Hockey Is My Boyfriend: Part Two (10 page)

T
hat night at dinner
, I was a zombie. Loreal and Xavier were talking about their days, but my brain was too fried to even attempt to participate. I couldn’t eat either. I noticed that Riley, at the next table, was having some trouble eating as well; he looked nervous and kept glancing at me. Perhaps his guilty conscience was finally kicking in. Odds were it wouldn’t be enough to stop him meeting me tonight.

Xavier was talking about the afternoon scrimmage. “T’was unbelievable. Max, of all people, started a fight with Jerome, the biggest guy on the ice and a bully. T’was unprovoked. So Max got sent off the ice early.”

“He probably did it to get back to the art room,” laughed Loreal. “I had to let him in there before dinner. Kelly, you’ve created a monster there, an art monster.”

I nodded numbly and poked at my salad.

They started talking about a sci-fi television series they both loved, so I could stop listening and let my mind go back to my problems. What was I supposed to do tonight? I didn’t want to have anything to do with Riley, but I also didn’t want photos of Jimmy and me all over the Internet. The only option was to go to Trudy and Burt, but then Riley would deny everything and I’d never get the memory card back. I wished—not for the first time in my life—that I were a gigantic guy who could take matters into his own hands. Then I would beat the crap out of Riley. Who was I kidding? I wasn’t the beating-up type. Riley was a lot bigger than me, so even armed with a hockey stick there wasn’t a lot I could do. I hated feeling weak and helpless.

Riley acted so creepy and entitled. I had no clue he liked me, and of course I didn't mean to lead him on or hurt his feelings. And since he had mentioned my parents, I felt worse. I wondered how bad the other photos were. Why wonder? I knew what we had done, and they were going to be bad. Riley had seen everything. Now I was close to throwing up again. Crap.

“Are you okay, Kelly?” Loreal asked.

“No, I feel a little sick.” I got up to leave the dining room. I decided I’d have to tell Trudy and Burt. Maybe we could figure out a way to get the memory card if I pretended I was going to go along with Riley’s stupid scheme.

Max came running up to me. “Kelly, I have a present for you,” he called out in his sweet voice.

“You know, I’m not feeling totally well right now. Maybe we can see it later.”

He grabbed my hand. “Please. This will make you feel better.”

“Okay, bud.” How cute was it that he thought his arts and crafts project could solve my humongous problems? I wished I were a kid again.

We walked to the art room, and I unlocked it for him. Still holding my hand, he walked me over to a little snowman-like object.

“You can’t touch it yet, because it’s not 100% dry. By tomorrow, it will be rock hard. This kind of plaster gets really hot while it’s drying and totally wrecks stuff. I used some of my Legos on a plaster sculpture and they melted out of shape.” That sounded dangerous, maybe I should have been keeping a closer eye on Max, but he seemed to know what he was doing.

The present was a little robot, with stuff embedded in him, like coins and beads. It was kind of cute with bead eyes, metal tube ears and an unsmiling mouth. At any other time I would have loved it, but it was pretty hard to concentrate right now. I looked at my watch; it was 7:00 PM now, three hours to go.

“Thank you, Max. It’s very nice.”

“Kelleeee, you’re not really looking at it. You have to take a super-close look at it.”

I bent down and examined it. Max was an excellent little sculptor and scrounger. He had used bits collected from everywhere: springs from pens, buttons, zipper pulls, and the mouth even seemed to have teeth. Wait! The mouth looked familiar—the mouth was made from a memory card. A freaking camera memory card.

I turned and met Max’s steady gaze. He nodded at me.

“I stayed, and I listened at the door.” Max paused. “I know that was bad, but I could see Riley was going to bully you. I didn’t want him to bully you.”

He stopped and twisted up his lips. “I heard him talk about the memory card. So I knew I had to get it for you. I got in a fight. It was Jerome, he’s mean so I didn’t feel bad about it. I won too. My dad will be happy when he hears I was in a fight.” Max sounded a tiny bit proud.

“Then I got in the dressing room early. I went through Riley’s stuff and found the card in his pants, and a backup one in his hockey bag. I took them both.” Max looked up at me earnestly. “Riley started looking everywhere, so I hid them in the robot.”

