Catch Up With Fate

“So you live with Viktor now.” Corey didn’t look in any way upset or disappointed (anymore), thank God.

“Yup,” I nodded.

“How’s that going? Do you only speak Swedish at home now?” the goaltender teased me good-naturedly.

“Not really, in fact we haven’t really spoken any Swedish, definitely have to fix that,” I pondered out loud. “I did make a few IKEA references though.”

Corey laughed. “Good job! They go there more often than they like to admit so don’t let him make you feel bad about mentioning it.”

I clicked my tongue and nodded, thankful for that tidbit of info. “I guess it’s kind of the same with everyone asking if I drive a Mercedes or a BMW at home... which I don’t. I’d love to but you don’t wanna pay off insurance for an X5 as a student in college.”

“I guess not,” Corey agreed. The whole table had mixed up seating arrangements, especially as the first few left. Somehow Corey had ended up next to me who I minded much less than Kaner, who had seriously chatted off my ear tonight. I was a little worried that things between Corey and I would be awkward now because of the date, but it seemed like they weren’t.

“So, how’s it going? How’s school?” Corey asked then.

“It’s good and it’s going,” I shrugged with a small frown. “No class today, Martin Luther King day.” Corey nodded in understanding. “How about you? How’s the crossbar?” Cheesy but he smiled.

“Helpful as ever,” he chuckled.

“You know, Fleury actually thanked the crossbar in their Game 7 Cup Final,” I remembered. “Do you guys do that often?” Maybe the question was weird and even a little rude but I was actually curious.

“Every now and then. Does come in handy,” Corey laughed. “Hey, didn’t you say once you wanted to try goalie?”

My eyes widened. “Oh, uhhhh...”

Corey laughed at my expression. “It’s fine,” he assured me.

“I don’t skate very well, so...” I tried to find an excuse to get out of being peppered with black rubber disks.

“You don’t really have to skate much,” he pointed out.

“At least you have enough padding that falling won’t hurt much,” I blurted and he laughed again. Sometimes I really needed to learn how to keep my mouth shut.

“Guess that’s true,” he chuckled.

Corey and I talked a little longer and eventually I stopped putting my foot in my mouth. When we all went home I was assured there would be no weirdness with Corey, fortunately. If there had been, the team would have been short of their #10.

.

On Tuesday college was back on. It was another off day for Viktor and he insisted I take his car to class, even when I told him I wasn’t going to be back until afternoon! That definitely wasn’t going to work tomorrow I had to work.

“Morning, Ms. Drunk, did you get over your hangover yet?” Diane had snuck up on me from behind and scared the living daylights out of me. I gave an awfully high-pitched squeak that promptly a few people around us had a laugh at. Assholes.

“I did, thank you,” I grumbled. “How’s Dillon?”

“He’s fine,” Diane smiled. “I hope your roomie was nice to you, all the stuff you drank must’ve made a nice one. Dillon didn’t get out of bed all day.”

“It was a very nice hangover and yes, my roomie was very nice to me, unfortunately. It was his birthday yesterday,” I frowned, still feeling guilty. But I already had an idea how I could kind of make it up to him, at least a little.

“You room with a guy?!” Diane gasped, looking completely shocked.

“I do,” I frowned even more at her reaction. “Didn’t I tell you about him?”

“No, you always said Vic, I thought you were talking about a girl, Victoria or something,” she shrugged. I let out a laugh.

“His name’s Viktor actually but I’ll tell him you said that, he’ll love it.” He wouldn’t actually, but that was the point.

“Okay, so you room with a guy. You should’ve told me!” she slapped at my arm. “Is he hot?”

“Uhhh... I guess?” I offered slowly. Viktor was most definitely to be considered ‘hot’, at least according to the rest of Chicago’s (and maybe Toronto’s and Gothenburg’s) female population. Personally I didn’t like that adjective too much, in the way most people, especially guys, used it, it was kind of degrading. For Viktor the (next) best one was ‘handsome’, I guess.

“Judging from your reaction he definitely is,” Diane grinned.

“What do you care? You already have a boyfriend,” I complained, eager to change the topic.

“I’m taken, not dead,” she waved me off. “So, do you like Viktor?”

“No!”

Diane eyes widened at my exclamation. “Whoa, okay,” she frowned slightly. “He’s got to be at least decent if you’re rooming with him though. Or is he gay?”

I snorted. “Most definitely not, though some might want to argue. He’s a pretty boy, so to speak.”

Diane laughed. “Oh yeah, I know what you mean. So, he’s not gay. Is there something wrong with him? Does he already have a girlfriend? Or picks up girls all the time?”

