Gonna Steal Your Heart Away

“Damn, Bruins!” Olivia yelled at the game before exaggeratedly pressing the power button on the remote to turn the TV off. It took all of the girl’s willpower to not aggressively throw the remote at the wall. Rachel groaned out of frustration and collapsed lifelessly on her bed on the other side of the dorm room. “I really hate shootouts.”

The Flyers had just lost 3-2 against the Boston Bruins. Each team had two goals apiece at the end of the first period and then the rest of the game went scoreless; overtime included. Then when it got to the shootout, only one out of six shots found the back of the net. Sadly, it came off a Bruin’s stick.

Only a minute or so later, Olivia’s phone began to ring. When Brayden’s name showed up on the screen, she became confused.

“Come down to the rink,” his voice sounded through the phone before Olivia could even get a word out.

“The game literally just ended, Bray. Have you even changed out of your gear yet?” Olivia attempted to joke back, but she was still in a sour mood from the game’s outcome that her voice didn’t sound too lighthearted.

“That doesn’t matter,” Brayden countered. He sounded just as defeated as she did and both were too annoyed to even notice how curt they were being with each other. He then let out a sigh, sounding more upset than frustrated, before continuing. “Please, Liv, I just want to see you.”

An overwhelming flutter instantly took over Olivia’s heart and stomach as if butterflies had just taken up residence in both places. She couldn’t hold back her smile when she remembered that this was the second time Brayden wanted to see her simply to make him feel better after a loss. She could definitely get used to that.

“Rachel and I will be there in ten.” The response left Olivia’s mouth before she could even register what she was saying.

“Maybe she can lighten the shitty mood G is in,” Brayden mumbled and Olivia turned to look at Rachel who was still lying on her stomach with her face shoved in her pillow. It was like the idea of going to see the boys didn’t faze her at all.

Olivia smirked when she realized what Brayden had said. She thought she was the only one to see that Claude had taken a liking to Rachel, but the huge grin that never left his face when she was around was kind of hard to miss so Olivia wasn’t surprised that Brayden had noticed too. Brayden and Olivia said their goodbyes before Olivia had to basically drag Rachel out of the dorm.

*~*~*~*~*

“I’m next to Max!” Olivia and Rachel yelled simultaneously as they scurried to catch up with Max Talbot as the group made their way into the diner after the game. Brayden and Claude looked at each other with confused expressions consuming their faces.

“Ay, Rach, I’m not good enough for you anymore?” Claude called out to her.

“He scored both the goals tonight. I think he deserves more love than you do right now,” Rachel responded without even turning around to look at Claude. Max then turned his head to face Rachel and waggled his eyes brows at her suggestively while throwing her a sexy smirk. Claude wasn’t going to have any of that. He ran to catch up to the group and put himself between Max and Rachel.

“Don’t even think about it,” Claude warned Max before grabbing hold of Rachel’s hand and pulling her through the diner’s entrance. Max shrugged his shoulders and offered his arm out to Olivia, who happily looped her arm through it while throwing a smirk back towards Brayden.

Olivia barely said a word to Brayden the entire, late night dinner. But he would have had to be blind not to see she was glancing at him every other minute. Scott Hartnell and Wayne Simmonds arrived a little later than Olivia, Rachel, Max, Claude, and Brayden, and Olivia was entranced in a conversation with them the majority of the time at the diner.

“Looks like you’re stuck with me for your ride home,” Brayden told Olivia as everyone exited the diner at the end of their meals. Claude and Rachel were ahead of everyone else and were already in Rachel’s car, pulling out of the parking lot.

“Looks that way,” Olivia chuckled, waved to Scott, Max, and Wayne, and made her way to Brayden’s SUV. “Well tonight was a complete bust,” Olivia stated when Brayden climbed into the driver’s seat next to her and shut his door so the pair was completely alone.

“Why’s that?” he questioned without even looking at her and started the engine. He could feel her stare on his face so he turned to look at her and she had the infamous smirk of her’s dancing on her lips. “Something you wanna talk about, Liv?” Brayden sarcastically joked as he turned down the volume of the radio that had turned on when he had started the car.

“You didn’t seem fazed at all that I sat as far away from you as possible tonight.”

“Did you want me to act differently?” Brayden asked nonchalantly in return as he backed the car out of the parking space and pulled onto the main road. Olivia did not say anything for a handful of moments and the car was silent. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence, but both Brayden and Olivia could feel the tension in the small space. “We aren’t together, Olivia. It’s not my place to be overprotective or jealous.” Brayden knew he was taking a big step in the conversation and their relationship by saying what he said, and he instantly question if it was even the right thing to say. The truth was, in her mind, Olivia only wanted to stay away from Brayden so he never even though that that night could have been a date. He had to wait for that. But in the back of her mind, she had to admit that she was trying to make him a little jealous. “If that’s what you’re playing at,” he awkwardly laughed trying to cover up the seriousness the conversation was becoming.

The SUV rolled to a stop at a red light and Brayden put on a forced smile and turned his head to look at Olivia. She had brought her hand to her mouth and was lightly biting on her nails as stared out the window, avoiding looking at Brayden. He had never seen her like this. Shy was never Olivia’s style. She was always more than happy to put everything out there and wear all of her emotions on her sleeve. But something about Brayden and this situation made her less confident. She began to mumble words that he could not hear so he asked her to repeat them.

“Do you want us to be together?”

And there it was. The question Brayden was unsure of how to answer. He knew the answer from the moment he laid eyes on this girl at the first day of practice, but he didn’t know if it was the answer she wanted to hear.

“I want to give us a try,” he practically whispered, moving his eyes back to the road as the light turned green. The rest of the drive to Olivia’s dorm was silent. Brayden could he feel his heart almost all the way up his throat and had to be completely focused in order to simply breathe. He stopped the SUV right in front of Olivia’s dorm building and cut the engine. “What do you want us to do?” Brayden finally found the guts to ask as he turned to face the passenger seat, but Olivia was already halfway out of the door. The slamming sound it made as she closed the door echoed in his ears and he leaned back against his seat with a heavy sigh.

Brayden got jolted from his thoughts when a knock came to his door’s window. When he looked over, Olivia was standing there with a mischievous grin on her face. He rolled down his window to see what she had to say. She simply leaned against the door, lifted her face to meet his, and place a small, gentle kiss to his lips. It was over before he even knew it started.

“To answer your question,” she started as soon as she pulled away. “I’ll have to think about it.” Olivia smiled to herself as she turned to walk away from the SUV and into her building. She left Brayden there with a blank look on his face. Everything happened too fast and his mind couldn’t catch up; his emotions didn’t even know where to start.