Page 69 of Scores Of The Heart

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The Stanley Cup Finals…

Time goes by faster than ever. We’re flying through the finals quicker than I can keep up with.

I haven’t seen Cindy properly since the night I went to her door. With all the back and forth and back-to-back games over the last two weeks, it’s made it impossible.

We text every single day though and have both agreed to wait until the games are over before anymore sneaking around.

I still haven’t caught up with Luke either, so that’s gonna have to be after the Cup because we’re now into the fifth game against Vegas Heat in the finals. I have a lot of catching up to do when this is over.

We’re aware if Vegas wins tonight, it could stretch out to seven games. But as we’re up three games to their one, if we win, the Cup is ours.

We’re on home turf tonight and I’m feeling pumped. The entire team is.

You can’t even describe that vibe that’s going on around the stadium. To have all our fans out here cheering us on, it’s like no other feeling in the world.

My whole family came, including my grandparents. And baby Leon is dressed up warm for his first hockey game. There’s nothing like starting them out early.

It warms me inside to see my supportive family watching. I know my parents wouldn’t miss it for the world. I also know my back is feeling fucked, and I need a rest before it gets worse.

So the Hawks do what we do best, and pull out all the stops.

We have a game plan, and each player knows his role in this. The plan is to put it away early. Vegas Heat didn’t make it here because they’re an easy team to beat. Taylor and I have been over the footage when they played the Dallas Lions, and we’ve taken that into our game plan.

“You guys know what you need to do,” I say in our team huddle going into the first period. Taylor is even more pumped than most because by now he and Emmerson have rekindled things, and he knows she’s in the crowd. He’s also been on good terms with his dad again, something that I think has been a long time coming. He has a lot to fight for right now. I guess we all do. But he’s playing even harder for her.

And I want to play hard for Cindy.

The first period we get off a rocky start because the play is so rough. The crowd loves a good fight, there’s no doubt about it, but there’s so much at stake tonight. I have to watch out for my boys more fiercely than ever. Jake scores the only goal five minutes before the buzzer. Vegas isn’t crushing us, but they’re making it very difficult. In the next breath, he gets knocked down by their defenseman Peter Montgomery. Taylor and Jay are first to get to him to pick him up off the ice and we resume, minutes from the siren.

I can see in Taylor’s demeanor he is going to get the drop on another goal before the buzzer. As he slides lightning fast, heading straight for the goal, snaking left and right, he draws his stick back and belts the puck flying into the net as the goalie lunges and misses the save, laying defeated on the ice.

We all cheer and skate up to Taylor for a brief celebration, but resume quickly because the clock is still ticking.

Jay flies through the center on the next play, passing the puck to Taylor as he skates up the right edge of the ice, finally being able to lose defenseman, Josh Beauman, for a second.

He draws back his stick to take a shot, but just as he does, Josh catches up with him and slams him into the barrier so hard he loses his footing and they both fall down onto the ground. Taylor lays there on the ice as the siren wails out around the arena.

I skate on over as Ashton is already helping him up.

“You alive?” Ashton asks him.

“Doesn’t feel like it,” he mutters, holding his ribs. “I hope I didn’t break something.”

Ashton and I help him skate off the ice as coach meets us at the players door.

“Go get that looked at,” he says, patting Taylor on the back as he gets to the player’s bench to sit down and take a breath. Assistant Coach Ted is on him in seconds and he ends up getting strapped around his ribs in the locker room. He’s refusing a substitute, insisting he’s fine.

Of course, he’ll say anything, but it’s up to the team doctors to decide.

“You alright?” I ask Jake, who took a bit of a hit himself in the first period.

“Yeah, they’re just extra tight tonight,” he mutters.

“And we’re going to come back even stronger.” My strategy is always encouragement, because telling them it’s looking shit and we’re however many goals down rarely evokes much confidence when the stakes are so high. If we win this, we win the Cup.

I give one of my usual pep talks during the ten-minute period. I steal a glance up at Cindy on the way through the player’s door. I notice she’s moved from her original seat and is now sitting over where Emmerson is with her family. She smiles and I give her a nod, my eyes lingering on her for an extra second or two.

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