The Hockey Life

PART SIXTY-TWO: SOMETHING’S UP
In the morning, it was February, which meant a lot of things. For couples like myself and Patrick, as well as Tess and Jonathan, it meant romance and shopping for gifts. For Patrick and a few other Hawks players, it meant the Winter Olympics in Sochi. However, my main concern lately was always the wedding, even when I tried to relax and just enjoy something completely unrelated. It was always on my mind. Well, except for occasional distractions that pulled my mind in other directions.
“Oh, great. I love wake up alarms,” Patrick mumbled as soon as my phone alarm woke us up. We were still at my parent’s house from the engagement party, so I knew we were the only ones awake. I reluctantly opened my eyes and groaned. I was as unhappy to be awake as Patrick was, but he smiled slightly when he looked at me with tired blue eyes. “They’re not as bad when I wake up next to you, though,” he added.
“Cheeseball,” I rolled my eyes, but I couldn’t hide my smile.
“You love it. Don’t even pretend you don’t,” he yawned.
“Sure,” I decided as I stretched. “Well, I’m definitely going to need some coffee before we leave.”
“Or I could help you wake up,” Patrick suggested. He moved closer to me and our lips collided with each other. I didn’t normally want to do anything in the morning except sleep, but it was a different story when we started kissing. I knew we should be doing something productive like eating breakfast or getting ready, but I could afford to skip putting on makeup or take breakfast on-the-go if I needed to. I pulled Pat even closer to me and tightened my grip on the back of his neck. I felt him smile briefly before he kissed me harder. I was a little annoyed when he paused.
“Brian’s in the room next door and this is your parent’s house. You better watch yourself, missy!” he cautioned me, mocking the warning I had given him before we went to bed.
“Oh, shut up! Nobody’s awake right now, anyways.” A few minutes passed and Pat was kissing my neck as a second alarm went off. I knew we would procrastinate getting out of bed in one way or another, so I made sure I was prepared.
“What the hell is that alarm for?” he asked, tugging at my tank top.
“It’s to remind us that we seriously need to get up and start getting ready to go,” I answered.
“Well, something’s definitely up,” he joked, and I couldn’t help but giggle.
“Come on. You can at least put on some real clothes. A shirt, maybe,” I prompted him.
“Who needs shirts anyways?” he asked as I pulled away and forced myself to get out of bed.
“You!” I dug into his bag and when I found clothes that looked suitable for him to wear, I tossed them at him. I pulled clothes out of my own bag as well. “You can stay in here, I’ll go change in the bathroom,” I announced.
“Oh, so now you decide not to change in front of me?”
“Pretty much. You better be changed when I get back in here!” I left for the bathroom where I put on jeans, a v-neck, and my Hawks trainer jacket. I had to wear it for games, but I wore it to practices a lot too, just because I liked it. While I was at it, I washed my face and brushed my teeth and then I returned to my room so Patrick could have the bathroom for a bit if he needed it. However, when I got back to the room, he was laying on my bed in the “draw me like one of your French girls” pose. Luckily, he had at least gotten dressed like I asked him too.
“You’re trying way too hard to get laid right now,” I smirked.
“Says the girl that was all over me a few minutes ago,” he reminded me.
“Whatever! You can have the bathroom if you need it,” I blushed. Surprisingly, we both managed to get ready, and in a decent amount of time, too. We each had a bagel before we left and as I predicted, nobody was awake yet when we headed out, so I left them a note.
When we got back to Chicago and we headed to work together, I was perfectly focused. It was after practice, during our lunch date, when I wasn’t so clued in on the world around me anymore.
“What are you doing?” Patrick asked when he noticed I had been on my phone for a while.
“Nothing,” I lied.
“Yeah, sure. Come on, what are you looking at?” he attempted to steal my phone.
“Wedding dress shops in the area,” I came clean.
“Do you have to get a dress this soon? I’ve kind of never been a bride before, so I don’t really know how these things work,” he chuckled.
“I don’t have to, I just want to. The dress is the best part of the planning and preparation for the wedding, and I just really want to try some on,” I explained.
“Is this going to be happening soon?”
“Yeah, probably after the Olympics. Why?”
“I don’t know. I just wish I could go with and see you in the dresses,” he sighed.
“Unfortunately, I’m traditional when it comes to that. You can’t see until the ceremony,” I assured him.
“I know. It’s best to wait, because it means so much more then, but still.”
After we got done with our lunch date, I went home and showed Tess the websites for all the amazing shops downtown. She immediately got as excited as me, and we both decided that it was never too early to start looking for “the dress”. I knew if we were going to start doing such major shopping, I would have to pick out a bridal party, so I felt grateful that I had thought a lot about it already. In fact, after talking to Patrick about it, I felt sure that I knew exactly who I wanted to be in the wedding party, and he knew too. We agreed to let everyone know at least by the time the Olympics were over, since the two weeks in Sochi would give us a great chance to ask a few of them if they’d do the honor of being a part of our special day.
I had already been very excited to find out that I’d get to go to Sochi with Patrick and his family, but now I was even more pumped up about it. I had never been out of the country before (except for Canada, of course), so Russia was a huge road trip for me. I had always wanted to travel, but I never expected to be going to the Olympics with anyone. Luckily, Tess would be going too, with Jonathan. Then there was Dylan and the two most recent internship winners. It was going to be an extremely fun experience, whether the United States did well or not. Even so, I’d be rooting for my country in every event, especially hockey. It would be the coolest thing in the world for either the men’s or women’s hockey team to bring home gold this year, if not both. I had a ton of respect for the other teams, mostly Canada, but I secretly hoped that they’d only get silver. I just never said anything while Johnny was around. I really wanted to avoid the trash talk until after the two weeks were up, just so my bets and guesses wouldn’t backfire on me. Unfortunately, there was still a week before the Olympics would even start, but oh well. With all the craziness in my life, I knew time would fly. It always did.

Notes

Hey guys! I originally was going to make this chapter longer, but once I got to writing it, I realized that I needed to break up a few parts that I had wanted to include in it. Hopefully you liked it anyways! Here's a little game for you guys, to liven up the comments section. If you have any guesses for who's going to be in the wedding party (guys and/or girls, best man, maid of honor, bridesmaids, groomsmen, anyone and everyone), tell me your guesses in the comments. I can't tell you whether you're right or not, of course, but you should find out in a week or less! Well, anyways, I should really stop rambling. Thanks for reading :)