The Tales of a Future Hockey Wife

Chapter 12: Year Three, The Final One

~Two years later~
~Eleanor~

"Is Ben coming to the reading tonight or is he working again?" Blair's words are slowed by her heavy intakes of air. We have been running around in circles for ten minutes and we are only halfway there. At the end of last semester, we were told that we had to choose an extra class for more credits. More precisely, we had to pick a sports class. We were very last minute, meaning that we had to take what was left, so here we are, in our cross-country class. I have personally never been a runner and, apparently, neither has she. We both are two laps behind everyone else. I feel like I am running after my breath and it keeps accelerating while I keep slowing down. I should have taken Ben's offer to train me before the semester started. He wanted to take me running, so I could have a head-start before classes began, but I refused. Instead, we spent our summer in British-Columbia with our friends and families. It felt so good to be back there for more than a couple of days, but, in the end, I kind of missed Windsor. I never expected I would feel this way when we first moved here, but it got better as time went by. I kept getting closer to Blair and Vivienne and even made more friends through classes and readings. At the end of my first semester, I finally felt like I belonged here and, over the last year and a half, the feeling only got stronger. Ben was missing Windsor too. His hockey career has never been better. The Spitfires won the Ontario Hockey League Championship two years in a row and won the Memorial Cup last year after losing in final the previous year. Ben won the top scorer award last year. His hopes for this year, his last with the Spitfires, are extremely high. In a perfect world, he would be first in the draft NHL board for next year.

"He's supposed to come. He comes off work at six." I can't believe that I still have to maintain this lie after two years, but, as time went by, it got harder and harder to tell the truth. After I learned that Brittany was Blair's cousin, Blair kept talking about her hatred towards hockey players and how they are all douchebags who think too highly of themselves. While this is true for some players, Ben is proof that they are not all like that. I warned him about Brittany's past and he promised me that he would never go near her and I never had any reason to doubt him.

"He is still working for his uncle in engineering?" I nod because I wouldn't have enough air to use words. This is what I came up with when they asked me what he was doing for a living. It covered two aspects of our "fake" life: why we moved here and why he can never come to events like tonight's. I hate having to lie to my closest friends, but what choice do I have now? It's not like I can run up to them and admit that he plays hockey for a living after convincing them for two years that he works in engineering. I would lose them and that is the last thing I want especially since it's our last year in college. I just have to maintain my lie for ten more months.

"How long do we have left?" Blair stops running as we pass by our teacher, a man probably in his late twenties or early thirties. He is one of the most handsome teachers I have seen in university. Since it's his first year teaching here, we thought he would be nice to us, but no. He is as exigent as any other teacher if not more. 

"Eight minutes girls keep it up. This is a cross-country class, you're supposed to know how to run. And remember, you chose to be here." I look at Blair, she is already looking at me, her hands on her hips trying to catch her breath. He tells us to start running again and to kick up the pace.

"I should have said yes when Ben wanted to go running with me before the semester started." I try to laugh, but it's taking too much air.

"And I should have come with you."

At the end of the class, we run to the showers. Our next class is in ten minutes at the other end of campus. I almost asked to skip the shower part, but I am way too sweaty to spend the day like this. I have never felt this gross in my entire life.