Big Girl Panties

speechless

Trixie looked at the second hand on her watch and one minute felt like an eternity. She was tired, both mentally and physically and knew her days were only about to get longer and harder. At this point, at 8:15 in the morning and having been in her staff meeting for over an hour already, the only thing keeping her awake was the double shot latte she had picked from Dunkin Donuts. She knew caffeine was off limits, but she didn’t see how this one caffeinated coffee would cause such harm. It was, however, causing her slight discomfort in the form of heartburn.

“Clint and Trixie,” Stan started, grabbing their attention. “We looked over your request for separate hotel rooms next season and that won’t be a problem.”

Clint and Trixie high-fived each other feeling as if they had just won a battle. That had the last item on the meeting agenda and it was time for them all to go their separate ways and prepare for the game. As the visiting Preds would be taking the ice in fifteen minutes for a morning skate, the guys weren’t expected to show up at the arena until some around three or four to start their pregame rituals. Closing her notebook full of nonsense notes from the meeting, Trixie packed her things away into her bag as she grabbed her coffee to head into Stan’s office. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to discuss her future with the team seeing as to how playoffs were hectic as was the off season as he was busy with signings and trades.

Taking a seat in the chair across from Stan, Trixie crossed her legs and sat quietly for minute as he finished skimming an email.

“How you feeling?” There it was; the cliché opening question.

Trixie took another sip from her coffee. “I’m fine, aside from the bloating and heartburn.”

“Let’s just cut to the chase.” Trixie started. She was never one for bullshit or beating around the bush. “I’m can still do my job, I love my job and I am still one-hundred-percent committed like I was when I first started seven years ago. Here is all the paperwork from my OB and physician signing me off to work through the playoff unless I start to show signs of exhaustion or pre-eclampsia.”

Stan looked through the paperwork Trixie handed him. She had been on top of it all, showing up for every doctor appointment, doing everything her doctors had advised to do so her body was ready for the playoffs. She wanted to be behind the bench, doing what she loved to do and not in the stands watching from a distance. That was something she just couldn’t do.

It was a rather hard decision for Stan to make. Never before had he been faced with this situation and he wasn’t sure if the decision he had in his head was the right one. He adored Trixie and would do anything for her, but he wasn’t sure if he wanted her, at five months pregnant, running her body to its very limits seemed treacherous.

“You ready for four and a half days with little sleep?” Stan joked.

“I wouldn’t have it any other way.” Smiled Trixie.



It was close to one in the morning when Trixie jumped off the plane in Edmonton. She was exhausted, sore and the hunger pangs in her belly were almost becoming a distraction. There was nothing more she wanted to do than head to the hotel and sleep although she knew she wouldn’t be doing much of that as the baby decided it was party time during the hours she wanted to sleep. She could now feel every kick and every turn and the doctor told her it wouldn’t be long until she could start feeling when the baby had the hiccups. In four long days, Trixie would be at 20 weeks and halfway done.

Loading the bags and off the plane and into the back of the truck, Trixie took the drive to the arena as an opportunity to catch a last few minutes of sleep as the flight from Vancouver to Edmonton was only an hour and a half. With Dan not fully behind Stan’s decision to let Trixie travel during away games, he had made Trixie promise to text him the second they landed with an update on how she was feeling. Of course Trixie had forgotten to send the promised message and what she didn’t know was that Dan was in his bed back at the hotel feeling restless and pacing, waiting for her message. When thirty minutes passed, he grew more irritated when his phone calls were sent directly to voicemail. He was losing his mind.

At the arena, Trixie had battled her fatigue and found her second wind as she immersed herself into tossing the heavy bags in front of the respectable cubbies, unloaded and hung skates, tapped sticks and cleaned the fingerprints she had accidently left on a few of the visors. As she cleaned the disinfected the inside of Duncan Keith’s helmet, Trixie had to step back for a minute as she felt an unusual sharp pain rip through her back and throb. She held her sore hips for a minute as she bent over at the waist, controlling her breathing and fighting the urge to vomit. The fatigue had resurfaced and while her body was giving her clear warnings it was time to slow down, she disregarded them and kept on moving.

