The Tandem

"Hey Lyn...", someone gently nudged me at some ungodly hour. I grunted and turned over, covering myself with the blanket. The someone sighed and flipped the switch by my bookshelf, turning on ALL of the lights.

"Dougie, I swear to god...", I said threateningly as I slowly sat up, blinking.

"Don't shoot the messenger!", he held his hands up in the air. I smiled and swung my feet over the side of the bed, putting my feet into slides and grabbing my phone. I groaned inwardly at the time. 5:26AM, really?

"What does the messenger have to say at this hour?", I asked, somewhat annoyed. Hey, sleep is precious to me. He leaned against the doorway, half facing the hallway.

"Tuukka is taking you to the airport in like twenty minutes, so he told me to wake you up. I want sleep, bye Lyn!", he recited the message and skittered off to his room, slamming the door and probably waking up David in the process.

Right, the flight to Minnesota is today. The quality family time my mother had been raving about starts today and is only three days long, but it feels like an eternity with the absolute crazies in my family. God help my soul.

After I took a quick shower, I got dressed in some sweats and a hoodie of Tuukka's that I got at the hospital. Pulling my hair into a ponytail, I noted that my suitcase had been moved out of my room, David's work probably. I thumped downstairs to find my suitcase and Tuukka next to the door, waiting for me.

"Ready to go Joce?", he asked, holding the door open for me.

"As ready as I will ever be to stay with the crazies", I replied, making him snicker, and grabbed my suitcase, throwing it into the back of my truck. I opened the drivers side door and was about to step in when a hand grabbed my arm and pulled me back out.

"No driving remember, keys?", Tuukka held his hand out and I frowned as I dropped them onto his palm and sat in the passenger seat. I hate this, the not being able to drive. I personally hate being dependent on other people for things I can do myself, but the doctor said no driving.

"You kept it?", he said to break the silence surrounding us in the cab of the truck. I looked at him confused and it took me a moment to realize he was talking about the hoodie I had on.

"Yeah", I said and then thought for a minute. "Can I ask you a question?"

He furrowed his eyebrows and gripped the steering wheel harder.

"Sure."

"Whose Canadiens shirt do I have?"

It took him by surprise, he hesitated in answering.

"Why do you want to know?"

I sighed heavily and turned to face him.

"Is it a crime to want to know whose number thirty one team issued Canadiens shirt someone gave me? Is it?"

I know whose it is, I just want confirmation on my suspicions.

"Okay fine it was Carey Price's shirt."

So after he visited me and tried to hug me, he still gave me his shirt. I knew it smelled familiar, like home. So obviously, I must've been dating him or something.
Tuukka and I sat in silence until we pulled up to the blacktop, next to the private charter I was taking with a few other Bruins to various places in the West. Torey, Kevan, and Bart are taking the plane with me and are waiting inside. It's going to Pittsburgh, Detroit, Saint Paul, and Los Angeles.

As I am about to step onto the plane, I turn.

"Was Carey my boyfriend?", I asked Tuukka. He looked down at his feet for a long while before looking back up at me, sadness pooling in his eyes.

"Yes."

I knew it. Every time Carey was brought up in conversation, Tuukka looked like someone just told him that he couldn't play hockey anymore. Carey had texted me a few times, usually saying that he was sorry and missed me. The most recent one said "I hope you realize that I'm gone now. I met this girl named Angela and she's wonderful. This is goodbye Jesse."

I never responded to him. But now, it all makes sense. I have an urge to talk to him. But I've boarded the plane and we're taking off and Logan is becoming a spot in the distance and I can't see Tuukka anymore, but my problems haven't shrunk. They've enlarged, magnified, and it hurts my brain. The guys want to me play cards with them, but I brushed them off and fall asleep in one of the seats. The only time my thoughts can't plague me is in sleep.

After getting jostled around when Bart got off and the dozing until Torey's stop, I finally got off at my stop. My parents, as well as my two sisters and brothers, are waiting for me on the blacktop. My oldest sister had someone with her that looked vaguely familiar. When we had moved off the blacktop to a parking lot, my mother wrapped me up in a huge hug.

"My Jocelyn, oh my Jocelyn", she murmured as she stroked my hair.

"I missed you too Mom", I hugged her back tightly. When she let me go, my father pat me on the shoulder.

