I'd never actually had to think about it, but as the rental skates were handed down to me by an irritable looking old man, I realized that wearing what essentially was knives on my feet and expecting to be able to navigate myself on ice with them was one of the worst ideas I'd ever had. And that was excluding the whole thing where I was pretending to have more testosterone than estrogen in my genetic makeup.
"I see the other guys," Pace said as we entered the ice rink.
My violent shiver didn't go unnoticed to them. As they stared at me I said, "What? I was born in the tropics. The only place I like ice in is my drink."
Pace put his hand on my shoulder. "And you just moved to Canada? How are you going to survive?"
Dean's eyebrows went up. He looked me up and down and shook his head before heading away.
"What the fuck is his problem?" I asked, not really expecting an answer. His friend dropped his hand from my shoulder and arranged the strap of his duffel bag on his. He was a lot friendlier and I already liked him better.
"Not gonna lie, he's an acquired taste."
I juggled the skates in my hands as I followed him to the bleachers, where the blond boy was sitting as he put on his gear. He gave a curt nod to a couple of kids our age who skated to a halt in front of him. One of them had glowing dark skin. The second one was a walking freckle.
"Welcome back, you jerk," the second one said as he rested his stick against the sideboard. "How was the whole thing?"
The first guy gave a good natured grin. "You shouldn't be so rude, Hunter. You're in the presence of a celebrity."
"A what?" I asked, which immediately made them all look at me.
Freckles, or Hunter, as the other guy called him, jerked a gloved hand in my direction. "Who's this? One of your buddies from World Junior, or what?"
"I just met him," Dean said as he laced up his skates. He didn't wear any padding, unlike the guys on the ice, when he grabbed his stick and swung his legs over the sideboard in a smooth motion. He hit the ice like he was born on it, and though I'd only known him for less than an hour, I had the feeling that he was much more comfortable in the ice rink than on land.
"Do you play?" the darker skinned boy asked me.
I looked around me. Pace was already joining his friend on the ice. Then there were these two other boys whom clearly were hockey players. I realized that the arena was actually quite full with people, a few watching from the bleachers as others skated. Little kids, adults and teenagers. It was the most action packed place I'd seen in town so far.
"So," I casually asked the two new boys. "Is there anything to do in this town other than this?" I asked as I motioned all around.
Freckles grinned up at me. "It's either this or try to get a date out of Lena Lee."
"Who?"
He narrowed his eyes at me. "Clearly you're not from around these parts."
I sighed. He had no idea.
"I guess I better get with the program, huh?"
I plopped myself on the bleachers and took off my boots. The skates felt tight, but the boys told me that that was much more preferable to having loose skates. That could risk either a twisted ankle or a flying skate, which sounded terrifying. I laced them up good and stood up.
Big mistake. My legs faltered and my panic had me flying to meet the floor intimately.
"Whoa," one of the boys said as I managed to catch myself by the sideboard. "You okay?"
I looked up at them with wide eyes. And just perfect, but Dean and Pace decided to stop by at that moment.
"Don't tell me, is this your first time?" Pace asked, and I could tell that he was holding back the desire to burst out into his weird brand of laughter. "Do you need help?"
Dean's cheek twitched. Like the bastard also wanted to laugh. It made my teeth grind. So I pulled myself up with as much dignity as I could muster with only two knives for balance, and I lifted my chin. Somehow I felt like I had already won, even though the real challenge hadn't begun. The problem with me was that I couldn't let sleeping tigers lie. Ever. And so I pretended I was an expert at the whole shtick and swung my legs over the barrier like I'd seen Dean and Pace do. I let out the most girly yelp imaginable as the ground swung under my feet and came directly to meet my ass.
I sprawled on the ice, blinking back tears of humiliation at the overhead lights.
Four heads obscured my vision as the boys peered down at me. But it wasn't concern etched on their faces. Oh, no. It was a hell of a lot of amusement.
Finally they lost it and started cackling like hyenas.
I rolled over on my side with a groan as I realized the fall had taken the wind out of me, but clearly I was the only one glad to be okay. I sat up and flexed everything just to be sure and counted my lucky stars that I somehow managed to spare my head from a blow.
Somebody crouched by me and the next thing I knew I was hauled up on my feet. I panicked as they glided over the smooth ice, but the arm around me kept me firm in place. I looked up to thank my savior when I realized it was the arrogant bastard. And his smirk robbed me of my breath as much as the fall did.
"So you said you play contact sports, huh?" Blue eyes twinkled like in his baby pictures as he looked down at me, both in the literal and the figurative sense. "You mean, contact with the floor?"
I was positive that the force of my glare would be enough to make him drop the smirk, but instead it strengthened it. I decided to show him just how good I was at contact sports. After all, this was how boys communicated among each other, right? So I pulled back my arm and delivered a solid hook to his solar plexus. Even though I was on ice and he was much bigger and solid, it had the desired effect. He didn't see it coming and the blow sent him stumbling back. I flailed as I lost my balance again but clung onto the sideboard while I had the pleasure of seeing him struggle for air.
One of the boys whistled. Turned out to be Pace. "Alright, we could use with a punch like that in the Bears."
I looked at him, seeking an explanation but he'd turned his attention to the two other boys.
"He's small, but if he can hurt Dean he can hurt our opponents."
"Right," freckles said. "And now that Aaron went off to college we're in desperate need of more enforcers."
"But what are we going to do about his skating skills?" the tanned boy said as he pointed at my flailing feet.
"Wait," Dean said as he rubbed his stomach. "You're not serious. This guy doesn't have what it takes to be a Bear. He's a little too-" At that he paused to give me another once over, this time openly hostile. "Girly."
My spine stiffened like a rod and my lips peeled back into a snarl. "Guess what, asshole. Girly little me just sucker punched you in the gut and made you double over."
His eyes narrowed. The cold air crackled with the same tension I felt before facing a contender on the boxing ring at my old gym. For years I'd been training myself to never again be vulnerable. To be strong. To come on top.
I lifted my chin. Dad was not going to defeat me. Canada was not going to beat me down. And this prick was not going to best me.
"Let's do this," I declared.
He looked at me from under his nose for a few more seconds before shrugging. "Suit yourself."
I watched him turn away and skate over to the center of the rink. The other skaters parted ways for him amid cheers. He turned back to glance my way only once more before picking up a black little disc with the end of his stick and tossing it in the air. He caught it back with the stick and that was when I knew he was showing off to me, because he proceeded to skate as he played with the disc in the air as though this were some sort of ice skating competition, and not a random ice rink in a podunk town in the middle of freaking nowhere.
It was like he was telling me precisely how much lesser he found me.
I snapped my jaws shut tight once I realized they'd been gaping open. It was official. I hated his guts.
"Show off," freckles said. "Man, I wish I'd have gone to World Junior, too. Maybe Lena Lee would like me then."
"Never mind that," Pace said as he rubbed his chin and looked at me. "We have a lot do before tryouts."
"Tryouts?" I asked.
He nodded. "I assume you're starting at St. Andrews tomorrow, right? Tryouts are on Friday."
I felt like ever since I arrived in this country I'd been treading on fine ice, pardon my pun, and that it was about to crack under my weight at any second. But fuck it, I decided, since everything was a mess already I might as well go with the flow instead of fighting it back.
And so I went against my dad's advice of not doing anything reckless as I asked, "Where do we begin?"
Charlie's The Man! and in this genderbender she'll prove to you just how much. wait and see 😉
hope you guys are liking the story so far! i don't know if you can tell, but i had so much fun writing this one, lol.