Page 75 of The Perfect Snipe

“We’ll get it back.” Petrov nudges me with his shoulder.

Dropping down onto the bench, I grab a water bottle, squirting some Gatorade into my mouth as Wyatt and Roan head onto the ice. “Come on, Virgin. Get us a goal.”

He winks at me. “You know I will.”

But ten seconds later, Garrison is sent to the box for tripping. Great. Just great.

The penalty kill is like being stuck in the world's most stressful time loop. Seconds stretch into hours as Smitty continues to keep us in the game, stopping three point-blank shots in rapid succession. It's the kind of performance that makes you want to build the guy a shrine.

“We owe him dinner for a month after that.” Mykyta laughs as Garrison finally skates out of the box.

“A month? Try a year.”

With eight minutes left in the game and the score still frustratingly tied, Coach Kinnear decides it's time to shake things up. "Hartman, Clanton, Morrow—you're up!"

“Time to stick it to these assholes.”

Wyatt and I snap our heads sideways, staring at Roan. Wyatt chuckles, twirling his stick. “Damn, Morrow.”

Roan goes wide-eyed and blinks.

“What? Didn’t mean to say it out loud?”

He turns red, and Wyatt and I laugh. Then I jut my chin toward the opposing team. “Morrow’s right. Let’s end this now.”

Wyatt wins the face-off and sends it over to Morrow. Roan skates toward the net like he's planning to go straight through it. He passes back to Lund at the last second, faking out half the Bruins' defense in the process.

Garrison fires off a slap shot. The Bruins' goalie barely gets a piece of it, but it's enough to send the puck ricocheting out. And there I am, in the right place at the right time. The second the puck hits my blade, I tap it in with a little lift, right over the goalie’s pad.

Goal.

“Fuck, yeah, Sparkles!” Wyatt crashes into me, planting a kiss my helmet.

“Just keep the pressure on. We’re only up by one.”

We hop off the ice as the next line goes out. Mykyta scores, putting us up by two.

The final minutes are some of the most intense hockey I've ever played. The Bruins, facing elimination, throw everything they have at us. They pull their goalie, giving them an extra attacker. But we hold strong.

Hudson and Lund are brick walls on defense, blocking shots and clearing the zone with a determination that borders on psychotic. Petrov takes a puck to the face that leaves him bleeding but grinning like a maniac. "Is good? Chicks dig scars, yes?"

I shove him toward the bench. “Go let the trainer fix it and stop worrying what women think. The series isn’t over yet.”

The game continues and Smitty’s giving everything he’s got. During one frantic scramble, he loses his stick but still manages to make a glove save that has the entire arena gasping in disbelief. That’s definitely making the ESPN highlight reel.

With thirty seconds left on the clock, the Bruins make one last, desperate rush up the ice. Their star forward, a guy who's given us nightmares all series, winds up for a slap shot from the point. Without thinking, I dive to block it.

There's a special kind of pain that comes from taking a frozen rubber disc to the shin at about a 105 miles an hour. It's the kind of pain that makes you question every life choice that led you to this moment. But as the puck slams into my leg, all I can think is, 'Better me than the net.'

Somehow, through either adrenaline or sheer stubbornness, I manage to chip the puck out of the zone from my knees. And then, finally, mercifully, the horn sounds.

The bench clears as my teammates and coaches pour onto the ice, tackling Smitty, then each other. While I might’ve been on a team that won the first round before, it just feels different with the Minotaurs. Maybe because we’re underdogs being a new team, one no one really expected to be here.

Or maybe it's because of all the shit we've been through to get to this point.

But as I look at my teammates—at Wyatt's shit-eating grin, at Mykyta with his arms up in the air, at Smitty's look of stunned disbelief—I know I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. Like all the twists and turns and fucked-up detours my life has taken have led me right here, to this moment, with these guys.

We eventually disentangle ourselves and line up for handshakes. When we’re done I glance over at the fourth row off to the right side of our net where a sea of people sit in Minotaurs’ jerseys—all bearing my name and number.

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