On the morning of December 30th, my wife—I’ll never get sick of those words, “my wife”—drives me up to the players’ entrance at the stadium, and then proceeds to throw her arms around me, climb into my lap, and kiss me ‘til I’m half considering saying “screw the game!” and driving us back home.
But then, Dallas walks by and smacks the window of the car, catcalling and whooping and plummeting me back to reality.
“Yas! Get in there, Slater,” he yells, pounding on the window.
“Screw off, Cooper!” I holler back, but I’m laughing. Then, I turn to Maddie, giving her one last kiss. “I’m going to miss you. First night we’ve spent apart in a while, huh?”
“We’ve been sleeping in the same bed for, like, a week.”
I grin. “Feels like forever. I can’t imagine it any other way now. ”
The Cyclones have an away game in Tennessee tonight against the Warriors—a good old-fashioned back-to-back to round out the calendar year—and I’m not sure I’m ready for it after the pounding we took from Tampa last night. On top of that loss, everything, physically, is still aching. I’d kill to just sit in an ice bath all day today.
But then again, I’d kill if I couldn’t be at this game with all my teammates.
As it’s a quick trip up across the state border and we don’t really need a nutritionist traveling with us, Stef decided that she and Maddie should both take tonight off. And Maddie, surely overcome with a sudden delirium or fever, decided to take Jax up on his offer when he asked her to try camping with him again.
I think being in love is making her a little loopy.
She nuzzles her nose into my shoulder. “Don’t go propositioning any new wives at hotel bars, you hear me?”
I tug gently on the ends of her hair. “Never. I’m a one-wife kinda guy.”
“Good.” She laughs. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow.”
“Should be back here around midday.” I fix her with a look and mimic her tone from earlier. “And don’t get lost wandering in any woods, you hear me?”
She sticks her hand out and her little finger loops around mine. “Pinky promise. Now, go win that game for me.”
“I’ll call you when I get to the hotel tonight.”
“And I’ll answer… unless Jax takes me to some weird off-grid place with no phone service and I’m bear fodder by then.”
“Ain’t no bears in Georgia,” I reassure her.
“Yeah, there are.” She peers at me, crossing her eyes. “Are you sure that you’re actually Canadian? Because your bear knowledge is pretty appalling.”
“You’re pretty appalling, missy!” I swat her on the butt, and she laughs and gives me one last hug.
I tear myself reluctantly away from her and she hands me the thick manila envelope that’s sitting on the center console before I hop out of the car and practically sprint to the bus. I’m not technically late, but I am the last one to board.
For a pack of generally unruly guys, the team manages to be pretty timely.
“Sorry, Coach,” I mutter when I reach the vehicle.
Torres, who’s standing right outside the door, nods at me, his dark eyes steady. “A word, Slater.”
We step away a few paces, and Coach looks me dead in the eye. “I’m not going to beat around the bush here. Your head wasn’t in the game last night, and I believe the pre-game meeting we had about your contract is to blame.”
“I’m to blame, Coach.” I meet his gaze respectfully. “But I’ve sorted my head out, and I’ll be on it again tonight.”
He raises a dark brow. “Does that mean that you’ve come to a decision?”
“I have. And I would like to accept. In fact, here you go.” I pass him the manila envelope. “Signed, sealed, delivered.”
Those brows pull together. “Well, I have to say that you’ve surprised me, Slater. At the meeting yesterday, I wasn’t sure how this was going to go.”
“My hesitation yesterday has nothing to do with the team or the contract itself, sir. I’m all in with this team.”
Like my wife is all in with me.
I can’t help but smile as I think back to our conversation in the gardens last night. At first, I wasn’t super pumped to hear that her “yes” came with a condition, but when she explained her reasoning to me, it just made me love her even more.
She doesn’t want us to continue with the spousal green card, because then, our marriage will always be linked to my career. And to our original agreement. But my new contract with the Cyclones will give me US immigration status of my own accord, and so, we can continue our marriage driven by nothing but our love for each other.
Choosing each other, every single day.
I never considered myself to be much of a romantic, but let me tell you, that was the most damn romantic thing I ever heard.
Torres considers my words for a few moments, and then nods. “You wasted no time coming to that conclusion, Slater.”
I grin at him. “You have my wife to thank for that.”
This earns me a chuckle. “Whatever she’s doing, tell her to keep it up.”
“I will, Coach. I’m glad to still be a Cyclone.”
Coach offers me a rare smile, one that makes his lined face look ten years younger. “And we’re glad to have you, Sebastian. Now get your ass on that bus. We’ve got a game to win.”
I step onto the bus to a chorus of whoops and cheers—apparently, word travels fast when it comes from the mouth of Dallas Cooper. Although the story of what he witnessed between Maddie and me in the car has devolved into something considerably more debauched than what was really happening.
“Watch it! That’s my wife you’re talking about.” I smack Colton upside the head as I walk to my seat—retaliation for a particularly lewd comment.
After everyone finally calms down from acting like a bunch of fourteen-year-old hormonal man-children, I sink into an empty row behind Aaron, who’s engaged in his usual pregame ritual. His tongue pokes out the side of his mouth as he attempts to wield a delicate crochet hook in his huge hands.
