“Grant!” The coach yells Cooper’s name for his line, and Michael and I get ready to get on the ice. The whistles blow when our goalie covers the puck, and Vegas calls a time-out. I look up at the time and see that we are twenty seconds away.
“We can do this!” the coach shouts. “We got this, but can someone put the fucking puck in that empty net?” He’s trying to keep his cool, but even he’s starting to look on edge. I smirk and get on the ice, skating over to the play beside the goalie.
“It’s just another game,” Cooper says to us. “Just another game.”
“I think I’m going to throw up,” Michael says. He starts to look around, and I block his face with my hand.
“Don’t do it,” I warn. “Don’t look up at the box. Just focus on the game. Twenty seconds and then we get to go on a family vacation.”
“Oh, I forgot about that great news, fifteen hours on a plane with you guys,” Michael gripes. “Who chose Bora Bora?” he asks, and I can see the nerves are gone from his eyes.
The referee comes back over with the puck in his hand. Cooper holds the stick in both hands as he leans down, getting ready for the face-off. The banging of the crowd starts the minute the puck is dropped. Cooper wins the face-off, and the puck goes to Miller as he passes it to Ben, who passes it to Cooper, and I hustle away from the defenseman. Cooper looks like he’s going to pass it to Michael, but then he slides it to me. The defenseman tries to block the puck with his stick but just sends it to me. I can feel him behind me, and I just shoot the puck down the ice, and it feels like everything happens in slow motion. I can hear the crowd going wild. I can hear every single beat of my heart. I can hear my breathing as if it’s in stereo.
My eyes watch the puck as Michael skates past me, and then it happens. It slides into the net, and I leave my feet. The roaring of the crowd is almost deafening, and I take my mouth guard out and throw it in the air once the red light behind the net goes off. The horns blow as I turn and jump with Michael. Cooper comes over, and the three of us are all yelling. “Holy fucking shit!”
Two more of the guys jump on us, and only when they let me go do I look up at the box and see my family.
Alex is standing there clapping her hands, and beside her is Maddox, who is wearing an Oilers jersey with my name on it. He throws his hands up to the sky, and it fills my soul. I skate to the bench, high-fiving everyone, and look up to see that five seconds are left in the game. Vegas stands in the middle of the ice, waiting to get it over with.
We skate to the middle of the ice, and the puck drops, but nobody does anything, and when the horn blasts, the gloves and sticks go flying. We skate toward the goalie, and everyone jumps on him. The fans hit the windows, and slowly, everyone starts to skate to the center ice. I look up to see Maddox standing in front of Alex who has her hands around him, my father beside them with his arm around Alex and his other hand on Maddox. The handshake goes quickly. No doubt Vegas just wants to get the fuck off the ice. It is one thing to lose but losing in the home arena is hell.
I skate to the bench where they are handing out the baseball caps with the champions all over the front. I spot Nico, who is hugging the coach, and he comes over to me. “Told you I would try,” he says, slapping my shoulder. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t do it alone,” I remind him, and he nods his head as he walks to Cooper and has a few words with him.
I take off my helmet as the Stanley Cup is being set up. I look out of the corner of my eye and see Michael being interviewed, and then he calls me over. Ever since they called Alex and me kissing cousins, I haven’t really granted interviews. Max was the only one who went on the record that day and said, “Looks like Dallas needs to do some research before they print stuff.”
Other than that, no one commented. Even though we were asked about it, it was off-limits, and finally, after the first month, they just stopped asking the question. But I was still pissed about the headline, and I made sure they knew.