State of Grace

It’s a surprise to Sid when Grace shows up at the rink the next day. A great surprise. Even though he had invited her, last night after her Mom came home and he’d chosen to use that as his cue to call it a night and head home. Sarah had worn a happy smile and greeted him politely, show cased the different types of candy and chocolate that she’d found for Jacob and laughed uncontrollably when Grace shared her horror at mistaking Sid for her, but she had kept questions in her eyes, and they were questions Sid didn't have answers for.

Sarah seems lovely, really polite and warm, and Sid can see where Grace gets some of her charm, but Sarah is still her mother and Sid is still a professional sports star who has spent a lot of time with her daughter. It makes sense for Sarah to have a need for some details, but Sid doesn't have any to offer. He is still trying to figure out what draws him to Grace, what it is about her that makes her so easy to talk to, and so important to have around.

He’d been more than happy to let Grace scrounge for answers for her mother, so he had said it was late and that he had better go. Grace had walked him to the elevator, saying goodbye with a heartfelt kiss and thoughtful eyes.

That’s when Sid had made the offer. When he’d taken her hand, looked up into her eyes and said, “I’ve got a practice tomorrow, but I’d really love to hang out with you afterwards.”

Grace had shaken her head. “I appreciate the offer Sid, I really do, but I think that maybe-”

“I need to kill a dragon or something first, right?” he teased, smirking. “To earn your heart.”

“Sid,” she’d smiled in response, right there in front of the elevator in her track pants and baggy shirt, her hair loose and barely kept in her bun, still looking beautiful. “ You've already earned that.”

Then she had kissed him again and promised to meet him after practice, and she had been forced to push on his chest a little just to encourage him to actually leave, which he seemed to have no intention of, locking his arms around her waist and bending his head for another kiss. She had indulged him and given in, then sent him on his way, telling him to have a great practice.

He doesn't know why he’s so surprised to see her making her way down the steps toward him now, but he’s glad. So glad that butterflies –something he hasn't felt in the longest time- stir up a small storm in his stomach.

He keeps himself propped up after the hard training by leaning on his stick, watching her walk down to the bench. She’s got a pair of skates in her hand, a nervous look on her face and an-almost regretful bite of her lip, but when she sees him looking at her she smiles.

Trying to ignore the mushy feeling in his stomach at the fact that his mere presence can put that smile on her face, he skates over to the bench, the ice now clean of all traces of practice having taken place.

He takes a seat beside her on the bench, takes off his helmet and leans in to kiss her cheek. “You look nervous.”

“I haven’t skated before,” she admits, her the corners of her eyes crinkling with the admission. “I’m going to be horrible and you’re going to be rolling around on the ice laughing at me.”

Sid chuckles and takes off his gloves, putting them on the bench to the side of him.

“You’ll be fine, I promise,” he says, taking her knee and bringing her foot up to his lap so he can tie her skates for her. “I’m going to take care of you.”

“Prince Charming, huh?” she teases as she swaps her legs over for the other skate to be tied.

Sid ties it tightly and then stands to help her to her feet. “I think I’m going for Knight in Shining Armour today actually.”

“Well,” Grace laughs, “let’s see whether that’s obtainable.”

At first, she really is like a baby giraffe trying to stand walk for the first time, only, given that it really is her first time, she is more like a baby giraffe trying to walk with skates on with the ice covered in melted butter and soap. More simply, she is a bumbling mess and not in the cute, ‘oh you’ll have to take my hand and lead me’ way that she would prefer to be, but in a ‘falling over every two seconds and getting a really sore butt’ way. Sid saves her numerous times with a last minute arm around her waist, but she’s still finding it tough.

Sid works to keep a smirk from his lips and pulls her in at his side, putting an arm around her waist and holding her arm with his other. He slowly teaches her how to move on the ice, eventually getting her to fight her natural movements and mimic his instead, and they really do cover some ground.

After thirty minutes of falling over, laughing, half-hearted threats to kill him and the blooming of at least three new bruises, Grace finally moves up a rung on the ladder of ability.

“Can I shoot some pucks?” she asks hopefully.

