Page 8 of Goal Line (Boston Rebels #4)
Chapter Seven
LUKE
“ H artmannnnnnn.” Amy drags out my name, like she can’t quite figure out how to make her mouth form proper sounds.
Given the number of birthday shots she’s already done, and the way she’s double-fisting some shot glass concoction with whipped cream on top, I’m hardly surprised. “Do another birthday shot with me?”
My eyes lock on Eva’s, and the performative smile she’s struggling to maintain indicates she’s ready to go.
Not that anyone else would be able to tell.
She’s been happy and enthusiastic the entire time we’ve been here, nursing her soda and dancing with our high school friends.
But social situations are always taxing for her—she can be extroverted for a while, but then she needs some alone time to recharge.
Although I can’t fully relate to this characteristic of hers, I’ve known her for long enough to understand and appreciate her limits, so I’m already mentally working out our escape plan.
“Can’t,” I tell Amy. “I have to skate tomorrow.”
“Oh, come on.” Her lips vibrate as she exhales through her pout. “That was Eva’s excuse too. She’s not drinking at all!”
“She doesn’t drink during training and has a low tolerance anyway,” I say. “And with the dangerous spins and jumps she does, she can’t risk being hungover.”
“Eva!” Amy shouts, motioning her over. When she steps up to us, Amy tells her, “Hartmann was just telling me you’re a lightweight.”
Her lips quirk up in amusement. “Was he now?”
“That’s not what I said.”
Eva taps her pointer finger against her lips, looking like she’s trying to make a decision. “Should I tell them about the Elf on the Shelf, so she can see who is actually the lightweight in this friendship?”
The laugh bursts out of me. “What?” I have no idea what she’s talking about, but I get ready to hear a ridiculous and totally fictional story—the kind we used to tell all the time in high school as part of an ongoing quest to see how far we could spin out a tale before people called bullshit.
The issue is, our friends have always been incredibly gullible.
“Yeah, that time you had too many spiked eggnogs and dressed up as the Elf on the Shelf at your family Christmas Party?” Eva’s yelling over the music, and she’s caught the attention of a few of our friends.
Anyone who knows me well enough knows I hate eggnog. Apparently, it’s not something my high school friends remember, because Hannah, Jonathan, and Reese are all egging her on to tell the story .
“Sure.” I shrug, already laughing because her smile is finally genuine, and I can’t wait for her to start spinning the tale.
“So a few years ago,” Eva says, her dark eyes scanning the small circle of our friends, “Luke enjoyed a bit too much eggnog with brandy?—”
“That shit is toxic ,” Reese interjects, as he seems to recall some of his own bad decisions.
“Sure is,” Eva agrees with a laugh. “And in his inebriated state, Luke decided that he was going to dress up as the Elf on the Shelf.”
“Only because I was saving you after Preston dared you to do it.” I glance at my friends, roll my eyes, and say, “Terrible example of a truth or dare game gone astray.”
“Yes, well,” Eva says, “I was sober enough to decline. So, the Hartmanns have their own set of Santa and Mrs. Claus costumes, and the Santa costume was in use because of the holiday party. All the Rebels families were there, and the kids were taking turns sitting on Santa’s lap.
” At least that part of the story is true.
..we do have an annual Christmas party, and the Rebels team members always come with their families.
“Oh god.” Hannah chuckles. “Please tell me you put on the Mrs. Claus costume, Hartmann.”
I raise my arms in a shrug, giving them my best guilty-as-charged face. “Eva refused to wear it because she said it was too frumpy, and she’d only be dressing up as Mrs. Claus if it was a slutty Halloween costume.”
Eva barks out a laugh. “Well, on Luke’s frame, the costume was perfectly.
..indecent. That red velvet skirt that would have gone to my knees barely covered his”—her eyes are full of mirth—“junk. He couldn’t even get the shirt on, and the bib part of the dress wasn’t doing a great job of covering his chest. But the best part was the tights. ”
“Don’t tell them about the tights,” I groan. “Or the bells.”
“Oh my god, the bells!” Eva’s peals of laughter ring out, and the way she’s so delighted has me practically glowing.
Not sure there’s anything I wouldn’t do to make this girl happy, including embarrassing myself.
“So yes, he was wearing these red thigh-high tights that barely went above his knees, and the Mrs. Claus slippers, which barely fit over the front half of his feet. And the toes of the slippers had bells on them”—she pauses to laugh—“which he thought was hysterical, so he was prancing around to make the bells ring.”
“Prancing?” Amy asks, halfway doubled over with laughter.
“You know,” I say as I do a little jig to demonstrate, which has everyone laughing even harder.
“Oh my god!” Hannah shrieks through her laughter, with her hand pressed to her chest.
“Dude,” Reese says, shaking his head but laughing. The two of us played hockey together all four years of high school, and against each other twice a year in college. “Just hand over your man card already.”
“Very secure in my manhood, my friend.” I punch his shoulder extra hard for good measure, because fuck that sexist shit. There’s nothing even remotely normal about anyone, of any gender, dressing up in a too-small Mrs. Claus costume and prancing around with bells on their feet.
“So, how was this an Elf on the Shelf situation?” Jonathan asks.
“Oh!” Eva says. “Because he decided that he looked more like the Elf than Mrs. Claus, so he started freaking perching on everything. The piano, the back of the couch, the post at the bottom of the stairs?—”
“My ass still hurts from that one,” I say. I think that if Eva hadn’t pursued figure skating like she did, she’d be an author—probably penning smutty rom-coms like the ones she reads on long trips and in between training sessions—because she can always weave a funny story out of thin air.
“When he decided he was going to try to sit at the top of the twelve-foot Christmas tree, his brothers finally put a stop to the nonsense.”
“Please tell me you took photos?” Hannah asks. “I need to see this with my own eyes.”
Eva rolls her eyes. “I would never let someone document my best friend’s drunken escapades.”
“I wish I’d taken a selfie or something,” I say, “because I’d love to see what I looked like. I barely remember any of this happening, but I’m sure I looked hot doing it.”
“Man, to embarrass yourself like that in front of your future teammates. You have balls of steel,” Reese says, apparently changing his mind and deciding that this behavior somehow makes me more manly?
“Nah, they were all gone by then. It was just family and close friends left.”
I’m sure most of my current teammates would totally believe this story. Not because I get drunk and do stupid things often, but because—outside of hockey—I generally don’t really care what people think of me.
Eva says it’s the confidence of growing up secure in the knowledge that I was completely loved, never feeling like I had to prove myself in any way.
And maybe she’s right...maybe my parents’ unwavering support, and her parents’ endless pressure, is why we have such different perspectives on other people’s opinions.
“Speaking of drinking too much, I think I need to get this lightweight home,” Eva says, nodding her head at me. “We’re on the ice in, like, six hours, and I have a feeling I’ll be skating circles around him.”
With promises of “getting together again soon,” Eva and I turn and leave our high school friends behind.
As we head to the door, I snake my arm around her hip, pulling her to my side.
“The fucking Elf of the Shelf, Evie?” I laugh into her hair as I press a kiss to the top of her head. “You’re too much.”
“Pretty sure I’m just right, actually.” She tilts her head up and grins at me with a bright smile that pushes her cheeks up and scrunches her eyes. It’s the kind of smile that makes my whole axis tilt, forcing me to hold on to her tighter so I don’t stumble.
Because when Eva Wilcott smiles at me like that, I temporarily forget that she friend-zoned me a decade ago, fell in love with someone else, and is pregnant with a stranger’s baby. Because all I want—all I’ve ever wanted—is her.