Just when I felt the first tear fall onto my hands I saw two sock covered feet in front of mine. I looked up and saw Cassie standing in front of me. She didn't say anything but sat down next to me and took my hand in hers. After taking a look at it she pressed an ice pack to my red knuckles.
"Becca texted and told me about practice. I know you're frustrated but it will come babe, you just have to give yourself more time. Breaking sticks and punching doors isn't going to help you out either." Cassie said and kissed my temple.
I didn't say anything for a while, still trying to calm down from everything that happened at practice. When I had a better handle on my emotions I leaned my head against Cassies shoulder.
"Coach might pull me from going to Boston next weekend if I didn't change my attitude." I said.
"So next week you go into practice with a better attitude. You can still be frustrated but use it to fuel your recovery." Cassie said.
I took what Cassie said and stored it in my brain for later. We eventually got up off the floor and moved over to the couch and that's where we stayed for most of the night. I was still pretty mad and I actually went out for a little bit just to get out of the dorm. I didn't want my mood to rub off on Cassie because none of this was her fault and she has been so great with helping me over the past few weeks. So I took a pain killer and went back to the rink. Nobody was going to be on the ice till later that night so I asked the manager if I could skate around. He said yes and I was left with the keys for the Zamboni to just cut the ice after I was done.
Skating around by myself made me feel a bit better. Even though my side hurt and would be really sore for the next few days, I needed to burn off this frustration before I went back home. Talking about my problems aren't going to help make these feelings go away. I had a front row seat to see what this kind of frustration could do to relationships and I didn't want that to happen to Cassie and I. So I just stayed at the rink. When I was done skating, I dropped my skates back into my locker and I went back to the rink to cut the ice. As I got off the Zamboni I saw coach standing just at the entrance to the tunnel. He didn't say anything and neither did I, after the stare down he turned his back and walked down the tunnel. I dropped the keys to the Zamboni on the managers desk before walking back to the dorm.
That weekend I didn't watch the game. It was the first time since the concussion I didn't watch one of my teams games. I was still a bit annoyed from dealing with coach from the week that I didn't want to watch the game. So instead Cassie and I went to the football game and had a nice night out. We joined a few of her friends in a tail gate for most of the day before the game started in the late afternoon. By the time we got into the gates of the football stadium we were both pleasantly drunk and were having a good time with her friends.
As we left the stadium a little bit early Cassie and I managed to snag two more beers from a tail gate still going on for the walk back to the dorm. The mid-November air made us walk a little faster back to our dorm then I wanted to go, but we were both happy to be back in our warmer dorm room. When we got there Cassie pushed me up against the wall and pressed her lips hard into mine. It took me a bit off guard but I just followed her lead and was happy that the cut on my lip finally healed completely.
Before this, our make out sessions wouldn't last too long. They would be just long enough to get us both riled up before usually Cassie would slow them down and then I would take a long cold shower to calm down. I was willing to wait however long Cassie needed, I would never rush her if she wasn't ready. So I was surprised at the forcefulness in Cassies kisses right now, but I wasn't going to complain. I just followed her lead.
Cassie pulled away from my lips and I almost chased after her. When I opened my eyes I found her green eyes shining bright into mine. Before I could ask if she was okay Cassie reached down and pulled her shirt over her head. We must have pushed coats off somewhere in the middle of our heated kiss and my eyes found hers. Cassie didn't say anything but reached down again to the bottom of my shirt and pulled it clean over my head.
"Are you sure about this?" I asked wanting to make sure Cassie was in a head space to consent to this.
"Yes I'm sure Mac." Cassie said forced me back up against the wall.
I was a bit shocked again but this time it was more from my back hitting the cold wall. Cassie pulled her lips away from my lips and started to kiss down my neck to my collar bone while I managed to kick my boots off. Once they were off I bent down grabbed Cassie thighs and lifted her up. She seamlessly wrapped her legs around my waist and bit down hard on my neck, no doubt leaving a hickey as I walked us towards her bedroom.
When I got there, I carefully placed her down on the bed and bent down on one knee to pulled her boots off. Once they were gone I looked up to find Cassie biting her lip. I didn't say anything as I unbuttoned my jeans and pulled them off my legs. After they were on the ground Cassie stood from the bed and wrapped her arms around my waist. She leaned in and gave me a soft kiss on the lips. When she pulled away she was holding my bra in her hands and a wicked smirk on her face.
