Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 46792 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 234(@200wpm)___ 187(@250wpm)___ 156(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 46792 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 234(@200wpm)___ 187(@250wpm)___ 156(@300wpm)
The room quiets when our newest teammate, Griff Carrington, walks in. The dude steals the lightness everywhere he goes. He was the captain of the Vancouver team and he has a longtime rivalry with Ford. Griff expected to play his entire career in Vancouver and is still pissed off his team traded him.
“Morning, sunshine,” Dom says to Griff.
Griff ignores him. Ford gives Dom a look that silently tells him to shut the fuck up.
Sergei was known as the quietest, most brooding member of our team, but he’s got nothing on Griff. I’m not sure I’ve seen Griff smile since he got here. He plays hard, though, which is all any of us expect.
“Did you get the car thing situated?” Ford asks Griff.
“Yeah.” Griff doesn’t even glance at him as he answers.
Griff’s Range Rover wouldn’t start when we got back from our last road trip, so Ford gave him a ride home. That had to be the most awkward twenty minutes of all time.
I finish changing, lace up my skates and head out to the ice, still awed as I look around our new arena. Mila went all out. We have nice, comfortable seats in our stands and the best sound and lighting in the league. Our arena is part of a mini village where fans can get food and drinks before and after games. Mila fought the city to ensure we didn’t just have enough parking but more than enough. Being unable to find parking was the most common complaint our fans had with the old arena.
Our championship banners and retired team numbers have all been hung. It’ll take time for this to feel like home the way our old arena did, but we’ll get there.
“Hey, you want to play Call of Duty later?” Dom asks me as he skates out.
I think about it for a second. “Yeah, I’ll play til’ nine.”
“Nine?” He laughs. “Okay, gramps. You gotta take your Metamucil and wash off your dentures then?”
I shake my head. “I won’t come at all, then. How about that?”
“You’re fucking coming, dude. We haven’t played in more than a week.”
Dom’s my best friend, and our friendship works well because I usually go along with his dumb ideas. But last month, he convinced me to keep playing the night before a road trip and we didn’t quit until I had just enough time to go pack my shit and make it to the bus on time the next morning.
Never again. I was a zombie on the way back to the hotel after the game that night. Our coach would rip us both gaping new assholes if he knew we did that.
“I’m setting a timer on my phone and I’m done at nine. I’ll walk out in the middle of a game if I have to.”
He gasps. “You barbarian.”
“Those are my terms. Take ’em or leave ’em.”
“Yeah, fine. Bring pizza and wings, but don’t say I told you to. Tess is making vegetable soup for dinner tonight and I hate that shit, but I don’t want her to know.”
“Would she be pissed?”
He shrugs. “No, but she’d be hurt. She’s trying to become a better cook and I don’t want her to feel bad.”
“And what about you? Are you trying to improve yourself in any way now that you guys are going to be walking down the aisle?”
Coach blows his whistle to start the practice.
“You can’t improve upon this,” Dom says smugly. “I’m already an eleven.”
I only hold back my response because practice is starting.
“Horseshit,” I say that evening, tossing the PS5 controller I’m holding on to the couch cushion next to me. “Clapper527 keeps cornholing me.”
“Hey, will you hold a piece of pizza in front of my mouth so I can bite it?” Dom asks, furiously pressing buttons. “But don’t block the screen.”
I take a piece of pizza out of the box and take a huge bite. “I’m not feeding you unless you wipe my ass.”
“I’ll wipe your ass if it’s clean.”
I laugh a single note and sit back down next to him. “Why would I need my ass wiped if it was clean?”
“Come on, I’m hungry.”
“You want me to ask Tess to bring you some more soup?”
“Eat my ass. She put squash in it this time. I had to smile while I ate that soggy shit and say it was delicious.”
“I told her when I got here that you hated it.”
His jaw drops and he looks over at me. “You better be fucking with me. If you hurt her feelings, I will dick punch you so hard your nuts will fall out of your asshole.”
He’s so distracted he gets killed in the game and I laugh, satisfied. “No, I didn’t.”
“You’re a cocksucker.” He sets down the controller and goes over to the open pizza box, taking out a slice. “Hey, Tess said you and Cam might be going out.”