Don't Make Me Spell It Out For You

The parties had calmed down about two weeks later and I was lounging around the house in my pajama shorts and a tank, enjoying my last few days in the states before I headed back home with Kris. Everyone was meeting up at the cabins up north in Canada. When we got the Cup, we would just have two days with it together. Two of the best days of my life, I just knew it.

“Where’s Andrew?” I asked Kris who was watching the sports channel.

He shrugged. “He left a while ago. Something about a meeting? I was still asleep when he hollered. Where were you? You’re a lighter sleeper than I am.”

“Well I was out for a run for the past hour and a half.”

He turned back to eye me in my attire. “In that? And no guys followed you home?” he joked.

I rolled my eyes, a minimal blush crept onto my cheeks. I was getting so much better with not being shy. “No, I changed into this when I got home, dumb ass. Anyways, heard any word on trades?” I asked, moving to the kitchen to finish up the dishes.

“Not yet. Heard there’s a trade in the mist with Atlanta though.”

“Are you going to get traded?” I asked, my heart pounding.

I heard him sigh all the way from the couch. “I hope not Rose. I sure hope not.”

I nodded. “When do we leave?” I asked, switching the topic to something a little more happy.

“Two days. You all packed?”

I nodded. “Have been for the past three days. What about you?”

He waved me off. “Just a few things left.”

“Kris, your suitcase was empty when I walked past your room like five minutes ago,” I told him.

“I’m a guy. Guys don’t need as much as girls.”

“Whatever,” I smiled, placing another dish into the dishwasher. “Turn it up. I can’t hear.”

The volume went up and I listened to the hockey news. This just in from the Chicago Blackhawks. The first trade has been issued between Atlanta and Chicago.”

I walked toward the television, drying the last dish in the sink. “Oh no,” I whispered. Time for the first heart break.

“Brent Sopel, Dustin Byfuglien, and Ben Eager are packing their bags down south.”

My mouth dropped. “Sopes has kids!” I exclaimed.

“This is not good,” Kris shook his head. “They already wiped out a wave of us in one trade.”

“Oh we forgot a player. Andrew Ladd will also be heading to Chicago as part of the trade.”

My vision went fuzzy and I heard a piercing crash as the dish shattered at my feet. I only stared, mouth wide open at absolutely nothing.

“Rose!” Kris shouted, jumping up to me, trying to snap me out of it. “Rose!”

I shook my head, staring at him. “No,” I whispered, lips quivering. “He can’t leave.”

Kris crushed me into a hug. “I’m so sorry,” he kept repeating himself. “It’s going to be okay.”

I pushed myself away, leaving the broken pieces of the dish and headed up to my room and locked the door. Once I heard the lock click into place, I slid down until my knees met my chin and I sat there shell shocked. One tear slipped and then before I knew it I was crying and I couldn’t stop.

~~~~~

Andrew didn’t come home that night and I ended up making myself sick with anguish and worry.

I finally came downstairs the next morning to find the dish cleaned up and Kris on the phone with someone. “Come on Kopy. He didn’t even give you a hint at where he went?” He sighed loudly. “No, of course I understand that you had just overheard the argument. I know. I know. Yeah, not too good,” he looked me up and down. “Not good at all. Thanks. Bye.”

He hung up and looked at me, sorrow in his big blue eyes.

“Where is he?” I asked.

“No one knows,” he sighed, running his fingers through his short hair. “Kopy overheard him saying that he needed a drink and well. . .”

I crumpled onto the couch staring at the blank television screen. “I want to go find him,” I started. “But I can’t.”

He was already pulling on his sneakers. “I’m already leaving to find his sorry ass and you’re staying here. Nemo’s coming over for a while.”

He opened the door and the goaltender walked in as my cousin walked out. Unfortunately for me, he had brought friends.

Adam Burish, Tessa, and Patrick Sharp squished me between them. “I’m sorry Baby V,” Burish said.

“Why?” I asked. “It’s not your fault,” I whispered.

I noticed that he couldn’t look me in the eye. “I’m not talking about that. I’m leaving too.”

My head snapped up at him. “What?!”

“I’m going to the Dallas Stars. I think it’s better that way.”

I only stared at him. I wanted to be mad at him. For leaving our team. Our home. But I knew how trades worked. People went and people came. I guess I just never had anyone worthwhile leave.

“Anyone else?” I groaned, my head in my hands.

“Not yet,” Sharp sighed. “They’re done for today.”

I nodded and looked at the other goaltender. “Hi.”

He couldn’t but smile despite the grim circumstances. “Hi there.”

I sighed. “I have to leave tomorrow to go back home.”

“Laddie didn’t come back last night, did he?” Tess asked.

I shook my head and I was grateful that I had cried all that I needed to cry last night. That way I wouldn’t embarrass myself.

“Steeger will find him,” Burish said.

Tess sighed and pulled her knees up to her chest. “He’s so stupid sometimes. Running away when he needs to be here.”

“Look who’s talking,” Burish snorted. “You ran away too, if memory serves.”

The blonde only grinned, showing off her teeth. “It wasn’t because I got traded though. It’s different.”

“Of course it is,” Sharp rolled his eyes.

