everything was going smoothly, especially since it had ended up being a bigger deal than I’d planned. Once my teammates had gotten onboard, and I’d casually suggested we play a scrimmage or two for her, things had sort of snowballed, and now here we were. The guys had all been enthusiastic, PR had been game, and suddenly “let’s let her come to a closed practice” had evolved into this. I’d barely slept last night because, oh God, there were so many ways it could end in disaster, but…so far, so good.
Please, please, let it all go down without a hitch.
Should we have done more?
Goddamn, we should’ve done more.
Well, too late now.
Once my teammates and I were presentable and didn’t smell like we’d just played a real game, we started heading up to the club level where Richard had taken the McKenzies.
On the way, there was plenty of shit-talking about “if we’d been playing for real, you never would’ve gotten that puck away from me” and “dude, if we’d been playing for real, I’d have punched you in the face and taken the two minutes for roughing,” but it was good-natured. The guys had all seemed to enjoy the informal game. I’d actually been surprised that so many of them had been onboard, though I really shouldn’t have been. Everyone on this team was involved in charity work and did all kinds of things for kids, so when I’d told them we had a fan who desperately wanted to come to a game, but couldn’t, they’d all jumped at the chance to let her see some Snow Bear hockey.
Now that the game was over and we were headed up to meet her, they were bantering and trash-talking as always, but I didn’t join in this time. I was too focused on where we were going and who we were there to see. Tonight had been occupying my brain ever since I’d found Dallas and Devin’s note, and now that it was all underway, I couldn’t shake the nagging worry that it wasn’t enough. Maybe because hockey had been my life since I was old enough to skate, and it was hard to fathom not even being able to go to a game. I couldn’t imagine what it would take to fill that void.
Then again, maybe everything we were doing tonight really was over the top. Dallas probably had hobbies and interests outside of hockey, and not being able to go to a game was frustrating, but not as crushing as it would’ve been for me. Was this all too much? And… No, really, was it enough?
Or maybe I just couldn’t do anything without overthinking the shit out of it. This was exactly why I hadn’t spearheaded any other events before this one. Last night had been hours of restless sleep and dreams of how many ways tonight could possibly go wrong. Not unusual—instead of dreaming about missing flights or not having my gear at a game, I’d dreamt that I’d given Devin the wrong date, or that I couldn’t get to the arena, or that my teammates hadn’t shown up, or—
As subtly as I could, I took a few slow, deep breaths. No need to get worked up. Everything was going smoothly so far. As my teammates and I followed the winding hallway up toward the club level, I just focused on breathing so I didn’t freak myself out. Overthinking everything was on-brand for me. Always had been anyway, and it had been ten times worse since my ex and I had broken up a couple of years ago. Especially in situations like this because nothing had ever been good enough, big enough, thoughtful enough, shiny enough, expensive enough for her. From our relationship onward, I’d never been able to shake the feeling that nothing I did or was could ever be good enough for anyone.
Thanks, Lila. Because I didn’t already lose enough sleep over shit like that.
“Hey, Kelly.” Kuznetsov fell into step beside me and pulled me out of my thoughts. “There have got to be other kids who can’t come to games for the same reason as her, you know?”
“What do you mean?”
“You know, the ones who want to come to games, but can’t? Because of…” He tapped his temple. “We do all kinds of things for kids who are in the hospital or too sick to come to games, but I never realized there were kids like her.”
I grimaced. “Yeah, me neither. I never even thought about a