"I'll give it to you, that was smooth." I said and gave her a smile.
"Why thank you, hey can you help me out of these?" Cassie asked and bit her lip looking down at her jeans.
I nodded and undid the button and the zipper. Cassie did a little shimmy and I pulled her jeans off her hips and down her legs. When the jeans got to her ankles I felt Cassie put her hands on my shoulders for balance as I pulled them completely off her legs. Once they were gone I got back up and Cassies eyes were dark with want and I picked her up again and put her on the bed before I climbed on I gave her a kiss and undid her bra. When I came up for air with her bra in my hand, Cassie was laughing and laid down on the bed pulling me with her.
Even though I had to be careful of my ribs, our first time together was everything I wanted it to be. Slow, sweet, full of laughs, moans and everything in between. After a while I lost count of how many rounds we went, just that I was getting tired. So I gave Cassies stomach a kiss and laid my head there as well while my hands wandered to her hip. I started to trace small patterns on her hip and thigh while Cassies hand ran through my hair.
I started to feel my eyes start to droop at the actions and my hand went farther down her thigh to her knee. Her hand stopped running through my hair. I could hear the sharp intake of breath come from Cassie and I opened my eyes fully and looked down. This whole time I've been running my hand up and down her bad leg. The patterns I've been tracing are the healed burn scars.
I placed my hand lightly on her upper thigh and turned to find her eyes. When I focused on Cassies face I saw eyes were fixed squarely on the ceiling with her jaw clenched and she wouldn't look at me.
"Hey" I said and took my hand away from her leg completely and brought it to her chin. It took a few second but I was able to bring her head down and her eyes met mine. I could see the storm of emotions in them and I didn't know which one I wanted to touch on first.
"I'm sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable Cas. I did realize it was your left leg and I won't again if you don't want me too." I said wanting her to know I'll do whatever she needs.
"No Mac, it's okay, I just, I've never had, uhm, that was my first time after the fire. You're just the first to see my leg like this, or even feel it, I don't let anyone else but doctors really feel it, hell I don't even really like to feel it. It's just a lot of emotions to go through at once." Cassie said leaned into me.
"Does it bother you if I touch your leg?" I asked again because Cassie didn't give me a clear answer.
"It's weird for me emotionally but I want you to go back to it." Cassie said with her eyebrows furrowed.
I didn't say anything else but just kissed her chin. I slowly got up from her bed and ran to the bathroom for a minute to get ready for bed and clean up a bit. Once I got there I saw dark hickey Cassie left me on my collar bone from when I first picked her up and brought her to her room. It made me smile and I rinse my mouth and washed my face. After I was done I went back to Cassie's room and found her sitting up in bed. We switched places and Cassie went to the bathroom to clean up and I slipped into a clean pair of underwear before sliding into Cassies bed.
Cassie joined me a few minutes later in a pair of boxer shorts and she took her spot right next to me. I wrapped my arms around her and held her close to me.
"I love you so much Cas" I said and ran a hand up and down her spine.
"I love you too McKenna" Cassie said and gave me a kiss before settling down again.
It didn't take long before both of us fell asleep after our long day together. When I woke up Cassie was just starting to stir next to me and I burrowed my head into the back of her neck. It seemed to settle her down a bit and I almost ended up falling back asleep. But Cassie turned over onto her back and I rolled into her side to cuddle. I could tell Cassie was awake when her arms wrapped around my waist.
"Good morning" I said quietly.
"Good morning love" Cassie said and kissed the top of my head.
"Are you hungover?" I asked as I started to feel a headache settle in.
"Probably, I haven't moved to much to notice it yet." Cassie said.
"Lets go to the diner for breakfast." I said and burrowed deeper into Cassies neck and heard her laugh.
"If the team found out how much of a mush you are, you would never be able to live it down." Cassie said when she calmed down.
"But I'm your mush." I said and felt Cassie run a hand through my messy bed hair.
"That you are, how about we get some food in that stomach of yours to try and soak up the alcohol from yesterday." Cassie said and loosened her hold on me.
"Fine" I grumbled and slowly started to peal myself away from Cassie.
