Too Much Soup {Jonathan Toews}

The Night of Bruises

Patrick's POV

Watching her leave was the hardest part. Letting her get on the plane was my third mistake. Letting her leave me standing at security with my hands buried in my pockets was my second. Letting her pack her bags was my first.

Arizona. Phoenix to be exact. One thousand, seven hundred and seventeen miles to be even more precise.

The first few hours were hard. Really hard. I started drinking beer after beer after beer. It's not like she was dead but hell, I was acting like she was.

When I woke up to see the lovely couple cooking in the kitchen is when I lost it. Not crying. No, I wasn't going to cry about this. I lost all hope. Hope that I was ever going to be happy again.

I didn't drink another beer; the taste just began to taste less and less appealing. I just sat in my bed, leaving a space for my girl. Well, my old girl.

It was about half way through that day when Tazer, Duncs, Saader and Shawzie busted through my door with XBox controllers.

"C'mon buddy just get out of the damn bed." Andrew pleaded. I didn't respond. "Fine then. Boys?"

All of the guys went to one side of my bed and flipped me out of it. "Ow what the hell?"

"Ah ha! So he is alive!" Brandon yelled. God he was too energetic.

"Yeah, yeah I'm alive." I grumbled. The boys looked at me with grins plastered on their faces. "What are you idiots looking at?"

"We are gonna have a guys day. No talk of girls, no moping around, actual fun. What do you say, Kaner?" Jonny asked.

"This sounds stupid but do I really have a choice?" All the guys shook their heads indicating I did not. "Ah shit lets just get this over with."

"Okay first, NHL lets play." Duncs said and all the guys gathered in the living room.

After five games, we all decided on our next activity. Going to the UC of course.
"How the fuck do you even have a key?"

"You see, because I am a reliable captain I get privileges that you, irresponsible Kaner, do not." Jon stated and we all rolled our eyes as he struggled with the key.

"Whatever you say just open the god damn door today please?" The ever so patient Shawzie tapped his foot.

Tazer finally managed to open the door and we all stepped inside, our noses glowing red from the cool air.

"Home sweet home." Keith said beside me.

We all raced to the lockerroom and laced up our skates. The crunch of the ice underneath my skates was a familiar sound that I had missed over the past week.

We all played two on two and Shawzie was in net. It got my mind off of things for a while until my thoughts got the best of me and I began to see Amber in her seat next to the glass.

Damn it Pat snap out of it! I kept trying to shake the image of her out of my head. "Okay Kaner's thinking new plan!" Saader's voice echoed through the empty arena.

"I'm sitting right her ya know." I rolled my eyes at the guys who were trying to form a plan as to what their next move was.

"Okay! So the current time is five o'clock and I believe it is time to go for dinner." Andrew finally included me in on the conversation.

"Where we going?" I asked.

"I was thinking that place we went that one time. What's it called? Roger's?" Shawzie tried to think of the restaurants name but I already knew it. My eyes bulged out of my head.

"You mean Ricky's?" Jonny soon realized that he was talking about that asshole's place.

"Uh I don't know if that's such a good idea there-" Jon started but was quickly interrupted by Duncs and Saader agreeing to the place.

Jon didn't know about the phone call that those dicks gave Liz at our practice. But I did. The best way to get rid of anger was to punch something right?

I smirked to myself. "Yeah you know what? That's a great idea."
**************
Elizabeth's POV

I was having a movie marathon with Chaunette, Alyssa and Kelly Rae when my phone rang. Jon's ringtone, Chelsea Dagger, went off. "Hey Canada what's up?"

All the girls leaned in trying to hear what he was saying to me. I giggled and pushed them away and walked toward the door of the Keith's house. "Uh you gotta come down here right now."

"Where are you?" There was muffling on the other side of the phone and the girls beside me began to get nervous.

"Ricky's..." He said sheepishly.

"Your WHERE?!" I snapped. He knew I didn't want him to be associated with that place.

"I'm at Ricky's, the boys wanted to go and I tried to tell them no but then Pat wanted to go and mumbled something about revenge..." Jon rambled on but I lost interested after that last line.

"What's he doing right now?" I asked nervously.

"He said he needed to go talk to a friend but we didn't trust him so we followed him and he beat up Ricky pretty bad and he's bleeding and-"

"I'll be right there. I love you, bye." I hung up the phone quickly.

"Well?" Chaunette asked with a nervous smile.

"It's Pat, we gotta go." I hurried them.

"Where the hell are we even going?" Kelly Rae asked as I pushed them out the door of their beautiful house.

"Ricky's." I simply stated. They all knew part of the Ricky situation. I just nodded and added an 'I know'.

We speeded down the road til we finally reached the small place. There were no police cars outside yet so that was good. Jon was pacing outside back and forth waiting for me.

"Where the fuck is he?" I growled at Jon. I knew this wasn't his fault but I was just angry at the situation.

Jon led me to the back alley where I was so used to running after bad blind dates. Oh the memories.

I saw Patrick first. He wasn't busted too badly. Just a large cut that was on his forehead. I saw Ricky next.

He was on the ground, blood coming from his nose and mouth. "Hey babe." He said to me as I approached him. Jon tensed beside me.

"You know I thought this would be the other way around. Why wouldn't you take my side baby? Remember what I said about your precious boy?"

"That's enough from you, sick bastard." Kaner got ready to beat the shit out of him again. All the boys held him back from doing anymore damage.

"You shut the fuck up," I pointed to Ricky on the ground then moved my finger to Pat, "and you control yourself please."

Everyone but Jon went back inside to try and calm down Pat who was still fuming. "I thought I told you to back the fuck off, Ricky."

"And I thought I told you to keep your hockey boys away from me before they did something they would regret." It suddenly dawned on me that Ricky was going to tell reporters.

"Nobody will believe you." I told him.

"Really? People seemed to believe the fucking taxi driver a while back." He smirked.

Smoke was beginning to come out of Jonny's ears. "Fine then. What the hell do you want? Money?"

"I want the girl." Ricky smirked. He looked at me with a crooked smile. One that was weak in comparison to Jon's. One that made me want to shrivel up like a raisin and burst into tears. My mind swirled and the world around me spun.

Everything was black, yet again.