Hockey is My Life, Plus Some Others

Chapter 8

Practice today was fun. Right now we are at the beach and Fulton and Izzy are sitting on the beach together. Izzy is asleep but Fulton is braiding her hair. I taught Fulton to braid hair when we were pretty young. So much so that our dad was still alive. I realize now that even when I first met Charlie, I knew we were soulmates. At the moment me and are Charlie a building a tide pool. Even though I didn't grow up near the beach some part of we has always know the best way to build things out of sand. My phone starts to ring, pulling me out of my thoughts. I see that Casey Conway is calling me. I answer.

*phone call* AJ=Bold Casey=Italics

AJ, is that you?
Yeah, it's me. What's wrong?
Your mom is in the hospital.
What?!
Juniper is in the hospital. Someone broke into your house and gravely injured her.
What happened to the person?
Sunny and Smokey injured him nearly as badly as they injured her. But they can't press charges because of your "BEWARE OF DOG" signs. You got lucky there.
What about the dogs? And are you okay?
I'm fine and the dogs are entirely uninjured.
Thank god! How is my mom?
She's in surgery now. Can you tell Fulton? I think he would take it better to hear it from you and not me.
I'll tell him, but what are we going to if my mom dies?
Juniper told me she wanted me to be your legal guardian. But Bob doesn't want dogs in our house. So, you can live with us without the dogs or I can sign a form and leave you in the custody of Coach Bombay. That is, if she dies. Your mother is a strong person and I have no doubts that she will survive.
Thank you, Casey. I appreciate you calling me. Please update me and my brother on the regular and tell my mom we love her with all our hearts. Bye, talk to you later.
Bye, AJ. Tell Charlie I said "hi".

*end of phone call*

"Charlie, my mother is in the hospital." I say, my voice breaking. "AJ, I'm sorry." He responds, "Do you want me to tell Fulton?" I look over at my brother and his girlfriend. Izzy is awake now and is sitting in Fulton's lap. "I'd better tell him." I answer. I reluctantly walk over to my brother and tell him the news. I've only ever seen my brother cry once (when our dad died) but I think he's pretty close right now. Izzy in envelopes him in a huge a hug and tells him it will be okay. "Fulton are you okay?" I ask. He shakes his head. "I lost one of my parents and I'm really close to losing another one. I don't think I'll ever really be 'okay'. Do we even know what'll happen if we do lose her?" Fulton says. I can tell that he's pretty close to a breakdown. I hug him tight and tell him what Casey told me. "I guess we'll probably be staying with Bombay, then." He says reluctantly. "What's so wrong about staying with me?" Bombay says as he walks over, "I heard, I'm really sorry, you guys." "It's okay, it's not your fault." I say. I hug my brother. Fulton is pretty tough, but he still has a soft and vulnerable side, and he hates showing it. The only people who have ever seen his soft side are our parents, Izzy, and me. Fulton, Charlie, Izzy, Bombay, and I go back to the dorms. As soon as I get to my room I start packing up my things; me and Fulton are going to have a rough few nights. Me and Fulton sleep better when we're in close quarters. The next couple days will be pretty rough.

