Lucky Shot- Adam Banks

44-Ouch-D3

Thursday came quicker than I anticipated. Although I was excited for the upcoming weekend, I was extremely nervous for the game against Blake. Our first game as the Warriors, and not the Ducks.

Not only that, it was my first game back in nearly a year. Sure, we've scrimmaged and scrimmaged, but nothing's the same as actually playing.

"Ava," Averman nudges me on the shoulder, making me flinch, "let's go."

I take a breath in and nod to him and the rest of my teammates, "Okay, everyone's expecting good, so let's give them great. Uh, the varsity's watching, so nothing too flashy."

"Yes captain," Charlie scoffs, shoving past me and bumping my right shoulder.

I heavily sigh, but keep my words to myself. We needed to be a team now more than ever, and everyone else doesn't need to see us fighting.

We head out into the arena and it's packed. Mostly, the crowd is red, adorning Eden Hall colors, but a small portion of it was green thanks to Blake.

I lead us in warm ups and when they're over, my eye catches Adams. He smiles and nods, a reassuring gesture for most, but seeing the entire varsity team sitting around him made me even more uneasy.

When we got into the huddle and started talking with Orion, I could hear Dean Buckley start talking about Charlie and I, "Conway and Carter are normally co-captains. Hopefully Orion isn't trying to push the feminism narrative on us now."

"Carter!" Orion yells and snaps my attention to him, "Listen."

"Yes sir," I nod and start listening to him.

"Alright, think defense. All right, hands in," he puts his hand out and we follow, "here we go."

"Quack, quack, quack," we all start, but he cuts us off by yelling.

"What the hell is that? Knock that off," he scolds us, "Go, team on two. Here we go, one, two-"

"Go team," we say, unenthusiastically.

"Go team, how original?" Charlie scoffs to Averman and Fulton, but I'm skating near them so I can hear it.

"Just get in the game Charlie," Averman shoves his shoulder.

Charlie looks up to the crowd and waves at a girl with brown hair. He grins, and she smiles back. Great. He will be showing off.

We skate off and Fulton joins me on defense. People probably think Orion is a mad man to put me on defense. But, he's said I have the speed and I'm good at reading the offense, so he has reasons.

But those reasons get thrown out of my head the second I look at the Blake boys. They were all at least 6 foot and 200 pounds.

I'll be lucky to make it out alive.

Charlie easily wins the face off and passes it to Fulton. Fulton skates up and passes it back to Charlie, taking out two guys as he goes.

Charlie scores and we all celebrate, him going beyond and being flashy.

Coach yells at him and we gather ourselves for the face off.

The game keeps going, us scoring up to 9 by the end of the second period. But after a talk in the locker room, everything seemed to fall apart.

We couldn't get the puck to stay on our side, and Blake's offense was pressing harder and harder on us.

They scored. And kept scoring. Until there was a chance to secure the win, and Charlie threw it away.

Connie and I watched anxiously on the bench as Charlie skated down the ice, doing fancy tricks all the way. Instead of passing it, he falls down and pushes the puck across the ice, trying to take advantage of Blake's pulled goalie.