ten

Jordan went straight to the bathroom connected to the locker room, where he knew he’d find Ryan examining his neck in the mirror.  Ryan immediately dropped his hands and stood straight, then gave up when he saw it was Jordan.

“It’s not that bad,” Jordan said, smiling at his teammate’s blushed cheeks.  If he asked for details on the night before now, Ryan might die. “If we hadn’t been talking about you, we might have missed it.”

Ryan groaned.  The neck of his jersey and undershirt were even lower than his collared dress shirt.  “The girls out there are not going to miss it.”

Jordan held out a powder compact, direct from Erin’s purse.  “It’s all she had.”

As awkward as a nineteen year old guy trying to use makeup could be, Ryan was worse.  He scrutinized the little sponge, dabbed it into the powder and peered closely again.  “For fuck’s sake, give it to me,” Jordan said, grabbing the little applicator and ordering Ryan to tilt his head.  He pressed the sponge down a few times, then rubbed it over the whole area.  They both looked at Ryan’s reflection.

“That’s pretty good,” the kid said, impressed.

“Taylor gets hickeys like teeth marks.  You should see what he uses to cover them.”

Erin was in the locker room, talking to Schultz and a few of the other guys.  Ryan gave her a shy nod, as if he wasn’t already enamored with her, and she winked back.  Jordan went to his locker and took down the jersey hanging there.  She wished the guys luck and Jordan led her into the hallway to avoid an awkward scene with twenty guys watching them say goodbye.  He handed her the Barons sweater.  

“We only have a couple here, you can wear this for now,” he said, feeling inexplicably nervous.  “I’ll get you your own.”

Erin was desperately trying not to smile.  She felt like a high schooler whose boyfriend was officially asking her to prom, complete with the awkward corsage-pinning moment.  She wanted to tell him to stop being so cute, but she did not at all want him to stop.  Pulling the jersey over her head, Erin held out her arms - it was more like a dress.  Jordan walked right into a hug.

"Good luck," she whispered.  Their kiss sent a shiver down her spine, so full of all they'd done the night before.  Erin lifted onto her toes to finish it strong.  As she was walking away with EBERLE across her back, Jordan called after her.  

"You look great!"

Erin half-turned.  "This old thing?!"

She wore the sweater to the restaurant across the street, where Taylor and Amanda were waiting for her.  There were still two hours before game time.  Taylor made a face.  "Can you save that for the rink?"

"Jealous, Hallsy?" she teased, but she took it off and folded it over the chair next to her.  "Where's Darcy?"

"Thought she was with you," Amanda lied. She'd thought of nothing but Taylor for days.

"Thought she was with Ryan, you mean," Taylor added.  Amanda slapped his arm, he grabbed her hand and sat on it.  She rolled her eyes.

"What?" Erin asked when their lovers spat was done.

"Ryan gave Darcy a ride home last night and when we got back to the hotel he wasn't there.  Not for hours.”  Taylor held up his palms, "I’m not saying anything happened.  But I'm betting there's one less v-card in Oklahoma today."

"Oh my God," Amanda covered her face.  "He's a kid!  She wouldn't."

Erin pulled out her phone.  "Well, someone did."

Darcy didn't answer.  They ordered burgers and sandwiches and watched as some Barons fans trickled in for a pre-game meal.  With each new table that filled, Taylor sank a little farther into the corner.  They killed time so as the be the last people into the arena for warm-up skate; even so they had to leave Darcy's ticket at will call.

Their seats were the same as last time.  Leaving Taylor and Amanda at the top of the section, Erin found an empty seat at the glass.  This time when Jordan hit the ice, he looked around for her and smiled.  Ryan did too, and Erin gave him a thumbs up.  She could not see the telltale mark on his neck.  The boys passed and shot and horsed around a little, while Erin watched intently from the front row.  It was hard to imagine, from this small stage, hockey being everything and the only thing in someone’s life.

Erin wondered if Jordan was the same honest, funny, guileless person at home.  With so many factors competing for his attention, talent and money, how was it possible?  She also wondered how many times, in any given week, a girl pulled a move like she had the night they met.  Approach him, ask for his number?  He must get the every day.  Yet he’d chosen to be with her.

