Hockey Rivalry

Chapter 26

Colton

I take a puff of my cigarette finding comfort in the smoke filling my lungs.

She bought me a hockey stick signed by Wayne Gretzky. That's beyond expensive.

I bought her a guitar so I can teach her. It sits in the corner of my room.

It could just be my mind. But my sheets smell like her.

"Fuck you Merlia." That same thing has been ringing in my head over and over.

We all hung out on Christmas without her. I wasn't having fun.

I take another puff and I hear sirens in the distance.

I saw a video of her singing in the music store. Her voice is so angelic. She even sang in front of people.

"My friends cut me off. I feel like I don't have anyone."

The day she came over and I was hiding in my room. The day I heard her scream at someone. Every time I think of her face I can hear her crying in my hallway as I watch.

And when she saw me it made her feel sick.

I take another puff and the sirens are close.

She's miserable. She's miserable because of me. Because I couldn't contain my jealousy.

"Man whore"

I hate it when she calls me that. I tried to prove to her that I changed. She trusted me. Then I fucked it up.

The sirens that were once in the distance blare through the rink's parking lot.

My heart pounds and I put out my cigarette. I run to the other side of the roof and look over the edge.

There's an ambulance. Alex comes rushing out and he's on the phone. The paramedics run in with a stretcher.

I hurry up and climb down. Alex spots me and I run over to him.

"Yeah dad, I'm gonna follow behind the ambulance. I'll meet you at the hospital." Alex says in a panicked voice. "Bye, I love you." He says before hanging up.

"What's going on?" I ask. I turn around and an unconscious Merlia is being rolled out of the building.

All the color from her face is drained.

"I took her here so she can hit some pucks. Right before she hit the first one she fell unconscious." Alex says not taking his eyes off his sister who is being lifted into the ambulance.

I turn around and push Alex to his car and then I run to mine.

"I clearly mean nothing to you!"

If only she knew that every moment I've spent with her are burned into my mind. Everything she does from the way she scrunches her nose when she disapproves of something to the way she would shyly take off her glasses and tilt her head down to hide her face as she cleans them. I'm obsessed with it all.

Ever since Carly died I have always been afraid of driving fast. My heart races thinking about chasing after the ambulance going over sixty miles per hour.

I put my car into drive and speed after the ambulance. Not caring that I could be pulled over.

It's Merlia. I'll do anything for her.

I'd die for her.

Because I love her.

_____

"She has to sleep in her bathtub a few nights." Alex tells me as we sit in the waiting room. "Some nights I'd hear her at three am going outside and then she would come back in about two hours later."