Triumph {The Manhattan Trilogy #3}

Practice (NT)

I lift my full bag of equipment over my shoulder as I push the doors of Marsh & McLennan Sports Arena open. My sister and I walk down the lengthy hallway, eyeing the posters of old Capitals stars. Some, like goaltender Jimmy Howard, even made it to the NHL. South Tower and I scan our badges, and the PLAYERS AND STAFF ONLY doors unlock in order for us to walk through. The Capitals locker room is the first door on the left.

I open the door, and everyone stares.

Quickly, I disregard this, reminding myself that I am in charge of this entire team, minus the coach. I walk to the center of the room and clear my throat as everyone's eyes follow me. My twin sibling sits down in her assigned seat as I begin my speech.

"My name is North Tower Staten, and I am the new captain of the Albany Capitals hockey team," I introduce myself. "A few of you boys have been on this team longer than me. But even as a rookie, I still made the promise to lead and protect you and make the Capitals into the best team we can be. Just like any other team, we're all in this thing together. And it's not all work—we'll certainly have a lot of fun in our quest to win the Smithson Cup. Beard, can you put away your phone for a second?"

The guy with the beard stares up at me, storing his phone in his bag. He has olive skin and messy black hair. His brown eyes are as cold as ice, and they freeze my heart. I can tell he doesn't want to listen to me, but for some reason, he seems afraid to disobey.

"Thank you," I turn away, but I still hear him groan. "So, let's go out and have a good first practice, okay? This is going to be a good start to a good season, boys."

All of the men in the room as well as my sister clap, and I even hear a few cheers.

"But wait," I hold up my finger. "Coach Morrison here has asked me to name the alternate captains today. Let's give a shoutout to Mitchell Targonski and Mohammed al-Hashim, who will help me lead this team to greatness. Congratulations!"

A young guy at the end of one row of lockers waves shyly, and Beard Guy stands up. I meet his eyes and grin approvingly to acknowledge his achievement. The moment I do, he looks away and sits down. I don't know why this Mohammed al-Hashim is angry at me, but I can tell he's ignoring me because of his anger, and I will get down to the bottom of it during practice.

Hundreds of fans that came to see us applaud and whistle as we skate onto the ice. My sister grins under her mask as she drops the puck that will begin our scrimmage. I take it on my stick and start dribbling it back and forth as fast as I can. It feels overwhelmingly amazing to once again do what I loved to do as a young girl growing up in Manhattan.

I spot Mohammed skating behind me out of the right corner of my eye. I make a decision to pass the puck across the ice to him, since Zach Price, my sister's backup, is watching my every move and not his. The puck slides easily over to Mohammed's stick, but he deliberately swerves out of the way and lets the puck collide with the wall.

"What the hell did you do that for, al-Hashim?" I throw my hands in the air and skate over to him. He is noticeably surprised that I am taller than him. "I saw you swerve. You avoided my pass on purpose. That would be a mistake that would lose us a goal in a real game, but do you know what it is here? It's a total dick move, number forty."

Mohammed glares up at me. "I knew you would hate me the moment I heard the news of my trade. In case you were wondering, that's why I hate you and your sister. That's right. We're on the same team, but there's no way I'll be your friend, and there's no way I'll help you in a game. You're the North Tower, right? All you would do if I ever dared to say hello would berate me for being a Muslim, and that all of us should go home because we all did 9/11 or whatever."

"I'm not like that, shitass! If you could read, you would find out on my Wikipedia page that I'm friends with a literal Saudi Arabian Muslim and have been for fifteen years, and I've also attended many events in support of the eradication of Islamophobia! It's quite upsetting to me that you would make the assumption that I hate Muslims just because I'm one of the Twin Towers and a few Muslim terrorists attacked me all those years ago. Being the human spirit of the North Tower is not the only aspect of my personality!"

I prepare to skate away when Mohammed shoves me so hard that I topple over.

"Don't fight!" Zach Price protests. "You're both on Red Team! If you want to fight, go for someone in my White Team!"

"Shut it, Pricer!" I snap at him as I stand up. Then, I turn back to Mohammed. "So, you want to go, al-Hashim?"

"Let's do it, Staten!" He sheds his gloves, and I shed mine. I hastily form my plan of attack in my head as we circle each other slowly, our fists raised. Mohammed al-Hashim probably didn't read about me being an experienced enforcer in the juniors, since he obviously didn't care about knowing who I was before he met me.

I dodge the first hit Mohammed aims at my abdomen, but the second punch lands right on my stomach. Two of my rights hit his shoulder, and he ducks. I take this opportunity to pull the turtle move on him. I cover his eyes with his jersey so he can't see me coming and hit him repeatedly over the head. Somehow, he stays on his feet for another thirty seconds or so until I finally manage to take him down and pin his shoulders to the ice. A volunteer referee blows on his whistle several times and comes over to separate us.

"Good fight," he fixes his jersey.

"And to you," I spit on the ice. Suddenly, I look at him and see a person who doesn't really deserve to be hated because of a mistake. I see a trusted teammate. "Listen, that was a nasty argument we just had. I'm sorry for misunderstanding that you made a mistake when I should have just accepted it, and I'm especially sorry for calling you a shitass. We're on the same team. We're supposed to get along and work together. I understand that teammates sometimes aren't friends, but all of them get along with each other and work as one to achieve a goal. We can do all of that, al-Hashim, right?"

He grins. "Yeah. Sorry for hating you because I thought you hated me. I'll accept all of your passes from now on, and we won't fight. If you want to, we can even be friends."

"Friends, eh? That would be nice," I shake his hand and resolve the dispute for good. We pick up our gloves and sticks and continue playing our practice game.

The Red Team wins 8-5, with Mohammed and I each scoring a goal and tallying one assist on each other's goals. My sister tallies a decent .861 save percentage, and all of us leave the ice smiling. I reach up to high five four hands, and am pleasantly surprised when the hands belong to Kyle Palmieri and the family of my old friend, Julia Davis Alievi.