"Good to see you healthy Jess", he said, using my middle name. We have a thing where he only uses my middle name because my mother chose Jocelyn and he wanted Jesse to be my name so I told him that he could call me Jesse. I really do love my dad.

"Glad that you're alive still with this one living in the house!", I remarked, punching one of my younger brothers, Marty, in the shoulder and he scowled at me.

In our family, we have my parents, Gayle and Rob. They met in high school and dated briefly before losing contact in college but they met up again and fell in love and got married and then we happened! Yeah I know that sounds like a cheesy love story, but it's true. Mom is a criminal attorney and Dad is the head coach for the high school hockey team.

I have two older sisters, Rosie and Tanya. Rosie is 29 and Tanya is 27. Rosie is blonde as you can get and didn't go to college and is still living under my parents roof. She makes her living off dating professional athletes, which is completely stupid and useless in my opinion.

Tanya is the complete opposite of her elder sister, she's the surprise ginger of the family and she actually went to college. And not just any college, but she went to Yale and is crazy smart. Seriously, it's crazy how smart she is and being a scientist pays well. If I had to pick a favorite sister, she wins every time.

I have two younger brothers, Marty and Jeremie. Marty is, well, the resident drug addict at 22. He doesn't have a job, dropped out of college because of drugs, and is hopped up on cocaine all the time. I have no idea how he keeps that habit, but I do know that my mother mentioned sending him to rehab. He has the same dark curly hair that Dad has.

Jeremie is my favorite brother and maybe even my favorite sibling. He plays for Anaheim and is the starting goalie at only 20. I'm so proud of him. I call him Jay because who wants to yell Jeremie every time you need him?

"Yeah yeah, can we go now?", Rosie said, picking at her nail polish. Her newest boy toy hovers by her side.

"Jeez, well don't you sound excited to see me", I retorted.

"Yeah yeah love you now can we go? Alex here is taking me on a date tonight!", she squeals excitedly, leaning up against her boy toy with the giant beaming fake smile I know too well. Alex? I looked at him again and he studied me for a minute. He's tall and broad, definitely hockey material.

"Jesse?", he asked and gave me a big hug without warning.

"Do you remember me? Alex Galchenyuk for the Montréal Canadiens, we used to be really good friends until it happened and you never talked to us again. Why?", he said in a Russian accent. Right, he was one of my favorite people on the team in Montréal. I remember now.

"I didn't remember that I was friends with you guys. No one told me", I replied, letting go of him as Rosie glared at me. Poor kid, he doesn't realize how mean she really is.

"Okay girls, I think it's time to go. Let pack up and head home!", Mom sensed the raised tensions in the group and wisely cleared us all out. She separated Rosie and I into different cars. Jay and I were in the SUV with Dad and Mom had Rosie, Alex, and Marty in the Jeep. They have nice cars because Jay, Tanya, and I kind of spoil our parents by sending a chunk of our paychecks back to them.

"Your sister Tanya is meeting us back at the house because she got in before you and was exhausted from the scientists international convention she was at", Dad said as we were driving down the main highway.

"Smartass", Jay coughed under his breath and I erupted in giggles.

"Be nice! You're the one who failed math and she bailed you out!", I whacked him in the shoulder.

"Well you...", he stuttered in finding a comeback, making me laugh. "You smell like fish!"

"I do not!"

"Do to!"

"Do not!"

"Dad, Jocelyn hit me!"

"Hey cool it back there!", Dad roared from the front seat, making both of us laugh even harder. "And Jeremie, I think you can handle a little whack from her."

"Ha!", I shouted triumphantly as I poke him in the side.

"You suck", he frowned at me and slouched in the seat. I grinned and started to tickle him. He laughed and laughed and squirmed in his seat, eventually falling onto the floor of the car. I laughed so hard that I fell on the floor too. Dad looked at us in the rear view mirror and shook his head, smiling.

"I forgot how you two get in the car. How am I going to survive the next few days?", he groaned and hit his head in the steering wheel, almost hitting another car as we turned into our street.

"Shit Dad, drive carefully! I don't need to be in the hospital again!", I yelled, poking fun at him. He leaned back and hit my knee with his hand.

"Shut up, you're a worse driver than me", he retorted.