He showed me the other one, which was part of the dials and gears on the robot’s back. What a prick Riley was. He was probably planning to give me one card tonight and then let me know there was a second one I had to work off as well.

“You don’t have to worry, Kelly. The plaster totally melts them. Even if you broke it open with a hammer, they wouldn’t be any good anymore.” I looked closely, and you could see the plastic was already slightly misshapen.

“Max, I don’t know how much you heard, but you have totally saved my life here. This robot is the most awesome gift I’ve ever had. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Can I give you a hug?”

“Actually, I would prefer not to,” Max said politely.

I laughed. “No problem. Wow, thanks so much, Max.”

“Sure. And you can leave the robot here to dry. Everything will be fine here. Now, could I stay here a bit longer?”

“Let me get a book, and you can stay as long as you like. I’ll be right back.”

Whew, I now had no plans for tonight and no worries. Awesome possum. When I got back to the cabin, Loreal was very upset.

“Someone went through all our stuff, Kelly. They tore the place apart looking for something. I haven’t found anything missing yet, but who knows.”

“Really? What a mess.” But I couldn’t stop smiling. Riley had obviously discovered the missing memory cards. “Listen, I’m going to the art room to supervise Max, and I’ll help you clean up afterwards.”

And then I gave Loreal a hug. I couldn’t help it; I had dodged a major bullet here, and I wanted to hug someone.

I
debated
whether I should tell Trudy or Burt about Riley, but I figured the fewer people that knew about the photos, the better. Riley was pitiful, but I didn’t think he was a serial pervert—just an opportunist. He avoided me for the last few days of camp, which was perfect. I did hear that Steve was pissed at him, as Riley had been the last one to use the laptop before its hard drive mysteriously disappeared. Hopefully Steve would get a little payback somehow, perhaps at the body-checking clinic.

Friday was the last full day of camp and also my birthday. In the mail, I got a card from my family and one from April. I didn’t think anyone at camp knew about my birthday, but maybe Trudy noticed on my résumé, because at dinner there was a big cake and everyone sang to me. That was sweet, and it was nice to feel appreciated. I had enjoyed helping the young players, and I could see coaching could be a really satisfying profession. There definitely needed to be more women coaches working with young girls. I had had only one female coach in my whole time in minor hockey.

Jimmy was coming to pick me up. He phoned and told me he had rejigged his schedule, so he could drive me to Montreal. “We’ll get some alone time together,” Jimmy said. Which was obviously a euphemism for screwing our brains out. Finally.

I liked Jimmy a lot. He was young, but he was also a nice guy and he had worked so hard to try and fix the whole photo situation. When I called him to tell him everything was okay, he sounded so concerned. I didn’t tell him any details because it was pointless. I had handled things, and it was over. Chalk one up for Nancy Drew and her trusty sidekick, Max. I had gotten Max's address before he left, and I would get my mom's advice on the very best gift for a budding artist.

By Saturday afternoon, almost everyone was gone. Loreal and I were taking a last look around the cabins to make sure nothing had been forgotten.

“I’ll miss you,” I told her. “And you have to promise to tell me how your date with Karl goes.” That big event was happening tomorrow.

“Don’t worry, I’ll let you know. And we can stay in touch.” Loreal’s eyes widened for a moment, but before I could turn, a strong pair of arms wrapped around my waist and squeezed.

“How’s my beautiful girlfriend?”

“Jimmy!” I wriggled around and hugged him.

He looked so nice in a white polo shirt and khaki shorts. He bent his head down and kissed me. I relaxed into his arms, feeling oddly safe and happy. His lips were soft and tasted a little minty. I finally remembered Loreal was there and broke off the kiss. Jimmy opened his eyes and smiled down at me, then looked up. “Hey, Loreal, how’s she going?”

“Going good. I’m walking home now, so I’ll leave you two alone.”

“Actually, can you do me a favour? I’d like to get a photo of me and Kelly.” He produced a camera and handed it to her. Loreal decided the light would be better outside, so we stood in front of the cabin. I had a weird flash of uneasiness, given the last time we had our photo taken, but Jimmy didn’t seem to make that connection.

I went to the office and said goodbye to Trudy and Burt. All the other staff had left on the camp bus. I gave a goodbye hug to Loreal and hopped into Jimmy’s pick up truck. Just the two of us. He grinned at me and patted the bench seat beside him.

