The ringing of the phone woke them both. Glancing at the clock before reaching for the phone, Portman noticed that it was almost ten. He cleared him throat and answered it with "hello."
"Are we practicing today or what?" Charlie asked.
"Just because you're up, doesn't mean I was," was Portman's reply.
"We're all meeting on the ice at eleven, think you can drag yourself out of bed and make it?"
"Eleven, on the ice. I'll be there."
"Good, now the only people I have left to call are Julie, Luis, Russ, Dwayne, and Ken."
"I'll call Julie and let her know."
"Alright. I didn't have to call Connie either, Guy wanted to do it."
"If I'm gonna meet you there at eleven, I'm gonna have to let you go, Conway."
They exchanged their goodbyes and then hung up. Turning around, he saw that Julie was awake, but still lying there. "Hockey at eleven?"
"Yep, we're supposed to be on the ice at eleven?" Portman answered.
"Breakfast?"
"If we hurry, it's almost ten."
"I'm going to go shower and get dressed," Julie said as she sat up. After a quick kiss, she put on her jeans, picked up the rest of her clothes, then left to go back to her room.
After a quick breakfast, they met almost everyone on the ice with a few minutes to spare. As Julie skated over to talk to Connie, Luis and Russ skated over to Portman. "So about ten," Russ started, "we just happened to be leaving our room."
"And we just happened to see a certain goalie coming out of yours," Luis continued.
"Now the funny thing here is, she was wearing a Ducks' jersey, but I thought that you were #21," Russ finished.
"We fell asleep watching a movie, it it's any of your business," Dean replied. "Now see, if the two of you had girlfriends of your own, you wouldn't have to worry about mine."
Before either could respond, Banks entered the ice. "Pick some teams Charlie," he said as he set his stuff down.
"Alright, Julie, Fulton, Guy, Mendoza, Wu, and Averman against Connie, Goldberg, Banks, Portman, Robertson and Tyler."
"And you?" Banks asked.
"I'll ref!"
The Ducks split off, each going to opposite goals. Julie took her place between the pipes and the others took shots to warm up. On the other side of the ice, the others were doing the same to Goldberg. "Face-off!" Charlie yelled from center ice.
Portman and Germaine went up for the face-off. Charlie dropped the puck and Portman skated away with it. He passed the puck to Robertson, who took it down a ways before passing to Connie, who shot it at the goal. Julie stopped the puck and passed it to Germaine, who, at center ice, passed to Reed. Fulton stopped and set up his specialty shot. Everyone dove out of the way. Goldberg left the net and dove behind it for cover. The puck flew in and Charlie yelled, "Goldberg, what happened to not fearing the puck?"
"Hey, Julie's number one, and you try standing here when he knocks that thing at your head."