Chapter 34 - Lost

"I woke up this morning and saw a deer near the edge of the woods. It was alone at first, but then a whole herd came out," Marie told Jill. "They were beautiful."

Jill sat there smiling and wishing she had seen it. "I've never really seen a herd before. Usually when I see a deer, it's running away."

The girls were at the Olympic ice arena watching the team practice. There were a few press people around who got lucky that day and got to watch. Out on the ice, Herb was making sure they didn't do any big plays, they were basically goofing off. There were times all five girls would laugh because one of the guys would get bombarded with a few of the guys jumping on top of him. Marie looked out on the ice that moment and saw Bah take Pav by the head and give him a noggie after taking his helmet off. "I swear they're getting more immature as time goes on."

"But you gotta love them," Connie said.

Marie smiled. She was watching Silk when Rammer caught her eye. The image of Jill and him came back to her from the night before and she wanted to know if something was going on. "You had fun last night, right?"

"Yeah, it's always a blast with everybody. I love spending time with everybody," Jill said while taking a sip from her water bottle.

Marie nodded while tucking a small piece of her hair behind her ear. "So… what's going on with Rammer and you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, last night you guys seemed a little chummy when you were talking."

Jill looked over at Marie and smiled. "Mike is a nice guy. We're the same age, we like the same stuff."

"Is there something going on?"

"Not really."

"Nothing at all?"

"Tonight we're hanging out… as friends," she told her.

Marie smiled. "That's cool."

"Marie, we're friends. That's all. Mike is cute, but there's really nothing there."

Marie nodded telling her she understood. 'Well, just be careful. I know I'm just your brother's girlfriend, but I am concerned for you."

Jill turned back to Marie and placed a hand on her arm. "I'm grateful for your concern. I won't let anything happen that could end up bad in the end. I've only known Mike a couple of days."

Marie smiled at Jill again. "That's good to know."

After the practice, the girls waited in the lobby of the hotel. Anytime now the bus was going to pull up and from there they could do anything the rest of the day. Marie was people watching, just watching them walk by, when she got an idea what some or all of them could do. "We have a full tank of gas in the car, right?"

Connie looked over at her and nodded. "Why?"

"How about we go on a road trip and look for deer?" Marie suggested.

"You want to go deer hunting?" Regan asked.

"More like searching for deer to look at. It gets us to do something other than window shop and eat food. I'll pay for the gas," Marie said.

"I'm in," Jill replied.

Connie was quiet for a few seconds before saying, "I want to."

"Is it ok if I pass?" Regan asked. "I think Rizzo was planning to spend time with his family. He had asked me to join them and I really want to get to know all of them better than I have so far."

"It's not a problem. Don't worry about it," Marie said when the bus pulled up. "Have fun with Rizzo." When Silk came in, Marie silently asked him to help her up by lifting her hand up. He took it and in a second she was up and in his arms. "I thought of something to do this afternoon."

"What is that?" he asked.

"A road trip to go deer looking," Marie told him. "It's better than doing the same thing we've all done the past couple of days."

"You're going to search for deer?" Jimmy asked behind them.

"Yeah," Marie said when turning around.

"Can I come?" he asked.

"Of course, anybody is welcome. Jill wants to, Connie wants to," Marie said.

Silk nodded. "It's something to do."

And so after they asked whoever wanted to go, they traveled over to the house and got into the car. Marie was the one who drove, Silk sat next to her, while Jill was in the back with Connie, Rob, and Jimmy. In the way back, Mark, Bah, Pav, and Baker sat against the side, two and two. They were talking and having a good time until Marie stopped the car and pointed to the side. There stood a deer. She knew they were there and was standing still. After about a minute, she ran off into the woods.

"She was so beautiful," Jill gushed.

"Sure was," Connie agreed.

Marie started driving again and the first road she came to, she turned right. After what seemed like forever, she stopped and did a u-turn. When she got back to the road they were on before, she turned. But when they came to another intersection, that's when everything went haywire. She couldn't remember if that was the road she turned off of to get to that road. She tried it after arguing with everybody about why they weren't paying attention before. The next intersection, she turned right.