As we got up, I let Cassie jump into the shower first as I striped her bed from last nights activities. Just as I finished putting fresh sheets on it I heard the water stop running. I put the sheets in a laundry basket and started to pick up all the clothes we dropped in our rush to the bedroom last night. They joined the sheets in the basket as Cassie came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel. I just stood there and watched her for a few seconds before I got a face full of towel.
"Go shower McKenna." Cassie said. I pulled the towel away from my face and gave her a glare before walking off to the shower.
My shower was quick and it did make me feel a bit less hungover. Once I had some food in my stomach, I would be right as rain. So after I finished up my shower, I got dressed in some sweats and grabbed my boots. Cassie was waiting for me in the living room dressed and ready to go. Once I finished lacing up my boots, Cassie and I left the dorm. Just as we got outside I could feel the chill in the air and I looked up to the sky.
"It's going to snow soon." Cassie said and took my hand in hers.
"Looks like I'm going to need to start wearing my coat." I said and kissed the top of her head.
We walked the few streets it was to the diner and when we got inside we managed to get the last empty table. As we sat down our waiter came over and started us off with coffee while we looked over the menu. It didn't take us long to make our choices though as we were both pretty hungry. After he came back and took our orders I pulled my phone out of my pocket to take a look at it as I haven't since yesterday afternoon.
I had a lot of missed notifications but the one that caught my eye at the top of the screen was the score from yesterday's game against Dartmouth. We lost 3-1.
"Shit" I said and opened the article to read about the game.
"What happened?" Cassie asked.
"We lost yesterday 3-1." I said and started to skim the article. One thing I noticed is that the writer expected me to be in the game. After I got through that article I googled the score and found a few other articles that all asked about where I was and why wasn't I playing or even on the trip. After reading the third article asking the same question I put my phone down.
"What happened?" Cassie asked as I tried to not let it get to me.
"The sport writers were asking where I was and why wasn't I on the trip, coach just said I wasn't ready to go and didn't make the trip, which of course is a lie." I said and rubbed my head.
Before Cassie could response the waiter came over with our orders. The food put me in a better mood and not before long I let it go completely. As we finished up our food the waiter topped off our coffee and I just sighed.
"What's on your mind." Cassie asked.
"Hockey, but I don't want to think about it. I just want to try and plan out Christmas and New Years with you if that's okay." I asked.
"Sure, are you going to go home?" Cassie asked.
"I'm going to talk to my mom about it when I go home next week to hammer everything out. I still have practice in the beginning of December then we get a break till the second week of January. I was thinking about just going home for a few days for Christmas when mom can get off work then coming back here to spend New Year's with you." I said and wrapped my hands around my mug of coffee.
"I like that idea. When you figure out the dates you are going home, I'll work around that and we can talk about New Year's. I'll very much like to have a New Year's kiss with you at midnight." Cassie said and bit her lip.
I gave Cassie a smile and leaned over the table to give her a kiss. Cassie laughed in the middle of the kiss and I couldn't help but smile as I sat back down on my side of the booth. We finished off our coffees and then I paid the bill before we left the diner and made our way back to the dorm. On our walk back to the dorm it started to snow and I couldn't help but just stop in the middle of the sidewalk and look up at the sky. Of course the snow would start already. I just closed my eyes and felt the little snowflakes hit my face for what felt like a few minutes. When I opened them again I saw Cassie watching me intently and I felt a hot tear fall down my cheek.
Cassie didn't say anything but just reached a hand up and wiped the tear away from my cheek. A few more followed the firsts path and all I could think is that I let my team down by not being there for them but I wouldn't have wanted to change this weekend here with Cassie at all. Two halves of my heart didn't know how to handle it all.
"What's wrong babe?" Cassie asked and I just sighed and looked her in the eyes.
"I want it all but I feel like I can't have both without sacrificing the other." I said and dropped my gaze.
I felt Cassie's hand under my chin and she forcefully pushed my chin back up to meet her stare. Her eyes held a fire and I felt like she was about to burn me.
"I want you to realize that you have me McKenna and I'm not going anywhere. I understand you play a very demanding sport that pulls you away for a lot of the year. But I want you to realize that I'm not going anywhere and there is no reason why you should feel like you have to sacrifice hockey or me. I love you and I'm not going to let you go easily." Cassie said with a fire in her eyes.