"Oh suuuurrreeee", I laughed and leaned forward to turn up the radio, blasting some really annoying song which led to us singing as loudly as we could in the car.

"WE'RE FUCKING HOME LET ME OUT OF THE CAR JOCE I NEED TO PEE!", Jay screeched as soon as Dad parked the car in the driveway, pushing me back into my seat so he could run and go pee. Fucking weird.

"Oh how I've missed that", I said sarcastically as I lugged my suitcase into the house. I forgot how big it really is.

The way the house is laid out is when you walk in through the side door into the mud room, the stairs to the second floor are to your left. Straight ahead, there is the living room with enough couches for an army and the kitchen and dining room take up the left side of the main floor. In the other mud room, we have the door to the backyard. In the backyard, there is a huge deck area where Dad grills and Mom hosts parties in the summer. There is a huge as hell pool, when you have five kids, you need big pools. Marty lives in the guesthouse, which is next to the hockey rink that Dad set up for us in the winter when I was a kid. No one ever goes into Marty's room, god knows what is in there.

Upstairs, there are two hangout rooms at either sides of the stairs. If you keep going straight down the hallway, Jay's room is to your right and mine is to the left, we both have bathrooms connecting to our rooms. If you go through either of the doors in the hangout rooms, you'll see Tanya and Rosie's rooms, there is another bathroom back there. Four kids sharing one bathroom would be slightly terrifying.

I love this house, I missed it so much in Boston. The house I share with Tuukks, Dougie, and Krej doesn't even come close to this house.

I threw my suitcase onto my bed, my room as clean as it was the day I left for BC. The colors of my room make me feel calm and happy, bright blues and greens. While I was gone, Dad bought a Boston Blades, a Bruins, and a Canadiens #29 jersey and framed all of them, hanging them above my bed. I have pictures of me from when I was a little goalie and when I won my first tournament, when I made the high school team, when I won my first championship, all the memories from my past live on these walls.

Mom hollers from the kitchen for lunch and we all go pounding down the stairs. Arriving at the table, my ginger ambushed me with a monster hug.

"Joce! I've missed you so much", Tanya said as she held me tightly.

"I missed you too Tanya, a lot", I said, letting go to secure my seat at the table.

Dad sits at the head of the table. Mom, Rosie, and Marty sit on one side and Tanya, Jay, and I sit on the other. But since Rosie has Alex staying with us, we've pulled over another chair to their side. Mom brings out a plate full of grilled chicken and placed plates of rolls and a bowl of corn on the table. Everyone immediately starts piling their plates full of good food.
I take back missing the house the most, I missed the food the most. As a professional athlete, my meals usually consist of lots of protein and enough carbs to replenish the amount that I burned off. Being a goalie, you need those carbs.

"So Jocelyn, how is rehab going?", Mom asked over the clicking of forks and knives on the plates. I swallowed my piece of chicken before answering.

"Good, my trainer is great and I've made a few friends there.", I said, consuming a dinner roll.

"And how's the boyfriend you told me about?", Jay piped up from his place at the table, making me blush. Remind me to kill that kid. All the heads at the table look at me at once.

"Boyfriend?", Mom questioned.

"And you didn't tell us because...?", Dad said in disbelief.

"Yay our little Jocelyn is growing up!", Tanya cheered.

Rosie glared at me for taking the spotlight and Alex gaped at me. After sending a glare to Jay, I turned to the rest of my waiting family.

"I was going to tell you all, but this idiot beat me to it!", I glared at Jay once more, he smirked and refilled his plate.

"Well tell us about him sweetie", Mom said, putting down her utensils. Everyone listened intently.

"His name is Devon Peters, I met him at rehab. He is a Blackhawks draftee and is set to break the lineup this coming season. He is really nice and lives in Boston in the offseason. We clicked immediately", I said, smiling because Devon. Besides my supposed relationship with Carey Price and my other supposed relationship with Tuukka, this is my first serious relationship and I'm happy it's with Devon.

Everyone at the table 'awwwww'ed, except for Alex, Rosie, and Dad. Rosie is expected, she's a bitch, what can I say? Alex excused himself from the table and went into the back hall to make a phone call. And Dad just looked mad.

"Dad, why do you look mad?", I asked, making him turn towards me, his face softening.

"Jesse, I want to meet him.", he said. God I feared that, Dad might not look like much, but he
is downright terrifying.

