Page 33 of Made for Us

I sit on the bench until the rest of the team is announced. The minute the national anthem has been sung, I close off my mind. It’s the only time I do, and for these two hours, I focus on one thing and one thing only. Making sure we don’t lose our season opener because nothing sucks more in life than losing at home, especially big games.

We squeak out a win by the skin of our teeth, and when I finally walk back to the locker room, there is a huge after-party celebration, but I’ve opted out of going. Instead, I dress back into my suit, omitting the tie, as I walk up to the lodges where I know Penelope waits for me.

I open the door of the lodge, and my heart now speeds up tenfold, knowing she might be here, knowing I can’t keep avoiding her. I have to make peace that we will only have that one night. The sound of adults chattering fills the room as I look around and see Penelope sitting on the couch with her iPad in her lap. Usually, I get the babysitter to bring her to the game, but Erika volunteered to bring her tonight since she was coming with all the kids.

“Hey,” I greet, and Penelope sees me and gets up, running to me, wrapping her arms around my waist. I bend down and kiss her head, and she looks up at me. She literally makes everything better for me.

“You did good,” she praises me, making me laugh as I nod. “Uncle Matthew said you could have scored at least four times if you shot the puck.” From when I introduced her to him, he always called himself Uncle Matthew, so she’s always called him that. Everyone else was jealous that he was Uncle Matthew, so they started throwing Uncle in front of their names too. They really have taken both of us in and have always treated us like family.

“Really?” I say, looking up at Matthew, who now throws his head back and laughs.

“I don’t think I said that exactly.” He walks over and holds out his hand to shake mine. “You played a good game.” I chuckle. “How’s the leg?” In the third period, with two minutes to go, the other team pulled their goalie, making it six on five. They were all over us, and we had a one-goal lead when their defensemen got the puck and shot a one-timer. I deflected the shot off my leg.

“Probably going to have a big bruise,” I tell him, omitting the fact it hurt like a motherfucker. “Ready to go home?” I look back at Penelope, who just nods her head before going to get her backpack.

She comes back and goes to hug Matthew. “Bye, Uncle Matthew.” She gives him a side hug.

“We’ll see you tomorrow at lunch?” he says, and the word no gets lodged in my throat.

“Yes,” Penelope says, and I don’t say anything. I just smile, not wanting to get into anything here. Besides, I’m fucking beat.

We walk out of the lodge and back down to the car. We get in, and when I drive out, the streets are still busy with people.

“Did you have fun tonight?” I ask her, looking into the rearview mirror to see her.

“Yeah,” she says, “Uncle Dylan threw me a puck to add to my collection.” She started collecting all the pucks she catches at the games and then makes whoever throws it to her sign it.

“Did you see Abigail?” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. But I’m jealous my daughter got to see her, and I didn’t. How crazy is that?

“Yeah, only for a bit,” she replies.

“Was she with her boyfriend?” I want to bite my tongue. When the talk about Abigail comes up in the room, I always get up and walk away. There is only so much I can take. Actually, there is only so much my heart can take.

“No,” she says. “We have to study for my spelling test tomorrow.” She changes the subject, and all I do is nod at her.

When we get home, she’s already half asleep by the time she walks up the steps. I go into my bedroom to undress, taking off my suit and tossing it in the dry-cleaning pile before slipping on shorts. When I make it back to Penelope’s room, she is already in bed and sleeping. I lean down and kiss her head. “Night, baby girl.” She doesn’t even grumble.

I usually go and have something to eat after the games, but I’m just not up to it, so instead, I slide into bed. Lying here in the dark, my head goes around and around as I try not to think of the one person I want to think about. I expected it to be hard to see her, but I wasn’t expecting to feel physical pain.

I turn on my side, and before I know it, I’m asleep. I wake when I hear plates clinking from downstairs. Turning over and grabbing the phone, I see it’s almost ten. Tossing the covers back, I go to the bathroom before I walk downstairs, where I find her in the kitchen making something to eat.

“Morning,” I say, and she looks over at me. I move to her and bend to kiss her head.

“I’m making a bagel,” she states, and I turn to the coffee machine, putting a pod in before starting it. She makes herself her breakfast, stopping at the fridge and grabbing some fruit from the shelf before sitting on one of the stools. She takes a bite of her bagel before she pushes back from the island and walks out of the room. I make my coffee, looking back when I hear something slapping the island. “We can study while I eat,” she states, and I can’t help but smile. She must get that from her mom because there was no way when I was her age. I even thought about studying. I don’t have many regrets in my life, but not knowing her mother is going to be one of the biggest ones. I wish I knew her even a little.

I sit on the stool next to her, grabbing her book, “What lesson?” I ask as I open the book and start flipping pages. We spend the next hour going over her spelling words and then her math to make sure she understands it. I wish I could say I understood it, but the way they are teaching math today is just to fucking complicated.

“What time are we leaving,” Penelope asks when she puts her plate in the dishwasher, “to go to lunch?”

“You really want to go to lunch?” I ask her. “You just ate.”

“That was breakfast. I’m going to go get dressed.”

“We can go catch a movie.” I try to make her change her mind, but she just pulls her eyebrows together and shakes her head. She leaves me alone in the kitchen as she goes to get dressed.

I put my own cup in the sink before I go upstairs and get in the shower. I literally take the longest time getting dressed. So long that Penelope comes into my room twice to ask me what I’m doing. I put on jeans and a baby-blue polo shirt and a pair of white sneakers. Penelope is dressed in jeans and a pullover.

I make my way over to Matthew’s place, and like always, cars are everywhere. I park on the street as far away from the cars as possible so I can get out easily when we leave. Last time, Cooper was stuck in the driveway for forty-five minutes, waiting for people to move their cars.

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