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Last night was the third night that me and Fulton have spent sitting together in his room looking at photos. We barely leave the room. Today, after lots of encouragement, we left the room and are walking along the beach. Fulton and Izzy are holding each other's hands tightly. I'm holding Charlie's hand. "Charlie, what's that?" I ask, pointing to a box by the road. "I don't know, but I want to check it out." He replies. We walk over and there is a litter of puppies inside the box. I see torn ears, gashes on their tiny bodies, and ribs visible through mats of fur. I pull out my phone and look up nearby vet offices. I call the one with the best ratings and hand the phone to Charlie. He explains the situation and I wave over Fulton and Izzy. I call Bombay and he's here in minutes. We get to vet clinic and explain who we are. The vat assesses the damage and explains that we will each have to hold a puppy while she fixes it up. They squeal and I wince every time but she fixes the puppies up pretty quickly and tells us how to care for them. She gives us some little slip leads and a box carrier but gives us a list of what other things we need to get. She also tells us that the puppies are around five weeks old and shouldn't need any milk replacer on its own. After we pay, we go to the pet store and buy the things we need. Fulton and Charlie agree to let me house the puppies in my dorm room. We go to the dorm building and Fulton grabs my things from his dorm room and takes them to mine. I lay out all the things we got at the pet store and get to work. Izzy keeps the puppies entertained while Fulton, Bombay, Charlie, and I set up the things. I prepare the puppy food with the recipe the vet gave me and give it to the puppies in the bowls we bought. Before I put the food in the bowls, I rinsed them out. I pull out the recovery collars we bought for the puppies and put them on their necks. I look over to Charlie and Fulton and Bombay and see that they have set up a puppy paradise in the corner by the bookshelf. Me and Izzy lay out the collars and let the puppies pick out which one they want. They have barely opened their eyes so we'll see how it goes. The colors of the collars are black, gray, red, white, and blue. The smallest puppy picks out the white collar. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, based on their body build and coloring we think they are German shepherds. The puppy with the most spunk picks the blue collar. The most levelheaded puppy picks the gray collar. The impulsive puppy grabs the red one. And the biggest puppy (who is a total scaredy-cat and is crazy shy) picks up the black one. Everyone else helps me put the corresponding harness on the right puppy. We release the puppies into their paradise and watch them explore. Their little paradise is a  crate that is set up so it has two levels that opens up into a playpen lined with puppy pads. There are toys and treats hidden all over the expanse of the puppy paradise. It's adorable to watch there faces when they find a new toy or a treat. Connie and Julie walk into the room. "Puppies!" Connie squeals. She and Julie run over to the paradise and start playing with them. "You know, each of these puppies reminds me of one of you guys." Connie says. "Yeah, like the spunky one reminds me of AJ. And the levelheaded puppy reminds me of Charlie." Julie agrees. "The tiny one with the kind heart reminds me of Izzy. The impulsive one is Bombay." Connie continues. "I get it, I can be kind of impulsive, at times." Bombay says. "'Kind of'? Have you met yourself?" I ask in disbelief. Bombay rolls his eyes. "The biggest one would be Fulton, then, right? Kind, polite, a little shy." Izzy says. "What should we name them?" I ask. "Duck for the spunky one. Just like AJ, she's the glue of the team." Bombay suggests. "Ok, Bash for the big one. He may be shy, but I can tell he has a lot of potential." I add. "That's cool, what about Lillie for the smallest pup. Like the pond flower, to go with the Ducks theme." Fulton suggests. "That's cool, how about Captain for the levelheaded puppy? Just like AJ and Charlie, him and Duck are the leaders of the team." Izzy says. "Puck, for the impulsive one. Like Bombay, he can be stupid and impulsive but he's dedicated and determined." Charlie adds. "Those names are perfect for them!" Connie says. "Connie, Julie, Izzy? Can you help me take cute photos of theses pups, I want to make a collage and put it in the group chat. I almost immediately have like twenty photos of each puppy. I go to PicCollage on my phone, pick the cutest photo of each puppy, and build the collage. When I finish the collage I send it in the group chat.

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"Fulton! Dean! Bring Bash back, now!" I shout, pounding on the door. They took my room key and the app isn't working, otherwise I would just walk in, scoop up Bash, and take him back to his siblings. I pound on the door again. "Fulton! I hope you know that I will put a hole in this door before I stop pounding on it if you don't bring Bash out here!" I shout. I've already put a dent in the door. The door opens. Dean inspects the door. "You put a dent in this door just by pounding on it?" He asks. "Yes, now give me Bash." I say, lunging for Bash. Dean tries to grab my shoulders. I duck under and slide on the tile. I pick up Bash from Fulton's bed. "Did you really think I was going to let you keep him?" I ask. "Yeah," Fulton starts. I shoot him a glare. "No." He answers honestly. "Good. Now, get your game face on, we have to leave for practice in ten minutes." I tell them. I walk out of their dorm and take Bash back to mine. I put Bash down in the puppy paradise with his litter mates and get ready for the game. We've had the puppies with us for a few days now and their personalities are showing. Puck recently decided to jump off the second level, instead of taking the steps, and chipped a tooth. The vet said that he'll be fine because he'll lose that tooth later on in life. "AJ, let's go." Connie says, pulling me from my thoughts. "I'm coming, hold on." I say. I pull my hair into a ponytail and secure the pups into their crate.

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"Coach." Charlie says as we walk into Bombay's office. "We just had the greatest idea ever!" I say. "Coach, we know that with Banks out we got a roster spot open." Charlie continues. "Yeah?" Bombay questions. "You know how I always told you that I'd make a better coach than a player?" Charlie answers. "It's not true, but whatever." I mutter. "Anyway, I did some scouting for us." Charlie finishes. "Come on in!" I holler, waving Russ inside. "Russ Tyler, Coach Bombay." Charlie introduces. "Hiya, Coach." Russ says. "Russ Tyler, huh. Well, Russ, what can you do for the team?" Bombay says. "You've never heard from my Knuckle-puck?" Russ asks, looking at me and Charlie. "Oops." I mutter quietly, shrugging my shoulders. "Knuckle-puck? No." Bombay replies. Charlie, Russ, and I shoot knowing looks at each other.