The Three C's

-Maggie-
About a month had passed, seventeen games have gone by since Pat’s birthday and the Penguins have won fourteen of them. We were twenty-one days into the month of December, Christmas was a few days away and I was pretty much finished with everything that I was going to be getting. Unfortunately, Pat and I weren’t going to be seeing each other for Christmas, but I was going to be going to Chicago for New Years and my birthday. We both didn’t have a game until the second and both of our games were in New York, his against the Islanders, mine against the Rangers. I have a game on New Year’s Eve, against the Devils, but it was an early game and I would fly out right after.

The boys and I had just finished winning our early home game against the Flames and now we were going to head to Mario’s to celebrate our Secret Santa and have a little party. After everyone showered and changed some of us headed straight over, while others stopped at home to retrieve their loved ones. We didn’t have a Secret Santa last year because of the lockout, but the year before, I had picked James, this year, I ended up picking Brandon Sutter. It was a good thing that we did this a little late and picked names last week, because we ended up bringing some players up from Wilkes-Barre, wince Pascal tore an ACL over a week ago and was going to be out for the rest of the season and Beau broke his wrist and would be out for about ten weeks. We had acquired Brian Gibbons, this short guy that had played for Wilkes-Barre for a while, never called up, I didn’t understand why, they guy was good; fast too, he had scored his first NHL goal in his first NHL game.

I arrived at Mario’s with Nick, Emma, baby Troy, Beau and Olli; I parked my Escalade, carefully walked through the snow covered ground to Mario’s porch, walked in and was greeted by Natalie. Beau, Olli and I were carrying our presents in for our teammate into the other room and saw that some people were already here and I giggled, surprised to see that they all so far, looked to be normal, at least from the outside.

“Maggie,” I turned around and saw Vero, Kasey and Maureen walking over towards me, I smiled and hugged each of them, not having seen them in a while.

“Hi guys, how are you?”

“We missed you at the Thanksgiving dinner,” Maureen said and I nodded my head.

“My parents were in town and they wanted just a little dinner,” I said and they nodded their heads.

“So is the hawk coming here for Christmas, or are you going up there?” Vero asked.

“No, we’re not going to see each other for Christmas, I’m going to Chicago for New Year’s though,” I said and they nodded their heads.

“What are you doing for Christmas?” Vero asked.

“Um nothing, Beau, Olli, Nick, Emma and I are gunna have a little dinner I guess,” I said and they nodded their heads.

We waited another hour before everyone was here, I was currently in the kitchen was a cripple Pascal and then Kunitz, we were talking about the Olympics and how on the fifth of January they were going to announce Team USA men and women’s team. Matt stuck his head into the kitchen and told us that it was time for the gifts and we made our way out to the room and saw the chair in a circle. I sat in-between James and Tanner Glass and watched as Natalie grabbed the first gift and looked at the tag.

“I guess we’re starting off with Marc this year,” she said and then walked over towards him and handed him the nicely wrapped box.

Marc unwrapped the box and handed the torn paper to Natalie and then opened the box and we all laughed hard when something popped out of the box, scared the crap out of Marc, making him jump and almost throw the box. He shook his head, smirking and taking a seat while we recovered from the surprising event.

“Fuckin’ asshole! Who did this?! Hate bats,” he said and I tilted a little to get a better look to see that whoever had made this, had designed it as if it was a jack-in-the-box. When Marc opened the lid a bat attached to a little spring jumped up. He put the box on the ground, holding a card in his hand; I figured it was inside the box. Marc looked over the card and just started to laugh, “What the fuck?”

“What does it say?” James asked.

“Roses are red, Violets are blue, Flowers are pretty and I have no idea where I’m going with this,” Marc read and we were laughing, “If you can guess who gave you this, I’ll give you your real present,” he said and I giggled and shook my head, “This is cruel!”

“Who is it, Flower?” I asked and he looked at me.

“Was it you?!”

“No, but I applaud whoever it was,” I laughed and the guys snickered.

“Wait! The only one- Duper, you fuckin’ dick!” Marc yelled and the guys laughed so hard as Pascal just smiled brightly, “You were the only one who knew I hate bats!”

“Am I good, or am I good?” Pascal asked and the guys laughed and shook their heads, the one closest to him high five him. Marc stood up and walked over towards him, Pascal stood up on his crutches and Carole handed Pascal an envelope, which he handed to Marc, “Merry Christmas, man.”

“Thanks,” he laughed and opened the envelope, and whatever was in that envelope made the man pretty happen, “Holy shit! Thanks man!”

“Thought you’d appreciate that, it’s probably gunna be another few days before it gets to your house, though,” Pascal said and Marc smiled and hugged his teammate.

“I needed a new one after the big guy here, broke it!” Marc said and it instantly clicked on what Marc got, a new air hockey table, “I don’t even understand how you broke it, G.”

“It mystery,” Geno said and the guys chuckled.

“All right, next it going to be,” Natalie looked at the tag, “Beau.”

“All right!” Beau said an I smirked as Natalie handed him the gift and his eyes widened, “Heavy,” he said and he looked around before looking down and ripping the paper only to pout and everyone to laugh, “A dictionary? Really Maggie?”

