Until the Break of Dawn

“You put clothes on,” James pouted at me when I was finally able to wake him up. What else was I supposed to do? Lay around naked all day? I don’t think so. I laid down next to him on my side, propped up by my hand holding my head. This left my other hand free to run through his messy, morning after sex hair. I leaned in towards his face and placed a gentle kiss on the tip of his nose. Barely having pulled back, I was already under the attack of James’s lips. He quickly wrapped his arm around my waist and effortlessly pulled me closer to him, holding my body against his. His lips were pressed to mine in such hunger that I had never seem from him so early in the morning.

My hand trailed from its place in his hair to his neck, only stopping there for a second before travelling down his chest and finally stopping at the top of his stomach. My fingertips grazed his skin ever so slightly as if to tickle him.

“Cory,” he mumbled slightly without removing his lips from mine. A satisfied chuckle escaped my lips and I started to pull away from the kiss my boyfriend – scratch that; fiancé – and I were sharing. Always leave him wanting more. That was always my style of play. Every guy I was ever with before James hated that I would stop before they felt completely fulfilled, but James completely ate it up. Of course, this morning was not the case and I was not going to get off so easily.

Our lips were only disconnected for a second or two before James dove to attach them again. He was never the most aggressive kisser so after his moment of roughness, he returned to being gentle and romantic. Removing his arm from my waist, he slid it up my side and placed it on my hand that was still rested on his stomach. Then, he slowly began to move my hand down his body, little by little. I had not noticed at first, being fully distracted by the deepness of our kiss and how his tongue felt against mine. When I actually noticed where he was taking me, I slid my hand out from under his and detached our lips. To further make my point, I rolled away from him and rose to my feet on the other side of our bed, officially ending whatever he thought he was starting.

“Corina Mae Merritt, get your ass back here,” James demanded with a smirk taking over his features. I could not help but laugh out loud at the sternness in his voice. He crawled in my direction as sat on the edge of the bed. The sheet barely covered the lower half of his naked body and left very little up to the imagination. “I don’t know why I use that last name of yours,” he commented and scooped my left hand up in his. “It won’t be there three months from now.” He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed the back of my hand directly behind the diamond ring he gave me nearly six months ago.

“Silly Jamie, you know Corina Mae Merritt sounds better than Corina Mae van Riemsdyk,” I teased and ruffled his hair in a joking manner. “I’m thinking about keeping my last name.” With that, I ran from the bedroom before he could grab a hold of me and tickle me until I took my joke back. Before I knew it, I was downstairs in the living room of the small house James and I shared. James could be heard walking around upstairs. Who am I kidding? James could be heard from a mile away. The man was 6’3 and weighed 200 pounds. He was a giant.

I busied myself in the kitchen, gathering the ingredients to make pancakes for breakfast, as I thought about the day ahead of me. It was James’s twenty-fourth birthday. There was going to be a big party at a local club later, but there was a laundry list of things to do before they could celebrate. The list mostly consisted of planning our wedding. James insisted on helping me make decisions, but I know he has a mile long list of his own of things that he would rather do that look through catalogs of bride’s maids dresses and “save the date” letters.

“Take that off,” James growled from behind me. I hadn’t even heard him come downstairs. His voice was lower and huskier than normal, and not in a seductive way. I looked back at him to find him glaring at me. Not at my face, he was not looking at me in the eyes. Instead, he was glaring at the bright yellow apron tied around my waist. I simply raised my eyebrow at him as if I had no idea what he was talking about. But we both knew that I was plenty aware of what was going on here. “Throw it away, burn it, I don’t fucking care. Just get rid of it.”

“It’s just yellow, James. It’s not like it is covered in Penguins logos,” I tried to reason even though I knew how futile my argument was. This was a tough topic for James right now. You see, my fiancé plays for the Philadelphia Flyers and their 2012-13 season came to a screeching halt when they were swept from the playoffs in the first round by the Pittsburgh Penguins. What made it all worse was that the Flyers had beaten the Penguins in the first round of the playoffs last year, so this defeat was like a smack across the face.

“Please, Cory. I can’t look at it.” His voice instantly transformed from demanding to pleading. I gave him a light smile as began to untie the apron to remove it from my body and placed it in a draw to use when the wounds of losing weren’t so fresh.

“You’re lucky I’m done cooking,” I joked, piled a few pancakes onto a plate and handed the plate to James. “Now hurry up, we’ve got places to go and people to see.”