“Why don’t you scoot over? You’re kinda far away.”

I rolled my eyes. Sitting right next to him seemed so trailer trashy. However, in person, it was tough to keep my hands off him. He looked so clean and vibrant that I wanted to take a bite out of him. I slid over, and he rubbed my thigh. “That’s better.”

He pulled out onto the road. “We have a choice. We can drive straight through to Montreál or we can stop and camp one night on the way. I brought camping stuff.”

“How long would it take us to drive to Montreal?” I asked.

“About ten hours. More if we hit a lot of traffic.” Right now we were zipping along the empty highway with the windows down and scratchy Top 40 on the radio.

“Stop and camp it is,” I replied. There was no way I was waiting ten hours to have sex with Jimmy. He grinned and nodded. I wriggled closer, enjoying his warm and solid body next to mine.

Jimmy’s hand clamped down on my leg. “Okay, Kelly, now that you can’t get away, who took the photos of us? It was Steve, wasn’t it?”

I groaned. “I told you, I took care of this. I got the photos back, and everything is fine.”

“I know it was Owen. I’ll take care of him once I get home again.” Jimmy sounded surprisingly ominous given his choirboy personality. I didn’t want to get into this, but I didn’t want Steve to get in trouble. I felt bad enough about wrecking his laptop.

“It wasn’t Steve. It was Riley.” I hated even saying his name.

“Riley? That dirty—” Jimmy looked over at me. “Why do you look so upset? Did Riley do something? Did he hurt you? I knew you should have come home with me.” Suddenly he yanked the truck to the side of the road and threw on the parking brake.

He undid his seatbelt and mine, then grabbed both my shoulders and turned me to face him. “Tell me. Tell me everything.”

“I told you I took care of it. I don’t want to talk about this.” I wasn’t too happy about his sexist assumption that he’d have to dole out the revenge. It was over because I said it was over.

“Don’t you know how worried I’ve been? I could tell from talking to you on the phone something big happened. I’m responsible, so I need to know.”

“Why? I’m not some damsel in distress you have to rescue. I can take care of myself.” I pushed his hands off me and slid away from him. “You know what? It actually didn’t have to do with you. Why should I tell you things that will upset you when there’s nothing you can do?”

“Kelly, we need to be honest with each other.”

“Yeah, that means I have to tell you everything you want to know. What’s the point?” I hated drama. I didn’t have a ton of time with Jimmy, and it was supposed to be fun. And right now, I was not having fun.

“Well, I’ll find out from Riley then. Right before I take his head off.”

“This is exactly what I don’t want. I don’t want you going off and exacting some macho justice that’s going to get you arrested or something.”

“Kelly, please. If I promise to be good, will you tell me?”

I looked at him. I knew he was extremely strong-willed, but I was stubborn too. We could sit by the side of the road for hours, and that would be a waste. I held out my baby finger. “Do you promise me you won’t touch Riley?”

He grunted. “Why are you protecting that scumbag?”

“I’m protecting you, dummy.” He hooked his little finger into mine and nodded. There was a hint of smile on his face. Naturally, because he was getting his way.

“Okay. Riley tried to blackmail me. He offered me the camera memory card if I met him on the beach too.” I watched Jimmy’s face as he took this in. A deep red flush rose up his neck and over his face. I wondered if the top of his head was going to explode like a cartoon volcano.

His voice was choked. “Meet him on the beach? To do what?”

“I don’t know,” I lied. “Obviously, I didn’t meet him.”

“So how did you get it back?”

“Remember Max? The little left winger?” Jimmy nodded. “He overheard us arguing in the art room, and he stole the memory cards out of Riley’s gear during scrimmage. Then he gave them to me.” The little robot was carefully wrapped in a sweater in my hockey bag.

Jimmy was silent for a long time. Then he moved towards me, his face looming large before he put his head on my shoulder. He encircled his muscular arms around me and squeezed me so tightly I could hardly take a breath.

