Antagonym

Chapter 45

How I managed to pull off a perfect shutout less than six hours after fainting and getting bitch slapped by my own mother was beyond me. I didn't even care that the opposing team wasn't that great, a shutout was a shutout. That was our last game before the frozen four competition in two weeks.

My last regular season NCAA game.

I couldn't tell if I was sad or happy about it, but there was definitely a strong yet ambiguous emotion swirling in my stomach. That wasn't the only big thing in my life, though. Ted Ed shared Sylvia and I's talk online last night and it already had millions of views. I didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing, either. If you couldn't tell, I was already feeling indecisive.

And what was about to happen wasn't helping.

I was sitting on the cool island of my apartment, eating a vanilla yogurt and watching Seb stress out about his upcoming Molecular Biology II exam while Beck threw crumpled prices of notebook paper at him. Axel probably would have been here if he hadn't been with Ken. I'd been seeing less and less of my best friend since he got a boyfriend but I get it. There are days I just want to stay in Beck's arms all day.

ESPN droned in the background from the radio, talking about the playoffs for hockey. "Keeping with the theme of college hockey is the upcoming draft. Just yesterday lecturing company Ted Ed released a Ted Talk about the effects of rape and the importance of believing the victim featuring Yale Lacrosse coach Sylvia Mason-Riley, the highest paid college coach in any sport, and her sister in-law and star goalie for the Quinnipiac Bobcats, Danielle Malton-Riley."

I internally cringed as they used my old last name, something that drew Beck and Seb's attention as they looked in my direction where I turned the radio up curiously. "The talk has brought up an old rape case of the former Malton, where the almost sixteen year old was raped by an athletic trainer. Now, I don't want to get political here or discredit the issue but there's a lot of debate over if this will help or hurt Riley in the draft. What do you guys think?" The sports caster asked the rest of the announcers at their little table.

"Help, help, help," one of them said without hesitation. "You got the number one college goalie in the country speaking out to the community and being an activist in an esteemed way. That's only going to drag in those teams looking to improve like-ability and PR. We saw it with Mason-Riley; she got a five million dollar deal with Nike freshman year in the Olympics. The only thing that hurts her is quite possibly that teams might not want to risk it on a woman but I think we've seen more than enough that she operates better than half the guys on the ice." I couldn't help but smile to myself. Sebastian wiggled his eyebrows up and down suggestively as I laughed, Beck letting out a warm smile and an amused face as well.

"Watch out Beck, John Ascari might have a think for Danny," Seb teased.

"I know, right? Who wouldn't want a sixty year old ex linebacker who's had three divorces. Sounds like my type," I drawled back in mock seriousness.

"It doesn't matter how well she operates in the crease. What GM's are thinking about is the chemistry of the team. You take Riley on and you're looking at sexual harassment, assault, distracted players, and over protective players. We've already seen that last year when Sebastian Williams almost knocked out Martin Sokolov for a dicey check," another castor cut in. Yep, this is about what I expected.

"Every team is protective of their goalie, Dave," John cut in. "And that's the exact thing Riley is standing up against. Sexual harassment and assault. That shouldn't increase because you add a woman to the ice."

"But what about this?" The original caster jumped in as the mediator. "This is the first time this is being reported to our knowledge."

That got me nervous. Sebastian's pencil stilled on his notebook and Beck froze, looking at the radio on the island. "Fresh from the family just hours ago; the mother of Olympic lacrosse player turned wall street hotshot, Griffin Riley, and sister Danielle Riley gave us an exclusive statement claiming her and her captain, Beckett Sampson are involved, but quote on quote 'the degree at which the two are involved isn't completely apparent to me, but he spends an increasing amount of time with the family and they frequently spend their nights together'. Now that's coming from Riley's mother. Does this change anyone's mind about the validity and value of having Danielle Riley on an NHL team?"