Heart Like Yours \\ M. Lucic

Chapter 37

I love love love this chapter aaaaaahhhhghhhggfggggggg

"BUT YOU PINCHED ME. WHO THE FUCK PINCHES SOMEBODY?"
-via Gregory Campbell

I FUCKIN LOVE GREG HES BAE I CANT EVEN OKAY

ENJOY BABES XX

(Things are starting to move quickly)
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Flash forward. The season opener, the Montreal games, absolutely sucking ass this season. Nothing had really happened. Milan, I suppose, had come to grips with the fact we weren't together. Jared and I were as strong as ever, and he was...well, he wasn't Milan. Let's put it that way. Things were going in a surprisingly good direction. We weren't exactly friends, and it was obvious he still had feelings for me, but he was...he was accepting of the fact we weren't together. However, Milan wasn't the problem, nor was Jared. I was the problem. Jared was lovely and I liked him a lot, but did I love him? Ah, that was the question of the hour. Actually, to be or not to be was the question. Contrary, actually, it's how to be or how not to be, but hey. Let's not get into the nitty-gritty things. Anyhow. Jared was great, but there was this little piece of me that missed Milan. And of course, when I say little piece, I meant basically all of me. I had been the rock solid one at the beginning of the breakup; he had been the weaker one. Now the tables were turned. I was weaker and finding myself more attracted to him than ever, but Jared was a phenomenal boyfriend. Milan, on the other hand, was enjoying life to the fullest and just going along with whatever happened. I did not find this remotely fair, but as a wise person once said, it's not whether we deserve what we get but how we handle what we get. Anyhow, I had been in pain lately. Mental pain, not physical pain. Things, other than my obvious indecisiveness and slight apprehension toward another relationship, were going semi-well.

But this game, in particular, was the only one I had been dreading. It was October 28th, and our first game of the season against the Wild.

I cringed. This was, ultimately, inevitable. Milan had been putting nasty hits on Charlie all game. Not that I cared, because we weren't together. I had Jared. But what did worry me was the fact that Milan may kill Charlie. Again, not that I cared about Charlie, but more for Milan's sake. We weren't together, but he was still a friend. And finally, it happened.

Milan slammed Charlie into the glass. They dropped the gloves right in front of the bench. I heard grunts and angry swearing as Milan threw the first punch. He knocked Charlie's helmet off, getting him forcefully in the jaw. Charlie grunted, and I watched in horror from around Loui's shoulder. The refs weren't really feeling the need to do anything, apparently, and soon Milan's helmet was off. The Garden went into a frenzy. I could hear the two insulting and practically abusing each other.

"I'm gonna fucking...." I heard Milan's voice. Charlie replied with a swift punch square on the nose. Blood, and a lot of it, spattered on the previously clean ice. He had broken Milan's nose. Milan swung at Charlie, Charlie ducked. Charlie swung at Milan, Milan ducked.

"Oomf!"

Milan took a punch to the gut, but didn't fall. Instead, he barraged Charlie with intense punches aimed toward his face.

"Fuck!" Charlie swore. Milan's blood was everywhere. The last punch did it. Milan punched Charlie, and he went down in a heap. Milan was on top of him in no time, still beating the everliving shit out of him. That's when they finally decided to do something: pull him off. I swore I heard him snap,

"That was for Dax!"

Milan was spitting, swearing, and I even saw tears running down his face. He looked at me with those big, brown eyes as if to say, I'm sorry.

"Claude," I nodded. Milan came back to the bench, blood streaming down his face from his nose. It was definitely broken. Sighing, I brought him back to the locker room silently. His large frame walked silently on skates. I brought him to the exam table and he sat.

"This might hurt," I warned. He grinned crookedly as Angela brought me a bucket of cold water and some towels. She disappeared almost as quickly as she appeared.

"I'm no stranger to this, Dakota."

I sighed and gave him a towel. He blew his nose, an insane amount of blood and mucus now on the towel. I, as I had done many times before to this man, made a triangle with both hands. I placed all four finger pads against one another with my palms sloping away from one another. Then I placed the apex of the triangle snugly at the top of his nose.

"Take a deep breath," I told him softly. He grinned again and did as instructed. While he was exhaling through his mouth, I brought my palms together until my hands were molded snugly (but not too tightly) around his nose. Finally, I slowly dragged my hands straight down toward his chin in as straight a line as possible.

"Fuck!" he swore as I realigned his nose. He groaned. I stared into his puppy dog eyes. This was almost exactly parallel to the first time I had met him. I flashed back to that day where he was sitting the same way, he had almost the same injury, the way those same eyes studied me intently.

"Does that hurt?" I asked, tentatively touching the side of his nose. He felt the underlying tension, too.

"No."

The both of us remained silent for a few seconds. We stared into each other's eyes. I forgot how pretty his eyes were. He had those long lashes, and he had that chocolatey brown iris.......

"Thank you, you know."

"For?"

"Beating the shit out of him."

"Yeah, well, you're still one of my friends," he shrugged nonchalantly. He cracked a grin. "What are you doin' tonight? Would you and Patty Cake wanna come over for beers?"

"I'm going out with Jared; I'm sorry," I frowned.

It felt like everything was exactly the same. He looked at me for a second before sliding off the table. He slowly made his way back out to the bench.

"Hey, Dax?" he called before he disappeared from sight.

"Yeah?"

"Thanks."

"Just doing my job," I grimaced. He stopped again.

"Hey, Dax?"

"Yeah, Looch?" I asked.

"That was almost exactly parallel to the day we met. Minus the fact that you didn't fall into my lap."