Page 2 of Halftime

Of course not.

The coach blew her whistle, and the goalie turned around, Devereaux written across the back of her jersey. Number thirty-one. Faith’s number.

Because in my dream, I hadn’t changed anything.

“Shit, Seb, you know her?”

Dream Cooper was surprised by this, as apparently were the rest of the guys on the team. But it was okay, I’d wake up soon.

“Yeah, she played in the same town as I did as a Junior.” Fortunately, dream me was smart enough not to say I knew her, as innakedknew her. Did not want to talk about that.

Instead, dream me rattled on about something else. “First practice on the Mav’s, we all tried to score on her. I think about two shots got in out of at least a hundred. She’s good.”

Dream Cooper got a glint in his eye, and I knew he was about to get up to some stupid shit. Cooper was the biggest contributor to our kitty. We threw in money when we did something we shouldn’t and gave it to a charity at the end of the year. Good thing this was just a dream.

“Really?” Dream Cooper wasn’t giving up on the idea. Real Cooper was just the same.

“Yeah, she played on the guys’ teams until she wasn’t allowed to anymore.”

Cooper turned to the rest of my dream teammates and said, “Let’s go guys. The freshmen need to see if they can do better than Seb’s sorry-ass Junior team.”

They all agreed, got up, and headed down to the ice. Dream me stayed put, waiting to wake up. It was definitely time for this to be over. My phone buzzed again, and I saw Holly had sent more pictures. I looked at them, wondering why I was so interested in women’s fashion in a dream. And it had to be a dream, right?

I shook my head. Down by the ice, Cooper called Faith. She skated over and tugged off her helmet. Sweaty hair surrounded her face, and the long blond braid fell down her shoulder. She pulled her arm over her forehead, wiping off the sweat. Like she did every damn time. And the bubble I’d created by telling myself this was a dream popped.

My hands started to shake. The phone buzzed again, but now I felt like I really was about to hurl. I found my feet and headed away from the ice, away from my teammates, away fromher. I came to in the hallway, leaning against the wall like I’d fall down if I tried to stand up straight. I breathed in and out, concentrating on keeping my food inside me.

What the everlasting fuck?

Faith was here? Why the hell would she be here? She knew this was where I’d gotten a scholarship. This was my school.

Shit. Sophomore year had just gone to shit.

* * *

Faith

Not every day was a good day. Some days, I couldn’t stop a beachball coming at my net. I didn’t have many of those days. I was good. So good that I’d been offered scholarships to a lot of schools. I’d had choices. My dad and I had gone over all of them, making up a pro and con list. The biggest pro was getting ice time.

I was a goalie. When my team was on the ice, there were five skaters and one goaltender. A team would normally run four forward lines and three pair of defensemen every game. That meant eighteen or more skaters would play in a game, and only one goalie. The backup goalie would only come in if the starter let in a slew of goals or got hurt. Bottom line? There weren’t a lot of goalies on a team’s roster, and they didn’t all get to play.

It was important that I had the chance to be in net for games. I was going to play hockey professionally, so I needed to show what I could do while I was at college. Dad and I looked at a lot more than team records and facilities. We checked out what the rosters were like, how deep they were with goalies both playing and ready to play.

The best shot to play was at Burlington University, known as Moo U. Moo U’s starting goalie had graduated last year. Her backup, Claire Anderson, was a rising senior, and this was her last year playing. They didn’t have any other goalies ready to start. Of course, the biggest con about Burlington was my ex. I knew he must be playing here this year, that is unless my darkest wishes had come true and he’d lost a leg or something. I’d been careful not to hear or see anything about him.

Bitter much? Yeah, I was.

I couldn’t tell my dad I didn’t want to go to Burlington because my ex had cheated on me. That wasn’t a topic we discussed in our house.

And hell, I wasn’t going to let my ex decide my future. I needed to put my hockey career first. That meant ignoring anything to do with him and taking care of myself. I’d been ignoring him for a year. I could keep it up. So I’d taken the offer from Burlington.

I’d been here on campus for a couple of days now. I was learning my way around, getting to know my roommate, and had seen no signs of my ex. So far, so good.

Today was our first practice. It was just the freshmen on the ice, though I had noticed some people sitting watching us. I knew some of them had to be some of my upper-class teammates. I was looking forward to meeting them, but first I needed to impress them with my skills.

If I could show them I was the goalie they needed, they’d be predisposed to like me.

Women playing hockey did not get all the perks and advantages that the guys got. We had to play for the love of the game, and we were all fiercely competitive. We had to be, or we’d all give up.

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