“Oh, Kelly. You make me feel helpless. I’ve never felt like this before, and I hate it.” He never released his death grip, but our bodies fell onto the seat, his weight heavy on me. He started kissing me, first blind kisses all over my face but once he found my lips, his kisses became hungry. He mashed his lips against mine with a bruising intensity. He was full of frustrated energy, and he was trying to bend me and break me to his will. But I met his kisses with my own, nipping at his upper lip, then sucking his tongue into my mouth. I pressed my body against his, feeling his cock stiffening through the thick fabric of his shorts. Then I wrapped my legs around him, pulling his hardness against the very part of me where I wanted him to go. Jimmy groaned and pushed one hand under my t-shirt onto my bare skin.

A trailer truck whizzed by and shook our vehicle slightly. Jimmy pulled himself up.

“No. Not here. I want us to be together, but it’s got to be absolutely private.” I growled in frustration and he smiled down at me. “See what you do to me, Kelly? I lose my common sense when you’re around. We shouldn’t have fooled around on the beach. Someone’s always watching.”

I sat up, smoothed out my t-shirt, and redid my ponytail. “Maybe in James Frechette world where everything is weird and stalkerish.”

I saw Jimmy trying to straighten out his shorts. Good luck taming that bad boy, buddy. He wanted this as much as I did. He started up the truck again and pulled out as if everything was normal. Mind over matter, I guess.

“How come you’re back over there?” Jimmy asked. I had resumed sitting by the passenger door.

“Because you’re a tease. You get me all worked up and say no. I’m not falling for your boyish tricks again,” I told him, trying not to laugh. But really, sitting right next to him wasn’t going to help either of us. I wondered how far our camping spot was.

“I guess we had our first fight,” Jimmy concluded. But he actually sounded proud, like it was some milestone for his Dear Diary. And that wasn’t a fight, it was him getting upset.

We drove on for a while in silence. Without taking his eyes off the road, he asked, “Hey, can you grab the map out of the glove box?”

I was surprised he didn’t know his way around the New Brunswick back roads. I opened the glove box up and saw a little gift-wrapped box. “What’s this?”

Jimmy was grinning and he gave me a sidelong look. He shrugged ultra-casually. “Yesterday was your birthday, right?”

“Yeah… but how did you know?”

“You told me, the very first day we met.”

I didn’t remember that. I took out the gift; it was the shape of a ring box and my stomach dropped. But even someone as intense as Jimmy wasn’t going to be giving rings this soon, was he? He was so unpredictable.

I unwrapped the tangle of scotch tape and the multi-coloured Happy Birthday paper and found a plain blue box inside. I opened it up and found earrings, but not your run-of-the-mill earrings from the Bay, these were silver hoops with a hammered surface. They looked unique and stylish, like something April would wear. Yet not too girly, which was like me. I took off the tiny studs I was wearing and put the hoops on. Then I pulled down the visor mirror and had a look. Very nice.

“Thanks, Jimmy. I mean, really thanks. I actually like these earrings.”

“You sound surprised.”

“Well, I am surprised. You have nice taste. Unless, your mom helped you or something like that.”

Jimmy frowned. “My mom did not help me. I bought them in L.A. when I was down there last week.”

He turned to look at me. “You know, Kelly, you need to stop underestimating me.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“You have me pegged. You think I’m too young, so I can’t do stuff. But I can, I’ve already accomplished a lot. I’m not like most eighteen-year-olds. You need to get that.” He didn’t sound pissed, only like he was stating a fact. “You need to see that I could be—your equal, your boyfriend. Someone who can look after you.”

Next time I was planning a fling, I’d have to look in the normal section of the guy store. I figured Jimmy was a horny teenaged guy with an amazing body who was attracted to me, so we could have some fun. He was right; I hadn’t taken him too seriously. But from the beginning, he was so intense about everything.

In some ways our relationship was ass-backwards. We got to know each other in such an intense way since we were together 24/7. And then we had near-sex and a crisis, and a resolution, all in the span of a week. It seemed like we had gone through all the consequences without having much of the fun. But should I be having sex with him if he was getting serious? I sighed inside. It was too late; I made my decision at the dock and now I was hurtling 100 kilometers an hour towards a weekend full of sex and whatever happened after sex.

I looked over at Jimmy: he was driving in this easy, relaxed way with one hand on the wheel and one arm out the window. His arms looked big and strong. His thighs were huge, even in his khaki shorts. When I looked at him, I wanted him. Maybe he was a little intense, but he was a sweet guy at the core.

Fuck it. I wanted him bad, and we were going to finally have sex.