The Inside Edge: Chapter Eight
Brianne blinked stupidly as the mass of bodies jostled past her for the
doors that lead into the concessions and main lobby of the hockey arena. Then
she blinked again. She’d enjoyed it. She’d actually enjoyed watching the hockey
game. Mentally shaking her head as she and Danette slowly rose to their feet,
the boys of each hockey team having long since exited the ice, she felt something
warm spread in her stomach.
“And they won.” The words, slipping softly out of her mouth, filled
Brianne with a surprising amount of pride.
“Well, of course they
did!” Danette said, elbowing Brianne and letting out a friendly cackle. “You call
yourself a fan, you better start at least pretending to have confidence in our
team.”
Brianne recoiled as
they reached the stadium stairs. “No, I didn’t mean it like that…”
Glancing back at her,
Danette winked. “There are rules, all the same.”
Laughing weakly, not
entirely sure if she’d offended Danette or not, Brianne nodded. “Got it.”
“Let’s see.” Tapping a
finger against her chin as they descended the steps, Danette seemed to be in
deep thought for a moment. “Riley High School. Biggest rival. So you need to be
extra competitive that night.”
Brianne nodded again.
Emptily. Unsure if she’d somehow managed to lose the thread of their
conversation that quickly.
“If Betsy is working
concessions, you want to keep her updated on the score every time you go inside
to buy something, or go to the ladies room, that kind of thing. It goes a long
way.”
“Yeah?” The word was
weak, soft. Brianne felt her body tensing, her heart constricting at uncomfortably.
Danette was making a lot of assumptions here. A lot of expectations…all but
insisting, taking it for granted that Brianne would make such a strong commitment
to the team.
Only. Well, sure she’d
had fun tonight but Brianne hadn’t necessarily intended to make this a weekly
activity.
“Oh. And Wolf
Halverson.” Nodding pointedly, Danette gestured to a thin man who must have
been pushing eighty, standing just inside the concession area, leaning against the
bank of windows looking out onto the rink. “He’s sort of the club’s unofficial mascot.
Wave or say ‘hi’ when you walk past. It’s a sign of respect.”
“Right.”
“Other than that—”
“Hey! Look, it’s Ms.
Kelling! Ms. Kelling!”
At the sound, more
voices joined in:
“She came!”
“I told you she’d
come.”
“Shut up, Cory.”
“Ms. Kelling!”
Whipping her head
around, Brianne had just enough time to spy a couple of heads poking around a
door situated down on of the many wide corridors branching off from the main
concessions areas of the lobby before, with a flash, she found herself watching
half the hockey team stumble through the doorway, still wearing their hockey
jerseys.
Must have been the boy’s
locker room, she mused.
But that was about all
the time she had remaining for such idle curiosity. At the clattering sound of the
boisterous teenagers spilling into the lobby, Brianne was sudden the focus of
everyone’s attention. And that meant everyone.
Feeling as though the entirety
of the hockey arena had suddenly come to a hushed, standstill, feeling as though
all the eyes in the building had suddenly taken notice of the petite stranger
with short brown hair standing so awkwardly in the dimly-lit space, Brianne
took a deep breath.
Then she smiled.
Tightly. Lifting her hand, she offered the boys a small finger wave. “Hey guys.”
Almost as though they’d
planned it, choreographed it, the boys all smiled in unison, their fisted hands
thrusting high into the air as they chanted wildly, crying out their win…almost
as though she’d rallied them up instead of offering a half-hearted greeting.
All the same, their
energy was contagious. And flattering. Brianne started to smile and then—
“I’m sorry. I’m not
sure we’ve met?”
At the sound of the
cool question, called out in soft feminine tones, Brianne turned to find
herself staring into the quiet but no less intense gaze of a woman who, by the crossed-arm
stance, decided her fate as one of the boys’ mom’s.
“Oh.” Ducking her head
the slightest bit, Brianne offered her a large smile. Sticking out her hand,
she watched nervously as a small circle suddenly formed around her, parents crowding
her on all sides as she shook the woman’s hand. “No, I don’t think so. My name
is Brianne. Brianne Kelling.”
“And how do you know
the boys?”
Fighting the
instinctive desire to shrink even smaller, Brianne tried to produce a flippant
laugh. It wasn’t a terrible effort. “Well…” waving generally toward the boys,
if for no other reason than to get the group of eyes off of her for a moment,
Brianne explained: “They’ve sort of been teaching me how to skate.”