“Did you two have a fun night last night?” Claude Giroux, James’s teammate, asked with a wiggle of his eyebrows from the passenger seat of the large SUV we were all in. We had just pulled out of the parking lot of the airport where we had picked up a handful of the Flyers players who were spending the weekend in New Jersey with us to celebrate James’s birthday. Normally, I would have already smacked Claude by now, but I was in a good mood so I figured I could play along just a little.

“What are you talking about, Rooser?” I questioned. Yes, my nickname for Claude was a combination of Roo, short for Giroux, and loser. Because I’m actually ten years old. I could hear snickering from James’s teammates – Brayden Schenn, Max Talbot, and Scotty Hartnell – taking up the back row of the SUV.

“I’m talking about fucking, Whorey,” Claude answered nonchalantly. If I gave ten-year-old inspired nicknames, the nicknames Claude gave were generated by the thirteen-year-old pervert that I’m positive still lived inside of him. I mean, putting Cory and whore together? Really mature, bro. “You’ve got that ‘I just had sex’ look that is kind of hard to not notice.”

From the seat next to me in the middle row of seats, Matt Read grabbed my chin and turned it so I was looking him directly in the eye. He held eye contact for a handful of seconds before letting go of my chin and announcing, “I don’t see it, man.” The whole car burst into a fit of laughter.

“Just because you fucked her in a dream on the flight here, does not mean she literally just had sex,” Max joked and everyone continued to laugh. I noticed a hint of pink rising in Claude’s cheeks, but my glimpse was cut short by James removing one of his hands from the steering wheel and shoving it in Claude’s face.

“Keep off my girl,” James joked and continued to hold his hand against Claude’s face despite all of Claude’s efforts to push it away. “I’m the only one that ever gets to think about sleeping with her.”

“Yeah, Rooser, that isn’t very best man-ly of you.” James had asked Claude to be his best man for our wedding, but he had yet to do anything to help. I honestly did not know what the best man’s job is for wedding preparation except to take the groom out partying and get him drunk off his feet for his bachelor party. I knew Claude was going to fantastic at that job, but other than that, he had done nothing for the wedding.

“Are you kidding?” Scotty questioned with a laugh. “Have you never seen those horrible wedding movies?”

“Yeah,” Max continued as if Scotty was never talking. “If anyone, besides the groom, is sleeping with the bride before the wedding, it’s the best man.” James and Claude’s teammates continued to laugh as if the conversation was still a complete joke, but I could sense the conversation had taken a wrong turn for the two in the front.

“Enough, enough,” James annoyingly huffed, letting his jealous and protective side shine through. Thankfully, the rest of the car took the hint and started talking about the groups plans for the night. I saw that Claude’s cheeks were still rosy, but I didn’t think anyone else noticed.


I could not help but think I was a slut when I looked at myself in the mirror that night. I wore a tight cocktail dress – with black, blue, and pink coloring – that fell a lot higher on my thighs than I was used to. But it was for James’s birthday, so that made the bright pink heels that I wore to match acceptable, right? This was not my normal attire and I felt a bit uncomfortable. I was still wearing the key-shaped diamond necklace James got me a couple of years ago for Christmas. At least I was still wearing something that was normal for me.

My medium length dark brown hair cascaded down my back in a waterfall of loose curls. I knew James loved when I curled my hair. He would end up playing with it and wrapping the curls around his fingers the majority of the night, like the six-year-old he actually was. My entire appearance that night was for him.

I was finishing up my makeup, putting on mascara for a final touch, when I heard the door open on the other side of the bedroom. My attention turned toward the door to find a rather handsomely dressed Claude. He had a royal blue v-neck t-shirt along with a pair of charcoal colored pants. His ginger hair was pushed back out of his face.

“Damn,” he mumbled with a raise of his eyebrows as he took in my appearance. You know you look good when ‘damn’ is the first word out of a man’s mouth. “You look amazing. That fiancé of yours isn’t gonna be able to keep his hands off you.”

“That’s what I was going for,” I told him as I began to put away all the makeup that was sitting out on my desk. “You don’t look too bad yourself. Did you dress that best friend of yours too?” Claude chuckled at my question and nodded in response. I’m not going to lie; James had no idea how to dress for any occasion other than hockey.

“Now let’s get out of here,” Claude said and gave a head nod out of the room. I stood from my seat and walked to until I was standing next to Claude in the doorway. “Looks like I need to get a few drinks in you to make you comfortable in that dress,” he commented and bumped my hip slightly with his. This action would have been casual if it were not for me losing my balance and almost falling over, only proving his accusation true.