Well, Erin thought with a clarity  she could only muster when Jordan wasn’t distracting her with his perfection, this is Oklahoma City.  Maybe I’m the first one who asked.  Maybe she was just lucky.  

Very lucky.  Because looking out at him under the harsh lights, with the buzzer sounding overhead, she knew this on-ice, game time hockey player was only a part of Jordan.  Girls at home don’t see that, she told herself in reassurance.  They see a number and some stats and a contract.  They don’t see him.

It wasn’t until the players left the ice and Erin turned back toward the arena that she glimpsed of how right she was.  Hardly any seats taken.  The crowd was a quarter of what it had been the night before - less than twenty-four hours ago - and game time was in fifteen minutes.  Like a punch to the gut, Erin knew that Jordan and his teammates had been looking past her at the same scene all along.

These people don’t know.  Erin had the urge to cry.  These people didn’t see Jordan the hockey player as the person she knew him to be.  But they didn’t see numbers and stats and contracts either.  It was  worse - they really didn’t see him at all.  If she could have called up every one of the eight thousand people missing from that stadium, she’d have told them all they were missing something pretty fucking special.

When she got back to the seats, she was pissed.  Even the sight of Darcy could not distract her.  “Where is everyone?” she demanded of Taylor.  He shrugged heavily.   “Last night it was packed here!”

Taylor, for all his swagger, suddenly looked like a little kid.  “This is the AHL, Er.  This is what it’s like in a lot of places.”

“It’s the second game.  People will catch on,” Amanda said hopefully.

Erin was surprisingly furious.  It was so sudden.  One moment she was mooning over Jordan on the ice, then thinking about his life without her, then this - a stark reminder of the life her new friends probably couldn’t wait to leave behind.  She didn’t have the time to wait for people in Oklahoma City to catch on.  Her eyes met Taylor’s and they said what she couldn’t say out loud.

Is it over yet?
____

“Not such a crowd tonight,” Coach warned them.  They all knew.  The warm up skate had been nearly empty - that is for anyone who could see beyond Erin at ice level, wearing her Eberle jersey like she was clutching an electric blanket.   Jordan noticed the lack of audience, sure.  But he only cared about one person anyway.

“Darcy here?” he asked quietly as they were lacing up.  Ryan blushed his answer.

“Let’s show ‘em what they’re missing,” Coach said.

And they did.  The Oklahoma City Barons came out flying.  They scored less than a minute into the game, then got another before the period ended.  Lake Erie took ages to score in the second, but just into the third they tied the game.  Try as he might, Jordan could not get a shot to drop.  Finally it was Schultz with his first ever AHL goal that put the Barons up.  Their opponents could not get another.   Jordan forgot his five shots on the night as the horn blared.  Ryan hugged him like they’d won an NHL game.  A big one, against a better team in their division. A four-pointer, as they called it at home.  Someday, those would matter again.  For now, a win was a win was a win.  Even if only four thousand people saw it.
____

In the stands, Erin was on her feet.  She’d never cheered so hard for a sporting event in her life.  It felt like a high school game, knowing the players could hear every voice in the crowd.  She made enough noise for four people - if only everyone else in the crowd could have done the same.  They left happy though, a win under their belts, and Erin felt in their collective energy that these people would come to another game.

Taylor was obviously relieved.  He even dropped Amanda’s hand and put his arm around Erin’s shoulders as they took the service elevator down to the locker room level.  She leaned against him, sympathizing in a new way for what it must be like to watch from the sidelines as your friends battled on.  Taylor leaned down and kissed Erin on the top of the head.  “I like you,” he said matter-of-factly.  Erin made a face like she already knew that, but inside she felt very proud.

They turned the corner toward the lounge and almost ran into Jordan giving an interview in the hallway.  A few reporters were huddled around him, and two video cameras with bright lights.  He still wore his skates and gear, wiping his face with a towel.  They stopped and watched until he was finished.

“Hey,” he gave them a big smile.  Erin wasn’t sure if the reporters would notice or care about her, but just in case she waited.  They all watched the last person go into the locker room and the door swing shut.

“Yay!” she ran ten steps between and and threw her arms around his neck.  Just as he went to hug her, Erin leapt off like she’d been electrocuted.  “Holy shit, what is that smell?”

