy chocolate ice cream. Try it. It’s amazing.”
Viviane tried to squirm out of his grasp but failed.

“Sidney…”

“Don’t Sidney me. You know I’m right. I remember you telling me that you didn’t have to starve yourself into a certain size.”

“That was before I gained all this baby fat. Before my body was ruined through…”

“Don’t dare saying Anakin ruined your body. The pregnancy changed your body yes, but to me it only made you more beautiful. Have you looked into a mirror lately? You got really thin. Two days ago I had to answer more questions about your anorexia rumors than on hockey. I’m not the only one worrying.”

“It is baby fat and I have a wedding dress to fit in to.” Her voice got more silent with every word and was just a breathing in the end. Sidney dropped his hands immediately and took one step back.

“No” was all he said before walking out of the kitchen.

----------------

Viviane stood there frozen trying to realize what happened.
The house was silent again.
Her eyes wandered through the room and paused a the ice cream. She cringed and picked it up. Seconds later it landed in the trash. She cleaned the spoon and put it away. The only sound she could hear was Sidney shuffling around somewhere upstairs. Annoyed Viviane headed to the living room and sat down on the couch.
After a while she heard the stairs squeak. When the door was slowly opened and closed she looked up and saw Sidney walking to the other end of the couch. He had changed into sweats and held a stack of pictures in his hands.

“Viviane… do you see this?” he handed her a picture. It had been taken at a local rink. Sidney stood on his skates in his famous yellow Tim Bits jersey. Viviane stood next to him in a thick winter jacket. Their arms were wrapped around the other’s shoulder and wide toothless smiles flashed into the camera. They looked tired but happy. Viviane’s hair was a mess and both of their cheeks reddened from the cold.

“Do you see this girl?” he gave her another picture. He had taken it a few days before Anakin was born. She was pale and tired. Her feet had been swollen, her back in great pain and two or three different injections went into her IV. Put again she had a big smile on her face. Her hands rested on the baby bump and her eyes were wide sparkling in laughter.

“And now look at this girl.” He handed her two pictures. One was from the start of her career. She was about 17 years old, looked worn out and depressed. It had been taken backstage during some show. The other picture showed her in the bathroom a couple of days ago twisting and turning in front of the mirror.

“Viviane… the girl I know, the girl I love is the girl that loves herself. That doesn’t care too much about what others think. Look how happy you were. You could weigh a ton and wear a pink tent walking down the aisle. I’d still be the happiest man alive to have you by my side. I don’t care if you are a size 00, 0 or a 2 or 4. I care if you have a smile on your face or not. Is it your agency who tells you to lose weight? If so screw them. We have more than enough money to live a nice life until the day we die, even in we both retire today. If you want to keep working… fine but work with an agency that allows you to be healthy. Do you have any idea what health issues anorexia can cause you? I don’t know about you but I think osteoporosis, hypokalemia, optic neuropathy, cardiac arrest and amenorrhoea are too scary to risk those things for just a job.”

Viviane nodded and looked down onto her hands. She knew that he was right but still she felt like she failed to deliver what people wanted from her. Ever since Anakin was born she only had gotten 3 jobs and it was nagging her. Just 2 years ago she would have gotten 3 jobs a day.
She felt the couch shift and saw Sidney leave the room. Where he sat only seconds ago now a stack of pictures laid.
Hesitantly she picked them up and looked at them.
Sidney had printed out a bunch of pictures of models that had died of anorexia or the things it had caused. In silence she looked at them and swallowed hard. Some of them were unknown faces to her. Others had shared runways or even campaigns with her.
With shaking knees she stood up and walked towards the hall.

“Sidney?” she said, her words echoing through the house.

“Yeah?” his voice echoed back and soon his footsteps came closer.

“Let’s go eat.” She smiled.

“Really?”

“Really!”

Quickly they changed back into their day attire and drove to a nearby restaurant.
Viviane ordered a big burger and fries. Never junk food had tasted better to her and Sidney smiled widely. Silently he swore himself to not let her out of sight tonight. On the way to the airport the night before he had talked to his mother in law.
He was shocked when she told him that Viviane had suffered bulimia only 4 years ago. It scared him. Never had he imagined her going through something like this.
When she finally pushed the empty plate away from her Sidney was proud.

