The Things No One Else Sees

He was running on adrenaline. They’d knocked out two away games and one home game in the past week. And they were busing it to Buffalo for a game tomorrow before flying down to Florida to play the Lightning, then back up to Pittsburgh before finally coming home. Six days. He was leaving tomorrow and he’d be gone for six days.

And he’d spent the past six days composing this conversation with Lucy in his head. He was just glad she’d been receptive. She’d been more than, actually. She had laughed and smiled and looked at him with her dark eyes filled with promise. And he was floating on air because she just said that she was his.

“So, my problem now is: I have you, but I have this job that requires me to leave the country for six days.”

Lucy pushed her lower lip out in a pout. “Poor baby.”

“I know; it blows.”

“So eloquent, Lupul.”

“You know me. I....”

“Well, look who’s here!” A male voice boomed over the droning music coming out of the speakers on the walls. Joff looked up at the same time as Lucy and saw rocker guy, the one he’d wanted to punch the night of his birthday party.

“Shit,” Lucy muttered, turning her head away and putting a hand up to shield her face.

“Don’t hide, Lucy. It was Lucy, right? Lucy the fucking tease who walks out on....”

Joff stood up so quickly his chair almost tipped over. “Walk away,” he told the guy.

“You think you’re fucking her tonight?” the guy asked Joff. “I thought I was a few weeks ago, but she left me with blue balls. Nothing is worse than a tease.”

She stood up and put a hand on Joff’s chest. It was the only thing that kept him from decking the asshole in the leather jacket. “Dominic, right?” she said.

“Oh, you remember me, huh?”

“I remember I never once agreed to ever go anywhere with you,” she told him. “Now stop making a scene. You’re embarrassing yourself.”

He took a step toward Lucy and Joff could see him swaying. He was drunk. Probably drunker than he seemed.

“Why do you think we were talking?" the guy spit out.

“You say another word to her, you’ll regret it,” Joff said, moving past Lucy. He put his body between hers and the asshole who was trying to berate her.

“Lupul, it’s fine. Let’s just leave.”

“Oh, you’re whoring it up with this guy, but I’m not good enough?” As soon as he finished the final word, Joff felt a flash of rage surge through his blood. He pulled his fist back and punched the guy in the face. Rockstar hadn’t been expecting it, so he hit the floor like a sack of potatoes, out cold.

A woman two tables away shrieked and then a burly man who was sitting by the front door charged over, putting his arm out to push Joff back. The bouncer didn’t need to because Joff was done. The guy on the floor was a skinny punk who thought he could intimidate women or shame them because they wouldn’t fuck him, but he wasn’t a fighter.

Joff held up his hands. His fist was stinging a little, but that was just because he’d connected with the guy’s cheekbone. “I’m done,” he told the bouncer.

Two more men came over, one of them squatting down to check on rockstar who was coming back to consciousness. “Are you okay, buddy?” he said.

Joff looked behind him. Lucy was unusually pale and her hands were clenched into tight fists against her chest. “Are you okay, Lucy?”

“You punched him,” she said.

“He was being rude to you. I didn’t like it.”

“You can’t just punch people.”

He stepped closer to her, worried she was mad at him. His worries dissolved when she wrapped her arms around his waist.

“She’s right; you can’t just punch people,” the bartender said.

Lupul shrugged and put his arms around Lucy. “He’s a dick, and he was being aggressive with my girl.”

The explanation felt good, sounded good. His girl. He was just protecting his girl.

“We’re leaving,” Joff told the bouncer and bartender. “Sorry for the trouble.”

“Hey, fuck you, dude," rockstar said to the man who was trying to help him stand back up. “Get the fuck off me.”

The bouncer shook his head before nodding at the door. “Go on, man. We’ll take care of it.”

Joff inclined his head in thanks before leading Lucy out the door and into the chilly November night.

Once they were standing beside her car, he reached down and lifted her head up with a finger under her chin. “You okay?”

“I suck,” she said.

Joff smiled. “Why do you suck?”

“Why do I always end up talking to assholes who get themselves beat up in bars?”

He thought back to her last boyfriend. What was his name? Dennis. Dennis had gotten himself knocked out by Jacob way back before Joff even cared about Lucy. “Wow, you do suck,” he said.

She hit him in the chest with the heel of her right hand. It just felt like a tiny bump. “I’m kidding, Lucy,” he said. “You and I have both made shitty choices in the past.”

“Eww, I never thought of it that way.”

“Creep you out?”

She shivered. “Totally. Me and Lupul: making bad life choices.”

“Not anymore,” he said. “Now let’s talk about this horrible schedule of mine. I’m gone until next Tuesday.”

“Are you trying to ask me if you can come home with me tonight?” she asked, looking up at him.

He smiled down at her. If only, he thought. Adjusting her glasses on her pretty little face, he said, “Are you propositioning me, Lucy?”

“I might be curious about your underwear.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, winking at her. “I gave this some thought over the last week. And I figured if our little conversation went over well and you didn’t hate me, then I’d make you suffer a little. Like you made me suffer.”

Her eyes were dark and distrustful. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to make you wait until I get back in town from this road trip.”

“Why?”

Her question made him laugh. Oh, how the tables had turned. “Because I like to watch you squirm.” His eyes softened. “And because tonight would be like a shitty one-night-stand since I have to leave for six days at eight tomorrow morning.”

“Damn, Lupul. Are you getting all romantic on me?”

“You getting all sex-crazed on me?”

“No. You know I have astounding will power.” She pulled her car door open and slipped inside.

