Lose Yourself - Eminem
3 months later...
I have no idea what Greyson is like right now, but boy was I a nervous wreck.
I paced back and forth in front of the glass as we waited for the officials to make a decision.
This was the final playoffs game for the Mavericks, they lost this game, they lost the Cup Finals this year.
They win this game, they win the 2022 Cup Finals.
The score was tied 1-1 and we were 3.7 seconds away from going into overtime.
"Sit down!" A guy yells from a couple rows back.
"Fuck off!" I yell back, flipping him off as Asher reaches his arms out for me from Anne's lap.
"You fuck off and sit down!"
"Do you know who I am?!" I yell back, starting to march my ass up there before Ellie grabs my arm, yanking me back.
"He's probably drunk, knock it off." She says, chuckling. But, the grip she still had on my arm let her know she was just as anxious as I was. The tension was thick and through the roof. We were playing North Carolina.
I grab ahold of Asher, resting him on my hip as he points to the ice. "You see Dada?" I ask before he claps. Let me tell you, having a 10 month old is worse than me on my period. One minute he's laughing, the next he's screaming because the old lady at the grocery store that waved at him.
He reaches his other arm out behind him towards the diaper bag that currently took my place in my seat. "Mom, will you grab the puffs out of the bag?" I ask as she nods before reaching over.
"Banana or vanilla?"
"Uhh, we'll try banana first." I say as she nods, digging around in the bag and pulling out the round blue container of Gerber Baby Puffs and hands it to me. I open the lid pulling out a couple as I set them in my hand and Asher reaches down and grabs one. I pull his pacifier out of his mouth as he shoves the star shaped puff in his mouth before reaching for another one.
The whistle blows, catching my attention as I return my gaze back to the ice were the Ref skates to the middle before his voice starts to echo through the speakers and I hold my breath.
"We're going to go ahead and go into sudden death, 20 minutes." He says as I sit back in my seat. "5-on-3." He says making the whole crowd start yelling.
"Oh come on!" Ellie yells, standing up before letting out a string of profound words and I cover Asher's ears over his beanie.
I scoff, that's ridiculous. 5-on-3 in the regular season was shitty enough as it was but to do it in the goddamn Finals, not even the Playoffs?! That was a whole other level of dick moves.
I understand there was just a huge fight, but come on. A 5-on-3 IN THE SUDDEN DEATH?! How was that even fair? Both teams equally participated in the line brawl. So, why are we the only ones getting punished.
Greyson, Chris, and Jake hopped onto the ice as Evan set his water bottle down on top of the net.
"Okay so, Hatfield is in the sin bin for only 1 more minute and then he's back out on the ice which gives our guys a starting advantage. After that, I suggest we start praying, real hard." I say bouncing Asher on my leg in anticipation before standing up and pacing again.
I watch carefully as Greyson skates over towards me, something he started doing when he was nervous about something in the game. He took his helmet off for a second, leaning his forehead against the window. Asher reaches his hand out waving at Greyson as he smiles.
I feel tears start to from in my eyes as I smile at the two of them. He looks at me as I mouth, "You got this", like I always did when he did this. He slowly nodded, slipping his helmet back on and fastening it before turning around and skating away as Asher started to cry.
"Oh my God, I'm gonna cry." I say, turning around.
"I see you're real quiet up there now!" I yell at the guy from earlier. He flips me off as I grin, taking a seat.
"You're asking for it." Katherine says, shaking her head.
"I'm Greyson Rhode's wife. Starting Centre and a star player for the Miami Mavericks, that man's favorite team. What's he gonna do?" I quip as she shoves another piece of pretzel in her mouth.
"Bubba, he's right there." I point to Greyson as Asher follows my finger before settling down and I wipe his cheeks off. He may not actually know that that's his dad, but it's alright.
Sweat dripped down my back, face, legs, and hair as I got into position across from one of the Tsunamis centres, Anthony Shields. While their starting centre, Matthew Hatfield, sat in the penalty box for another minute and a half. Which gave us a starting advantage for this bullshit punishment for a line brawl we didn't even start, for once. The Ref skated over to us, with the puck in his hand, he gave us both a look before tossing the puck. With a flick to my wrist I quickly snatched the puck before skating off towards the net.
I look to my left as Chris nods, before passing the puck over to Jake on my right, throwing their defensemen off. Jake shoots the puck and it hits the top right corner of the bar of the goal, bouncing off in front of me. I take it, skating a circle around the net before Thompson, their right defensemen shoves me into the wall and we battle for the puck. Our sticks keep getting caught in each other's as we try to push each other out of the way before he gets the puck and passes it to Shields and they all take off in their direction. Chris, Jake, and I following closely behind them. Chris catches up sooner than myself considering he had a head start, and his stick accidentally hits Thompson's and the Ref blows the whistle.
"Hooking! 2 minutes." The Ref announces as we all skate over to him.
"That was clearly an accident!" Chris yells.
"That wasn't even a goddamn hook! What the fuck is your problem?!"I yell. I was beyond infuriated at this point.
"Hey! You all want a penalty?" Jake and I stand down as Chris cusses his way to the sin bin.
Shields and I get into position for a face off, "Now, knock this shit off, and grow the fuck up." The ref says before dropping the puck and I take off with it. I only have it for a minute before Shields is hopping off the ice and Hatfield is back on... Coming straight for me.
I swerve around the goal before passing it to Jake. I slam Hatfield into the wall beside us when he tries to hook me. "Fucker, you're gonna pay for that." He spats out, rolling his shoulder back before her turns around. I try to figured out what he's doing as he starts to skate towards our goal... With no puck to shoot in the net.
And that's when I realize... I pull out my mouth guard, "That motherfucker!" I yell, before Jake and I start to skate towards him.
