“I knew you had it in you, Gret.” The elation on my dad’s face was something I had strived to see since I was a kid.
“Thanks, coach.” I gave him a wink before turning to cheer on my teammates that were fighting to keep our enemies for the evening away from our goal.
The seconds ticked down and we were victorious. We all leapt to our feet and celebrated as the small number of our fans that made it to our away game cheered and chanted.
As I hugged my old man, I caught a glimpse of Etta’s intoxicating smile as she jumped and clapped in the stands.
“She made it,” I muttered under my breath.
“Who, son?” My dad asked.
“Etta. She came.” I yelled back.
“That’s sweet of your girl to make the trip all the way out here.”
I didn’t even think about it. I rushed to the locked room, grabbed my cellphone, ripped off my skates and ran through the maze of the arena in my socks to find my girl.
Dialing Etta, I huffed and puffed as my aching muscles and blown out knee screamed at me to stop, but there was no way I was going to.
“Gret?” Etta yelled into the phone.
“Where are you?” I panted.
“Fighting the crowd to get out of this place.”
“Come to the back entrance. Just tell the security guards you’re with me and you can have them call me if they need to.”
Waiting by the back stairs, I paced as sweat poured out of me.
I was gross from the game and my nerves were making it that much worse.
Etta finally joined me.
“I can’t believe you made it,” I sighed, leaning against the far wall.
She took a few steps closer. “Neither can I to be honest. I would have been here for the whole game but my flight got delayed because of the snow storm. I am so happy that I got to see you guys win though. It was a lot of fun. I even got a shirt, see,” she rambled nervously as she pulled at the ends of her Ollie shirt.
“It looks amazing on you,” I grabbed her hand. “Thank you for coming.”
“Thank you for inviting me.”
Without thinking about it, I crushed my lips to hers. They were so soft and perfect. And then the best thing in the world happened—she kissed me back.
Picking her up, I twirled her around without breaking contact.
Pulling away a little, Etta giggled, “What do we do now?”
“We celebrate.”
Etta
I waitedfor Gret to get cleaned up and meet me at my hotel.
Gret: Down stairs.
Me: Coming down now.
I rushed for the car that was waiting for me out front. Gret was in a beat-up t-shirt and faded jeans. A total contrast to my long dress and fancy coat.