“Whatcha working on today, Marino?” I ask. In response, he holds up a crocheted pattern of a puppy in a basket. I grin. “Nice.”
Way back in high school, Aaron helped his grandma with a crochet project the same day as an important game… and then proceeded to have the game of his life. It’s been his ritual ever since, and he swears by it. Hockey players are generally known for their crazy superstitions, so everyone takes Aaron’s crocheting in their stride, and would never dare make fun of it.
While I respect other players’ little oddities, I’ve never been superstitious myself. But I can certainly think of a few pregame rituals I’d like to adopt that involve Maddie…
I spin my wedding band around my finger, thinking about the conversation I just had with Coach.
Whatever she’s doing is working. I can feel a change within myself. And last night, she showed me how much she believed in me, believed in the best version of me when she convinced me to sign my contract.
But the whole thing has got me thinking. Because in doing this, she’s effectively given me everything I ever wanted… and more. Now, I know that I wasn’t ever actually searching for the perfect contract, I was searching for her. Hockey is just the icing on the cake, the extra.
She’s the actual entire freaking recipe.
There were so many things she wanted, when it came to falling in love, that she didn’t get because of the way things happened between us. We met and were married before we even really knew each other. And it was only after we were married that we had the whole romantic experience: the flirting, cuddling, dating, exploring each other…
One thing she never got was that dream wedding.
I turn around in my seat to face Lars Anderssen, two rows back.
“Hey, Lars! How’s the wedding planning going?”
The goalie grins, all big white teeth. “I have no idea—Lena does all of it. I turn up for suit fittings, and when she asks my opinion on something, I agree with hers.”
Randy Allen, another married guy on the team, laughs. “That’s a good strategy. Happy wife, happy life, I say.”
“I don’t know,” Triple J says with a sigh from a few rows up. “If I got married, I’d want to help plan the whole thing. Little pigs in blankets, an arch made of white roses, and those centerpieces on the tables with floating candles…” He trails off as the entire bus breaks into peals of howling laughter. Up at the front, in the bus’s rearview mirror, I see that even Coach Torres’ mouth is twitching.
“What?” Jimmy demands. “What’d I say?”
“Just wondering… were you planning on wearing white?” Dallas asks with a smirk.
“Well, I haven’t thought about the color scheme, yet,” Jimmy replies thoughtfully, clearly missing Dallas’s joke. “But I think I’d go for a tuxedo with a top hat. And my future wife would wear one of those poofy dresses with the laces on the back, maybe wear a matching top hat…”
At this, everyone dissolves into a fresh bout of laughter, made all the funnier by Jimmy blinking and saying “what?” repeatedly, genuinely not understanding what’s so funny.
It’s almost too much, and I’m clutching my sides by the time it all dies down.
Then, Mal looks at me with a smug, knowing smile. “Why all the wedding questions, Seb? Wanna get something off your chest?”
“I was actually thinking that I’d like to give Maddie a wedding, seeing as we eloped and didn’t really have one,” I admit. I don’t care if the guys label me a simp for this comment, it’s just true.
I’m amazed when Colton nods encouragingly. “You should.”
Aaron looks up from his puppy crochet disasterpiece. “It’s a great idea.”
“Does Mad Dawg like surprises?” Dallas asks. “You could throw a surprise wedding.”
“Do you really have to call her that? And who ever heard of a surprise wedding?”
“Duhhh, they’re, like, a thing on TikTok.”
“You think I should throw a surprise TikTok wedding for my wife,” I repeat dumbly.
“We could plan it!” Jimmy pipes up. “Do you know what she likes?”
I think back, and suddenly remember all of our interview prepping.
Of course I do. I know her favorite food, color, flowers, places…
“Damn right I do,” I tell him, a strange excitement building in my stomach. Is this really going to happen?
Jimmy’s already got his phone out and is taking notes. “First thing’s first: when do you want to have it?”
“I don’t know.” I frown. “Soon, I guess. How long does it take to plan a wedding?”
“Years, apparently.” Lars sighs tiredly.
“I’d say you could do it pretty quick,” Mal pipes up. “You’d just need to give everyone a task.”
“So…” I blink around at my teammates, who are all sitting up straight, alert, and peering at me like a pack of meerkats. “Are we really doing this? A hockey team is planning a surprise wedding?”
“Looks like it,” Jake Griswold grumbles from the back of the bus. “Dunno how you’re all gonna keep your mouths shut and not ruin the surprise, though.”
Up at the front, Coach Torres stands. He winks at me. “I know how. Because we’ll do it tomorrow night. New Year’s Eve. The wedding can be in lieu of the party.”
New Year’s Eve is Maddie’s favorite holiday.
A fresh new start for a fresh new year.
I stare at Coach. “A New Year’s Eve wedding…”
“And we can do the heavy lifting,” Jimmy pipes in. “Work together to get all of Maddie’s favorite things.”
A loud, communal holler and cheer resounds around the bus as my team, my dysfunctional pack of brothers, all indicate that they’re in.
This plan is so freaking insane, it might actually work.