Three hours later they sat in their cinema. Anakin was spending the night at the Lemieux’ house. Nat thought they could use a night “just as the couple they were, not as parents.”

They had watched a move and now sat in a love seat, the legs coiled together.
Viviane’s phone vibrated.

“Okay… we can move our appointments. She will just mail us pictures of stuff and well do some things over the phone… but she gives us the task to ‘make confessions’. Original quote” Viviane summed up the text message their wedding planer had sent them.

Sidney nodded, reached for the remote control to switch off the TV and turned around in the love seat so they were facing each others.

“Confessions eh?” he smiled taking one of the feet into his hands and started rubbing them softly. Viviane closed her eyes and purred like a cat.

“I don’t think I have had a foot rub since the pregnancy.” She mumbled while enjoying it.

“That’s not a legit confession, Viv.” Sid laughed but continued.

“Well then… start…”

He hesitated not sure what to say…

“I guess there’s one thing I should tell you… uhm well the night we had the one night stand…”

Viviane started laughing out loud.

“What?” Sidney asked slightly annoyed.

“I don’t think you can consider it a one night stand if you end up marrying each others… oh wait… you’re Sidney Crosby… I forgot… ”

He shook his head at her silliness and continued.

“Very mature Viviane. Anyways… I went out and got so drunk that night because Rebecca called me on Skype hours before. At that time she still was in Pittsburgh. She was really happy and when I asked her for the reason-the days before she seemed a little down- she just said ‘Oh you know some weeks ago I forgot to take the pill and I was pregnant but today I finally got rid of that shit.’ Just like that she told me that she had been pregnant with twins and gotten an abortion. I felt like she had ripped out my heart and stomped on it with her heels. To that time I thought I loved her so I was devastated. What about me wasn’t good enough that a woman aborted my babies? I just wanted to forget myself and find some puck bunny to let my anger out. Little did I know that I would run into you and make the best so called mistake I could ever dream of. When you told me about Anakin and returned to your house, she flipped and yelled at me how I told her to get an abortion and let you get away with it. ” he finished with his head dropped down his gaze locked with her toes.

“WOW… that is one crazy story… imagine you could be a dad of three now.” Viviane laughed and tried to lift his head with her foot.

“Not funny. Somehow I now am happy that she decided against the babies. I’m fully dedicated to the family I have. My wife and my beautiful son. If we will have more kids down the road, I’m more than happy but I’ll say it as many times as you want to hear it. You are the only woman I can imagine having my kids. It’s been a crazy ride so far but we got to this point what should tear us apart? So your confession please.”

Now it was Viviane’s turn to drop her head and remain silent for a moment. Should she really tell him about it? It was the biggest secret she had and she knew it would be better it would be better to tell him. On the other hand they had sworn each other never to tell anyone.

“The guy I had this affair with…” she hesitated for a second and he interrupted her.

“Was Max. I know.” His voice was cold and matter of factly. She raised her gaze and found him sitting there with his head tilted back staring at the ceiling.

“What? How do you know?” She was shocked.

“There were just a few things that added up. You always were really happy when we played the Flyers. Then you forgot to throw away some boarding cards from your trips there while I was on the road and dunno. I just had a feeling. When I asked Max about it a few weeks ago he confessed it all.”

“A few weeks ago?”

“Before I proposed.” Sidney smiled at her and pulled her close remembering the day the finally proposed for real. Every single detail was burned into his mind and he still got goose bumps thinking back to that moment. He was really nervous unsure about how she would react. Every time he set a foot on the beautiful promenade by the banks of the river her surprised face popped up in his head. Her sparkling eyes and the tears that formed when he showed her the ink that had marked his skin with her initials forever. Smirking he glanced down in her hand and pushed the set of rings aside. Only a few days after she had agreed to renew their vows they visited the tattoo studio and now she had a tattoo to match his.

Viviane tilted her head back and smiled.

“I love you.”

Sidney smiled and softly kissed her forehead.

“I love you too. And I can’t wait to see you walk down the aisle again.”

She moved and curled up in his side listening to his heartbeat.

“Let’s just enjoy this summer before having a perfect year. Amazing wedding, the season you dream of without any injuries and stuff and a good life.”

“And another baby.” Sid said with a smile in his voice.

“We’ll see about that.”