Page 64 of Vying Girls (Girls of Hazelhurst #2)

Tilda

I am on fire.

Not literal fire, unlike the two that’ve already been put out by volunteers, and started by who knows who.

Definitely someone from Hazelhurst. We’re not above a little home destruction.

The hockey pitch under my feet is writhing with girls and sticks, the sound of laboured breathing and skidding shoes and the clack of the ball on wood drowning out the frantic beat of my heart.

The whistle’s imminent; my ears are pricked for it. The final match of the competition, the deciding game.

And we’re fucking smashing it.

I scoop the ball, my body low and blocking, the sight of the goal sending a current through me. We’ve got seconds left, but fuck it, why not get another in?

Because I could do this forever, riding this high, responding to the shouts of the crowd surrounding us on all sides.

It’s a new pitch, this one, opened in time for Varsity, the blue turf like the ocean around us, gleaming white seats tiered and teeming with students from both Hazelhurst and the mainland uni. It’s only right it sees us to victory for its first year.

For a moment, at the beginning of the match as we settled in our positions, there was a dip when I didn’t see Nic’s lanky form, gripping her stick with that competitive intensity in her eyes. Then I got myself together, because she was out there somewhere, watching, needing me to win this for her.

And win for her I will, for a myriad of reasons, but none more so than what she did for Elly.

They agreed in the end. Her nan especially wasn’t above denting her pride for the sake of Elly’s education. There will be a period of mourning and then Angelica will start, easing the burden as paid for by Nic’s inheritance.

Every time I think about it, I want to squeeze her.

Kiss her.

All these things we haven’t done since I’ve been away at Elly’s.

Which isn’t long, considering. Two weeks. Two weeks watching that man die, feeling so proud of Elly and her family for staying strong and upbeat and together.

The final day was one I never want to relive, the guilt of no one being with him as he slipped away quietly in the night.

Wrecking Elly who was getting together a bag so she could start sleeping at his bedside on a night.

He’d had a good day that day. Maybe that should have clued us in—the high before the low.

Knowing Elly, the guilt of that will stick with her forever.

As forever as me, who promises to soothe any self-condemnation that might come her way.

Air gusts from my lungs as I’m tackled by some sweaty, desperate mainlander. I grit my teeth, that competitive anger flooding me as I whisk the ball away. I don’t look as I line the shot, just take a breath and send it in the direction of the goal with all the force I possess this late in the game.

I lift my head. It goes in. The whistle blows.

With a breathless sigh, I flop on the ground, fending off my eager teamies as they doggy pile me. Their faces are feral as they loom over, red and wild-haired and grinning. I let one of them drag me up, pulling me into their hot body for a brief hug and a shoulder slap.

The crowd is deafening. This really had been the deciding game, the last match of the competition.

We usually know way before who’s won, and that’s been the mainland for the last handful of years.

But not this year. We’d been neck and neck from the beginning, ending on a stalemate only hockey women’s first team could break.

And break it we fucking did.

I slump on the bench to slurp from my water bottle, eyes scanning the crowd for the three sets of eyes I know will be watching.

Probably shouting louder than anyone else.

They texted me their positions. They’re at the top somewhere but I don’t see them as everyone files out.

The plan is to meet them later, after our initial celebration with the other hockey teams.

I check my phone to see where Tommy’s at, the meeting arranged by Nic, ever concerned for my safety.

I’d rather just meet her, to be honest. She’s been holding it together about the whole Varsity situation, but it’s probably another thing to watch from the sidelines as the team you used to captain sail to victory without you.

Apart from a few celebratory messages from Haz and Elly, the only other is from an unknown number.

Hey, it’s Tommy. Phone’s dead. Meet by the defunct fountain. We’ve got bubbly

I cap my bottle and follow the others off the pitch. I’m down for leaving now but as captain, I’m obliged to stick around for Coach’s congratulations. Never seen her usually serious self smile so much. I even get a hug.

Back in the locker rooms, I stash my stick before commencing the dash across campus. I should be wrecked but the endorphins are keeping me higher than high.

It’s wild out here. The whole uni’s turned out but the paths are so thick with smoke, the air coloured by smoke bombs, that they’re nothing but ghostly silhouettes.

Everyone I pass has their face painted in burgundy and purple stripes, Hazelhurst’s colours, their eyes the only gleaming thing about them.