"Okay Dad, can you come out to Boston? It's so close to the preseason that we can’t really travel. I'll pay for your ticket", I reasoned, trying to work out in my head how Devon would react.

"Alright, I just want to make sure he isn't a dick", he said, pulling me into a hug. I laughed and started to help Jay, Tanya, and Mom clear the table. Rosie disappeared during Dad's interrogation of myself and Marty, well no one really knows where Marty is. We generally leave him to his own devices.

After clearing the table, Mom excused us from table duty. As I walked out of the kitchen, Alex grabbed my arm and pulled me outside.

"What?", I whacked his hand and rubbed the sore spot on my arm. He paced back and forth on the deck, running his fingers through his short blonde hair.

"Does Carey know?", he asked, still pacing. I shook my head and frowned.

"Does he have to?", I retorted. He sighed deeply.

"You guys never broke it off, so I think he should know!", he sat in one of the deck chairs, I sat in one across from him.

"Alex look, I was in a coma and lost memory. He started seeing someone named Angela and I've started seeing Devon. I think the break up is mutual", I reasoned. I don't know if I still like Carey, I haven't seen him in a few months. I just don't know, do I like him or do I like the idea of us? I don't know.

It's quiet for a few minutes as Alex mulled over my statement in his head.

"He's still in love with you", he said quietly. "He's really distraught right now. He said that he's booking a flight here and wants to see you. I couldn't stop him."

"Shit, seriously?", I muttered and punched the chair. I do not need a "boyfriend" visiting me on my family time. Dad would flip shit. And flipping shit is an understatement. I sighed and sat back down, running my fingers through my hair. Alex put a hand on my shoulder and left it there, even though it's a small gesture, it helps.

"Okay fuck it I'm going to call him", I stood up and pulled my phone out of my pocket, dialing Carey's number furiously. Alex opened his mouth to protest, but closed it at the look of frustration on my face. Oh hell yeah I was frustrated! Even though Carey and I are no longer something, he needs to get it through his goddamn skull that it's OVER! The phone rang once, twice, three times when he finally picks up.

"Jesse? Oh my god, you actually called. Jess, I miss you so much and I swear Angela and I aren't eve-", he rambled until I cut him off.

"Carey, there is no way in hell that you are coming to Minnesota. Okay? You aren't. Get it through your head that we aren't something anymore! I don't remember any of it! So just stop. Stop trying!", I yelled into the phone, tears of frustration dripping down my cheeks. I'm done. So done.

“Listen Jess, I’m so sorry. But I want to see you.”, he insisted. Fuck him and his insisting.

“If you want to see me, we have to get a few things straight. First, I’m not Jesse or Jess. My name is Jocelyn. And second, you are not coming to Minnesota. End of discussion.”, I said firmly into the phone. Beside me, Alex paced around anxiously until the back door opened and Blonde Satan yelled for poor Alex. He follows her around like a lost puppy, most guys do. Jay had come and taken Alex’s post beside me, listening to me scream into the phone. I bet I woke the neighbors up.

“Okay fine. If I can’t see you in Minnesota, you’re coming to Montréal.”

Fuck.

“I’ll even buy your ticket for you. Jess, I mean Jocelyn, I just want to see you. Please, just one last time before the season starts.”, he pleaded. I groaned inwardly and mulled over my options in my head. I could have him come out here and all hell would break loose. Or I could visit him in Montréal, having to lie to everyone about where I’m going because they would all flip shit. Jay, the idiot, made the decision for me. He grabbed my phone, yelled, “She’ll see you in Montréal, bye!”, and ended the call.

“What the hell was that about?!”, I roared, staring him down. Jay has had all 20 years of his life to perfect the resistance of my ‘Death Stare’, so I don’t know why I even bother anymore. Stupid boys.

“I was doing you a favor, we know how Dad gets around boyfriends.”, the idiot reminded me. The last time I had a boyfriend come over, Dad almost beat him with a chainsaw. The guy was a douche and harassed me, so I guess me breaking up with him was better than Dad murdering him with a chainsaw.

“Right. Thanks dude”, I sighed and stood up, heading towards to door back inside. I’m so tired and sleep is calling. Jay puts an arm around my shoulders and pulls me against his side as we walked inside and upstairs to our rooms.

Notes