Jordan and Taylor both laughed.  “It’s my gear, I’m sorry, all these pads soak up everything and....”

Erin backpedalled.  “Well good game, okay?  A for effort.  Go shower then....”

“What?  I don’t get a victory hug?”  Jordan followed her with his arms out like the Frankenstein monster.  She ran off down the hall at full speed.  Immune to the stench, Taylor gave Jordan a fist-bump and escorted Amanda and Darcy into the lounge.  Erin was already there, back to the corner so no one foul-smelling could sneak up on her.

“It’s on me,” she said, working her way out of Jordan’s jersey.  “I can still smell it.”

Taylor tucked the jersey under his arm.  “You get used to it.”

Erin flipped her hair down in front of her face and took a deep breath of the shampoo scent.  From beneath the veil she simply said, “Boys are gross.”  Suddenly she stood up straight, pushed her hair back and rounded on Darcy.  “Wait.  Waitwaitwait.  What happened last night?”

They all looked at the blonde girl.  She’d been uncharacteristically quiet all night, but they were so wrapped up in willing the Barons to a win, no one had really noticed.  Erin had been too angry at every empty seat in the place to remember that one full seat had a very big story to tell.

“Nothing,” Darcy said.

“Nothing comes home at night,” Amanda countered.

“Nothing doesn’t give hickeys to high schoolers,” Erin almost snapped her fingers for effect.

“WHAT?!” Taylor shouted.  Every head in the room turned toward them.  He zipped his lips and pushed the three girls closer together.  he had not heard about the hickey.  “What?”

“I didn’t....” Darcy started to protest.

“Someone else gave Ryan a hickey then?  Because I saw it this morning and whoever did it was just about,” Erin held her hand to the top of her head, measuring her own height as equal to Darcy’s, “this big.  And it wasn’t me.”

“Erin was busy test-driving a Canadian model of her own,” Amanda added for good measure.

Erin gave her friend the thanks-a-lot look.  “Smooth handling around the curves,” she said sarcastically.

“Great mileage,”Amanda nonchalantly put her arm around Taylor’s waist.  “Drives for hours.”

Darcy let her head fall back and looked at the ceiling.  “We just kissed, okay?  He’s really sweet.  Compared to you assholes,” she gave her friends a mock-glare.  “We went for coffee and we were talking and then he drove me home.  It was no big deal.”

Amanda and Erin both crossed their arms over their chests like they didn’t believe it.  Taylor saw and quickly did the same.

“I don’t...,” Darcy dropped her voice even more.  “I don’t think he does that a lot.  Right?”  She looked at Taylor.

“Get hickeys?” he asked.

Darcy slapped him on the arm.  “He doesn’t kiss a lot of girls, does he?  Up at Santa’s Workshop or wherever the fuck you guys live?”

Taylor smiled at that one.  “No, Nuge doesn’t get a lot of ass...,” he caught himself, glanced at Amanda and quickly rephrased, “he does not go on many dates at the North Pole.”

“Right,” Darcy said, visibly relieved.  “Because it’s not like I went out to go out with him.  You guys kinda ditched us,” she pointed at each of them in turn, “and it was only ten o’clock, so we went to a cafe.  On the way back to the car....”

“You pulled him into the bushes?” Amanda suggested.

“He kissed me.  He stopped walking so I stopped and he just kissed me.”  Darcy’s wide-eyed expression must have matched the one she gave at the moment in question.  “Then he got all nervous and apologized, and I said don’t be sorry so he kissed me again.  Just like that.  It was... nice.  Like...,” she turned to Taylor, dead serious.  “It’s not his first kiss, right?”

“No,” Taylor was a little stunned by the story, but he knew Ryan.

“Thank God.  Then I’d really be a felon.”

The four of them stood there silently processing.  Finally Darcy shrugged.  “That’s it.  We made out in the car for a while then he drove me home.  He even waited till I got inside before he would leave.  I felt like I was on the Disney Channel.”

Erin and Amanda looked at each other, matching smiles on their faces.  They were about to ‘awwwww’ when Taylor groaned at the sight of them.  “God, you’re all gonna go home and listen to Taylor Swift and write in your diaries now.”