I couldn't help but pull Cassie into a kiss. It was hard and rough and full of clashing teeth and biting lips. When I pulled away the snow was still falling around us but the rest of the world was quiet. It felt like we were standing in our own personal snow globe.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have put that on you." I said.
"No, I want to thank you for being honest with me about how you are feeling Mac. But how about next time we have these heart to heart chats inside where it's not currently snowing." Cassie said and wiped a snow flake off her face.
"I think it's kind of romantic." I said and smiled.
"Maybe if we were dressed for the occasion but we aren't so lets go." Cassie said and took my hand pulling me off into the direction of our dorm room.
The walk back was a bit rushed as Cassie was pretty cold. I was kind of used to it from being on the ice all the time from hockey, but I didn't say anything, I just let her pull me along. Before we walked back into the dorm hall, I threw my arm around her neck and pulled her back into my front to get a selfie of us. Cassie started laughing as I got a few pictures of the two of us before she had enough of me and pushed my arm off of her and walked inside.
I met her inside a few seconds later and we walked back upstairs to our dorm room together. When we got there, Cassie went into her room and changed into a dry pair of sweats and I did the same. Once I was done I made my way over to the couch and dropped onto it. While Cassie was still changing I took a look at the pictures I took a few minutes ago and I picked one I wanted to post. My eyes were on Cassie's face as she was smiling bright right before she started laughing. Once I got the picture right I typed out a caption, Right where I want to be, and hit send.
I didn't bother tagging Cassie in the picture because I knew she would see it once she opened the Instagram. Cassie bounced over to me after coming out of her room and settled down on the couch right in between my legs. Once she was settled Cassie threw a blanket over both of us while I turned on the TV. My teams game is on right now but I don't feel like watching so I put on Thor Ragnarok and let Cassie cuddle farther into me.
That was how we spent the rest of the weekend, cuddled together watching random movies on the couch. When Cassie saw the Instagram photo of us together, I felt her leave a kiss on my neck and I couldn't help the blush from my cheeks. She ended up posting another one of the pictures I took, one of me smiling like a goof and her laughing at me. As it got later into the afternoon and evening I decided to cook dinner for the both of us. I ended up making penne alla vodka with some grilled chicken. As I finished up dinner Cassie opened a bottle of wine and we sat together to eat at the table.
We talked a bit more about our week coming up and the next time Cassie is going home for PT. I wanted to go with her for moral support but she made the appointment for when I'll be in Boston. As we finished up dinner my phone started to blow up. I sighed and was about to put it on do not disturb when I got a phone call from Becca. I looked up at Cassie and she gave me the okay to answer the call.
"Yea?" I asked hoping to keep this call short.
"Reporters were already questioning coaches decision about you not being on this trip, and then you post that picture with you and Cassie with that caption. Coach is livid McKenna. You're lucky we won tonight otherwise he probably would cut your head off." Becca said quietly. It sounded like she was getting ready to board the flight back to Wisconsin and snuck off to make this call.
"He said I needed to change my attitude, and I did. He got what he wanted Becca, so this is on him." I answered looking at Cassie. I reach my hand out to her and Cassie took mine in hers. I brought it to my lips and kissed her knuckles.
"You guys did look cute together. We actually just landed and are picking up our baggage now so we'll be back at the school soon. I just wanted to give you a warning." Becca said.
"How did the team take my post?" That was my main concern.
"They are fine with it. They were all kind of pissed at coach for kicking you off this trip. We have your back McKenna. I'll send you a text when we get back to campus." Becca said.
We didn't speak much longer and hung up. I was happy I got the heads up from her thoough. Cassie and I finished the last of our dinner before I put everything into the sink to start cleaning up. Cassie tried to fight me on doing the dishes but I wouldn't let her. I made the mess and I was going to clean it up. Cassie just sat close to me on the counter and finished off her glass of wine.
After the dishes were washed Cassie and I returned to the couch and she picked a movie for us to watch. It didn't take long for us to get tired from the big dinner and the wine so we got up from the couch and got ready for bed. When we were done Cassie pulled me into my room and we got into bed together. Once we got settled I pressed my lips to Cassies forehead and I could feel her smile where her lips rested on my shoulder. It didn't take long after that for both of us to fall asleep.
a/n: sorry but no smut. you guys should know by now i dont really like writing it. song for this chapter is Lay It Down by Illenium and Krewella.