“Why are we here again?” James whispered in my ear while we were dancing at the club. We had been dancing like this for almost an hour at that point. His hands were glued to my hips pressing my hips to his until there was no force in the world that could come between us. My back was to his chest and my head was tilted back, resting on his shoulder half the time because of my drunken state. I giggled at the tickling sensation I got from James’s hot breath on my ear and back of my neck. It was the type of giggle that only got out of me when I had had a few too many drinks and was a little too far gone.

“Because it’s your birthday and your friends wanted to do something nice for you,” I reasoned with him. I turned my head behind me, at an uncomfortable angle, to place a simple kiss on his lips. Wrapping his arms further around my waist, so his hands were resting on my belly button, his tounge pleaded for entrance and deepened the kiss.

“There are so many things I would rather be doing,” James basically growled as his lips trailed from my lips down to my neck. The growing bulge in my fiance’s pants, that I felt against my lower back, told me exactly what he was talking about. But being drunk made me not want to give in so easily. I just wanted to heard him talk dirty to me.

“What kind of other things?” I innocently questioned as I traced lazy designs up and down his forearms.

“You,” he blatantly answered inbetween all the kisses he was giving my neck. I giggled at his words, the same giggle from just moments before. “I would rather be home alone with you and the only reason this dress,” he paused for a second to grab onto the hem of my dress with his fists for emphasis. “would be involved would be for me to rip it off you with my teeth.”

James began to slowly raise the end of my dress higher and higher up my thighs. It started higher than I was used to, so I was not sure how much high her was trying to make it before revealing my black lace thong to the rest of the club. Maybe that was his intension? I was too far out of it to stop him and I think he had too much to drink to register that there were a boatload of people with us on the dance floor. Before I could find out how far he was going to take this, a couple of James’s teammates came in to stop what we were doing.

“Alright, bithday boy. I think it’s about time we got some water and pretzels in you and sobered you up a bit,” Matt Read announced and pulled at James’s arms until they let go of their hold on my dress.

“What are you talking about? She’s so much worse than I am,” James tattled and a jokingly smacked at his shoulder. It felt like James and I were both seventeen-year-olds that were discovering alcohol for the first time and Matt was our father who had just caught us coming home from a party drunk. And James just sold me out for being more drunk than he was.

“But she’s not trying to strip you in public, is she?” Claude questioned from his position next to me. When on earth did he get there? I knew more people than just Matt stormed over to us to break up our party, but I never saw Claude. With that, Matt pulled James in the direction of the bar to get him to drink something other than alcohol. “You wanna go sit down?” Claude turned to me and asked. “You look a little flustered.”

I nodded in response and Claude guided me to one of the booths against the wall. I turned to look at James at the bar with Matt and were joined by Sean Couturier and Danny Briere. This was the first glance I had gotten of his whole body in the past hour and I had forgotten how amazing he looked in the clothes Claude put together for him. He was wearing a dark purple button down shirt loosely tucked into a dark pair of jeans. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to his elbows and a bunch of the buttons at the top of the shirt were undone to reveal and white muscle shirt underneath. All I wanted was to taken him home, undo the rest of those buttons and remove the rest of his clothing.

“I’m sorry about how sex driven Reemer has been lately,” Claude commented without looking up from the circle he continuously dooded on the table with his finger. He did not even need to glance up at me to know that I was glaring at him with an upset and confused expression. How the hell did he know how much sex James had been wanting as of late? “He doesn’t come right out and tell me about it, if that’s what you’re thinking. But when a bro doesn’t answer his phone past eleven, I can take a hint.”

I laughed and relaxed in my seat. My eyes returned to looking at James who was now laughing and joking around with his teammates without a care in the world. It always put a smile on my face to see him happy.

“It’s just…he’s had a lot on his mind since our season ended, ya know?”

“No,” I answered almost immediately. What did have to be worried about? Our wedding? No. He wasn’t involved enough in the planning to be stressed out because of it. I wasn’t even stressed out, so far I had everything under control. “What’s he worried about?” I questioned, thinking aloud.

“The talk he had with Lavy when we got knocked out,” Claude answered as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. He continued to stare at me until a look of recognition crossed my face. It never did. “Maybe you’re more shitfaced than I thought. I’ll go get you a water.”

