Determination

The sickness knocked me out for two whole days. It felt like forever to be stuck in bed, unable to move without my head spinning like a freaking amusement park ride. I was brought all my meals, and it turned out I had just been at Marc Andre's sisters house the whole time. He hangs out here when he just needs some time alone from the guys, and that's the address he gave me when I texted him after the last day of training camp that I had been to. It's a weird time to get some sort of sickness, early October. I would think more like December, February.

*AFTER TRAINING CAMP 2 DAYS LATER*

I sat in my car, trying to find my car keys in the mess of all the other stuff in my purse. Did I throw them in my hockey bag by accident? I could not find them! And I need to get out, I have to check out of the hotel down the street that has currently become my "home." Even if I'm not living there, I'm spending a ridiculous amout of my Dad's money.

I finally found them, and as I did my phone screen lit up and the name read, "Your Bestest Best Friend Ever." Maybe I should stop letting people put their own contacts in. I answered my phone and said, "What's up James?"

"Um hey March, it's actually Sidney. Sorry my phone died."

"No worries, what's up Sid?"

"Well," He began, dragging out the word, "Well I know we had this conversation earlier in the week, but I live with Marc Andre, James, Jordan and Kris. Talbot lived here for a week or so, before we kicked him out. But you're sort of living at a hotel, when we have a perfectly good two extra rooms here."

When I didn't respond right away he started rambling, "Well it's just because we all feel bad for you because we don't want you to be alone there and paying a freak amount of money,"

I heard James say from somewhere else in the room, "Sidney she doesn't want to stay with us because we're crazy shits and she's normal."

I rolled my eyes. He will find out that I am NOT even borderline normal. "Tell James that I'm the opposite of normal, and you all seem like the opposite of crazy shits, but whatever. And I don't mean to be rude, but when can I move in?"

I could almost see Sidney's million dollar smile stretch across his face. "Really?" His voice cracked, and I couldn't help but burst into laughter. I smiled myself and rolled my eyes.

"I see why they call you Sid the Kid!"

"Shut up!"

"Whatever. So do you want to come by the hotel and help me pack all my stuff up? Bring the others, too." I suggested.

"Okay I'll ask. I think Staalsy wanted to do something, can't remember what he said."

I nodded, "Alright. Promise you'll ask them though? We could use the help for sure!"

"Alright! Me and some others will be at your house, I mean hotel, in a couple minutes, okay?"

I nodded, "Stop making fun of me! If you thought you were going to move in with some crazy whores, would you do it?"

Sidney laughed his girly laugh, "Alright, alright MAYBE you're forgiven. Maybe. From me maybe. From the others, NEVER."

"Well I'll just have to see what I can do about that now, huh?"

He laughed, "Nice. I'll see you soon!"

"Alright, bye!"

I hung up my cell phone and smiled to myself. I really had a friend or two on this team. Different from those other teams I've been on.
***************************************
Sidney beat me to the hotel, and was already up in the room by the time I pulled in to my home for the last two weeks or so.

Sidney opened the door for me, and I smiled at him and asked, “How in God did you get in here?”
 
He gave me a smile, “Well this is Pittsburgh, you’re March Wilson and I’m Sidney Crosby. You can do almost anything you want March, everyone knows who you are!”
 
I snorted, “That’s such a lie, no one knows who I am!”
 
Sidney threw a magazine at me, where’d he get that anyway? It looked like he pulled it out of his back pocket or something. “Sid, this is TIME.”
 
“Page 48.” He said nonchalantly. I opened the magazine to the page Sidney had told me.  I gasped when I saw the title was  “IS MARCH WILSON THE FACE OF PITTSBURGH?”
 
“What the…” There were pictures of me practicing with the team, and practicing with Coach Harrison. There was even one of my in normal clothes with James and Kris. “Who took that?” None of us were looking at the camera, we looked to be just talking and smiling. I read through the article. “How do they know all this stuff about me? Who told them my brother played hockey for a year? How do they know all these coaches I’ve had? How do they know that I have four siblings?”
 
Sidney smiled, “March, they know EVERYTHING. Prepare your siblings to be recognized, and to have to do interviews about you. If you turn the page, you can already see what Kim said about you.” He stifled a laugh, “And what she said about me!”
 
I turned, the article finished on page 51. There was a picture of Kim and I from just a few weeks back. “Did my parents give these pictures?”
 
Sidney said, “Yeah, if you look in the corner you’ll see it says picture courtesy to the Pittsburgh Penguins Hockey Club and the Wilson family.”
 
