On the Way Down - Andre Burakovsky

Ch. 3: "I'm moving."

The Capitals had been eliminated from the playoffs a couple days ago. I had been spending a lot of time with Tom since the season ended, and he was still kind of cranky about it. Today, I was going to make it worse. I got up early and texted him and asked him if he would come over and see me. When he knocked on my door I took a deep breath, scared of how this was going to go.
  "Hey Tommy." I said as I opened the door. He immediately threw his arms around me to hug me and almost knocked me over.
  "You okay? You never text me this early to come over?" I looked down at my feet and shook my head before leading Tom over to the couch and sitting down.
  "I don't know how to go about saying this so I'm just going to spit it out. I'm moving."
  "Where to?" he said cautiously, you could see in his eyes he was hoping it was close.
  "Colorado." it came out as a whisper and I'm not 100% sure he heard me until his face falls.
  "When?"
  "The end of June." Today was the first day of May, so we had some time.
  "Guess you'll just have to spend a bunch of time with me over the next month." I smiled sadly at him. I could tell he was trying to not see the bad. He knew if I was leaving I had a good reason, and I did. I had gotten a job that I had been trying for years to get.

 Tom had said we would spend a lot of time together before I left, and he wasn't kidding. It was the week before I was leaving and he hadn't left my house without me in tow since the day I told him I was leaving. He helped me pack all my stuff, flew out to Colorado with me a couple weeks ago to find an apartment that was close to Pepsi Center - since that's where I was going to be working, and right now we were sitting in my almost completely empty apartment eating chinese food and binge watching FRIENDS. I felt kind of bad for him because the rest of the team was on vacation. They had either gone home or to some tropical place to let loose and here he was stuck here with me. I tried a few times to get him to leave and go on vacation but he took it to heart and got all upset thinking I was trying to get rid of him so I dropped it.
Today was the day, me and Tom had loaded up the moving truck and started the cross country trek to my new home. I cried leaving my house. I cried again when we crossed state lines. It had definitely been my favorite place I had lived so far. We drove as long as we could before stopping at a hotel to sleep. I was exhausted and I could tell Tom was too, but that didn't stop him from going out to get us food and when we were done eating, dragging me to the pool for some fun.
  "You need to relax and get your mind off of everything for a little bit Chels." he said hugging me from behind as I stood at the edge of the pool, then he pushed me in. I came out of the water sputtering.
  "You're going to pay for that." I threw some water in his general direction but he moved away quickly and the water just hit the ground. I shot a glare his way. I climbed out and moved over to the hot tub, my body hurt from packing the truck and sitting in the same position all day. Tom came and sat next to me a couple minutes later, when he was sure I wouldn't be splashing him with the hot water.
  "I'm really gonna miss you." he said throwing his arm around my shoulder. I leaned into him and put my head on his chest.
  "I'm going to miss you too, but at least I'll be able to see you when the teams play each other. And, you'll just have to deal with the fact that I'm going to spend all the bye weeks with you." he smiled and said it was a deal. ---------------------------------------------------
 I had been in my new apartment for a couple days when Tom came running into my room with a towel around his waist.
  "Tommy, what is so important that you couldn't get dressed before coming in here to tell me?" I questioned, trying not to look at him.
  "Shut up you know you like it." he smirked smugly before he shook his head remembering why he was in here. He shoved his phone in my hands.
  "What am I supposed to be looking at?"
  "They just traded Burks." my face fell as I read the article and then I smiled a little.
  "They traded him here."
  "What?!" he yelped grabbing his phone from me to finish the article himself. "I need to call him." he left the room quickly and I rolled my eyes before laying back down in my bed. I was too tired to deal with overprotective Tom at the moment.