Claude pushed himself to his feet as he exited to booth and wandered towards the bar to get some water to sober me up. I honestly had no idea what he was talking about, and he thought it was just because I was drunk? I was not going to just sit here and have Claude explain something to me as if I were a five-year-old when I should have heard it from James a long time ago.

I rose to my feet, completely surprised with how stable I was, and marched over to James and his teammates which now included Claude. I was determined to get answers.

“What the hell kind of talk did you have with Laviolette after your ass got swept?” I yelled at him, looking and sounding angrier than I had it quite some time. How dare he try to keep something from me. Especially if it was eatting him up inside like Claude had said. We are supposed to be getting married and spending the rest of our lives together. How can we do that if he cannot talk to me about important shit going on in his life?

“Cory,” Danny stated as he stepped over to me and rested his hand on my shoulder in a soothing manner. He always was the peacekeeper and I was very thankful for that, but I was not about to turn my attention to him and stop the death glare I was sending James. He looked caught off guard and completely mortified. “Calm down, sweetheart, everything is alright.” The tension in my body started to loosen. Why did Danny’s voice have to be so damn consoling?

“No! Stop it, Danny,” I demanded but that did not stop him from rubbing my shoulder in a comforting way. “My fiancé is keeping important fucking information from me and I want to know what it is!” I emphasized the word fiancé to make a point that keeping secrets is worse now than it was when we were just dating.

“It’s nothing to get this worked up over, Cory,” Matt added, trying to sympathize with me. My eyes darted to glare at him with fire burning in my eyes. I held eye contact long enough for him to start tap his finger on the bar under pressure. He averted his eyes in such shyness that I could tell he regretted putting his two cents in.

“He knows too? Do they all know? The whole team?” I exploded back at James. He was not looking at my anymore. He now stared down at his shoes as if they were the most interesting things in the word.

“Can we not do this now?” James questioned, barely louder than a whisper, still not looking up at me. This was the first I heard him say since we were on the dance floor.

“Hell no!” I yelled. This was the point in movies that the whole place would fall silent and freezes to notice the big dramatic scene going on. But who were we kidding? We were in a club, with loud blasting music and pack to capacity with drunken people. I would be downright shocked if anyone noticed that I was yelling. “Am I embarrassing you, James? Is that it? You would rather me not yell at you in front of your friends, right?”

“No, Corina! Just stop!” he exclaimed, finally lifting his head to look at me. I could see annoyance and hurt in his eyes. “I want to have this conversation when you’re rational and not so drunk that I’m surprised you are standing on your own right now. I want you to remember the conversation in the morning.” With that, I stepped closer to him and slapped him across the face before storming off. He cannot just casually insult me like that and think I was going to sit there and take it.

Before I knew it, I pushed through the front door of the club into the warm air of early May. The slight breeze nipped at my bare arms and legs, making me wish I were curled up in my bed at home. I sat down on the bench by the sidewalk, rested my elbows on my knees, and held my head in my hands. My phone buzzed, signaling I had a new text message, from inside my pocket. I remembered being so excited when I pulled this dress out of the bag when I returned home from buying it, to discover that it had small side pockets.

When I glanced down at my phone, I found a text message from none other than Mike Richards. He was the captain of the Flyers two years ago but was traded to the Los Angeles Kings. Before he left, we had became really close. Mike was the first one of James’s teammates I met when we started dating and we hit it off from the very beginning. He was like an older brother to me and this still held true even though we were on opposite sides of the country. My guess was that this text was about the argument I had just gotten in with James. Mike had a tendency to know everything about my life before I got the chance to tell him. It’s like he had cameras following me around 24/7. But in reality, he had all the guys that he played with here keep him updated on me so it was like he never left.

When I opened the text, my assumption was verified.

Text Message from Mike:
Cory, I know you’re drunk right now but I beg of you…think about what you’re doing before you go back inside. For me. Reemer is in a difficult situation right now and he is trying to deal with it for the both of you. I don’t want you doing something that could make things worse. The last thing I want is to see you upset. Love ya.

I struggled to understand everything Mike was saying, so I just locked my phone and put it back in my pocket. Does Mike know the big secret that no one else telling me? Before I could get myself worked up over the whole thing again, as if on cue, Claude walked out of the club and strolled over to me.

“This seat taken?” he asked and pointed to the spot on the bench next to me. Obviously not, dumbass. There is no one sitting there, just sit down so I don’t have to talk to you.

“Yes,” I retorted, turned my body in the opposite direction of him, and hoped he would take a hint. Too bad luck is never in my favor. Claude sat down next to me and rested his hand on my back. “Nothing you can say is going to make me less mad at him.”