I saw it, and then saw Kim’s quote, “Yeah March is awesome. She’s really sweet and I don’t get how she’ll hit people in the NHL.” The article also said they asked her about her Devils fan heritage. “March? She doesn’t care. She would go to the Rangers if that were her only option! But I think the Penguins are cool too. Sidney Crosby is really hot.” I laughed when I read that, and Sidney laughed too.
 
“But please, I know you think I’m hot too. We all know it runs in the family!” He teased.
 
I threw the magazine at him, “Oh please, Adam Henrique is cuter than you!”
 
“Prepare to check him into the boards!”
 
We both laughed and I asked, “So did the others just decide not to come?”
 
Sidney replied, “Staalsy was already at lunch with Nealer and Geno, Kris has a girlfriend who is in for the weekend, and I tried asking Flowers, but he said that he had something… going on.”
 
I knew very well that Marc Andre was still giving Sidney the cold shoulder. It gets worse every day. I didn’t question Sidney I knew he probably didn’t even end up asking Marc Andre. Whatever, it might be easier to get the job done without a million hockey players in the way.
 
I turned on my iPod as I started packing my suitcase up. Sidney stripped the sheets from the bed, and I didn’t know why until I threw the blanket over my head.
 
“SIDNEY!” I yelled, still untangling myself from the sheets as I stood up. Maybe that’s not how I should phrase it.
 
Once I was “unstuck” (is that better? Maybe?) I ran after Sidney, who was perched on one side of the bed, and I was stuck on the other. “I am so gonna get you!”
 
He smiled and replied, “In your dreams Wilson!”
 
“I’m one to make my dreams reality, as you can see!” I said with a laugh.
 
Sidney said, “You gotta use that quote next time they interview you! Go for the inspirational approach!”
 
I laughed again, “Maybe I will!”
 
I took him by surprise, launching myself across my bed and tackling him to the floor, running away after counting to ten loudly. He gave me a mischeiviously. “I’m going to get you so badly!”
 
“Ha! You wish!”
 
I smiled. We finished the job fairly quickly after that. I went to the bathroom and when I came back, Sidney was playing around with my iPod.
 
“Ahem!” I said loudly.
 
He looked behind him to see me, his eyes full of surprise. “You’re a Bruce Springsteen fan?” He asked.
 
“My parents raised me right, so of course I am.”
 
“You have 220 Bruce Springsteen songs on here!” He said in response. “What’s your favorite song by him? Sometimes we listen to Born to Run, Born in the USA and Glory Days in the locker room.”
 
“Born in the USA, huh? Born in Nova Scotia, I think you could get away with a parody, what do you say?”
 
He laughed and started singing, “Boooorn in Nova Scotiaaa.”
 
“Well I can see why you didn’t make it big as an international rock star.”
 
He just laughed it off, and asked me again, “So, favorite Bruce Springsteen song?”
 
It took me some thought. Just ONE song to choose as a FAVORITE? Hmm. “Uh let’s see, only ONE?”
 
“Or a few.”
 
“Hm, well I like Born to Run, but you can’t get away with being a Bruce fan without liking that one. Let’s see I liked Working on a Dream for a while because I was, well, in fact working on a dream. But I like the lyrics, not really the song. This is really hard!” I said with a laugh as I thought some more. “I like Rosalita (Come out tonight) and From Small Things (One Day Bigger Things to Come). I like Dancing in the Dark, Hungry Heart, Man’s Job, Rocky Ground, Land of Hope and Dreams, Mary’s Place. Oh I love the Rising and Into the Fire! Countin’ on a Miracle is pretty special too. But I like Tomorrow Never Knows too! Badlands, Valentine’s Day, and One Step Up too! Oh and Mansion on a Hill, especially when Patti duets with him it’s a beautiful song!”
 
Sidney looked overwhelmed, “I’ve heard of Born to Run, Dancing in the Dark, Hungry Heart and Into the Fire.”
 
I smiled, “It’s alright, you didn’t grow up in a Bruce family. I grew up in a DIEHARD Bruce Springsteen fan base, and I lived in Asbury Park for a long time too.”
 
He nodded, “Yeah. So it looks to me like you like to listen to Bruce Springsteen, Tim McGraw, Christina Aguilera, Ke$ha and Train.”
 
I nodded, “Pretty much, yeah. How about you?”
 
“I like everything. I’m not really a music person, I pretty much leave that to James and Flower not to put on anything that’s not awful.”
 
“Liar! You HAVE to have a favorite!” I insisted, blown away that you couldn’t have a favorite artist, or a favorite song or a favorite something music related!
 