As far as I knew Viktor didn’t have a girlfriend and the number of his conquests didn’t seem to be very high either. Otherwise I hoped Abby or Elina would have warned me. “No to both,” I shook my head.

“Okay, so there’s this hot, nice guy that’s single and he’s your roommate. And you don’t like him even a little bit? Are you dead?”

“I don’t date,” I grumbled, tired of the topic. Diane always had a way of saying things that put you on the spot. Dillon loved that about her though.

“Why the hell not? There’s lots of interested guys, Tasha. In fact I know that Jamison, the drummer of Dillon’s band, has a mad crush on you now,” she grinned and wiggled her eyebrows.

“Great. I don’t even want to know the stupid things I did while I was drunk,” I groaned and covered my face with my hands. There was a reason I usually didn’t drink (much).

“You weren’t bad,” Diane assured me quickly. “You were kind of quiet and a little sad, I think. Apparently Jay and you had a good conversation about song lyrics.”

“Promise I didn’t do anything embarrassing? Especially something that someone took pictures of and posted them online?” I was terrified of having one of those horrible drunk pictures online. The internet would never forget and drunk or other embarrassing pictures were going to look so good on my resume when I was looking for a job at a school.

“No one posted any pictures, I promise. I think Dill’ took one of us all together at some point but it’s just a nice group shot and he definitely won’t post it if you don’t want him to,” she promised sincerely. I nodded slowly, breathing a sigh of relief. People always accused me of being paranoid with the online stuff, but I would rather be safe than sorry, especially with something that could possibly affect my career.

“Thanks.”

“No problem. But there is a problem with you not dating! What the hell’s up with that?” she wanted to know.

“I just don’t want to,” I shrugged, but she didn’t buy it. “When the semester ends, I’m going back to Germany and I just don’t want the heartbreak.”

“It’s not like you gotta marry the guy, Tasha,” she chuckled. “Just go out and have a little fun! I can give you Jay’s number or him yours and if you’re uncomfortable meeting him alone, I’ll force Dillon to do a double date, okay?”

“I’ll think about it,” I offered only so she would get off my case.

“I hope so, Jay’s seriously adorable, if I didn’t have Dill’ I’d go for him. Drummer’s have nice muscles, trust me,” she winked and then the teacher came in. Viktor had nice muscles, too...

.

.
“I’m home!” I called into the apartment when I closed the door behind me. The TV wasn’t on so I wasn’t sure if he was even home. A moment later he appeared from his bedroom though.

“Hi.” Unfair smile. “How was class?”

“You went to college, too, you tell me,” I shrugged and took off my boots, then my coat. “Your car keys.”

Viktor took them from me and threw them on the side table. “Everything go okay?”

“Car’s still in one piece, yes,” I chuckled. “How was your lazy day?”

“Lazy,” he grinned. “Watched some TV, talked to my brother...”

“Which one?” I asked, he had two, both younger, but I didn’t know their names. The younger one went to Viktor’s old college though.

“Sebastian, the little one,” Vik explained.

“The one at your college?”

“Yeah, Vermont,” he nodded.

“Blech, I could never do college and hockey at the same time. How did you even have a life?!” I made a face that made Viktor laugh.

“It’s hard, but you manage. You gotta do well in school to stay on the team,” he told me.

“Ha! And you did?”

He rolled his eyes. “I had a GPA of 3.6, thank you.”

I crinkled my nose. “Guess there’s got to be some brains inside your blondie head after all,” I joked cheekily.

“You’re blonde, too!”

“Exceptions prove the rule,” I grinned. “By the way, one of my friends thought I was rooming with a girl.”

“What! What the hell did you tell them?” He eyed me suspiciously.

“Nothing about your bathroom habits,” I laughed. “Apparently I only called you Vik, so she thought I meant Victoria or something like that. Not too far off, huh?” It was really amusing to see the frown on his face.

“I hope you corrected her,” he grumbled.

“Yeah, then she proceeded to ask me if you’re hot,” I blurted. He let out a loud laugh.

“What did you say?” he asked curiously. The way he just looked straight at me made it really hard not to blush. Dammit, me and my big mouth!

“I said ‘I guess’,” I tried to shrug it off. He grinned smugly.

“You guess?”

“You look into the mirror enough to know you’re not completely ugly,” I gave back. “I got some school stuff to do now.”

“Uh huh,” he laughed as I disappeared into the guestroom.

Later when we had dinner together he kept teasing me about my ‘I guess’, but I didn’t lag that far behind with keeping up with him. We laughed a lot and it was the first evening that I didn’t think about or of CC. I was just having a good time hanging out with a friend.