Music to his ears, Sid leaves her in the middle of the ice and goes back to the bench to retrieve his stick and a couple of pucks. After a brief lesson on how to shoot, Grace is like a duck to water, picking up on this particular skill a lot better than the art of skating.

“We should have a competition,” she suggests, getting confident.

Sid shows off by flicking a puck up with the stick and practically making it dance before firing it into the open net. When he looks back at Grace, her expression has faded from confident to sheepish.

“Okay, no competition,” she declares after marveling at his talent. “Definitely no competition. I forgot that I was talking to an NHL player and not a regular human being.”

Laughing, Sid takes her hand and skates with her to the bench. They untie their skates and Grace puts hers into a bag that Sid hadn't seen her bring in with her. She pulls it from under the bench and reaches in to retrieve something else out of it also. It’s a square shaped object, wrapped in black wrapping paper with a gold bow.

“It’s for you,” Grace says as she passes it to him. “It’s kind of silly but I just thought, I mean -I……” she trails off and leaves it unfinished, holding her breath and watching Sid unwrap it.

When the bow is off and he peels open the paper, a thick wooden frame is revealed. In the middle of it is a photo of the two of them together at Heinz Field, but not the same one that was in the paper. It’s one of them both lying on the ground doing the ‘Grass Angels’ and as Sid looks down at it, he can’t quite recall a photo of himself in which he looks happier than this one.

He touches his fingers over it, softly brushing them over the giant smile on Grace’s face as the photo captures her mid-laugh. It takes him back to that moment, to the one they shared there, and the many more they've shared since. If Grace decidedly has to leave in just a matter of days, he’s at least glad that he gets a token of their time together, even if it’s not what he wants most.

“Grace,” he starts, her name sounding sacred in his mouth, “it’s great, thank you. You didn't have to-”

“I wanted to,” she insists, cutting in.

There’s no accurate way to describe how much time she had spent standing in a store this morning looking for the right frame, or how she had gazed so googly-eyed at all the photos of them that she’d gotten developed before choosing this particular one. But Grace wants to tell him the reason why she did, hand it to him on a plate for him to take it and do with it what he likes.

“I…I’ve had a lot of fun in these last few days, Sid. More fun than I have ever had, and I just wanted to give you something to remember me by.”

‘Don’t forget me’ and ‘I would love to stay here and see where we could go with this’ remain left in her mouth unsaid, but the glow of her sweet eyes hold the sentiment. With the words she does say, she says them calmly, with held posture and a sturdy smile, but Sid can read between the lines.

He puts his hand on her thigh and leans closer, the gift resting in his lap. “I’m not going to forget you, Grace. Not in a million years. I couldn't, even if I tried to.”

And that’s God’s honest truth, because, really, how can Sid ever forget a girl like Grace? One that is so simply wonderful, the one thing in his life that he feels like he actually needs, but can’t quite ever get enough of. You don’t forget someone like that. You can’t. They get burnt into your brain and they stay there, and Grace already is. Sid isn't trying to fight it, why bother with that when time with Grace makes him feel as good as this?

Grace blushes, her face filling with heat. “Sid-”

“No,” he says, “really, Grace. You’re amazing and I’m actually really disappointed that you have to go home. I think that-” he stops and waits out a pause until he’s finally ready say the words and give them to her in hopes that she will feel the same and not shoot him down. “-I think we would be great together. I think we are great together.”

To his immediate relief, Grace looks like she couldn't agree more.

“I know we are great together, Sid,” she says definitively. “Part of me wishes I was staying too.”

“All of me wishes you were staying, Grace,” Sid admits. He lifts the frame and sets it aside, tugging Grace into his lap in its place. She fits in sideways, her legs over his.

“How many days do we have left?” he finds enough bravery to ask, enclosing his arms around her, pressing his face into the shoulder of her thick black North Face jacket.

“My flight is the day after tomorrow, at nine o clock.”

“We can work with that,” he replies, assuredly. His brown eyes look to be worrying though, in an opposite way to his confident tone, and Grace holds a hand to his face, pushing back his longer lock of hair.

