The Roommate

With the holidays around the corner things have been busy for the two of them equally. Bri has been covering a lot of functions and doing a lot of promotions, while Sidney has been doing an intense amount of press on top of his games. Let alone the public appearances. And there were a lot of those.

Today marks the day of the official family Christmas party with the Pittsburgh Penguins organization which meant it was a huge day for Sidney. Luckily for him he doesn’t have the added stress of bringing a family of his own to this function but that didn’t mean it didn’t mess with his mind a bit.

Part of him felt slightly disappointed not having a wife and kids by this stage of his life, but selfishly he knows he can’t make that kind of commitment. How could he? He can barely make the effort to see Bri outside of the house as much as he’d want to. Although there wasn’t much effort when it came to her.

He knew bringing her today to the family portion of the party was a huge step, especially introducing her to absolutely everyone he deals with on a regular basis. But with kids being there there won’t be the added pressure of the formal dinner for the players and their ladies. He was confident in her ability to handle it.

Bri had to go into the office in the morning so she couldn’t really get ready at the house with Sid so she was relying on his memory of what girls wore from previous years. Things were tense at work, knowing that Diana knew something was going on with her and Sidney and knowing what she wanted her to do. Her job was on the line but so was her budding relationship.

Diana called her into the office immediately as Bri got settled at her workspace. Mia was scared on her behalf and wished her luck. Anxiously she walked alone to Diana’s office. She knocked and got granted permission to answer. She sat at her desk and arched her eyebrow in an intimidating manner.

“Take a seat Bri,” she ordered. Bri did so politely after shutting the door. “I hear you're leaving slightly early today.”

“That is correct.”

“To go to the Pittsburgh Penguins family Christmas Party?”

She stuttered in fear and was thankfully cut off by Diana in an aggressive mood.

“You will get me a story in that and it will be submitted as soon as you get home tonight. If you have pictures send them my way. I don’t care what angle you take, just get me the story.”

“I’m not sure if I can legally do that,” she stuttered.

“We’ll find a way around it. I’m not impressed you're not abusing your opportunity more. I saw the pictures of you two at the mall. Are you sure you’re not a couple?”

“No, just good friends, I promise.”

She arched an eyebrow, “More than friends?” My god this woman is crazy, Bri thought. She shook her head frantically. “Just get me that story. Send it to me and I will personally edit it.”

“I’ll have it to you as soon as I can.”

“2 in the morning, I don’t know what time those things finishes at,” she swatted her hand, leaning back in her chair. “Now go get ready and look presentable, you’re representing our company.”

“I won’t let you down,” Bri smiled, excusing herself from Diana’s office.

Walking back to her desk she made eye contact with Mia from afar, she could tell something was up. When Bri sat down Mia texted her asking what happened so she told her. If it weren’t for Mia knowing her situation, she would have probably quit a long time ago from the pressure.

Bri headed directly to the Consol Energy Center from her office which wasn’t too far away for her. She parked in the parking lot where Sidney told her to and gave the gentleman the car pass he gave her. When she got out of the car she met up with Veronique and her daughters. They were absolutely adorable dressed up in their fancy Christmas dresses. Vero looked stressed so she came over.

“Hey do you need any help?” Bri asked.

“Estelle, come here please,” Vero ordered her little girl who was climbing to the back of the mini van. “Hey, you made it!”

“Sid asked me to come so I did,” Bri smiled. “Do you want me to take Scarlett?”

“Do you mind?” she asked with her arms full of a diaper bag and a baby who was starting to get fussy. When she handed her off Bri was somewhat relieved she was going to walk in with someone and wasn’t going to be lost.

Once Vero got the wagon filled with their coats and baby toys and diaper bag, she put Estelle inside and Bri continued to carry Scarlett in her arms since she was so content. “Are you nervous?”

“Nervous about what?”

“Being introduced as Sidney Crosby’s plus one. This is huge!” Bri didn’t even think that far in advance or think it was that important of a deal. But now that she’s thinking of it, holy crap that’s a massive step regardless if they’re going as friends or not.

“Well I wasn’t before,” she joked.

“You’ll be fine. This is the fun part of the weekend. The couples only part will be the hard part. Or at least it was for me when I was new and so was he. Neither of us knew what was going on.”

“When you put it that way I guess it’s true,” she chuckled nervously.

