Round 1 - Game 1; // Part 1 of 23 //

It’s now April. Playoff season. Which means, Corey is going to be growing out his crazy ass beard and he’s keeping his curly hair. This is going to be a wonderful, wonderful ride. Since we weren’t able to go to enough playoff games last few seasons with Christina due to her multiple doctor trips back and forth. It’s just a struggle trying to keep her occupied when she’s supposed to be staying still and shit.

Getting out of bed this morning, I groaned due to the fact that Corey was getting ready to leave for Nashville and I had to get Christina ready for her yearly checkup. Little thing was so excited when she found out that her dad is starting tonight, so all she could think about was getting ready to go to Nashville tonight. But sadly, we can’t go because I wasn’t trying to be around a field of yellow jerseys for a long periodical time. I just don’t have the patience.

But when they are playing at home, then yes, we will go to a game. That’s a promise that I can’t break. Since us and the other girls are able to have the better seats in just chilling’ in the box room, it’s a good thing to get away from crazy and crazy fans. Walking down the steps to find Corey on the couch, I groaned once again due to the sight of his hair and facial hair.

“How long do you have to keep this up?” I asked curiously, sitting down on the couch next to Corey.

“Until we win the cup or lose in a round, then I’ll shave it.” Corey answered, not even looking down at me when he replied.

“What if Chrissy ask you to shave it?”

“Then I’ll tell her the same thing I told you.” Corey grinned as he finally looked at me, kissing my forehead with a sheepish grin.

Asshole was only thing I can say in my mind due to Christina coming down the steps in a pair of jeans and her daddy’s jersey, infant size of course.

“Mommy, I’m ready for daddy’s game! Let’s go kick ass!” Christina screeched when she jumped off the last step.

“Christina Sarah Crawford!” Corey and I gasped when we heard Christina curse.

See, I don’t know if it’s the amount of wrestling she watches, or it’s the amount of times she hears the guys in the locker room, but I for one do not curse around Christina. I mean it slips once in a while, but I quickly correct myself ASAP.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it. Please don’t hit me.” She whimpered, hiding behind the counter.

I shook my head and got up from the couch to go into the kitchen to begin making breakfast. I had a feeling that someone is coming to come get Corey so they can go to the airport together. So I decided to make food for at least everyone. I had muffins in the microwave already. I was feeling generous.

“Christina, no one hanging around Auntie Sarah.” Corey whispered to her, making me roll my eyes in a playful manner.

~~~~ Taylor’s POV ~~~~

I have finally left the hospital and I’ve never felt so much better. I hate the hospital, and I honestly hate nurses and doctors. I made sure that Dustin moved the bed into the guest room downstairs, but even when he asked, he told me that I was an idiot and I should move past it. Even though he’s my oh so loving husband, I’m going to kick his ass because of that comment

I feel weird being home for a playoff season, it’s a weird feeling knowing that my best friends are all going to playoff games, and then there’s me. Home. Home all day, unless I feel like going out. Which won’t happen, so I’ll be home.  Relaxing on the couch with Trevor, my late best friend’s son, and watching Bob’s Burgers.

“Auntie Taylor when is Uncle Dustin coming home?” Trevor asked while he played with his train set.

I looked over at the clock on the wall to see that it was almost 12 in the afternoon, “He should be here soon. I promise, Uncle Brownie did pick up your Oreo shake from Burger King.” I told Trevor, tossing him another cheese ball.

“Good, I would be very upset if he didn't.”

I simply just laughed at his comment, realizing how he really does act like his mother. I’m actually really happy that she did as much as she could as a mother to raise Trevor as the handsome young boy he is. I was glad to see her take care of him and gave me points when I did something right! Not real points, but you know what I mean.

After a few minutes of tossing back and forth cheese balls at one another, the front door suddenly opened and a storm of guys just came inside of the house. I turned around to practically see half of the Kings team here and I groaned loudly. I didn’t even fucking clean the house, and now they’re here.

“Taylor, I hope you don’t mind, the guys came over to help with stuff and talk about things.” Dustin told me, giving Trevor his Oreo shake.

“Talk about what exactly? How you guys failed to even try to be in the Stanley Cup playoffs, or what?” I smiled nonchalantly with my arms crossed over my chest.

“No, you ass,” Doughty, my, oh so loving cousin, said “We’re here to help with the baby room and talk about ways to become a stronger team.”

“Should have thought about that before getting kicked out.” I huffed, turning back to the TV.

“My goodness, she’s cranky when she’s pregnant.” Carter whispered.

“I heard that.”