He shook his head, “Nah, and at home the music is run by Taylor, and if you touch it, you might die right then and there.” He laughed, seeming to be reminiscing.
 
He was quiet for a second, “You miss her, don’t you?”
 
He snapped out of it at my question. “What?”
 
“Taylor. You miss her a lot don’t you Sid?”
 
He nodded, “Yeah. She’s really the best. You remind me a lot of her, you’d get along really well, and I know it! Don’t you miss Rachel and Kim and David and James and all of them?”
 
I nodded, “Yeah. But it’s been pretty fun for me so far and I haven’t really had any time to think about my family in theses past few weeks, you know what I mean? And its all so exciting that I don’t even have to worry about missing them, you know? Is that how it gets during the season?”
 
Sid nodded, “Yeah. I don’t really think about ANYTHING else actually. It’s HOCKEY, HOCKEY, HOCKEY and even more HOCKEY! That’s all that occupies my mind actually. Sidney Crosby is pretty much all hockey.”
 
I smiled, “Well yeah! You’re Sidney Crosby!”
 
He smiled and looked around the clean room, besides the sheets of course, still all in a pile o the floor, from where I had been sitting before. Sidney smiled, “I had fun actually, March.”
 
I nodded, “Same. I thought this was going to be really boring!”
 
I looked at him. His eyes really are sparkly, and I love his messy, uncontrollable curls. He’s really adorable.
 
*SIDNEY’S POV *
 
She looked at me with her gorgeous green eyes once we were done packing up all her stuff. She’s seriously the most gorgeous girl I’ve ever seen. Ever. And I’ve seen some beautiful girls out there. She has this wavy hair that’s actually pretty curly, and I would love to stroke her hair without seeming like a creepy weirdo. She probably thinks of me as some creep anyway; it probably wouldn’t matter if I started touching her hair. She has pretty features too, I just can’t explain her, and she’s like this cross between cute, adorable and sexy. March Wilson is literally unexplainable. I wonder is she has a boyfriend back in New Jersey. Which is probably a valid question, but I can’t ask it. Maybe I can have James do it. Everyone loves James, and James loves everyone so it wouldn’t be awkward. But then James knows I like her… and once James knows, so does Marc Andre Fleury, and once Flower knows, everyone knows.
 
*MARCH’S POV*
THREE HOURS LATER
 
I had put all my stuff up on the empty walls of the huge room I was given. It was a little much, a bathroom the size of the huge room, a big walk in closet and an enormous queen size bed. Honestly, it looks more like a king size, but how do I know which is which? I don’t, but it’s a lot bigger than my bed back in New Jersey.
 
I sat on the bed; the purple sheets I made my parents ship me, as much as Rachel wanted them for herself.
 
I heard a sudden knock on the door, “Come in!” I yelled, too lazy to get up and see who is trying to get into my room.
 
James burst into the room, and dived onto the bed next to me. “Nice Pittsburgh Penguins team picture hanging over there.” He pointed at the newly pressed picture of the team, in which I sat next to James and Kris. I seem to ALWAYS be in pictures with those two team mates. They are two of my best friends, along with Sidney and Marc Andre and I’m still getting to know Jordan Staal, but he seems awesome. Actually they’re all awesome. But then there’s Evgeni Malkin, who everyone says is awesome, but he seems to have a bone to pick with me. What’s his deal anyway?
 
James laughed suddenly. “What?” I asked him.
 
He just said, “I have an idea!” He rushed out of the room. What could he possibly be doing? He came back in two minutes later, with a picture printed out, tape in hand.
 
I looked at it after he taped it on to the light blue walls, a color I liked and probably wouldn’t paint over. I looked at it and saw that it was my first practice. I was clustered around the bench with James, Sidney, Marc Andre, Kris, Pascal Dupuis, Deryk Engelland, Paul Martin and Tyler Kennedy’s shoulder.

I smiled, James and I were looking at the camera, and he had his arm swung around my shoulder. I smiled. "Good days huh?"

He nodded, but seemed a little out of it. "Very, very good days. You know, your first NHL game is tomorrow at 1:30 in the afternoon. Day game! I love day games!"

Oh yeah. My first NHL game. And then suddenly a whol clan of butterflies erupted in my stomach. Not happy I'm-crushing-on-you butterflies. But evil black butterfiles of nerves and fear.

My first NHL game.

My first NHL game is tomorrow.

Tomorrow at 1:30 I am going to be standing on the ice, my name called and I'll skate out. March Wilson, number 77, center for the Pittsburgh Penguins.

And I've never been more nervous in my entire life.