"Games Should Be Fun"
Again, Maurae was awoken by Britney. Only this time it was a song that rang true. While "Stronger" played in the background, she, Connie, and Julie gathered up their workout clothes with cheerful, but weary, smiles, slightly more rested than they had been in a week. Still exhausted but less so.
Meeting at the UCLA training arenas for a workout had been a somewhat mutual decision. But that didn't mean that they were happy with said decision. Forming up in two ranks, they started an easy workout, mainly to stretch them out and strengthen their muscles.
"Coach isn't here, why do we have to be?" Connie finally asked as they were all bent over, stretching their legs.
"We have a game tonight; we have to work out," Dean replied.
"I say mutiny; who's with me?" Goldberg asked, standing up. Dwayne straightened next to Maurae, who was letting her elbows rest on the ground wearily.
"Goldberg, I'm too tired to mutiny," he said quietly.
"Come on, guys. It's not like we can't use the conditioning," Julie said reasonably, trying to diffuse the argument before it started. No such luck, unfortunately.
"Speak for yourself, babe," Dean said. And that's when the dam broke. Their frustrated emotions from the past week, bottled up on the shelf behind their exhaustion, had finally broken loose and found an outlet: each other. Adam stepped forward, losing his temper spectacularly.
"Her name is Julie, not babe," he said coldly.
"DON'T tell me how to talk, rich boy!" Dean shot back, giving Adam a shove.
"Hey, Portman, chill!" Fulton shouted, darting forward to restrain his Bash Brother and defend his friend. And the situation erupted. Maurae grabbed arms, trying to pull her teammates apart, to no avail. About to use the whistle again, she was stopped by the obnoxious voice of Jesse's taunter.
"Hey, Team USA! What're you gonna do today? A million jumpin' jacks?" They all turned.
Dean recovered his voice first. "This kid's crazier'n' me. Forget about him!" He turned back to Fulton, but Jesse shoved through the mob.
"Man, I'm gettin' sick of you!"
"And I'm gettin' sick of seein' the USA represented by a bunch of whining babies!"
"Well too bad you can't back up that mouth!" Jesse shot back, incensed.
"Man, me and my boys will take you any time, any where."
"Ha! I don't see no 'boys!'"
"I got 'em waitin'. Now grab your gear, and let's go play some schoolyard puck. Unless you forgot what it's like to play for REAL pride!" Just then a guard grabbed him and started towing him backwards. "Man, whatch'ou doin'? Get off me! You comin' or not?" he yelled back to them. After a brief conference, they shrugged and went. They had nothing else to do...
* * * *
Team USA faced off against a bunch of street kids. One of them finally spoke. "My little brother Russ here's been tellin' me that you guys have been chokin'. Big time." Maurae bristled, her temper still raw.
Jesse beat her to it. "Yeah? Well your brother's got a big mouth!" he exclaimed, almost instantly realizing that he may have gone too far. Both sides tensed for a melee. Then the speaker smiled and glanced at his brother sideways.
"He does, doesn't he?" With a sigh of relief, the tension drained. "Well, we thought we'd call y'all out, see what you can do."
"Yeah," spoke up Russ. "Cause we know you can talk to the press and sign autographs and stuff."
"We can do more'n that," Luis said.
"Well, we can teach y'all to play like the real Team USA."
"Man, what would you know about it?" Dean asked angrily. Smiling smugly, the black boy only motioned for the game to begin.
Facing off with the street team, most of whom were more her size, Maurae felt instantly better. This game was cleaner, healthier: less politics and more fun. A game. A simple game that was only for fun; no prizes, no strings attached, just fun, pure 'n simple. It was just what they needed to get back into the game, to remember why they'd left their home leagues to come and play as a part of the country's representative team.
Maurae also had to admire their skill. Less refined than a league team, maybe, but it was astounding. Team USA was getting royally trounced by a bunch of street kids. Another face-off was starting when she skated over and nudged Charlie out. She bent and crossed sticks with Russ' older brother.