“I’m not here to make you less mad at him,” Claude replied with a small smile on his lips instead of the usual arrogant smirk.

“Some best man you are.”

“I have done nothing as Reemer’s best man for the past six months, why would I start now?” We both shared a laugh at his joke. He rested the hand that was not on my back on my knee that was furthest away from him and used it to turn my body so that I was facing him. “I’m here to make sure you are okay.”

“Do I look okay to you?” I questioned, sadness seeping through my voice and I turned my head so I was looking at the ground instead of him. Claude had quicker reflexes than I thought and caught my chin with the tips of his fingers and turn my head back until I was looking him straight in the eyes.

“You look just as beautiful as you do when you are happy. I get to lost in this gorgeous face of yours to reach deeper emtions,” he stated and moved his hand from my chin to my cheek and started to draw lazy circles on my cheekbone.

Then my cell phone began to ring. I reached into my pocket, without breaking the intense eye connection Claude and I were holding, accepted the call and held the phone up to me ear.

“Hello?” I answered. Claude took this as an opportunity to wrap his arms around my waist and pull me closer to him on the bench. He knew I was not going to verbal protest because I did not want the person on the other end of the phone call to know anything.

“You didn’t answer my text,” the voice rang in my ear. I knew that voice anywhere. Mike. It was refreshing to hear his voice because we had just been having texting conversations as of late. “I get worried about you, Corina.”

“Don’t worry, Mike,” I replied with a slight chuckle. A smirk appeared on Claude’s face and then he basically dove at me, kissing a trail along my jawbone up to my ear. I covered the mouth of the phone so Mike couldn’t heart the kissing sound. He began to babble on about how I should thoroughly think about what I was going to say to James when I go back inside and that I should not take too long thinking though because he did not want me outside alone.

“He thinks I’m going to make a move. Might as well make him right,” Claude whispered in my ear and made me more grateful that I cover the phone so Mike had no chance of hearing. Claude’s kisses moved from my ear down to my neck in a matter of seconds.

“Will you relax, big brother? I am in very capable hands.” That caused Claude to give my neck a playful, gentle bite as he tightened his hold around my waist. Part of me knew that what I was letting Claude do was wrong, but an even bigger part of my mind was clouded by all the alcohol I consumed that night and was altering my judgement.

“Claude’s?!” Mike basically yelled into the phone. “Damnit, Cory! He has had feelings for you for years…I knew as soon as I found out that you and Reemer got in a serious fight that Roo was going to jump all over the opportunity. I’m going to kill that littler fucker!”

“Lighten up, fighter,” I joked, trying to sound as light hearted as possible. “I was talking about my own hands. I am capable to taking care of myself, ya know.”

“You’re drunk, Cory,” Mike replied with a sigh of relief to hear that I was not with Claude. I felt guilty to one of my best friends calm down because of a lie I told him.

“Alright, Captain Overprotectivepants, I’m hanging up on you now,” I finished and hit the end button on my phone. I barely slid my phone into my pocket before I was nearly knocked over as Claude hungrily pressed his lips to mine. I gave into his touch and he immediately deepened the kiss.

It was not long before we were lying down on the bench with Claude being on top of me. I had no idea what I was doing or why I was continuing to let it happen. The way Claude’s hands ran through my hair and brushed up and down my sides made the very little logical thought I had left diminish.

“James,” I whispered against his lips as one of his hands began to slowly slide up the underside of the bottom of my dress. Wait. James? Yes. I had just said James. But Claude did not seem to care much as he continued to kiss me and his hand did not make any motion of stopping. “Claude, stop.”

“Why?” he mumbled in return. His hand had froze at the upper part of my thigh, but his lips continued to kiss mine.

“Because I just called you James!” I exclaimed, crying to hold back tears. “This was a mistake. I’m in love with James.” Nothing had ever sobered me up quicker than forcing myself to remember that I loved James and he was the only man I wanted to be with for the rest of my life. I squiggled my way out from under Claude and rushed back into the club. I could hear Claude calling out my name behind me, but I had zero intensions of turning back.

Tears were streaming down my face, without a doubt messing up all of my makeup, when I found James sitting at the bar exactly where I left him. I ran into his arms and took a death grip around his torso. I never wanted to let go. James never even questioned as I cried into his chest; he simply hugged me in return and stroked my hair comfortingly. I began to mumbled inaudible words with my face pressed to his body. That was what caused him to speak up.