He wanted to get in there with her and go back to her place so badly. But he’d spent hours over the past week planning this, thinking about the best way to orchestrate things so that they wouldn’t get fucked up and he wouldn’t end up lovesick and mooning over her while listening to a goddamn Ray LaMontagne song or National song. He’d gone without for months. What was another few days?

“I’ll wreck your willpower next week,” he told her before shutting her car door and waving goodbye.

************************************

He sulked out of the administrative office for the Leafs and boarded the bus a couple minutes late. Most of the guys were either deep into their video games or talking among themselves. Joff lowered himself into a seat next to Kessel about halfway down the aisle.

"They get you?" Kessel asked with a little grin.

"Yeah." That's why he liked Kessel. No bullshit or chirping when a guy wasn't in the mood to hear it. Just acknowledgement and moving on. He hated talking to the Public Relations people.

"I'd expect Bozak to get into barfights over girls before you, Loops. I thought you were a lover, not a fighter," Kessel replied. Joff mentally took back every nice thing he'd just thought about the man.

"The guy was a grade A dick. He said some shit to Lucy that I wasn't cool with."

Kessel nodded and wedged his earbuds into his ears and then plugged the headphones into a PSP. "I'd have done the same thing, man. She's something... I don't know... dIfferent."

"Yeah," Joff responded. He'd gotten in a little bit of hot water with the P.R. department for the hockey club. A couple people in the bar had talked about the scuffle, which didn't even amount to a fight, and a picture got out of the dick and his swollen face. The buzz about the fight was minimal since it hadn't been at a high-profile place and there was no police report, but they still weren't happy with him. He'd had to come in early for a lecture like he was a fucking fourteen-year-old boy.

"You know I was going to ask her out," Kessel said, nonchalantly, powering up the PSP.

Joff looked over and gave his friend a weird look. "Ask who out?"

"Lucy. When I saw her at the show that night while you were getting beers she kinda got me. I joked with her about Biz and all that bullshit. And she's kinda hot in that every single day kind of way."

Kessel was his friend, but he still felt the flame of jealousy lick at his mind. "Every single day kind of way?"

"Like, you'd want to wake up to that and go to bed with that every single day. Not a one-night deal in a club." Kessel waved off his explanation. "You know what I mean."

Yeah, he did know exactly what Kessel meant. He just hadn't known that was what he thought of Lucy. "What stopped you from asking her out?"

Kessel chuckled under his breath and shifted in his seat to get comfortable. "You. It was pretty obvious there was some stuff between you and her when you got there with the beers."

"I thought I was pretty smooth about it," Joff replied.

"Naw, man. You were obvious. I thought you were going to die. Felt like we were fifteen and the girl you liked was completely ignoring you at the school dance."

Joff let out a surprised bark of laughter before slouching down in his seat and pulling his cap low over his eyes. "Fuck you, Kessel."

"And then you were about two seconds from writing a fucking emo love ballad when I caught you outside after she left."

"Yuck it up, asshole. I'll make sure I'm on the other team at the next practice."

Kessel shook his head. "You and her together yet?"

"Why? You trying to ask her out now?" If Kessel said yes, then he was going to have to get up and leave the bus before he punched him. Jealousy wasn't really an emotion he was used to having, especially when the women he had always dated were attention whores who begged for men to look at them.

"Fuck no. You'd kill me." Kessel leaned toward the window and looked at Joff over the top of his PSP. "She is pretty hot though, with the eyes and the glasses and the smile and those tits..."

He didn't get to finished because Joff punched him in the arm. "Better shut up," he warned Kessel.

"I've got a date with her friend Alice when we get back into town," his teammate said, rubbing his upper arm where Joff had hit him. "I'm not going to steal your girl. She didn't seem like your type though."

"I don't have a type anymore. I just want her. We've got plans next Tuesday."

Kessel raised his brows. "What kind of plans?"

"I don't know what her plans are, but mine involve getting her naked."

"Think she'll let you?"

"Good chance."

Kessel laughed. "You need to rub that shit into Biz. I think she broke his heart."

**********************************

JOFF: Would you prefer I take your panties off with my hands or my teeth?

He'd sent the text an hour ago, but she hadn't responded. It was mid-morning and she was at work, teaching all those little boys who probably had crushes on their teacher. He'd have a crush on her if she was his teacher. Just after noon she replied. He was on the bus, heading back to the hotel in Tampa Bay. He'd planned on a nap before the game. There was one more in Pittsburgh and then they'd be home for over a week.

LUCY: I was hoping you could do it with your toes.

JOFF: Kinky.

His phone rang. Joff answered it without evening looking to see who it was because it had to be her. "But for real, hands or mouth?" he said instead of the customary hello.

"What?"

Joff's eyes widened. That wasn't Lucy's voice. Pulling the phone away from his ear, he looked at the display. Jacob. Damn. "Uh, wrong person. What's up, Jay?"

"What's the deal with you and Lucy?"

"What do you mean?"

"She's on cloud fucking nine. I didn't know your dick was that big."

Joff felt the grin spreading over his face. "Gotta go," he told Jacob before hanging up.

JOFF: I hear you're really looking forward to getting me naked.

LUCY: Says who?

JOFF: The street.

LUCY: The street otherwise known as Jacob?

JOFF: Could be.

LUCY: Jacob doesn't know what the hell he's talking about. I'm pretty blasé about the prospect of seeing you naked. I do have my own copy of The Body Issue now. So, I can see you without clothes whenever I want.

His grin got bigger as he read her response. "What's with you?" Bozak asked, looking back at Joff.

"Making plans to get laid," he replied matter-of-factly.

Bozak shook his head. "It been that long for you, Lupul?"

Notes