Darkroom: A Moo U Hockey Romance

avid fans dressed in green and white. Hockey was to Burlington U what football was to Notre Dame. Our fans were devoted, numerous and we sold out every home game. Even at away games, we could always count on a sizable contingent of people rooting for us. Inside the arena, the energy was unbelievable.
Burlington was one of the twelve NCAA Division I hockey schools and our championship tournament, known as the Frozen Four, took place in the spring. We won it last year so the entire town was hungry for a back-to-back. I usually didn’t go a day without someone mentioning it to me.
Many of my family members had gathered at my parents’ house in Brooklyn to watch on TV. The good luck texts had been coming in all day.
And I was fucking freaking out.
I tried to tell myself that my brain and body knew what to do. But all the practice and training in the world didn’t guarantee good performance. I saw it all the time—professional players going into a weird tailspin that lasted for months. I couldn’t afford that kind of slump. I had to be improving every single game because, even though I knew there wasn’t a Dragons representative attending the games or even religiously watching video of my play, it felt like they were. Every mistake I made, I wondered if they were going to see it and to mark it down on a tally somewhere of Hudson Forte’s fuckups. I had a dream once where the league commissioner was dressed like Santa but instead of his list saying “Naughty” or “Nice,” it said “In” or “Out” and my name was on the top of the Out list in big bold letters.
AJ made pregame meals for us of turkey burgers with pepper jack and this mustardy mayo he whipped up himself, oven roasted sweet potato wedges and spinach salad with honest to God warm bacon vinaigrette. It tasted great at the time, but as we headed to the rink, my stomach started feeling weird.
“Hey, that turkey was okay, right?” I asked AJ. “It wasn’t expiring or anything…”
“No. It was fine. Why?”
“I just…” I shook my head. “I feel a little…unsettled.”
“It’s because Indi’s going to be there tonight,” he said. “You don’t want to look like an asshat in front of her.”
“Probably.”
And it was also my first game as captain. The coaching staff and my teammates would be looking at me, wondering if, as a junior, I’d been the right choice. So there was one more thing I had to prove.
Eventually, drenched in sweat, even though the most strenuous thing I’d done was put on my gear, I realized I was going to vomit. I made it to the men’s room just in time to hurl my dinner, which was a sickening combination of brown, orange and green.
As I flushed the toilet, my phone signaled a text. I quailed when I saw it was from, Adam Kee, the President and CEO of the San Francisco Dragons.
Kee: On behalf of the entire Dragons organization, good luck, tonight, Forte. Knock ’em dead. We’d all love to see Burlington go all the way in April.
I wanted to reply, I’ll put it on my list of things to do, but I didn’t.
Hudson: I’ll do my best, sir.
Kee: And that’s why we drafted you. You always come through.
After I read that, I threw up some more.
When I got back to the locker room, I guzzled some Gatorade.
“Are you okay?” AJ asked.
“I’m good.” I didn’t want him to know how fucked-up my stomach was. If I did, he’d think it was his fault. Plus, I promised myself when we made this cooking for rent money deal, I would never complain about the food.
“Bullshit. You’re still thinking about Indi.”
“Maybe a little,” I admitted. “Aren’t you thinking about Ruby watching you?”
It was a given that Indi would bring Ruby with her.
“Hell yeah, but honestly, you win some, you lose some.” He checked the tape on his stick and smoothed down a spot that was lifting. “I don’t plan on playing like shit, but if by chance I do and she doesn’t want to see me anymore, so be it. Don’t get me wrong, if she rejects me I’ll cry in my pillow for a month, but life’s too short to be with someone who only values you for your hockey playing.”
He wasn’t saying anything I didn’t already know, but I wasn’t really afraid Indi would drop me if I stunk up the ice. I hadn’t known her long, but I knew her well enough to be sure she wasn’t that shallow. Her life’s goal was to help repair the messed-up faces of little kids, for Christ’s sake. No. My anxiety centered more around a yearning for her approval and respect. I wanted her to look at what I did and be impressed. More than that, I wanted her to be proud to be seen with me, to be dating me.
Too late, I realized that meant I had added one more name to the catalog of people monitoring my performance.
Shit piss fuck damn.
UConn got two in a row in the first five minutes of the game and the entire first period and five minutes of the second went by without an answering goal from us. We weren’t even getting any good chances. Everyone seemed like they were skating through tar.
“Come on, boys. Turn the juice on,” I yelled, reaching for a water bottle as I sat on the bench catching my breath.
I watched as my teammates followed the UConn players down the ice. Their guy swooped around behind the net with the puck and passed it to a teammate on the blue line who fired it and missed.
The puck bounced off the boards right to Lex Vonne, who scooped it up and whizzed past one of their guys. He passed center ice, passed the blue line and sent it across to Callan Thomas. Thomas shot. It went wide. Two players were fighting for the