~~~ My POV; 5:30 pm ~~~

Corey had left just a few hours ago to catch his flight to Nashville, thankfully the muffins were finished in time so they can have something to snack on while heading over to the capital of country music. Ugh, country music, I had to deal with that when I was growing up with Jenny.

Christina and I just returned from her doctor’s appointment, thankfully that the girls decided to come over to watch the game and to hang out before and after the game. Hopefully, for the love of god, they go home. I love my friends, but damn they are here too much.

Sarah, Kat, Ashley, Amy and I were all relaxing on the outdoor couches with the fire going like we did a few weeks ago, and Christina playing in her sandbox. We were all talking about how we’re so excited for the playoff games to start and then we started talking about our lovely brackets that we created.

“So, who did you guys have winning the cup this year?” Ashley asked all of us.

“The Wings.” Sarah said.

“Rangers.” I replied.

“Blackhawks” Kat answered.

“Montreal.” Amy squealed, causing us to look over at her.

“What the hell was the squeal for?” I looked at her curiously.

“I just want my home to win a Cup again.” Amy pouted, looking down at the floor.

I rolled my eyes and shook my head “Listen, y’all have 24 wins. We need a chance. And by us, I mean Rangers, because you know, they haven’t had a win since the OJ trial, and I’m getting really old.” I pointed out, causing everyone to shake their heads and laugh.

“Auntie Ashley, can you help me with the sandbox please?” Christina asked when she approached us, giving everyone a smile after asking.

“Is it the sandcastle? Yeah I saw you were…” Ashley spoke, her voice trailing off while she and Christina walked away.

Taking out my phone, I decided to quickly send Corey and good luck text, along with Henrik, from the Rangers, a text as well. Even though they have a game tomorrow, game 2 to be exact, and I wanted to send him and his team a good luck.

~~~~ Corey’s POV ~~~~

After receiving a good luck text from Jamila, I placed my phone back into the stall and looked up when Coach Q came into the room. As always giving us pointers and all of that good stuff. At least I was grateful to know that I have people watching from home, other than the fans. Who are probably wishing I get pulled, but oh well, that tends to happen almost every game anyway, I have gotten used to it.

As we all were getting up to make out way to the ice, all I saw was yellow. I swear to god, I wasn’t hallucinating or anything, but literally everything was yellow. Some say gold, but that was nothing but bullshit. Yellow is such an odd color, please god, don’t ever make me get traded to this god for saking team.

“Corey!” Kane yelled as he skated over to me.

“What?” I looked up at him with a curious look.

“You’ll be fine. We’re all counting on you. Just breathe.” Kane smiled taking his stick on my goalie pads, giving him a nod as a thank you.

This is going to be one hell of a period, let me tell you that.

***

Looking up at the clock to see that it’s been almost 6 minutes into the period, was just looking upon everything that was happening at the other end of the ice, and next thing I know, Colin Wilson, comes out of nowhere and scores. I’m not pissed off, I’m just a little bit flabbergasted that this even happened.

Then a few minutes went by and boom Viktor scores. Weren’t we on the same team?! Fucking asshole, now I’m pissed. I don’t even know what’s going on but I’m seeing red. Score is 2-0 what am I supposed to do.

3-0 later… What the fuck?! I’m disappointing a lot of people right now, mostly myself. What the hell?! Can this night get any worse?

Thank god it was time for intermission. When I heard that sound, I quickly skated off the ice and into the locker room. All I could do was keep my head down because that’s all I could do that this point.

~~~ My POV; Start of Second Period ~~~

“Mommy, mommy hurry! The game is starting!” Christina yelled from the living room.

I had to quickly whip up something to eat because we were running out of food. This is what happens when you have everyone over. And by everyone, I mean my, oh so loving friends, who likes to eat all of my stuff. They’re going to start paying for stuff, just you wait.

“I’m coming!” I hollered, coming back into the living room with all of the food and drinks.