"What are we going to do? Sit on the side of the road all day and watch where the sun sets? How is that going to help?" she had asked a half hour later when they realized they were lost. "Do you think you'll get us out of this situation, John?"

Bah muttered, "Maybe."

"Ok… nobody talks for the rest of the ride," Marie stated. "First town we get to, we'll pull over and ask."

An hour later, they finally made it out of the woods and found themselves in a small town named Ray Brook, which was west of Lake Placid. So after finding out where they were, and got food from their convenience store, they headed off on the main road that lead back to Lake Placid. Marie had told them that they had something to remember and that nobody else did. Everybody chuckled and agreed. When they got into the driveway, they noticed that there were some deer near the woods and Bah made a sarcastic comment about how they could have stayed there the whole time. Marie rolled her eyes and turned off the car.

"It was fun, but let's not do that again," Baker joked when everybody was saying bye.

Marie sighed and waved goodbye before heading inside. When she entered, she saw Rizzo, Regan, Sophie, and Vincent sitting at the table. "Hey."

"Where have you guys been the last four and a half hours?" Regan asked.

"Lost," Marie only said while flopping down on the couch.

"You guys got lost?" Regan chuckled. "How?"

"Nobody paid attention to how many times we turned," Jill told all four. "Eventually we ended up in Ray Brook, west of here."

Silk sat on the arm rest of the couch near Marie's head. He put a hand on top of her head. "There was only one deer that we saw until we parked in the driveway."

"It must have been fun," Vincent said.

Marie smiled but the only person who saw it was Silk. Marie got up and decided to take a nap. Silk and Jill left, but about an hour and a half later when Marie woke up, she felt an arm around her waist and looked over and saw Silk. She looked at the clock and saw that it was almost 4:30. She sat up and went to the bathroom.

"Baby… wake up," she whispered leaning over into his ear.

"Five more minutes," he muttered.

"I'll give you that. I'll come back in five, ok?"

"With a good surprise?" he murmured.

Marie chuckled. "How do you know it's not a good surprise now?"

"You flushed the toilet," he muttered. "No sexy lingerie, sorry."

Marie kissed his cheek before leaving her room. When she got out there she was met with "Violet, you're turning violet, Violet." Marie looked over the TV and smiled. Charlie and the chocolate factory was playing. "Is it on TV?"

"Tape," Connie replied.

Marie looked over at the group for the first time and chuckled. Connie was sitting against Rob, Regan was sitting in the chair, Rizzo was sitting on the floor in front of her, Sophie was lying on the floor, and Vincent was in the other chair. "Is it just one of those days?"

"Must be," Rob muttered.

Marie went into the kitchen and got something to drink. Then when she went back to the living room area, she sat down where she got the puzzle started. She got into it that she didn't go back into the bedroom to wake him up. Fifteen minutes later, he sat down next to her, giving her a smirk. "What?"

"You didn't come in to wake me like you said with a surprise," Silk replied.

Marie chuckled and really lightly smacked his cheek. "I got really into the puzzle."

"Ah," he said before looking over at the TV. "Hey, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."

Marie smiled and kept on working on the puzzle. When the movie ended, the group put in another movie that lasted for about an hour and a half. After that, Marie and Silk went out to eat at a restaurant.

"I talked to Rammer this morning," he told her after they ordered their food.

"Yeah?"

"He said there was nothing going on," he said.

Marie nodded. "I talked to Jill and she said the same thing."

"I just thought it was interesting. It's not like I would have made his nose bleed," he replied. "If they decided to date, I'd be all for it."

"Jill only thinks of him as a friend."

The manager come up then and set a bottle of wine down. "Compliments of the house. I heard one of the US boys was here and I had to come over and tell you good luck."

Silk smiled. "Thank you, but you didn't have to bring over wine."

"No, no. It's on me," he replied before shaking his hand and leaving.

"At least he didn't say beat the pants off of the Russians," Marie said after taking a sip.

"We've won two and tied a game. People are more anxious for round two," Silk quietly said. "I think they just want is to beat them more than to win the gold."