"James Tyler," he said with an appreciative smile.
"Just call me Ro," she replied, slipping the puck to Ken, waiting for it. She danced around James Tyler and accepted the pass from Ken, skating past several street boys to score in the trashcan being used as a goal.
After several more hard-earned goals, Team USA was beginning to get their old confidence back. Not the cockiness, but the self-confidence, and their appreciation for a hard-won victory. Russ managed to pull off an amazing shot he called a knuckle puck to tie up the game when USA had gotten ahead, but the last goal was Ken's.
Surprisingly, James went after Ken, to teach him a little something about defending himself. 'Stick, gloves, shirt...I'll have to remember that,' Maurae commented to herself with a grin as the two teams gathered in a group huddle in the middle of the court. When they got back on the bus to return to the dorms to get ready for the game, Maurae couldn't help but feel that she'd just played the hardest game of her life- the game where the only thing she'd won was her own pride.
"That's what it was," she said as they rode back.
"What?"
"What we were missing. Don't you see? We were playing to win the gold, to make others think better of us. That's not the point of hockey or of any other sport, for that matter. The point is to play for yourself. To make yourself better, so that you can really start to have pride in your game." She sat back in her seat, tired but satisfied, and far less exhausted than she had been in a week. And much happier.
* * * *
At the game that night, they were ready. Ready to play as they had played in Minnesota, and on the court that day- as a team, as one.
And then Bombay never showed. When the ref informed them that they had to either have a coach behind the bench or they'd forfeit (meaning elimination), Charlie pulled some sweet moves and convinced Miss McKay to act as their coach for the game.
'She has no idea what she's doing,' Maurae thought, amused, as she waited for the call. It was an advantage for them, then, to be such a close-knit team. When McKay finally shouted the change-up, they moved smoothly, a well-oiled machine. Maurae sped out onto the ice with a smile on her face.
At center-ice, Fulton, Averman, Jesse, Dwayne, and Maurae debated who would take the face-off, when Bombay walked in, blowing the Duck call. The team turned to stare at him.
"Look who FINALLY decided to show up," Fulton remarked sarcastically.
"No way, man, just ignore him. Come on, Averman. You take the face-off," Jesse said. The redhead nodded and the huddle broke apart. But then the call went up again, and this time in the team's box. They came back together.
"What have we got to lose?" Maurae asked quietly.
"Respect!" Fulton exclaimed. "He'll dump us the minute it's all over." Nonetheless, he was calling them in, and they couldn't ignore that. So, reluctantly, the six iced players skated over.
"Team..." He stepped down to their level. "Guys. I'm sorry. I was wrong. I forgot about the team...and the team...is all I have. Give me one more shot. I'm back. Okay?"
'We trust too easily,' Maurae thought absently as they all nodded, forgiving him already.
The game went smoother after that; they won again, still alive, still in the tournament.
The game was fun again.
It was Sunday afternoon, and she sat on the bench between Charlie and Adam, with Jesse between her feet. Bombay, Miss McKay, and Jan, Coach's friend, stood in front of them.
"I've had a lot of distractions since I've been here in LA," Bombay said. Jan handed him a cardboard him. "This is a distraction."
A rounding chorus of, "He looks familiar!" and "I know that guy!" combined with laughter at that statement. Bombay handed the cardboard cutout back and struck a match, dropping it into a nearby trash barrel. "This is a fire-in-a-barrel." He reclaimed the cutout and folded it in half, stuffing it into the trashcan. "This is a distraction, in a fire-in-a-barrel. Any questions?" Only applause.
Practice became practice again, and not training for the IronMan competition combined with Navy Seals training combined with imaginative torture. They improved, getting along and reliving the game.
