Title: Dayton, Ohio 1970

Author: Elizabeth Bennet-Darcy

Disclaimer: They are not mine for keeps. I'll just borrow them, play very carefully and put them back unharmed (relatively).

Summary: The senior staff, plus two, on the day before their tenth birthdays. Mainly focuses on their relationships with their fathers.

Spoilers: Various episodes, but nothing too telling.

Rating: PG13 for the series; PG for this story.

DAYTON, OHIO 1970

"C.J.! Look out!"

C.J. came out of a nearly perfect sit spin only to be slammed into by her older brother in full hockey gear. "Andrew," she screeched, "this is my end of the ice! Daddy said I could practice on this end and you have to stay off! Daddy said it!"

"Sorrr-eee," Andrew sneered back, "it's not like we can control which way the puck'll go."

"Isn't that the whole point of hockey- to control the puck?"

"No, brainless, the point is to make a goal."

"And how are you gonna do that when the goal is on the OTHER END OF THE ICE?!"

"Listen, aren't you done with the whole, fairy-princess, sugar-snow-plum thing anyway?" her oldest brother Chris asked. "'Cause we could really use you on defense."

"Really?" C.J. asked flattered, they never let her play hockey with them.

"Yeah," Andrew said brightly, "You're so long and skinny we could use you as a stick."

"Actually, I was thinking she could do that flailing around thing she was just doing and distract the other team," her brothers and their friends skated away laughing.

She skated to the end of the pond and pulled her skates off, "Just wait Chris and Andrew and Kenny, I'm telling Dad!"

"C.J.," Kenny said placating.

"It's Claudia Jean," she said stomping down the path.

By the time she got to the house she was steaming mad. How dare they make fun of her? How dare they try to wreck her Olympic dreams? A stick!? Flailing around!? Oh, she'd sure show them.

"Daddy, the boys are on my ice and I can't practice and Andrew called me a stick and they won't let me play!" she whined to her father.

"C.J." her father looked up from the papers he was grading, "no one likes a tattle-tale. Besides your brothers don't want you to play because the first time things don't go your way you cry and whine and tell. I wouldn't want to play with you either."

C.J.'s eyes filled with tears, "Daddy..."

"Claudia, I'm in the middle of something... I have to get these tests graded, go do something somewhere else."

"Forget it then! Forget everything! Forget I'm even your daughter!" C.J. said in a burst of tears as she fled the room.

Twenty minutes later her mother knocked on her bedroom door. "Can I come in? I have hot chocolate."

"Yeah," C.J. said wiping her eyes. Janet Cregg sat at the end of her bed as C.J. sipped her chocolate.

"All your father meant, sweetheart, is that if you want to play with the boys you're going to have to play like the boys. You're going to have to be tough, and because you're a woman, you'll have to be tougher. You'll have to be smart and because you're a woman you'll have to be smarter. You'll have to be good, and because you're a woman you'll have to be better. You can do anything you want, but you'll have to work harder."

"Why can't Daddy just say it like that?" C.J. asked tearfully.

"Because sometimes people can't find the right words. Some people don't understand that the right words make all the difference, sometimes."

"Thanks Mom," C.J. said smiling.

"You're welcome, Claudia Jean."

"It's C.J."

When her mother left the room C.J. took off her pink skating outfit. Tomorrow she would wear Kenny's old hockey gear to the pond. Tomorrow C.J. would play with the big boys, because tomorrow C.J. would turn ten.