“What was that, sweetheart?” he questioned and placed a kiss on the top of my head.

I turned my head to the side so that face was no longer pushed into his chest and repeated myself. “Claude and I kissed.” James’s hold on my body tightened at my words. I was not sure if his new locked grip was out of anger or protection. I was sure as hell hoping for the latter.

“G?” James questioned emotionlessly. I hated that I couldn’t read him and had no idea what was running through his head. James was the jealous type. He should have exploded with rage by now; flipping over chairs and breaking beer bottles. I was expecting a full out Hulk moment. But that was not what was happening. I tilted my head up to find that James was not even looking at me. Following his stern glare, I found Claude standing in front of us.

“Let me explain,” he stated, already pleading for forgiveness.

“No,” James growled and rotated out bodies so he was standing between Claude and I.

“Deep breaths, Tiger,” Danny interrupted. “We’ll fix this,” he continued referring to Matt, Brayden, Scotty, Max, Sean and himself taking care of the Claude problem. “And you tell Cory what has been going on for the past two weeks.” James nodded in agreement and turned so that he was facing me.

“I might be getting traded this off season,” he dove right into the conversation. I opened my mouth the ask one of the million questions that were running through my mind. “Just let me get this all out. Nothing is set in stone yet. And by nothing, I mean absolutely nothing. Lavy and Paul aren’t even sure if they want to trade me yet. They just know that there are a handful of teams out there that want me. If one of them make a worthy deal, I’m going to get traded. But the deal has to get the Flyer someone of real worth in return; they aren’t looking to trade me just to get rid of me.” I nodded my head along with everything he was saying and rested my hands on his arms when he finished. “I didn’t want to tell you so early in the process because I didn’t want you to get all worked up when everything is so up in the air. You don’t deserve that.”

“I love you,” I told him in a serious tone, but a grin took over the majority of me face lessening the seriousness. “You don’t have to worry about me getting upset. I’m going wherever you go, no questions asked. You’re stuck with me for the rest of our lives.” A childish smile formed on James’s lips at the words coming from my mouth. “I just want you to know that I’m here for you, all the time, whenever something like this becomes too overwhelming. You don’t have to go through any of this alone.” He nodded when I finished, brought his head down, and rest his forehead against mine.

“I love you too, baby,” he whispered so that no one around us could hear and brought his lips to mine in a slow kiss that we both poured all of our emotions into.

We ended up going home and talking the rest of the night and into the morning. Discussing all the possibilites of places we could end up the following fall. Not once to he meantion the Claude problem, which I was very thankful for. He knew I was too far gone that night to register what I was doing and just glad that I came to him right after and was honest with him.We worked on wedding plans until the sun came up, our eyelids were too exhausted to stay open any longer, and we collapsed on top of mounds and mounds of catalogs and fell asleep.


Text Message from Mike:
Danny told him to keep his dick in his pants or he would cock block him until he was so old that the only single girls he could go after were crazy, cat-lady virgins. I have never heard Danny talk like that…so happy Hartsy called me so I could be part of it instead of just hearing about it later.

Text Message to Mike:
Are you serious? Danny is incredible. I’ll have to bake him some cookies for that one.

Text Message from Mike:
He’s always got your back, little sister, all of us do. Even though I’m not really considered part of the group anymore.

Text Message to Mike:
Don’t be ridiculous, Michael! Everyone here still thinks of you as part of the team…except for the rare occasion that the Flyers play the Kings. Then you are trash to us :P

Text Message from Mike:
Awwwwwwww thanks. I feel the conditional love. How did that lover boy of yours handle Claude when he finally got his hands on him?

Text Message to Mike:
Oh you know, the usual. Took his feet out from under him every change he got at practice. Roughed him into the boards a couple of times. Then at the end, a handful of guys hung back to hold Claude’s arms and legs to the goal posts while James took a couple free shots at his chest and stomach. He’s got like half a dozen bruises, but he’ll live.

Text Message from Mike:
I heard about that last part! Couldn’t stop laughing at that one.

Text Message to Mike:
Nothing I ever tell you anymore is news :(

Text Message from Mike:
Yeahyeahyeah quit your complaining. At least I’m still interested in your life. :P Are Roo and Reemer all good now or are they still uncomfortable around each other?

Text Message to Mike:
Haha yeah they are all good. James kicked Claude in the balls and then told him they were even after practice. It was like a scene from a movie. But then they went out to lunch and had a man date afterwards like they used to. So yeah, things are back to normal.