* * * *
Maurae was returning from the library with her bookbag slung over one shoulder, humming along with her CD; her life was great again, and now she could stop lying to her parents in the letters she was sending them. If she'd told them what had happened in the previous week, they'd have pulled her from the team, and she knew she wouldn't have been able to handle that. Not when she was finally back into the swing of things; she'd known these people all her life, or so it seemed, and she wasn't going to jeopardize that. Not for anything. She had two best friends in Adam and Jesse, and great girl friends for the first time in Connie and Julie. She was happy with them.
She didn't see him as she came around the corner and only noticed him when she ran smack into him. Looking up, she sighed. She should have known that she couldn't avoid him forever.
"Maurae."
"Gunnar."
"Where are you going?" he asked after she'd pulled the headphones from her ears.
"To my room. So excuse me," she said, knowing it wouldn't be that easy. Sure enough, after checking for her 'shadows,' he smirked down at her. She moved to duck around him, but he blocked the way. So she sighed and stood her ground. "What do you want?"
"I'm not quite sure yet. You humiliated me, and threatened me, in front of the entire tournament, my team and your team included."
"I lost my temper," she shrugged, not apologizing. "Now, I really have to go." He blocked her again.
"What, no friendly chat?"
"You aren't my friend," she said bluntly. "You aren't even close."
"I'm close to you now."
"That isn't the point," she said firmly. "I don't like you."
"That's all right. I like you. That's enough for me. You've got spirit; you're bold. I like that."
"Funny, a couple weeks ago, you were telling me I was out of my place. Now you're telling me you like that? That it turns you on? Congratulations. Now excuse me." She ducked under his arm and walked off. He grinned and followed her, falling into step behind her. She'd turned up her music and pulled out her keys, humming again.
Unlocking the door, she kicked it shut behind her, not even checking to see it as she deposited her stuff. Then she turned and nearly swallowed her tongue.
"So this is what a girl's room looks like. Not as much clutter as I would have expected." She shoved him backwards.
"No decency? No respect? Dwayne would have your hide for that," she said, pushing him out the door. "You aren't invited. Leave me alone, Gunnar Stahl. Go away." Then she closed the door. This game of cat-and- mouse...not so fun.
Again, Maurae was awoken by Britney. Only this time it was a song that rang true. While "Stronger" played in the background, she, Connie, and Julie gathered up their workout clothes with cheerful, but weary, smiles, slightly more rested than they had been in a week. Still exhausted but less so.
Meeting at the UCLA training arenas for a workout had been a somewhat mutual decision. But that didn't mean that they were happy with said decision. Forming up in two ranks, they started an easy workout, mainly to stretch them out and strengthen their muscles.
"Coach isn't here, why do we have to be?" Connie finally asked as they were all bent over, stretching their legs.
"We have a game tonight; we have to work out," Dean replied.
"I say mutiny; who's with me?" Goldberg asked, standing up. Dwayne straightened next to Maurae, who was letting her elbows rest on the ground wearily.
"Goldberg, I'm too tired to mutiny," he said quietly.
"Come on, guys. It's not like we can't use the conditioning," Julie said reasonably, trying to diffuse the argument before it started. No such luck, unfortunately.
"Speak for yourself, babe," Dean said. And that's when the dam broke. Their frustrated emotions from the past week, bottled up on the shelf behind their exhaustion, had finally broken loose and found an outlet: each other. Adam stepped forward, losing his temper spectacularly.
"Her name is Julie, not babe," he said coldly.
"DON'T tell me how to talk, rich boy!" Dean shot back, giving Adam a shove.
"Hey, Portman, chill!" Fulton shouted, darting forward to restrain his Bash Brother and defend his friend. And the situation erupted. Maurae grabbed arms, trying to pull her teammates apart, to no avail. About to use the whistle again, she was stopped by the obnoxious voice of Jesse's taunter.
"Hey, Team USA! What're you gonna do today? A million jumpin' jacks?" They all turned.
Dean recovered his voice first. "This kid's crazier'n' me. Forget about him!" He turned back to Fulton, but Jesse shoved through the mob.
"Man, I'm gettin' sick of you!"
