My Hockey Alpha

Nina

The morning after my motorcycle ride with Enzo, I woke up to dozens of Twitter notifications. Still blinking the sleep out of my eyes, I scrunched up my eyebrows as I opened my phone and started to read all of the notifications.

“Wowwww @ninaharpı, alone time with Enzo, huh?”

“Enzo must be joking if he’s hanging around with that ugly nerd @ ninaharpı!!”

“What a slut, messing around with two boys from the hockey team at once. Save some for the rest of us @ ninaharpı!”

I sat up in bed, my eyes glued to the phone as I opened Twitter and realized that someone snuck pictures of Enzo and I last night. There were pictures of me talking to Justin in the parking lot, a picture of me as I shoved Justin to the ground, Enzo wiping the tears from my cheek, and getting on his motorcycle together.

I knew I shouldn’t have trusted him. This was just another step in the game he was playing with me!

As I looked at the time, I realized that I had class in twenty minutes. I jumped out of bed and threw on some jeans and a t-shirt, quickly braided my hair and brushed my teeth, and ran out of my room.

Jessica was standing in the kitchen when I came out of my room. She looked up from making her coffee briefly, then looked back down. Even in that brief moment, I could see tears in her eyes.

“It was really nothing,” I said, assuming that she already saw the photos. “Justin was harassing me and Enzo just happened to show up. He drove me home.”

“Enzo seems to just magically appear around 1 you a lot lately,” she grumbled as she poured her coffee.

I sighed and adjusted my bag on my shoulder. “It was just a coincidence,” I said.

Jessica suddenly slammed the coffee pot down, sloshing coffee on the counter. “Bullshit,” she said, glaring at me as tears streamed down her cheeks. “What is your relationship with him, really?”

I looked down at the floor and bit my lip. “I’m just the team doctor,” I replied. “But not for long. I’m gonna talk to the dean today and get reassigned.”

he looks at you,” Jessica said,

hard time believing it then. Now I know something is going on without a doubt.

I wanted to be honest with Jessica about everything, but right now I had to

said, “I’ll tell you everything later. But I’m

away and grabbed a paper towel to start

from other girls. I kept my head down and sat in the back of the lecture hall; the girls who I sat next to got up and moved seats when I sat down, making me feel even more like a pariah. I just tried to keep my head down and pretend like I was looking at my

down next to me. I looked up to see Lisa sitting beside me

Lisa,” I said, rummaging through my bag

scoffed. “I told you to stay away from both of them,” she growled. “We had

I replied. “But all of this is out of my control. I didn’t ask to be the team

she said, raising her voice. “For all I know, you probably slept with someone

started whispering amongst themselves. Lisa, pleased with herself, stomped off to sit

was the first to leave the room

in the quad, who seemed to be the only

“I can’t take this anymore. I feel like I’ve got

bullseye exactly,” she said, pulling

grabbed the paper and winced.

paper said. I whirled around to see a

waving the paper

me away. “Ignore them,” she said, grabbing the paper from my hands and crumpling it before throwing

gotten involved with Justin or Enzo,” I said, fighting back tears as

you,” she replied. “That whole team

room and not have to deal with any of the bullying. So long as I didn’t look at my