"The country sure does need some spirit. The last couple months have been sad."

Silk leaned in and whispered, "I had a dream last night. I was standing up on that podium and the gold medal was being placed around my neck. It was an awesome feeling."

Marie smiled at him and took his hand. "You never know. It could happen." In her mind, she knocked on wood.

When they got outside the restaurant an hour later, Silk took Marie's hand and they started walking down the sidewalk. They were talking, looking into the windows of the shops. Marie looked up and noticed that Tretiak and Slava Fetisov were coming their way. Tretiak looked over at them and nodded, which Marie smiled back before they passed one another. Marie was pretty sure they didn't know who they were, he was just being courteous.

When Silk stopped in front of a building a few minutes later, Marie looked over at him and asked silently what's going on. He started walking toward the building, while he pulled her with him. He opened the door, and Marie wondered if this was a good idea. She had no clue where they were. They walked down the hallway, they heard some cheering, but were walking away from it. Silk stopped in front of the breaker switch and pushed the lever up. The lights in the arena came on.

"What are we doing? Isn't this a bad idea? Won't we get into trouble?" Marie asked worried.

Silk turned around and put his hands on her shoulders. "I talked to the rink manager. He knows. I made the plans with him."

"Ok," Marie said skeptically.

Silk gave her a reassuring smile before entwining his fingers with hers. He took her to the bench and waiting there, there was skates, a hockey stick, and a puck. "I was thinking without anybody around, we could do whatever we wanted. Cause that skating pond is always busy."

"When did you do this?"

"When we got back from that road trip and I took Jill to the house."

Marie smiled and leaned over. The kiss was short because she really wanted to go out there. She never had the opportunity before to skate on Olympic ice and she wasn't going to waste the time now. She was still skeptical, but wanted to go out. After putting the skates on, she went out and started to do a figure skating routine. She did a triple lutz which got her a clap from Silk.

"Right before I did that, I was scared that I was going to fall because I don't have a toe pick to assist me. I can't believe I did it," Marie told him. "I can't believe I remember how to do it."

Silk laughed at her excitement, went over and hugged her. "Care to try to shoot at the net?"

"Ok," she replied. She took the stick, and they went over near the net. She was only a few feet away. She whiffed on the first shot, which made her laugh. She doesn't do this often. On the next shot, she hit the puck, but it only went a few feet.

"Have you ever played golf?"

"No," she said. "Just because I work at a bar, doesn't mean I can do everything."

"I know you aren't Wonder Woman. If you were, you'd have that outfit and a invisible plane."

"Wouldn't you think she'd be invisible with it?" Marie asked him.

"She is invisible with it. For the audience, we're supposed to know she's there in the plane," he replied.

Marie smiled back at him before skating over to the puck. She got ready to slap it in, but kind of hit Silk with the stick in the stomach. "You ok?" she asked startled. She went over to him and bent down to where he was. He nodded and straightened back up.

"It doesn't hurt. It stung," he replied. "I'm ok."

Marie put a hand on his stomach and lightly patted it. "If you say so." She leaned in and gave him a kiss. This time when she went to hit it, he was nowhere near her. She went over to the net, and fished it out. They took turns hitting the puck in the net, but after a while, they just started to skate around the ice.

"I wanted to play hockey," Marie told him after he asked if her dad taught her how. "But of course there were no girl leagues yet. So I took figure skating instead." Marie started to skate backwards.

"Don't fall," he said to her.

"I'm not going to fall," she replied back.

"Famous last words," he said.

Marie reached out and hit him lightly in the shoulder. After a few more minutes, she went over to the center ice and sat down, not caring if her butt gets wet. "I love you. You know that, right?"

"I think you've told me before," he said before crouching down beside her. "I love you, too."

"This was fun. I now know what it feels like to skate on Olympic ice," Marie whispered.

"Why are you whispering?" he whispered back.

"To make sure this isn't a dream," she said after a few seconds. She smiled over at him. She got back up and encircled her arms around him. "Thank you." She kissed him before they broke apart and went back to the bench. From there, the rest of the night they walked around town again before calling it a night.