Page 122 of Keeper
She relented with a small laugh. “Fine, fine. I’ll give it to you. That was our first date.”
I pumped my fist. “Yesssss.”
“But this is still our firstdinnerdate.” She bumped her shoulder against mine. “So you’re still a same-side sitting creep.”
I grinned at her. “Hey, this creep can go away, if you want him to.”
But the moment I started to slide out of the booth, she hooked her arm around mine and pulled herself against me. “No. Don’t go. I want you right here. I need you.”
I kissed the top of her head. “I’m right here, babe. Always.”
“God,” she muttered beneath her breath. “You always say the right thing.”
I held her close. Something about being together just felt so comforting. I guess after the shit we’d been through, we needed to be close to each other more than ever. Kinda funny, when you think about it, that Marta’s attempts to break us up only drove us closer together.
During dinner, I wanted to know about therestof Ainsley’s day. Shetold me about her day with the WAGs, and it warmed my heart to see how the girls took her in and welcomed her so quickly.
I scarfed down my meal and ate the rest of Ainsley’s once she was too full to finish. She couldn’t believe my appetite—but what really shocked her was how much water I downed. (Our waitress, having recognized me when I came in, knew to keep a pitcher of water filled on our table to save her the trouble of refilling my glass again and again.)
“What’s with all the water?!” Ainsley asked when the waitress swapped out my empty pitcher with a new one. “What are you, a camel?”
“I lose ten to fifteen pounds a game, Ainz,” I said. “And it’s all water weight.”
“What?Really, that much? Why?”
“Goaltending is insanely physical.”
“How much weight do the other players on the ice lose?” she asked.
“I dunno, but it’s not nearly as much as a goalie, I’ll tell you that.”
Her eyes narrowed with confusion. “I don’t get it. How can that be? You’re the goalie. You just stand in one place the whole game while everyone else is zooming up and down the ice.”
I pretended to be offended. “Oh, so you think my job is easy, huh?”
“No! I’m not saying that,” she laughed. “I seriously just don’t understand how you could lose so much weight when you don’t have to skate as much as everyone else.”
“Think about it like this,” I said. “Any time the puck is in our zone, I have to be set in an athletic stance so I’m primed to explode in any direction, if I need. But it’s a balancing act, because while I need to be ready to explode, Ialsoneed to stay loose, quick, and flexible, because I’ve got to be ready for anything.”
“Jeez,” she said, starting to understand.
“As the play moves around the ice, I’m making thousands of micro-movements to stay square to the shooter and take up as much of the net as I possibly can. When I push off from one side of the net to the other? That’s an incredibly powerful motion, and yet I have to keep it tightly controlled. All night long, I’m making explosive bursts of energy and then stopping on a dime. Any skater will tell you, that’s the most exhausting part of skating—the starting and stopping. And that’s what I’m doing all night long.”
“Wow,” she said. “Really. I had no idea.”
“Yup. In fact, the goaltender is often the best skater on the team.”
“Are you the best skater on your team?” she asked.
I laughed. “Not to toot my own horn … but yeah, babe.”
“No kidding?!” The sparkle in her widening eyes told she’d just gained a hell of a lot of respect for my job.
“Yup,” I said.
“Wow … that’s incredible! I never would’ve guessed that. But yeah, everything makes sense when you explain it like that. Goaltending sounds very tiring.”
“So you really thought I just stood there in net, huh?” I teased.
