Inspired by a vague idea of denial and some watching of ice-hockey which ending in me devoutly hoping that I'd never have to see sit in an arena and watch the game.
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Denial and Other Feelings.
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He says, "Please don't embarrass me and come to my games. I have a rep to protect."
She says, "I wouldn't want to embarrass myself and show up at your games. I have my dignity to maintain."
But in reality, she knows he's asking her, in his own twisted way, come to the game, be my good luck charm. And she in that twisted way of hers is agreeing and saying, I will be at the game, watching you play. It's just the way they work.
It's the way they have always worked.
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He's shitting bricks for sure and sweating buckets of water that isn't even there in his body. It's always like this before a game and as a pre-game ritual he holes himself up in the bathroom and recites the Periodic Table backwards because if anything, it's reciting Radium, Francium, Radon and a whole slew of other elements in backward order that helps calm him. She taught him that trick.
And in any case it's a better alternative that emptying his guts into a toilet bowl and feeling bile coat his throat and tongue.
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When the times comes, he zooms onto the rink, looking like he hasn't spent the last fifteen minutes shitting bricks and sweating buckets and as if he definitely didn't have to recite the Periodic Table backwards in order to stay calm. He looks like he always does, cool and calculated and completely confident that the bitches on the other side are going down.
He can't bring himself to look at the stands though.
At that very spot where's she's supposed to not be sitting and not sipping a can of Root Beer and not nervously chewing on an overly salted pretzel.
Because after all he told her not to come because he has a rep to protect.
And protect it he will by not allowing any of his teammates to even land their sometimes roving eyes on her because she's too Casey and they are too themselves and he knows, he just knows that they wont mix well together.
Call it intuition.
(Or really, just call it, I-know-Casey-like-nobody–else-ever-will. Just don't let him hear you say it.)
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She's sitting in the stands, sipping on her no longer cold Root Beer and is chewing on a pretzel that's beginning to look sorry that it ever existed and she's definitely not looking at him skating on the rink at breakneck speed, dodging burly pumped-up on steroid types and playing some sort of cat and mouse game with the puck and the opposition except he's the cheetah in this game, swift and intelligent and they are ordinary people, a little slow on the uptake.
She's here not to look at him because she's really here to watch an indeterminate friend play (and she doesn't even know his name but it doesn't matter because she doesn't have to tell Derek).
So it's not her heart beating a thunderous tattoo against her ribcage when somebody body slams him and it's not a gasp escaping her mouth when he narrowly dodges a hockey stick which was meant to make contact with him alone and not the puck.
It's not her eyes which widen and it not her pupils which dilate with fear when he joins in a pile-up and has to extricate a member of his team from the clutches of a bunch of aggressive gorillas.
And it's definitely not her who's chewing furiously, desperately on her nails when he skates so fast that she can see the sheared ice fly up, as he zooms in on a goal area and with one quick swing sends the puck home. That girl with the thumping heart is not her.
Because she's not here since she can't embarrass herself by being here and she's only here under duress to watch the indeterminate friend, whose name she doesn't even care about and she sure as hell doesn't want to know.
And finally, she's not the one sighing in relief as he finally makes it off the field, no longer fuelled by a dizzying adrenaline rush.
Remember, she was not even here.
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He says, "Thank goodness you weren't there. We would have definitely lost otherwise and my rep would have been blown to smithereens."
She says, "I'd hang myself upside down before I can even show up at one of your games. I have an image to maintain."
But in reality, he's saying in that twisted way of his, thanks for being there, thanks for actually caring and thanks for being my good luck charm. And she in that twisted way of hers is responding, I'd never miss it for anything and I'll always care.
It's just the way they have always worked.
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