Glancing back at the
woman, Brianne saw the tail end of her raised, incredulous eyebrows. “Really?”
“They took mercy on
me,” Brianne mumbled, feeling the weight of judgement circling around her chest
as all those eyes continued to stare her down—how many people were huddled
together? Ten? Twelve? The men were glowering. The women tight-lipped. Protective.
Curious. Unsettled.
At her words, however,
Charlie started laughing. He laughed so hard that he actually bent down and slapped
his hand against the side of his hockey pads. Cory chimed in, his low chuckle
bouncing off the cinderblock walls. “You could say that again. Guys, do you
remember how terrible she was that first day?”
“All flailing arms and
screams.”
“I did not scream,”
Brianne insisted, her cheeks warming uncomfortably.
“You screamed a bit.”
The contradiction, and
the unexpected sound of Coach’s voice, cut through the room. Jerking her head
up and around, Brianne spied him standing just behind the boys. In the gathering
crowd she hadn’t seen him approach. Thankfully, his voice commanded not only
her attention; with relief, Brianne felt the weight of public eyes leave her
person as heads shifted, a few chuckles riddling the air.
She was grateful for his
distracting presence, even if he had just made fun of her.
“But you also caught
on quick,” Coach added, giving her a small smile.
And just like that,
the proverbial snap of a finger, all eyes were back on her again. Bopping
uncomfortably on her feet, Brianne tried to act natural, but her shoulders were
stiff, her eyes not quite meeting those of the gawkers around her.
“Yeah, well, they’re
good teachers,” she offered weakly. Her palms were sweating. Taking a determined
step backward, her mouth forming a quick apology when she backed into someone—though
she didn’t stop moving, forcing that person to side-step out of her way—Brianne
lifted her chin just the slightest bit as her eyes caught Coach’s gaze. “But
anyway…I should, ah, I actually have to get going.”
With a flick, she let
her eyes glance toward the hockey team. Her smile softened then, became a
little more natural as she said: “Great game, guys. And thank you. For inviting
me to come and watch.”
Brianne wondered if she perhaps shouldn’t have made that last comment, especially as she saw parent’s heads swivel yet again, going from her to their kids and then Coach. Then again…she wasn’t about to stick around long enough to find out one way or the other. Turning a deaf ear, Brianne spun on her heel, her head buzzing with the sound of continued chattering…
“Bye Ms. Kelling!”
“See you Sunday!”
“Thanks for coming.”
That woman’s voice
again. “They’re teaching her how to skate?”
Coach. “Yes. As a team.”
“Well shoot,” a
masculine voice said. “Is that what’s different?”
“Absolutely.”
“Huh. Well…I mean, she
seems nice.”
Coach chuckled, the
sound just reaching Brianne as her hand brushed up against the door. “Nice doesn’t
enter into it. She’s our secret weapon.”
Pushing through the door,
pretending she was out of earshot, Brianne frowned as she marched across the
crunch of snow lightly covering the parking lot. She wasn’t altogether sure she
appreciated being recruited as a secret weapon.
And dammit, she was
nice and it wouldn’t have hurt that man to acknowledge it.
It wasn’t until
Brianne was pulling into her designated parking spot outside her apartment
complex that she realized that she’d never said goodbye to Danette. Crinkling
her forehead as she alit from her vehicle, Brianne couldn’t actually remember
seeing Danette after the boys had created such a ruckus. Walking up the stairs and
across the courtyard to her front door, Brianne stuck her key in the lock
automatically as a lowering thought settled on her shoulders.
She hadn’t seen her
because she’d forgotten about her.
Worse, Brianne had
forgotten her because, unlike Danette, the other parents had shown an interest
in Brianne—something it was clear they’d never thought to do with the other woman.
Never mind the fact that Brianne hadn’t wanted or welcomed their attention, she’d
gotten it.
The outsider had been
thrust into a group of insiders.
Only, she’d left
someone behind.
“Well, fuck,” Brianne
muttered. It was hardly her fault, hardly her responsibility to include Danette,
a woman she hadn’t even known three hours earlier…and yet, the pit in her
stomach only widened.
After all, she knew only
too well the terrible ache of being alone. Of watching from the outside. Of not
feeling like she was enough.
“Well. Fuck.”
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