The first period, was awful, I’ll give you that. Just horrible, but I really hope it didn’t get to the guys already, this isn’t going to be good if they are already down 3-0 and can’t come back from it. That’ll be terrible, and I won’t hear the last of it from the people in the gym. Those people complain a lot.

“Jammy, if the guys win, you better give Corey some good P-H-O-N-E space –S-E-X!” Kat spelled out when she took her food from the tray as the buzzer for the second period began.

“The fact that you spelled that out amuses me a lot.” Sarah laughed as continued to braid Christina’s hair….I won’t say continued, I would say attempted. Poor thing doesn’t know what she’s doing.

As the second period went underway, I crossed my legs over one another and looked directly at the TV, squinting my eyes and then making them pop open again numerous of times. If you can’t tell I’m nervous, well… I’m nervous.

“Jamila if you keep doing that, you’re going to end up needing those magnifying glasses type of glasses.” Ashley laughed while she kept looking back and forth with me and the TV.

“I’m freaking out here, damn. I kind of what a happy husband to talk to after this game.” I muttered, taking a sip from my cherry cola. “Kiss my ass Trashley.” I stuck my tongue out.

“Rude!” She glared, just as Hjalmarsson scored.

“Yay! Uncle Hammer!” Christina jumped, her small little hands raising up in the air.

“Did you teach her the nicknames?” Amy asked me.

I shook my head, “When she was starting to talk, more and more, Corey taught her everyone’s name, but she had a hard time with it, so he settled with the nicknames.” I shrugged my shoulders.

“Fair enough, at least she’s learning.” Kat smiled.

“Mommy where’s daddy?” Christina pouted as she looked at me and over at the TV, “Mommy?”

“Honey, Joel probably pulled him from the game. It’s okay sweetheart.” I quickly told Christina, hoping that she’ll get the concept just a bit.

Poor thing still doesn’t understand that when goalies are pulled, they’ve let in way too many goals, or well easy goals at that. Christina just looked at me, but her frown had deepened more because of the fact that I told her that her dad isn’t coming back into the game. Just a heartbreaking experience to watch with her.

***

“End of the first Overtime.” The announcer from the NBC sports team said, causing all of us to groan.

“What the hell man!” Ashley groaned, covering her face with the pillow.

“Why is this even going on? Who are these goalies?!” I whimpered, looking over at the time to see that it was 11 at night, way past Chrissy’s bedtime. Even though it was way past bedtime, that little butterfly was hyper as ever. This is not how I imagined a game one game.

But at least they tied up the game in the second! But it’s cutting into my beauty rest. I jumped slightly when I heard my phone go off, hearing that it was Taylor’s text message tone. I reached over to get my phone, looked at the message and read it out loud;

“Tell your husband and his dumb team to score. I have an OB/GYN appointment tomorrow!” I read, causing everyone to laugh.

“She has the right to call our team dumb. When's the Kings next game? Oh right… in September.” Kat spattered.

“That’s something we would tell Matt.” Sarah ginned, popping another chip in her mouth.

Rolling my eyes, I just replied saying to shut the hell up and go to bed “I’m too tired to even type anything sarcastic right now.” I groaned.

When the buzzer rang for the second overtime, we all tried to wake each other up somehow and shockingly it worked. We just needed a lot of sugar and loudness. Seven minutes and forty-nine seconds in, Duncan Keith in the goal winner.

“YES!” We all cheered, finally happy that it’s over.

“I see daddy!” Christina jumped as she pointed to the TV.

“Alright, alright everyone! Settle down, settle down!” Amy waved her hands as she stood in front of all of us.

“Jammy can we stay here? I’m too lazy to drive.” Ashley asked.

“Me too.” Said Sarah.

“Me three!” Kat piped in.

“When don’t you butts stay here?” I rolled my eyes playfully.

I decided to let the girls stay anyway because I’m a kind and generous person like that and I wasn’t going to let them drive home extremely tired. We watched a couple of shows before we all went upstairs into our respected rooms. I walked Christina into her room and tucked her in.

“Mommy?” Christina asked softly before I walked out of the room.

“Yes pumpkin?”

“Did daddy still win even if he didn’t play anymore?” She asked curiously.

This poor thing has so much to learn…

To be continued….