My Hockey Alpha

Nina

“Why were you two saying my name so much just now?” Eli asked quietly as he blocked my way to the door.

I furrowed my brow. “We weren’t. What are you talking about?”

Eli shook his head. “I heard you. You kept saying the name ‘Enzo’.”

My eyes widened. His name wasn’t Enzo. It was Eli… Right? For a moment, my heart skipped a beat as I looked up at him, searching his face for some sign that he really was Enzo; but unlike before, his face never shifted or changed. He stayed looking just the same as he was now: an unfamiliar face.

It must have been some sort of sick prank.

“That’s not funny,” I growled. Eli stared at me with wide eyes, but I just pushed past him and through the door, out into the cold night air.

“Wait!” he called, running after me. “I’m serious.”

I scoffed. “Sure you are,” I replied, holding my arms as I walked briskly through the cold night air. “Did Sadie send you? Is this some sort of prank to get more dirt on me?”

sent me,” he said quietly.

cold. Part of me wanted to turn around and run to him, as though Enzo would be standing there when I turned to face him, but I knew that wasn’t the case. All of this was just some sort of nasty prank;

and without turning around to look at Eli,

I arrived back at home, I ran to my room and ripped off the dress that Eli had given me. Without thinking, I shoved it into a plastic trash bag at the back of my closet, pulled on some pajamas, and promptly threw myself down onto my

I heard Lori and Jessica come home. They must have heard me crying, because my door quietly clicked open, and the next thing I knew someone was rubbing my back gently while I

…

been asleep for two, maybe three hours.

in my bed. In fact, I quickly realized from the feel of the freezing cold biting against the side of

open. I sat up abruptly, looking around

I got my bearings, I knew

saw Enzo stepping through

out here in my pajamas. My hands and my feet were freezing; when I looked down at them, they were bright red from the cold. I quickly shoved my hands into my armpits and shivered, looking around frantically as though a Crescent, or even Selena, would suddenly burst out of the shadows and

was silent, aside from

not if I wanted to keep all of my fingers. A light snow had even begun to fall, leaving a light dusting on the crunchy, dry leaves beneath my feet. If I didn’t get home now, I

had somehow managed to sleepwalk out into the middle of the woods and wake up next to the portal, and somehow I knew it wouldn’t be the last. I would have to tell Jessica and Lori to lock me in my room at night, otherwise I really would