"And I'm gettin' sick of seein' the USA represented by a bunch of whining babies!"
"Well too bad you can't back up that mouth!" Jesse shot back, incensed.
"Man, me and my boys will take you any time, any where."
"Ha! I don't see no 'boys!'"
"I got 'em waitin'. Now grab your gear, and let's go play some schoolyard puck. Unless you forgot what it's like to play for REAL pride!" Just then a guard grabbed him and started towing him backwards. "Man, whatch'ou doin'? Get off me! You comin' or not?" he yelled back to them. After a brief conference, they shrugged and went. They had nothing else to do...
* * * *
Team USA faced off against a bunch of street kids. One of them finally spoke. "My little brother Russ here's been tellin' me that you guys have been chokin'. Big time." Maurae bristled, her temper still raw.
Jesse beat her to it. "Yeah? Well your brother's got a big mouth!" he exclaimed, almost instantly realizing that he may have gone too far. Both sides tensed for a melee. Then the speaker smiled and glanced at his brother sideways.
"He does, doesn't he?" With a sigh of relief, the tension drained. "Well, we thought we'd call y'all out, see what you can do."
"Yeah," spoke up Russ. "Cause we know you can talk to the press and sign autographs and stuff."
"We can do more'n that," Luis said.
"Well, we can teach y'all to play like the real Team USA."
"Man, what would you know about it?" Dean asked angrily. Smiling smugly, the black boy only motioned for the game to begin.
Facing off with the street team, most of whom were more her size, Maurae felt instantly better. This game was cleaner, healthier: less politics and more fun. A game. A simple game that was only for fun; no prizes, no strings attached, just fun, pure 'n simple. It was just what they needed to get back into the game, to remember why they'd left their home leagues to come and play as a part of the country's representative team.
Maurae also had to admire their skill. Less refined than a league team, maybe, but it was astounding. Team USA was getting royally trounced by a bunch of street kids. Another face-off was starting when she skated over and nudged Charlie out. She bent and crossed sticks with Russ' older brother.
"James Tyler," he said with an appreciative smile.
"Just call me Ro," she replied, slipping the puck to Ken, waiting for it. She danced around James Tyler and accepted the pass from Ken, skating past several street boys to score in the trashcan being used as a goal.
After several more hard-earned goals, Team USA was beginning to get their old confidence back. Not the cockiness, but the self-confidence, and their appreciation for a hard-won victory. Russ managed to pull off an amazing shot he called a knuckle puck to tie up the game when USA had gotten ahead, but the last goal was Ken's.
Surprisingly, James went after Ken, to teach him a little something about defending himself. 'Stick, gloves, shirt...I'll have to remember that,' Maurae commented to herself with a grin as the two teams gathered in a group huddle in the middle of the court. When they got back on the bus to return to the dorms to get ready for the game, Maurae couldn't help but feel that she'd just played the hardest game of her life- the game where the only thing she'd won was her own pride.
"That's what it was," she said as they rode back.
"What?"
"What we were missing. Don't you see? We were playing to win the gold, to make others think better of us. That's not the point of hockey or of any other sport, for that matter. The point is to play for yourself. To make yourself better, so that you can really start to have pride in your game." She sat back in her seat, tired but satisfied, and far less exhausted than she had been in a week. And much happier.
* * * *
At the game that night, they were ready. Ready to play as they had played in Minnesota, and on the court that day- as a team, as one.
And then Bombay never showed. When the ref informed them that they had to either have a coach behind the bench or they'd forfeit (meaning elimination), Charlie pulled some sweet moves and convinced Miss McKay to act as their coach for the game.
'She has no idea what she's doing,' Maurae thought, amused, as she waited for the call. It was an advantage for them, then, to be such a close-knit team. When McKay finally shouted the change-up, they moved smoothly, a well-oiled machine. Maurae sped out onto the ice with a smile on her face.
At center-ice, Fulton, Averman, Jesse, Dwayne, and Maurae debated who would take the face-off, when Bombay walked in, blowing the Duck call. The team turned to stare at him.