~~~~~

An hour later the front door swung open and there was Kris with Andrew who looked just as bad as I probably did.

He walked in and saw us all sitting there in silence. “I didn’t realize we were having a going away party,” he said gruffly.

I didn’t say anything, but only drank him in, even in his disheveled appearance, I needed to memorize him. It was a need, not a want.

“No, just a search party,” Tess said, a little on the cold side.

“Dallas, eh?” he commented lightly to Burish, ignoring his sister’s jab at him. Silence. “Not a bad team,” he said and I even felt some of the tension lift from the room from the guys.

Not from me though. I stood, the blanket that I had draped over my shoulders had dropped to the floor and I felt everyone’s eyes on me as I stood there uncomfortably. “I’m going to take a shower,” I announced before brushing past Andrew and rushing up the stairs, tears already falling off my cheeks. I couldn’t even look at him without breaking down.

I ran into the bathroom, turning on the water right away, looking at my pathetic self in the mirror. I was crying over a guy. Sure, my best friend besides Kris, but I mean I needed to get over myself.

A knock on the door made me jump a foot in the air. “What?” I responded to the knock, trying to hide the fact that I had been crying.

The door opened and the man himself, slid in, shutting the door behind him. “Hi,” he said awkwardly. What else was there to say?

“Hi,” I sighed.

He came up to me and brought me in for a tight hug and we held each other for a good five minutes. “I can’t believe it,” I whispered. “You’re leaving.”

He nodded. “I don’t want to leave you guys here.”

“Atlanta though,” I said, my voice muffled by his shirt and his cologne. “You’ll get more playing time and a better chance at being the hero.”

He only nodded. “I want to spend as much time as I can with you.”

“I leave tomorrow,” I reminded him.

“Well,” he said, parting with me and taking a seat on the shower floor, against the sink. “While you take a shower, we’ll talk.”

I raised my eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

“We’re going to spend the next twenty four hours together. So hop to it missy and stop wasting time gaping at me with those blue eyes of your’s.”

“Close your eyes,” I told him and waited until I was sure he had his eyes closed before I quickly stripped and jumped into the shower, letting the hot water run away the bad events from yesterday’s past.

“What do you want to do after you get all squeaky clean?” he asked.

“We’re not doing anything until you wash up too mister,” I told him. “You look like shit.”

He laughed. “I’m really going to miss you,” he said.

I washed my hair in silence.

“No response?” he asked, sounding hurt.

“I don’t want to cry again,” I said.

“You cried over me?”

“You sound like you don’t believe me,” I responded.

“I’m not really used to people crying over me.”

“You worried me when you didn’t come home last night,” I murmured quietly.

He sighed. “Steeger said you made yourself sick. Is that true?”

Hesitation. “He has no reason to lie,” I finally said. “Towel.”

That time there were no jokes or keeping it out of my reach. I wrapped myself in the blue towel before stepping out and right into his arms. “I didn’t mean to make you worry,” he apologized.

I couldn’t help but smile. “Go on take your shower. I’ll help you pack.”

For the rest of the day, we packed up his things and stacked them. “What are you going to do with the extra room?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s not really my house.”

He rolled his eyes. “It is as much as your house as it is mine or Steeger’s. Well feel free to let another guy use it if he feels the need to move in with you crazy Versteeg’s.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “I just pictured Tazer trying to live here.”

He burst out laughing as well. “The house would burn itself down because it couldn’t take you three under one roof. Good thing Tess won’t ever let him.”

It was then that it hit me. Andrew and I would never be together. It was like the universe slapping me in the face by ripping him apart from me. And I had to learn how to deal with it.

~~~~~

Andrew drove us to the airport the next day, both of us bleary eyed from staying up all night talking and packing.

Kris went ahead of us and we both stared at each other. “I’m going to miss you sweets,” he said, bringing me into a tight hug.

I breathed him in, fully knowing I may never take in his scent again. “I’m going to miss you too,” I said, trying not to choke up. Again.

He handed me a poorly wrapped present. “Don’t open it until you really miss me, okay?”

So as soon as I get on the plane? I didn’t say that out loud though. I only nodded and he watched me walk away very slowly.

I found my seat next to Kris and just stared at it. He rubbed my knee. “You’ll see him again.”

“I don’t want to play against him. I’m giving that game to Nemo.”

He only laughed. “You would let him score.”

“No. . . .” I started but trailed off. “Maybe. . . .I would make it look convincing!” I argued back while he laughed his ass off.

“We’ll let Nemo play those games,” he confirmed. “What’s that?” he pointed at the present.

“I can’t open it until I really miss him.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

Twenty minutes later. “I miss him,” I stated and ripped open the package as Kris tried not to smile. It was Andrew’s favorite Blackhawks hoodie that he always wore.

“You’re pretty special,” Kris whispered.

I fell asleep for the rest of the trip with his sweatshirt clutched in my hands, his scent teasing my senses.