She leans in and kisses him, giving him all the agreement she can possible, even without words.

She will be back for another brief stay and game in the future, she knows. She even started looking at the schedule last night to pick one that wont interfere with calving –the busiest part of the dairy farming season. But she also knows that they can plan that later, in emails or phone calls or whatever, as long as it’s later and they use now for other things that you can’t do through technology, like make the most of their time together, able to touch and kiss and see each other’s laugh in person. All the bits that are Grace’s favourite.

“Come on,” she says to him, tipping her head in the direction of the tunnel. “Let’s get out of here.”

As luck would have it, like the Universe is truly making this the best trip of a life time, as Grace and Sid navigate through the hallways they come across two Pens players who have been caught up with talking to trainers, further exercises and other things that have kept them in the building. As they walk into the kitchen part Grace lays eyes on Ben Lovejoy and Geno sitting around the middle island on stools, drinking water like it’s going out of fashion.

“Oh god. Oh god,” Grace breathes in a low whisper, beyond panicked. “Please don’t let me say anything stupid. Seriously Sid, if I start to –just cover my mouth. I give you permission. I totally give you permission.”

Sid laughs as Grace’s hand squeezes his so tightly that it might seriously stop the blood flow.

“Hi boys,” he greets. “Hey Benny, I’ve got your biggest fan here.”

Ben’s face goes from tired to alert in record time. His eyes light up like a he’s a kid on Christmas morning and Sid has just brought the biggest present ever and placed it under the tree.

“Really?”

“Yeah, this is Grace,” Sid introduces, letting go of her hand to let her shake Ben’s. “And Grace, I’m fairly certain that you don’t need me to tell you who this is.”

Grace’s eyes are enlarged and she blinks a lot of times like she can’t really believe it, and Sid would let it hurt his ego that she looks far more awe-struck now meeting Benny than she did meeting him, but she keeps her sentences short and full of sense so Sid feels a short win on his behalf of account of tongue-tied inducing presence.

“Benny,” Grace says, “Holy crap. This is unreal! I've always wanted to meet you! You are my favourite player, and I know I’m not supposed to have favourites- but how can people not love you?”

Ben looks absolutely flattered, but cocks his head a little. “That’s a very interesting accent you've got there, Grace.”

“I’m New Zealand!” Grace says without thinking. “I mean –I’m from New Zealand, not that I am New Zealand, ‘because that’s silly right? That’s a country, no one can BE New Zealand.”

She shoots a SOS look to Sid who is more than happy to cut in.

“Grace was here the other night for the game against the Rangers,” he tells Ben. “She saved up for it and flew all the way over just to watch. She wore your jersey.”

“My jersey?”

Sid nods, almost snickering at this point, and Grace gets her mouth together enough to say, “Yeah, of course I wore your jersey! The home one of course, however I do have your away one, too.”

Ben throws his arms around Grace and hugs her tightly. “You have my jersey. You have two of my jerseys,” he repeats to himself. “Bless you Grace! Grace -uh-”

“Jackson,” Sid fills in.

“Grace Jackson,” Ben says, indebted with respect, like he’s greeting the Queen. “Bless you, Grace Jackson, my biggest fan.”

“Benny finally has fan,” Geno chirps from the bench, looking amused. “Good for Benny.”

There is a bit more commotion as Ben requests Sid take a photo, so Grace and Ben pose and then Ben excuses himself to depart for another appointment, saying, “I’m really sorry, Grace, but I've got to go. I will definitely be tweeting about this later though” and makes sure to get Grace’s twitter handle from her so he can tag her before he leaves, still grinning.

Grace pulls up a stool next to Geno while Sid grabs a bottle of water from the fridge on the other side of the bench.

“Looks like you no learn lesson, hey Sid,” Geno comments, shaking his head.

Sid glances back at him and they share a look, then Geno turns to Grace to introduce himself now that she’s finished being distracted by Ben. “Hi Grace, I’m Geno.”

“Hi Geno,” Grace replies, happily shaking his hand. “It’s an honour to meet you.”