"Look who FINALLY decided to show up," Fulton remarked sarcastically.
"No way, man, just ignore him. Come on, Averman. You take the face-off," Jesse said. The redhead nodded and the huddle broke apart. But then the call went up again, and this time in the team's box. They came back together.
"What have we got to lose?" Maurae asked quietly.
"Respect!" Fulton exclaimed. "He'll dump us the minute it's all over." Nonetheless, he was calling them in, and they couldn't ignore that. So, reluctantly, the six iced players skated over.
"Team..." He stepped down to their level. "Guys. I'm sorry. I was wrong. I forgot about the team...and the team...is all I have. Give me one more shot. I'm back. Okay?"
'We trust too easily,' Maurae thought absently as they all nodded, forgiving him already.
The game went smoother after that; they won again, still alive, still in the tournament.
The game was fun again.
It was Sunday afternoon, and she sat on the bench between Charlie and Adam, with Jesse between her feet. Bombay, Miss McKay, and Jan, Coach's friend, stood in front of them.
"I've had a lot of distractions since I've been here in LA," Bombay said. Jan handed him a cardboard him. "This is a distraction."
A rounding chorus of, "He looks familiar!" and "I know that guy!" combined with laughter at that statement. Bombay handed the cardboard cutout back and struck a match, dropping it into a nearby trash barrel. "This is a fire-in-a-barrel." He reclaimed the cutout and folded it in half, stuffing it into the trashcan. "This is a distraction, in a fire-in-a-barrel. Any questions?" Only applause.
Practice became practice again, and not training for the IronMan competition combined with Navy Seals training combined with imaginative torture. They improved, getting along and reliving the game.
* * * *
Maurae was returning from the library with her bookbag slung over one shoulder, humming along with her CD; her life was great again, and now she could stop lying to her parents in the letters she was sending them. If she'd told them what had happened in the previous week, they'd have pulled her from the team, and she knew she wouldn't have been able to handle that. Not when she was finally back into the swing of things; she'd known these people all her life, or so it seemed, and she wasn't going to jeopardize that. Not for anything. She had two best friends in Adam and Jesse, and great girl friends for the first time in Connie and Julie. She was happy with them.
She didn't see him as she came around the corner and only noticed him when she ran smack into him. Looking up, she sighed. She should have known that she couldn't avoid him forever.
"Maurae."
"Gunnar."
"Where are you going?" he asked after she'd pulled the headphones from her ears.
"To my room. So excuse me," she said, knowing it wouldn't be that easy. Sure enough, after checking for her 'shadows,' he smirked down at her. She moved to duck around him, but he blocked the way. So she sighed and stood her ground. "What do you want?"
"I'm not quite sure yet. You humiliated me, and threatened me, in front of the entire tournament, my team and your team included."
"I lost my temper," she shrugged, not apologizing. "Now, I really have to go." He blocked her again.
"What, no friendly chat?"
"You aren't my friend," she said bluntly. "You aren't even close."
"I'm close to you now."
"That isn't the point," she said firmly. "I don't like you."
"That's all right. I like you. That's enough for me. You've got spirit; you're bold. I like that."
"Funny, a couple weeks ago, you were telling me I was out of my place. Now you're telling me you like that? That it turns you on? Congratulations. Now excuse me." She ducked under his arm and walked off. He grinned and followed her, falling into step behind her. She'd turned up her music and pulled out her keys, humming again.
Unlocking the door, she kicked it shut behind her, not even checking to see it as she deposited her stuff. Then she turned and nearly swallowed her tongue.
"So this is what a girl's room looks like. Not as much clutter as I would have expected." She shoved him backwards.
"No decency? No respect? Dwayne would have your hide for that," she said, pushing him out the door. "You aren't invited. Leave me alone, Gunnar Stahl. Go away." Then she closed the door. This game of cat-and- mouse...not so fun.