Who Wouldn't Want To Be Me

“Relax Cam, will make sure douche-bag does not hurt you,” Geno assured me, patting the top of my helmet in a brotherly fashion. I managed a weak smile for him, knowing that it might not be up to him.

“Yeah, ‘e will get ‘is ass royally kicked if ‘e gets too close!” Kris seconded, and soon the rest of the guys had put their two cents in as well. From the sounds of it if Max so much as bumped me it was going to be the entirety of the Pittsburgh Penguins versus Max Talbot in World War Three, and I had no doubt he would lose. Dan still hadn’t let me know if I was playing or not – I would be a game-time decision, and the suspense was killing me.

“Thanks guys,” I forced a grin, remembering all too easily how painful my last run-in with him had been. I still had a long scar on my side; it was about five inches long and stretched from my hipbone toward my belly button.

“Relax Cam, I’ll keep an eye on you if Dan plays you tonight,” Jordan whispered over my shoulder as he walked past me. Every time he’d whispered something at me I’d nearly started to blush, then kicked myself for being such a stupid girl about it.

“Thanks Jordy,” I whispered back, and I saw his adorable little grin before he put his ‘hockey face’ back on for all of the guys. I wondered if they had any clue just how sweet of a guy Jordan really was underneath all of that rough ‘n tough façade he put on.

“No prob. Now let’s get out there and kick their asses, all right?” he asked, putting his hand on top of my helmet, his face just inches from mine; his breath fogging up my visor. It wasn’t so intimate that people would wonder, but all of the guys knew he was trying to calm me down.

“All right,” I managed to steady my voice and shoot him a smile, and laughed when he gave me a ‘nougie’ although he had his hockey gloves on and my helmet was on. It lightened my mood, and we were all pumped by the time the announcer told the crowd to make some noise for their hometown team, and ran out to the ice and went into a hard skate. Dan had told us just moments before we were going to leave the locker room that I was going to be playing, and that while it wasn’t supposed to interfere with how we played that the guys keep an eye out for me. It was a little embarrassing that everybody felt the need to protect me; like I was unable to do it myself. That angered me a little, even though I knew I was just being overly sensitive about it and that they just wanted to make sure I could keep playing. I was a bundle of nerves still, but at least when I got into the game I knew I would forget the nerves and just play; at least until Max and I were head-to-head.

Jordan, Geno and I sat anxiously as Sid, Neal and Dupuis started the game, with a two and a half minute long shift. We hopped the boards, eager to get into the game, and we were playing against Van Reimsdyk, Read and Simmonds rather than Talbot’s line.

The Flyers were playing hard; wanting to make up for their last loss to us, but we weren’t backing down any time soon. Jordan and I were right back to our usual play; able to pass to each other without looking, back to knowing where each other was and reading each other with an almost psychic-like ability. When I fired a blind lateral pass to him and he nailed the one-timer in for the first goal of the game I think everybody knew we were going to be a force to be reckoned with.

“YEAH! WOOHOO!” Jordan hollered, the crowd going wild as we piled in to congratulate him on a clutch top-shelf goal.

“Atta boy Gronk,” I grinned, making his smile grow.

“Nice pass Bates,” he replied, and I laughed as we headed to the bench.

“Looks like you guys are back in action,” Sid grinned, and we both just shrugged.

“You can’t deny greatness,” Jordan smirked, making us all laugh, and even Dan was trying to hide a tiny grin. We were pumped now, and chomping at the bit to get back on the ice. Dan seemed to see this, and sent our line out as soon as he possibly could. Again it was like magic; Geno fed it to Jordan behind the net, faked the wrap-around and back-hand passed it to me to put top-shelf stick-side on Bryzgalov, who hardly even saw it coming. I couldn’t resist a fist-pump as I was dog-piled by the guys, unable to believe we’d put up a two point lead ourselves.

“There we go Bates!”

“Right back at ‘er, eh?” Chris asked, teasing me as we skated past the bench before going back to center ice for the other face-off. I was ecstatic; my first goal since being sidelined at the last Flyers game, and I had a two-point game already.

The remainder of the first period flew by, and we went into the locker room on an excited high – we were keeping the Flyers scoreless, without a lot of chances, and they were getting pissed off.

“Looking good out there boys! Looks like we’ve got our deadly duo back,” Dan smirked, looking towards Jordan and I. We couldn’t manage to keep the stupid smiles off of our faces. There was an odd noise in the locker room, and a few seconds later I realized with embarrassment it was my cell phone.

“Sorry, thought it was off,” I mumbled, but everybody was too excited to even care. There was a congratulatory text from Becka, and one from my mom and my uncle as well, telling me I was doing great for my first game back and to keep it up and be careful out there. I sent them all a quick ‘Thanks!’ in reply before turning my cell off and putting it back on my shelf in my stall.

“Ready to go back out there and kick some ass?” Jordan asked, and I grinned at him.
“As long as you are,” I elbowed him lightly, making him laugh as we all made our way back out to the bench.