Home Ice.

Chapter Two.

Finn

It's our last meeting before the wedding and before training camp, which means today is the day that the first captain of the Seattle Kraken is chosen, along with three assistant captains.

Our team has gotten incredibly close over the last few years and the lineup has stayed more or less the same. I'm closer to these guys than I was with the guys on the Sharks which I didn't think was possible.

I miss those guys, I won't lie. The day the Kraken picks were announced, I was a nervous wreck. I'm not someone who is constantly on social media, but I couldn't get off of it that day. I was looking through pretty much every comment to see what people were saying.

Sean was right when he said people would be less upset with me since I was in the expansion draft. The fans don't know that I was actively looking at other teams so they think I just took the Seattle contract because it's my home, and I wanted to keep it that way.

I posted some photos from my time with the Sharks and then added two pictures of Casey and I, along with our tattoos that we got for our respective teams. One of them was of us when we were on the Thunderbirds and the other we had taken after we moved back here, in our old T-Birds jerseys. Everyone freaked about it, which was funny to see. The amount of people who were just excited that we were going to be on the same team again was unreal. I knew people liked how close we are, but I didn't realize just how many people did.

My first game back at the Shark Tank was really emotional for me. The video package they put together for me had me holding back tears. The amount of cheers and applause I received was overwhelming. They chanted my name like they always did and my old teammates tapped their sticks and came over to give me a nudge.

Jack roughed me up a bit too, which made fans go crazy. Playing against him at first was so fucking weird. We had been teammates for such a long time, so when we were going head-to-head we both knew exactly how the other ticked. It made it extremely hard to get anything done for a while.

I still see Jack often. He comes to visit us quite a bit and we've gone to San Jose a hand full of times too. We've stayed in touch with all of our friends, honestly. Both Avery and I never wanted to shut anyone out.

I love living with my girl, but that's not a surprise. My chest tightens every single morning when I wake up next to her, no matter what position we're in. Usually we're tangled up with each other, but there are definitely days where we wake either the on opposite sides of the bed or with her curled into a ball and me spread out.

I love those days just as much, though. It feels so normal now but it doesn't feel any less like a luxury. Looking over my shoulder and seeing her knocked cold with her hair everywhere and her mouth wide open instantly makes me smile every damn time. And then I get to turn over and experience the feeling of pulling her into me first thing in the morning. Hearing her breathe in a deep breath and seeing a smile pull to her lips even though she's not completely awake makes my heart go nuts every time without fail.

Our family means the fucking world to me already. Olive feels like our daughter but I want a baby so fucking badly. I want to stand over a stick in the bathroom with her and watch it until it tells us that our kid is growing inside the woman I love. I want to watch her grow bigger and bigger and I want to do everything I can to make her feel like the hottest pregnant woman that's ever lived. I want her to tell me in the middle of the night that her water broke and I want to have a panic attack as I rush us to the hospital while she tells me to chill the fuck out.

And I just want a fucking kid, man. I want a little Avery in the worst way. I want two of my favorite people, hell hopefully even more if she'd let me.