𝐏𝐄𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐓𝐘 𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋 || 𝐀•𝐁

𝟎𝟎𝟕 || 𝐎𝐎𝐏𝐒

𝐓he next day, Adam packed his bag for hockey as usual. His padding, under-armour, jersey, shorts, and his skates.

This cold winter morning, at 8:30. Adam was carrying the hefty bag on his shoulder, with his white hockey stick glued to his hand. The boy walked down the stairs with joy in his step, hockey practice was his second favorite thing other than the games.

"Ready, Adam?"His mother, Carol, asked, standing by the door with a kind smile on her face. Adam nodded with an even bigger smile on his face, running out into the snow towards the car parked in the driveway.

His mother laughed, locking the door behind her and took her son to his one hour practice for that day. The car ride consisted of how many snowflakes there was on the windows and what to get family members for christmas.

"Bye mom!"Adam waved, climbing out his mother's car and running into the arena. He was still unaware that the skates in his bag were half a size smaller than his own. He was too excited to realise.

"Hi Adam."His team greeted, getting changed into their own jerseys, ones that fit them, meanwhile Adam huddled over the bench looking at the mismatched lace colors. His laces were black, to match his jersey. These ones were blue and yellow.

"Adam, man, you good?"McGill questioned his friend, who had his eyebrows furrowed as he tied the laces in a tight double-looped bow.

"Yeah, come on."Adam shook it off and thought maybe his mom changed them for him during the night and walked out with a slight tightness around his ankles. These skates were far too tight and even though they were secure, they hurt a lot.

The duration of his practice was okay, he skated as well as he could and ignored the bruise that was forming above his ankle. He knew there was something up, these were not his skates.

After practice, Adam rushed to get them off and he so did. He threw himself down on the bench and untied the laces until they hung by the blades. He checked the sewed in tag and his eyes widened.

𝗔𝗦𝗛𝗟𝗘𝗬
𝗦𝗜𝗭𝗘 𝗦𝗠𝗔𝗟𝗟?
𝗜𝗗𝗞

"Damn it." He groaned, why did he have her skates, was it an accident or on purpose? The thoughts rushed through his head like a blizzard and fogged his head up until a slap on the shoulder shook him out of it.

"Great job today, Banks."Coach Reilly praised, smiling down at the twelve year old. Adam nodded slowly, a smile creeping up on his face and looked back down.

He had to give them back now.

However, back at Brooklyn Park, Ashley sighed as she stared at the skates she wore. They were a bit big
and the laces matched.

"You're being dramatic."Averman sighed, skating in a circle on the frozen over pond as he watched his best friend read the tag.

𝖠𝖽𝖺𝗆 𝖡𝖺𝗇𝗄𝗌.

"You gotta be kidding me." Ashley scoffed and crossed her arms across her chest. She didn't want to see him again but a little part of her did.

Averman read the tag and started laughing like a child, which annoyed the girl more. Her foot lifted up and pushed him down onto his back, his hockey stick falling along with him until they lay side by side.

"That was rude."Averman gasped dramatically, and stood up. Ashley rolled her eyes and tied the skates up with a triple-loop instead of a double. It provided some support but not too her liking.

"Oh yeah, this is even ruder."Ashley scoffed up some snow in her woollen gloves, and dropped the ball of snow onto his head. She watched his back arch and a scream leave his lips at the freezing mess of snowflakes make contact with his bare skin as it dropped down his back.

In the span of two minutes, a full blown snowball fight. The thought of the swapped skates didn't cross Ashley's mind at all afterwards. She got to see Adam one way or another, and so did he.

They weren't complaining about that, but the confusion of how their skates got swapped was unusual. Adams skates were black, Ashleys had bright laces to differentiate them.

The grin on Hans's face when Adam took Ashley's skates home with him did in fact play in Ashley's head when she got home.

"He mixed them up on purpose..Momma!"Ashley gasped, running downstairs and accidentally kicking her hamster ball downstairs.

"Mr. Tibbles..Oh good you're alive!"

..