Right before we get to him, he slams Evan right into the side of the goal, making me wince.
"Are you fucking kidding me?! I swear to fucking God, if Hatfield doesn't get suspended from this game, right now!" I hit the glass, continuing to yell at the Ref. "You pull him the fuck out right now!"
Evan slowly stands up, pulling off his helmet before dropping his mitts and going straight for Hatfield but he gets held back by the officials.
You have got to be fucking with me right.
After a couple of minutes the Ref starts talking, "Matthew Hatfield is suspended for the rest of the game. Evan Henderson, penalty shot."
"WHAT?!"
They don't just give out penalty shots, especially in the Playoffs or the Finals. In fact, there have been 11 penalty shots given out total in the Cup Finals. Out of those 11 shots, only 1 of them has been made . Evan, was a goalie, he didn't take penalty shots, he caught them.
His eyes widened as he frantically looked around until his eyes met mine. I slowly nodded at him as he reluctantly pulled his gaze away when Coach Jacobs appeared beside him. They chatted for a few minutes before Greyson handed him his stick and him and Jake patted him on the back before skating away.
My legs bounced up and down as Evelyn reaches over, placing her hand on my knee. I leaned forward, resting my elbows on my thighs and my chin on top of my hands. They placed the puck in front of him as he took like 5 deep breaths before he started skating and I swear everything turned to slow motion. He glided the puck back and forth as he picked up speed, until he came into the attack zone, with a flick of his wrist he closed his eyes as the puck when flying through the air.
I squeezed my eyes shut right before it got close to the goal, waiting, as milliseconds felt like hours before I heard the sound of the crowd behind me going wild and all I could do was let a tear I didn't know was in my eye, fall.
I stood up to my feet, yelling as the sound of the buzzer went off.
They won.
They were the 2022 Cup Finals Champions. And I couldn't be prouder.
Greyson, Chris, and Jake all skated into the ice first, followed by the rest of the team as they all jumped on Evan. All of them falling down in the process but the whole team continued to just pile on.
It doesn't take long for them to bring The Holy Grail itself out onto the ice and the Cup Finals winning traditions begin with each player skating around the rink holding it. We all watch as the guys all do their things, letting Evan go last. Then they all gather around it and Greyson, being the captain, hoists it up in the air. A tradition that goes back to the 1930s, I believe.
We wait for pictures and everything before making our way down to the ice.
Stepping into the ice, I wait for Greyson to finish talking to someone before his eyes find mine and the biggest heart warming but panty wetting grin forms on his face and he excuses himself from the conversations and skates towards Asher and I. Before I can even process anything, one second I'm standing on the ice and the next I'm being lifted off the ground and spun around as I let out a aquel before laughing.
"Greyson!" I say as he stops spinning, looking up at me. I barely dip my head down, his lips meeting mine. The kiss is sweet, rough, and needy all at the same time as I wrap my hands around his neck. I pull away, looking down at him. "I'm so proud of you." I say before he sets to set me down.
"I love you!" He yells over the music.
"I love you too!"
Anne comes carefully walking over with Asher in her arms crying, he reaches his arms out towards me as I scoop him up and she quickly makes her way off of the ice. "Aw Bubby, it's okay." I rub his back as he cries on my shoulder for a second before starting to calm down. "I know, it's past your bed time. And Daddy left you all day, didn't he?" I say looking up at Greyson whose just smiling down at me. He reaches his hands out taking Asher out of my arms.
"I'm right here Bub." He says, wiping the tears off of his face and fixing his Carhartt beanie.
It only takes a second before Asher is smiling and clapping like he wasn't just sobbing a couple of seconds ago. The kid was all over the place, and extremely clingy. We couldn't even walk out of a room for a minute to grab something without him crying for one of us. To say Greyson was happy to be going to five hour practices when it was that time of the month for me this month, was a bit of an understatement.
"I missed you." He says, kissing Asher on the cheek and Asher grabs Greyson's face in his hands and Greyson kisses him again, making him laugh.
Chris and Sailor come over as Chris reaches his hands out for Asher. "It won't last long." Greyson says, passing Asher over as Chris talks to him. It takes a little longer than the last time Chris held him before he starts crying again and Greyson takes him back.
"Good job Chris." I say as he skates forward a little and I wrap my arms around him, smiles on both of our faces. "I'm proud of you." I say as we pull away and he pats me on the head.
"Thanks sis."
✳︎
"He's still asleep." Anne says as we stand outside the door her hotel room.
"Good." Greyson slightly slurs as I giggle a little.
"Go get some sleep guys. And drink some water." She says closing the door of her room.
"I told you he was fine." I say, hitting Greysons chest as we make our way down the hallway to the elevator.
"I know. But, I missed him." He says, hitting the up button for the elevator as we hear it start to move.
A minute or so passes before it dings and the double doors slide open and we step in. I hit the button for the 12th floor before the doors close and it starts to go up.
I feel Greyson mouth on my neck and I shut my eyes. "Babe, there are cameras." I say as I feel his hot breath blow on my skin when he chuckles.
"I'm only kissing you. Am I not allowed to kiss my incredible sexy wife?"
"We both know it's not that innocent." I whisper when the elevator dings and the doors open.
"Guess you'll just have to wait and see." He says grabbing my hand and yanking me out of the elevator towards our suite.
"I love drunk sex!" I all but yell before Greyson's hand comes up to cover my mouth as he laughs, throwing his head back. "Do you have your jersey?" I ask raising a brow as he looks down at me, his eyes turning a shade darker as he grabs the keycard from his pants pocket.
"Maybe." He says, opening the door as I walk in first.
"Where is it?"
"In my bag still, why?" He asks, resting his hands on my hips through the short, tight dress I was currently wearing.
"I'm about to make a lot of your fantasies come true."
Word Count: 2,620