A pair of arms appeared at Erin’s waist.  Jordan pressed a kiss to her neck before she even saw him.  But she could smell that he was freshly showered and returned to normal size.  “Hey guys,” he said.

Erin, all full of butterflies and rainbows after Darcy’s story, turned and kissed him right on the lips in front of everyone, same as last game.  Because that’s what couples do.  “Nice game.”

“I heard you cheering.”

“You were playing so hard!”

Jordan squeezed one of her many ticklish spots.  “Trying to score a goal for you.”

Erin leaned her mouth to his ear.  “Wanna keep trying?”
____

Jordan would have been content to hold Erin all night, even fully dressed and standing up.  Seeing her at the game, getting a win, then knowing she was waiting nearby made everything that much better.  Maybe no one had come to see them play, he hadn’t scored yet, he wasn’t where he should be.  Or maybe he was.  Jordan only felt right about wanting it when Erin was around.

They talked for awhile, until it became obvious they were all waiting for Ryan.  Jordan slipped away to check on the kid.  Sure enough he was sitting in an almost empty locker room, dressed and ready to go.  Jordan sat down next to him.  “Darcy in there?” Ryan asked.  Jordan nodded.  

“You know I kissed her.”

“Yeah,” Jordan said.  Hickeys didn’t bite themselves into existence.

“No, I mean I kissed her first.  I just felt like kissing her, so I did.  Then I spazzed out and she was nice, she said don’t worry so I did it again.  But I don’t think she was asking me to.”

Ryan was looking at his hands, twisting his phone and peeling the case back at the corners.  Jordan knew Ryan’s sad face in profile from sitting next to him in locker rooms, planes and buses.  He didn’t want to see it now.  Not tonight, Jordan thought, when he himself was holding on by only a slightly thicker thread.

“She kissed you back?” he asked, though it was obvious.  “A lot?”  Ryan shrugged, so Jordan went on.  “She wouldn’t kiss you back if she didn’t want to.”

“What if she was just being nice?  I mean, you guys all left.  She probably felt bad for me - I don’t even know anyone else here.”  Ryan suddenly stood, reminding them both that he was a lot taller than Jordan.  He might be a kid but it wouldn’t last long.  “What are we doing here, Ebs?  Why am I kissing someone because I feel left out that you guys both have girlfriends when we’re not even supposed to be here!”

Jordan shook his head, as if hearing the things he’d thought over and over.  

Ryan started to pace.  “Darcy’s different.  She doesn’t treat me like a kid, she’s not afraid of me or looking around to see who notices us.  Not that anyone would.  But Darcy doesn’t care, it’s like she actually wanted to hang out with me, for me.”  He sat down heavily.  “I liked it.”

“I know.  I think that’s why Taylor’s doing it - he’s got a girl for now and he’s fine just being happy.”

“But you’re not,” Ryan said.

Jordan exhaled.  “Happy, yeah.  But not fine.  I really like Erin and whenever this ends it’s going to suck.  But I’m not going to wish I didn’t do it.”

They were quiet for a minute.  Everyone had left.  An empty locker room sometimes seemed like the only place on Earth that Jordan could make sense of anything, because it’s where he left so much of himself.  Tonight it just told him what he already knew.

“What happened with Julia?” Ryan asked out of nowhere.

Jordan closed his eyes.  After a year he was still ashamed and humiliated by what had happened.  The girl had been a conniving manipulator, a gold-digger or a fame whore or whatever else, but she’d still played him.  And to get to his best friend.

“I caught her trying to cheat on me,” he said in a measured voice. Ryan nodded, like he’d figured as much.  Jordan knew it wasn’t fair to hold out.  “With Taylor.”

“What?”

“He didn’t.  He brushed her off, then she got more aggressive.  I saw a text that he sent her saying no.  So I dumped her and let him explain; he showed me everything.”

A glance to the side told Jordan that Ryan didn’t really understand how low people could sink, even people you trusted.  Jordan hoped he never would.  He patted his younger friend’s shoulder, feeling like a wise, if scarred, old man.

“It’s okay.  She was awful, not me.  Not Taylor.  And not everyone else.  So unless I’m really wrong, there’s a pretty girl in the other room waiting to see the guy who kissed her last night.”
_