Sidney and his teammates all waited patiently at the arena for their families to come. A few of them had to show up early to do some press so the others came with their kids. He was telling Flower and Kessel how Bri was coming today at his date.

They were chirping him of course, but that didn’t really bother him much today. However when she walked in the door they really started. “Who Sid, watch out!” Kessel laughed.

Bri walked in next to Vero while holding a baby, playing with her in her arms and talking away to her in baby talk while Vero pulled the wagon and the other child next to her. “Baby fever already? Be careful man,” Flower laughed.

“What are you doing with a baby?” Sid asked her, laughing, as they walked towards each other.

“Someone was giving mommy a hard time so the other one started so I took one and she took the other,” Bri smiled up at him.

“They’re never good for mommy when I’m not there,” Marc-Andre laughed, giving his wife and kids a kiss. “I’ll take her.”

After he took his baby Bri waved goodbye and gave Sid a laugh. “Do you like kids?”

“I love them,” she smiled. “My goal in life is to be a mom one day. But she’s a good baby.”

“Scarlett is a pain sometimes,” he shrugged his shoulders. “Doesn’t really do well with other people. Well, she hates me at least.”

“I thought you were pretty good with kids?”

“I thought I was. Guess not her. Estelle on the other hand is a different story. She adores me. So does Tangers son Alex, he’s great too.”

“So what goes on here today?”

“I’ll take you to the party, come with me,” he waved her on as they walked throughout the arena.

The entire arena was full of empty seats and the ice was drained. Instead of where goalie nets should be there were jumping castles and other games for the kids to play with lots of room to run around. Inside the guest dressing room was where Santa’s village was set up for the kids to get a present from Santa and take a picture, and in the conference room was a buffet.

It reminded Bri of the Christmas parties she would go to as a kid for the Leafs year after year with her family. Minus the venue of course, they had it at an old warehouse and everything was in one room. All the kids were dressed up in their Christmas best and looked adorable, obviously enjoying themselves.

They mingled with other couples and were introduced to their kids and whatnot. Sid kept eyeing down the jumping castle and noticed it was finally empty so Bri encouraged him to go on it. Geno was gung ho as well, who was there with his very pregnant girlfriend, and a few of the others decided to take a turn.

It was comical to see how into it they all got, shoving each other around and play fighting. Bri was taking pictures on his phone. Then out of nowhere Pascal Dupuis threw himself into the madness and all the guys were thrilled to see him, so of course he got dog piled too.

After their playtime was over they went back to their women sweating buckets. “Glad you got that out of your system?” Kris’ wife asked, rubbing his stomach.

“We need to get one at the house,” he breathed, reaching for a water.

“It was fun until Duper showed up and hell broke loose,” Kessel scuffed.

“I was innocent!” Pascal laughed.

“No you aren’t! I got an elbow to the face!” Phil argued back.

“And I got kicked in the dick!” Geno added.

“You all sound like such kids right now,” Bri laughed.

“It was vicious in there!” Sid defended his friends. “We haven’t gotten that into it since mini sticks in St. Louis.”

“You can’t compare that time,” Fleury said in a serious tone.

“My eye still hurts,” Geno frowned.

“What the hell happened on that trip?” all the women asked.

“We played a mini sticks tourney in the hallway at a hotel in St. Louis and it was pure disastrous. Geno got a black eye, Beau broke a decorative coffee table with his back and had a bruise as big as Russia on a map on his back and everyone just got wrecked,” Tanger responded.

“Could you imagine if Nealer was there?” Flower asked laughing hysterically while putting his shoes back on.

“I miss him,” Geno hung his head. “He would have been a savage.”

James Neal got traded a few seasons ago but he remained good friends with everyone, certainly no bad blood there thankfully. It was nice for Bri to see how they all interacted with each other outside of the rink in a hockey sense, mainly because they were still at the arena and at a work function.

Bri and Sid got their picture taken with Santa as a joke and then Sid had to do some press there for PensTV so she kind of hid in the background watching him do his thing. That gave her an opportunity to think about what she was going to tell Diana in part one of her article. Fuck, that stupid article.

Notes

Outfit of the chapter: https://www.polyvore.com/soft_poncho/set?id=216347293

So sorry for the delay! Been extremely busy over the past two weeks with work!

Anyway, this chapter is kinda short but super important for Sid and Bri's relationship! You should know why within the next few chapters!

As always your feedback is greatly appreciated! Thanks for everything :)