Page 19 of A Shot at Love
Aside from being here with you?Jules nearly said. She gave it some serious thought for a moment, seeing her life flash through her head in moments of sacrifice. She saw herself trailing behind Cam, felt how badly she wanted so much more for herself but always pasted on a smile because she had to be happy for him.
He was doing it all for their parents. It’s what he said all the time. “This is for them, Jules. To honour them.”
Jules wanted to honour them too and if she could do anything, she would be on the ice. She would have her name on the back of a jersey that someone wore because of her and not because of who she was related to.
“I would be playing professionally,” she confessed. “I would be on the ice every day. Cam wouldn’t be the only Clarke making waves in the sport.”
No one knew that, not even Cameron. It was a dream she’d kept to herself since she was forced to give up the sport so her twin brother could thrive in a world that gave him so many more opportunities than she would ever have.
It sometimes felt like when their parents died, Jules had lost three things she loved. She was still in the world of hockey but her place in it was not the same as her brother’s.
Frankie smiled and gave her arm a squeeze then leaned back in her seat. “I thought so.”
“Really?” Jules asked, her pulse thundering, her body already missing Frankie’s touch.
Silence stretched between them for a few seconds before Frankie bobbed her head in agreement and the smile on her face shifted into something more playful.
“I see you, Jules,” she said. “And I’m going to make it my mission to get you back on the ice, I promise.”
I see you, Jules.
What was she meant to do with that?
Chapter 11
“Yes, good, good!” Frankie shouted as she skated back to the blue line then passed another puck to a player who then passed it to his teammate and circled around the net. He parked himself by the far side of the net and waited for the perfect pass back to him so he could tap it in.
In theory and on screen when you’re watching a game, it looked easy, like he was wide open and sure, he was, but there were so many factors involved in getting him the puck for that easy tap in.
“Cycle! Find a lane!” She yelled, watching the group of guys on the ice in blue practice jerseys circle around the players wearing black ones.
The timer on her watch beeped and she blew her whistle then looked down at the white board in her hand. Sighing, she gave her head a shake then skated to the bench to grab a drink of water as the guys did the same. Her first line for power plays wasn’t working the way she wanted it to but it was very much a work in progress and luckily, this is what training camp was for.
”I think if Mason releases the puck half a second earlier there it could slip through to me,” Cam said as he skated up beside her.
Frankie swallowed and nodded, glancing back at the net. “I agree,” she said. “But he wasn’t in the right spot. He needs to try to get to the point and it might need another pass before it gets to you. You’re right though, it’s happening too slowly with this play.”
”So what’s the fix then, coach?” He asked, a boyish smile on his face that she knew drove all the girls crazy. He was a charmer, no denying it, but she was impressed by his dedication to the game and his professionalism on the ice, especially in practice. He wanted to get better and in doing so, helped everyone around him to do the same.
The rest of her team skated up to join her and Cameron by the bench so they could all take a breath and have a drink. Everyone knelt in a half circle in front of her and waited for whatever came next.
She turned around and looked at the choppy ice around the net and tried to visualize the moment during a game. They’d been at it for an hour and a half so far and she was happy with their progress but she could tell some of the players were getting frustrated by repeating the same sequences over and over again.
But that’s how you learned plays, that’s how you became comfortable with your line mates movements, how you anticipated what their first pass would be, their speed.
“The fix is we can’t assume when someone will stick check and I can tell that some of you are expecting it,” she said.
“Well, our first pre-season game is against Detroit and some of their penalty killers are known for it,” said Myles Christian, a right wing forward who had come to the team from Anaheim.
Frankie nodded because she knew he was right, but Detroit also signed two new defenders at the top of the summer who were shoe-ins to make the season opening roster and would be in the line-up during their pre-season game in two weeks.
“That may be true,” Frankie said, looking between the players on the ice in front of her, all of them waiting and questioning her next move, silently judging her decisions based on their own experience and not hers.
“But we can’t play like wethinkwe know what’s going to happen next, we need to play based on what’s happeningnowbecause when we anticipate the next move, oftentimes we’re wrong and then they clear the puck or worse, get a hold of the puck. Boom, short handed goal. We need to make them think they know what’s going to happen next and prove them wrong.”
“And how do we do that?” Myles asked.
“You do a fake out,” Jake Ashton called out from where he knelt at the back of the group with his goalie helmet cradled in his arms, his stick standing tall like a trident in his free hand.
