Ready to Love Again

Ryan sighed as he signed his name on the line. The saga that was his contract renewal with the Avalanche was over and he’d officially be back in an Avalanche uniform that Sunday. He had enjoyed playing with his brother in Russia but Denver was where he heart was. Calgary would have been a fresh start and an escape from the past but his roots were in Colorado, it was where he had been since he was drafted.

Ryan sighed as he finished packing his luggage. It seemed like forever ago he was doing this last season. The lockout had taken its toll on a lot of players but they were all excited to be back. Ryan grabbed his phone from the nightstand and sighed when he saw the picture of him and Alyssa from the Christmas before her death. He put the frame in the drawer and sighed as he locked up the apartment.

Ryan drove to the airport and cleared his head as he turned on the music as loud as he could. Why did he feel so guilty for treating Corinne the way he had? He had never treated a woman like that. Alyssa and his mother would have been so embarrassed and he sure as hell wouldn’t want anyone treating his sisters like that, so why had he treated her like that? It’s not like she had done anything wrong, he had just snapped for no reason at all.

All throughout the weekend Corinne had been on his mind. It was driving him crazy to say the least, he hadn't thought about a woman in a really long time. Corinne drove him crazy in every sense of the word, she was mouthy and feisty, annoying and loud. He couldn’t get her out of his head. The upcoming weekend was something he had been looking forward to for so long, he was finally back with the Avalanche and the lockout was over.

“Hey Factor, welcome back,” Joe Sacco said when Ryan boarded the plane.

“FACTOR’S HERE,” Shane O’Brien shouted as Ryan made his way through the plane.

Ryan sat down next to Gabriel Landeskog who shook his hand and welcomed him back. Jamie was the last one on the plane and groaned as he sat down across the aisle. “Fuck this shit,” Jamie grumbled as he threw his carry on in the overhead.

“What’s wrong,” Ryan asked.

“Fucking Corinne needed my car because hers is broken down and she had to decide what she wanted to wear to work, so here I am fucking almost flying commercial because I had to give her my car.”

“I keep telling you just to buy her a new one, she doesn’t want a fancy car, just something to get her to and from work. Get her a used car if you have to,” Paul Stastny said.

“She doesn’t want a new one, she’s so fucking stubborn.”

“As stubborn as a mule just like her horse looking relative,” Gabriel Landeskog smirked causing Ryan to laugh.

“Fuck off, Fabio,” Jamie replied causing everyone to laugh. When the plane finally took off, Ryan busied himself watching a movie on his laptop. When the flight landed, Gabe shook Ryan awake and Ryan quickly shoved his laptop into his backpack and followed Gabe off of the plane.

Ryan was exhausted from being up on the phone with his agent all night and from flying. He had spent a majority of the last two weeks flying. First from Russia to Pennsylvania, then from Pennsylvania to Denver, and Denver to Columbus. He was beyond jet lag and just wanted his life back to normal…if his life could be called normal.

He was a 22 year old professional hockey player with a dead girlfriend who spent his free time playing guitar and practicing his game. His life sucked, NHL be damned.

Ryan sighed as he left his suitcase open on the bed and grabbed his wallet to go get something to eat. When he came back, he sat down on the bed and ate the pizza he had got from the shop next door to the hotel. Matt had gone to dinner with the guys, but Ryan chose to stay and take a nap. He needed as much rest as he could get before the game the following night.

Ryan had taken a long hot shower and was now laying in bed playing a game on his cell phone while texting his brother in Russia. The phone bill was going to be high, but Cal had been there for him since Alyssa died and Cal had kept him from losing his mind.

There was a knock on the door of Ryan's hotel room and Ryan got up to answer it. "Duche, did you lose your key again?"

Ryan's eyes widened when he noticed the brunette in front of him. She smiled as she walked by him into the room.

Ryan shut the door behind him and when he turned around, she stepped forward and ran her hands up his bare chest, over his shoulders, and into his still dampened hair.

"Corinne, what are you doing here?"

"I think we got off on the wrong foot," she smiled leaning up to kiss him and Ryan reached down to pick her up causing her to wrap her legs around his waist.

Ryan lead her to the bed and removed the hoodie she was wearing and began kissing her neck when the alarm went off.

Ryan sighed and leaned over to shut it off and when he did, that's when he realized that it had been a dream. Ryan looked around the room and saw that Matt still wasn't back yet and he had the room to himself. Taking a deep breath, he looked at the clock next to him and saw that he had been asleep for almost an hour.

The door opened and Ryan looked up to see Matt walking through the door. "Hey Factor, what's wrong? You look like you saw a ghost."

"I just had a dream," Ryan replied.

"Was it about Alyssa again? Did you take your medicine?"

"I haven't dreamed of Alyssa in almost two months," Ryan said suddenly feeling guilty for having a sex dream about another woman.

"What was the dream about?"

"I almost had sex with Corinne."

"Jamie's cousin? Shut up! I heard you two hate each other."

"I wouldn't say we hate each other, we just don't get along."

"Well, you know what they say about people dreaming of people they know, right?"

"What?"

"The person you are dreaming about is lying in bed awake thinking about you."

"I doubt she is thinking about me. Thinking about me? No. Thinking about planning my death…yes."

Matt laughed and Ryan smiled, "Let's get some sleep, we have a big game ahead of us tomorrow."

Ryan laid in bed that night praying that when he fell asleep, his dream would pick right back up where it left off and he'd be making love to the woman he hated.