My Hockey Alpha

We entered the arena, which was already packed full with excited students. Half of the arena was reserved for our university, while the other half was reserved for the other university. Our school colors were burgundy and gold — the other university was blue and black.

“Let’s find a good seat,” Jessica said. I followed her up the stairs, then we shimmied between rows of seats toward a couple of empty spots. Once we had our seats, I could hear the conversation between other girls around me; their talking points mostly centered around Enzo.

“Do you think he’ll make us win again?”

“Of course! Enzo always plays perfectly.”

“I feel so lucky just to be attending the same university as him!”

I cringed a bit at the conversation and scrolled on my phone while I waited for the game to start. Beside me, Jessica pulled out a pair of binoculars and started scouring the ice rink. I can see the cheerleaders performing an energetic opening dance on ice skates before the game, with Lisa in the lead. She looked dazzling in her skimpy uniform, with her perfectly tanned legs and platinum blonde hair pulled up into a high ponytail with a bow. She waved her pom poms around to hype the crowd up. Looking at the girl who stole my boyfriend made me sick.

I had never been much of a sports fan, but the way the crowd was getting excited made me excited, too. As the hockey players skated out onto the rink, some of them skated up to certain cheerleaders who were their girlfriends and kissed them publicly. I could see Justin and Lisa exchange glances.

Justin had never brought me to his games, even though we had been dating for a couple of months. When I did go to his games, he never paid any attention to me until after. I thought that he was just shy at the time, but now I knew that he just didn’t want Lisa seeing us together.

“Don’t pay any attention to Justin,” Jessica said, handing me the binoculars so I could see better. “He’s not worth your time.”

searched for Enzo. I didn’t know why I wanted to see him so

And he saw me.

as though he had a sixth sense, like he knew exactly where I was

out to the middle of the rink, skating around in circles and pumping his hockey stick in the air while the crowd cheered. All around me, girls screamed and swooned while guys whooped

able to follow the game by watching Enzo, who skated as fast as lightning and moved nimbly around the rink as though he was born with ice skates on his feet. He would perform quick moves with his hockey stick to fake out the opponents, hitting the puck between their legs to one of his teammates before zooming away. He moved

opponents became frustrated and aggressive. One player in particular — I think he was the captain of the other team — started following Enzo closely and trying

“C’mon, Enzo!” Jessica shouted.

get hurt,” another girl said from beside me, sitting up in her seat to see over someone in front

scored a goal, and suddenly, the other team’s captain threw his stick and his helmet down on the ice and tackled Enzo. The crowd gasped as they tussled on the ice. The other player threw punches at Enzo while Enzo only blocked and dodged, clearly not wanting to

realized how much pressure was on Enzo as the star hockey player. I held my breath as I watched the fight, images of us in bed flashing in my mind. For some reason, I cared enough about Enzo to not want him

whistle and broke up the fight. The crowd cheered as Enzo stood and put his helmet back on, covering his curly brown hair.

to the rink and began their halftime

I said to Jessica. She looked at me and shrugged, too involved in her conversation with another girl about how hot Enzo looked dodging the unsportsmanlike competitor during the fight. As long as I had known her,

row, then went down the bleachers toward the food stands. My stomach was growling and the smell of soft pretzels was making me even

I said to the

then, I felt someone watching me