Golden Because We're Alive

I pulled the black and gold jersey over my head. It was too big, but then again I had ordered it big on purpose. My friends laughed because I owned the jersey, but these were the same girls who gushed over how Tyler Seguin was. It made me slightly annoyed and amused at the same time. I did know however that that wasn’t going to be an issue with me wearing the jersey to the meet and greet that night.

School passed in a blur. October days were the ones that I loved, but it was the night that I looked forward to. The boys on the school hockey team and I discussed the meeting and the games. A few of them would be going, so the seniors in the group, including myself, decided to meet for dinner. My parents didn’t care as long as I showed up at the house before curfew and didn’t die before then.

“Em, wait up,” called Adam, my boyfriend. He broke free from the group as I started to walk away. “I’m not going tonight.”

I looked up at him and pouted. The school goalie shrugged. Whenever he and the team had hockey related plans, I was there. Anything hockey related was a part of our lives and made up most of our dates. Other times, he and I found some other types of dates, but they didn’t compare to the hockey dates we went on. Adam put his arm around me and gave me a slight squeeze.

“Fine, but if I hook up with Tyler Seguin, you can’t be mad,” I smiled. Adam kissed the top of my head then let go of me.

We met at Fitzgerald’s Pub at five for the earliest dinner possible. The Fitzgeralds were used to us being at their restaurant. The fact that their daughter was in our group probably didn’t hurt any though. Between the seven of us at the table, we represented six players: Seguin, Chara, Thomas, Lucic, and Krejci. Some of the others at the restaurant asked us if we realized we covered enough players for the right positions on the ice. We had noticed, but it hadn’t been coordinated like some had asked.

Rachel Fitzgerald drove with me to the meeting of the Boston Bruins players. We talked about boys and college on our way. She told me about her plans to stay in state, and I spoke about going to school at UNH or McGill in Montreal. She asked about Adam, but I ignored that. We spent the rest of the way just gossiping about boys and school until we got there.

I stood in line to get my autograph and picture with Tyler Seguin. Rachel giggled behind me knowing that I had a crush on the player. My cousin had told me that when she met him in Nashville last season, he was such a sweetheart. That made me like him. Once it was my turn, he smiled up at me from where he was sitting. I handed him my jersey and a poster to sign.

“What’s your name?” asked the nineteen-year-old signing autographs.

“Emily. Emily McMurphy,” I answered. He held his hand out to shake, and I took it smiling brightly.

“Nice name. Irish?” asked Tyler. I nodded. It hadn’t seemed like he spoke this much to the others, but maybe I was just thinking that I was special.

Rachel said something to me, and I turned around to look at her. As I turned back, Tyler finished rolling up the poster and put a rubber band around it. He stood for the picture and wrapped his arm around my waist. I could feel the butterflies forming in my stomach.

“Emily Patricia McMurphy, you have a boyfriend! Shame on you,” chided my best friend as we drove home. She chose a ride with me over her boyfriend, and now I wondered if I should be upset about that.

Once we stopped, she put a piece of paper into my lap and pointed at it. Apparently, it had been wrapped up in the poster. My eyes widened in surprise. The phone number on the paper wasn’t one that I recognized, but I definitely knew the name.

“Rach, don’t tell Adam. I didn’t know it was there,” I whispered. There was no one else in the car, but I felt the need to be secretive. This couldn’t be happening to me. This was just too surreal.

I dropped Rachel off at the house before going home. I was still trying to wrap my head around what we had discovered. The number definitely didn’t lead to the rejection hotline. Why would Tyler Seguin want to give me his number? I looked at myself in the rearview mirror as I sat in the driver way. My red hair, freckles, and green eyes made me the stereotypical Irish lassie as my grandparents had once joked. Only a handful of people thought that I was even remotely pretty. I went upstairs and prayed for Friday.

That Friday, school passed way too slowly. Rachel passed a note to me in anatomy about Tyler asking if I had called him yet. Three days had passed since the number was given to me. Calling him terrified me. It should, but the idea of it scared me just because of who it was. I would do it that night. They didn’t have a game, and I wasn’t scheduled to work or see Adam.

I got home and held the phone in my hands. I dialed the number but never pressed call.

“Suck it up, cupcake,” I told myself. Quoting our soccer coach made me feel better, and I pressed the call button on my phone hoping that it was all a joke and that this would go nowhere. I panicked once there was a ring. This wasn’t going to be a dream. It was now a nightmare.