“I swear it wasn’t me,” I laughed, “But damn!”

“What the hell?” Beau started to name off names, and one by one the guys shook their heads, “Sid?”

“Finally,” he said and the guys laughed, not expecting Sidney to pull a gag gift, “But open the book, dumbass,” Sidney said and Beau looked down and his mouth opened and his eyes widened.

“Holy- What- How?”

“What is it?” someone asked and Beau put the big book down and I got to see that it was a false book, the pages inside had been cut out and Beau pulled out a small frame.

“Dude! How?!” Beau smiled towards him and Sidney just shrugged his shoulders.

“I’ve got people,” he simply said and we crowded around Beau to see that he had a small picture of a personally sign autography from former King, legend Ray Ferraro, Beau’s favorite player.

“Thanks Sid,” he said and the two bro hugged and I smiled and sat back down, realizing that the first two who opened their presents both had gag gifts, but ended up loving their real gifts.

“All right,” Natalie started as she grabbed a bag and looked at the tag, “This is for Olli.”

“His first Secret Santa gift- How do you feel, kid?” Kunitz asked and Olli just laughed a little.

“Little nervous,” he said and we all laughed and I felt James nudge me, I looked at him and saw him smirking towards me.

“You?” I whispered and he nodded his head and I giggled, ‘…This’ll be good…’

Olli opened the bag and pulled out a card and opened it, he read it and I snickered when we all saw his face turn red. Olli snapped his head up and glared at Beau, “I’m gunna kill you!”

“I didn’t do it! Swear!” he said and I laughed.

“Maggie!”

“Wasn’t me!” I laughed.

“What does it say?” James asked and I looked towards him and smirked.

“It’s says nothing- Nope!” he said we all laughed and I watched as Marc snatched the card and looked at it and threw back his head and laughed, “Don’t!” Ollie whined and Marc shook his head.

“Olli, a little birdie told me that you’ve never been with a girl before, this is here to teach you what to do and hold yourself over until you do, also the number to a bunny, you can take her off my hands,” Marc read and we all laughed and the guys began to chirp the poor nineteen year old on his virginity, “What’s in the bag?”

“I don’t wanna know,” Olli said and the guys laughed.

“Awww, you’re not being a team player, Maatta!” Pascal yelled and I just laughed.

“Fine,” Olli grumbled and opened the bag and slapped his hand over his redder face, “Oh my god.”

“Let’s see,” Marc said as he snatched the bag, “Socks, vaseline,” we were all laughing so hard that most of us were in tears, “Porn, condoms and a napkin with a number and lipstick print on it- Typical virgin bag.”

“Think you’re all set, Olli,” Pascal said and slapped Olli’s bag and I watched at the kid just held his face and shook his head, clearly embarrassed, but I knew he was having a fun time.

“Who do you think it was?” Sidney asked.

“I know that there’s a few people that could do this and Maggie and Beau were the only ones who knew- Bennett, who did you tell? Flower, Duper and Nealer are the pranksters,” Olli said more to himself.

“But who was it?” Pascal asked.

“Nealer,” Olli said and James smirked and held out his hands, “You’re the only one who would be trying to get rid of a bunny.”

“Got a fuckin’ detective right here!” Kunitz stated and the guys laughed.

Natalie passed out more and more presents, most of them weren’t gag gifts, just simple ones, but she finally picked up a pretty big box and looked at the tag, “This one’s for Maggie.”

“Oh boy,” I said and the guys snickered, “At least last time I could easily tell who it was from- You’ve brought me a challenge,” I took the box and placed it on the floor, I unwrapped it and opened it to find another box, “Oh you fu- We’re really doing that?” I sighed and the guys laughed as I took the box out of the box and pushed the other one away, opening to find another box, “Oh my god,” I laughed, shaking my head and then opened the box to find another box, “I would say that this is Duper, but he already got Flower, and Cookie’s not here anymore- Nealer, got Ollie," I sighed and continued on, "Beau, is this you?!”

“No, but I gotta use this some time,” he said and the guys laughed and I groaned as I opened the fifth box to find another box.

“Oh come on!” I laughed and the guys laughed even hard. Six boxes down, I opened the seventh and let out a fake cry but the guys were just laughing.

I opened that box, expecting to find another, but was thankful when I didn’t. There was something wrapped and I picked it up and tore the paper off to see a picture frame. I was holding it backwards; I turned it around and gasped. My eyes widened and I knew they were tearing up, it was an amazing picture of Mike and I, it had to have been at some event we were having at the rink, we were both in long sleeve shirts and jeans, I was on his back, he was carrying me around as he skated on the ice. We weren’t looking at the camera; both of us looked to be laughing.

I couldn’t even guess who had gotten me this, it was beautiful, I held the frame with two hands because it was fairly large. I felt hands on my shoulders and I let a few tears run down my cheek, “I can’t even think- I don’t know.”

“Merry Christmas, Mags,” I heard and looked up surprised to see Kris standing in front of me.

“Kris,” I said and he smirked and nodded his head, I stood up placing the picture on my chair and hugged him tight, “Thank you.”