If The Past Could Heal...

Chapter 5 - Hockey Morons

Noelia's POV:

Getting up the next day was hard. After not having done ice skating for a while, my muscles are so stiff and it's a chore to even walk to the car. Cami and I decided we would sacrifice extra sleep so we could get Starbucks before school and as we are sitting cold in the car, I am severally regretting it.

"I'm sure this heater works" Cami grumbles as she cranks it up and bangs it a little with her fist.

I yawn in response.

"Very lively this morning Lia" she rolls her eyes as we pull into the drive through.

Still holding my drink as I step out of my final class is a miracle, I must admit it was freezing by the time I had my final sip, but by the end of the day it was hotter, so it was refreshing.

Grabbing my bag with my skates, I headed over with Cami to the Kiora building, just to be earlier this time, and I walk with her to the studio upstairs that she dances in. She waves to the teacher and we pause outside the studio and hug each other.

"Have fun" I remark.

"Always" she pulls back and grins at me.

I turn away as she walks in to greet her teacher properly. I walk back down the stairs and look at the clock on the wall that tells me it 4:48. I'm pretty early, so I walk into the rink, but what greets me inside makes me heat up in fury.

Hockey boys. Training in my time slot. Red clouds my vision and I storm over to the sidelines to find my coach mirroring a similar expression of fury on her face. I catch her eye and she walks over to me as I look into the commotion on the rink and scream Declan's name. His head pops up from the pack and he smiles when he sees me. He skates over and says "What's up". As if he hasn't taken up my time slot.

"What kind of sick joke do you think you playing" I can barley keep my voice down.

"Our coach said if we were blaming you on being late, we could just train before you" Innocent is the only way I can describe his facial expression. Which is completely inaccurate.

"This is Noelia's time slot Declan, stop causing problems" Coach Tracy tells him.

"If Declan thinks this is best for the team, I'll let him do this" Declan's Coaches voice booms behind us, we all flinch not seeing him there.

"But they ruin the ice!" I complain.

"So do you, Missy" Declan's Coach turns to look at me with a raised eyebrow.

"But they train after me because they leave deep groves in the ice and the ice cleaner only comes after we are both finished!" I explain exasperated.

"We know Noelia, we see the cleaner come in" Declan says with a know-it-all tone.

"This is highly inappropriate, Tomas" Coach Tracy remarks to Declan's Coach.

"Tracy, what's done is done, it won't kill your girl to just wait for my boys to be finished" He tells her.

Coach Tracy's mouth goes into a straight line and she shakes her head as she walks off, muttering something about hockey boys' incompetence.

I stall to the sidelines without sparing a glance at Declan because I can just imagine that stupid grin on his face. I plop down in the middle of the stands and rest my elbows on my legs and my face in my hands.

If I say they weren't good, I'd be lying. It was honestly jaw dropping to see the team play, they were so in sink and you could see they knew each other well. It was hard to keep the frown on my face, but it reappeared when Declan kept winking at me when we caught each others eyes. Declan on ice, he was amazing, not that I would even dream to admit that to him, that stupid boy caused me more headaches than I'd ever had in my life, but damn he's good at hockey. He is insanely fast and great at shooting. Hunter and him make an incredible duo, Hunter is an amazing defender and is great at making pases.

When they finally finished, I nervously walked over to the rink to see the damage that they did. I peeked at it but didn't see any horrible damage, thank God.

"Is the ice okay for you to do jumps?"Coach Tracy asks.

I nod, so she directs me to learning my new routine. I was nailing the first part but then we started to try out the harder tricks in the routine.

I was doing a triple axel when I landed in one of the deep grooves that one of the boys left. My right foot got caught in it causing me to jolt forward, my face and the rink coming in contact, I felt a splitting pain in my head and then everything went black.

————————————————————————————————————————

Authors notes:

Uh oh! What have the stupid hockey boys done now! Keep reading to see Declan's reaction <3

Please comment and vote and star rate my story, I'd really appreciate it <3

My TikTok is @heartsforbooks_ so make sure to follow it for bookish content!!!