The digital clock struck 4:15 when they finally finished. Clint wrapped an arm around Trixie’s shoulders as they both stepped back and admired their work, taking the silence in before the chaos was set to begin again at 8 am sharp.

“Tired?” Clint asked.

The warmth from the hotels heating system hit Trixie like a ton of bricks as she let out a wide yawn.

“You have no idea.”

Their room was on the sixth floor and as Clint led the way down the hall, Trixie took her phone out of her pocket and was instantly filled with panic as she saw the five missed calls and seven unread text messages from Dan. She knew was pissed; the language he used in the texts became increasingly colorful as she read through them. It wasn’t intentional, her not responding. She had a job to do and she wanted to get it done as quickly as possible.

Tossing her own duffle on the bed, Trixie envied Clint as he flopped right down and closed his eyes. She wished she could do the same but sadly she had to head down a floor and console her worried boyfriend and show him that he had nothing to worry about.

After approaching Dan’s door, she knocked gently afraid of waking Bickell for she knew there was no way he was still awake. It had been a long three days so far for them all and she was surprised she hadn’t crashed. Part of her was afraid to lay down and close her eyes, worried she would shut down and sleep through all alarms and wake up calls set for 7:45.

Dan opened the door to his shared room wearing only his boxers. The only light came from the television and she heard the soft hum of an infomercial giving her the first clue he had spent the last three hours doing nothing but pacing.

“I’m really sorry—”

She was cut off. “What the fuck, Trixie? I’ve been calling and texting you and you can’t even pick up the phone and give me the slightest hint you’re okay.”

Dan wasn’t going to say it, but he felt partially responsible for the current situation. He had been the one insistent that Trixie sneak into his room to get tangled in the sheets while Bickell was out to dinner with a few of the guys. Her fuel tank had been running close to empty and by the time she actually fell asleep after hours of tossing and turning, she was lucky she got the 3 hours of sleep that she did.

Trixie ran her knuckles against his scruffy jaw and pushed some of the damp hair away from his face. There is was again, that sharp in her back again. Trixie grabbed the doorframe and once again tried to breathe through it. Dan could she wasn’t feeling well.

“You okay?”

Trixie plastered a fake smile. “I’m fine, baby’s fine, and everything’s fine.”

Her lie was a bad one. “Come lay down with me. You’re exhausted.”

Not in the mood to fight anything Dan was telling her, Trixie followed Dan into the room and giggled to herself when she saw Bickell sleeping on his stomach with the blankets tangled around his legs and his loud snoring. The snoring wouldn’t be a problem; she was tired Trixie could sleep through a rock concert at this point.

When Dan sat on the edge of the bed running a hand through his hair, Trixie took off her hoodie and tossed it at him. “I’m gonna jump in the shower quick.”

Stepping under the hot stream of the shower was exactly what Trixie had needed. She turned her back to the shower head to the water beat down her body but as soon as she found even the water pressure on her back was causing her pain; she nixed the idea and quickly washed her hair and body. She figured some sleep was the only thing she needed.

Climbing out, Trixie wrapped a plush towel around her body. When she looked down at the white bathmat, her heart instantly stopped and she swore she felt it drop into her stomach. Her hands were shaking violently but she somehow kept it together as she tip toped to the bathroom door and opened it.

“Dan, come here.” Trixie called out.

He could hear the shaking in her voice.

Tossing the blankets off his body, Dan marched to the door to find out what the hell was going on with her. Pushing the door open to revel a towel clad Trixie, Dan found himself speechless as Trixie burst into tears. Dan’s eyes darted from Trixie’s crying eyes to the stream of blood flowing down the inside of her left leg.