I’m glad Tommy had the foresight to meet by the fountain. I’d never see him on the main stretch.

Still dressed in my hockey garb, I’m approached by total randos wanting to congratulate me.

Some look like they’ve already got the party started, drinks clasped in their hands.

It’s going to be a long, loud night at Vipers.

The few mainlanders around are heckled, their faces peeved in their defeat.

I don’t feel sorry for them. Taste of their own bloody medicine. Hazelhurst is so back.

I breathe in the smoke, my lungs open wide, letting it buoy me. It’s the smell of victory, a happy ending on more than one front.

God, I really, really want to see Nic. I’m craving her. It’s been a harrowing two weeks, but that kiss on Elly’s doorstep has kept me going through it all. It signified something good on the horizon, the breaking of a new dawn.

Our spring—finally here.

I have to slow down when I reach the edge of the woods where the fountain’s ensconced, finally out of puff and far too sweaty.

Hopefully I can get in a shower and a change before seeing Nic later.

Haz likes me sweaty, Elly has seen me in far worse states, but with Nic, it all feels so new and delicate.

And it is delicate, but for once I’m not worried about her shields going up. At least not for now. We kept in steady contact over the past week, mostly through texts and one wholly surprising phone call the morning after Elly’s grandad died.

I don’t know what’s changed in her but something has. Something good and entirely welcome. Maybe she’ll keep it up, maybe she won’t, but today is a day for celebration, not fretting. Tomorrow will come soon enough, it always does.

It’s cooler under the trees. Hazelhurst is finally seeing some good weather.

The wind is down, and the sky has been blue all afternoon.

Smog from the celebrations, more resembling a riot at this point, creeps into the woods.

My lungs are scratchy and I cough as I take out my phone, not seeing Tommy by the grey, weathered fountain.

It’s overgrown with weeds, muddy and dry from misuse.

I perch on its edge as I open the only message I have, from Tommy’s number this time.

Hey, where are you?

I type back, Here x

Tommy: Where?

Me: By the fountain, where are you?

Tommy: What fountain? I said the locker rooms. Your whole team is here

With a frown, I look around.

Me: Yeah, but then you said the fountain? Thought your phone was dead, how are you texting me?

Tommy: I’m confuuuuused. Just come this way before Nic kills me

With a sigh, I stand up, brushing off the back of my hockey skort. All this way for bloody nothing.

It only takes a few steps back through the forest before it dawns on me, like a huge, icy bucket of water, the most probable reason for that unknown number text, then a few more steps before I realise I might have fallen into a trap.

Especially when I spot the dark figure step out from behind a tree.

I don’t know if I’m glad for Nic unearthing that picture of Damien and finally showing me my faceless stalker, or not.

In that picture he had been smiling. Today, there’s nothing of that on his face.

There’s half a second where I’m frozen. Then, with a sharp inhale, I turn to run.

My arm is grabbed, making me yelp, then my feet are taken out from under me, my mouth seized by a hand when I open it to scream.

I hear his frantic breaths as he seeks to incapacitate me, my mouth covered tightly with cloth, my arms tied behind my back. In the space of a second, I’m immobilised, my body borne up into cruel arms.

I look around frantically as he hurries me deeper into the woods. They’re figures in the smoke but there’s no hope of them seeing me, not even when I shriek as hard as I can behind the cloth.

Nic! I scream uselessly in my mind. Nic!

Nic

Well, they did it.

I let a smile lift my lips. There’s grief, too, but I push it down, following Elly and Haz from the stands.

They wait for me to catch up, too busy as I was watching Tilda until I could no longer see her. She’d been formidable out there, just like I told her to be, easily carrying the team to victory.

It should have been my win, too, but there’s stuff you win in life, and others you lose. I’m trying to focus on what I’ve won, mainly the girl with the dark plaits and hockey stick down below.

I still wish I was down there in the scrum. I think Elly sees it as she flashes me a smile, taking my arm and tugging me along.

‘She did good,’ she states.

‘Fucking right she did,’ Haz exclaims. ‘Fuck, that’s our girl!’

Ours.

How weird. How…nice?

It feels nice. Right now, it feels like a good thing.

Haz slaps her fist into her palm. ‘Right, so, get some bevvies, go back to ours, then wait for Tilda? Could just go meet her now. She needs a fucking kiss for that.’