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23
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“Okay Dad, I’m sure you’ve told me this before, but what is a hat trick?” Emma asked as they left their seats.  The game had just finished and the three players of the game had all skated out and dispersed their sticks to waiting fans.  The Gulls had managed to beat the Sharks by one point, with the final score being five to four.  Kyle Underwood had received the number one spot, and even though he gave his stick to a random person cheering in the stands, he turned around and locked eyes with her, giving her a smile.  Like a secret smile shared just between the two of them.  She responded with a miming of tipping her hat to him.

“I mean,”
she continued, “I get that a player scores three goals in a game, but why is it called that?  And why do people actually throw hats onto the ice?”

“Let me get this straight,” Jeremy said.  “We’ve been going games since you were ten years old, and you’re still not familiar with what a hat trick is and the tradition behind it?”

“Dad, I was ten,” Emma said flatly.  “I had books, an iPod, and food, and you never actually made me pay attention before.”

Jeremy explained just what a hat trick was and how it came to be that fans – including Jeremy himself – threw any sort of headgear onto the ice.  After Kyle’s third goal of the game, Emma watched as hundreds of people tossed various hats onto the rink, including baseball caps, fedoras, and flat caps that normally adorned the heads of golfers.  However, the majority of them were Gulls hats, some looking to be brand new, bought solely for the purpose of being thrown on the ice.  It seemed like a waste of fifteen dollars to buy an already too-expensive hat just to throw it away because a player happened to score three goals in one game.

“You’re not appreciating the fact that for a player to score three games in one game is amazing,” Jeremy said.  “It’s phenomenal.  It’s cause to celebrate.”

“What happens when the player scores six points in one game?” Emma asked.  “Do they get credited with two hat tricks or is it called something else?”

“You know, stuff like that never happens anymore.  The Phantom – Joe Malone – played for a team called the Quebec Bulldogs way back in 1920 and he scored seven, count them
seven
, goals in one game.  Can you believe that?”

Emma would have responded had someone not bumped into her.  She had never seen the stadium this crowded before.  Even with a win, fans filed out of the rink before the top three players were announced in order to get out of the parking lot before heavy congestion occurred.  But now, fans seemed to hang around, discussing the game, the respective teams, and even Ken Brown’s murder and Brandon Thorpe’s absence.  People claimed he was arrested, others claimed he was just brought in for questioning.  Some people claimed the goalie was innocent while others claimed he definitely did it.

Just off to the side, Emma caught sight of two men shoving each other, and by the looks on their faces, she had a feeling the shoving match would only escalate.  But along with the increased numbers of people in attendance, Emma did notice there was an increase in security, and not just any type of security, but security guards who probably moonlighted as bouncers at popular nightclubs that lined Pacific Coast Highway. 

“
Dad, is it just me or is the atmosphere tonight… different?”  Despite the noise, Emma tried to ensure that her voice was quiet.  She didn’t want the wrong person to overhear and cause any trouble with her and her father.

“Yeah, there’s definitely more tension than there normally would be, even with the Gulls playing the Sharks,” Jeremy said with a nod.  “The fans are pretty nasty when we play them, but what with the whole murder thing and Thorpe being taken in for questioning, they’ve only gotten worse.  And as much as I like to say that we have classy fans – which we do in most circumstances – even our fans seem to be turning against the team.”

“But what more do they want?” Emma asked.  “When are they just going to be happy?  Brandon Thorpe was just brought in for questioning even though the uncle is the main suspect.  Do you think the police just gave in to pressure?  I thought they didn’t really have anything on Thorpe.”

“I have no idea what they have on him,” Jeremy said, shrugging his shoulders.  “They could have something, they may have nothing.  It sounds like the latter since they only brought him in for questioning.  But I wouldn’t put it past the cops to take him in because of that pressure from the residents of Newport Beach.  They can be quite affluent, you know.”  He gave his daughter a look and Emma rolled her eyes.  Her father
constantly told her how influential people from Newport Beach could be since, for the most part, everybody had or came from money. 

“But it’s not even that,” Emma protested.  “Not only is Thorpe down at the station – wherever that is – but the Gulls won. 
Without him.  Why are people still mad?”

“People are never going to be satisfied,” Jeremy said.  “You give them what they want, they’re just going to find something wrong with it or ask for something else.  If the police really don’t have anything on Thorpe, then they basically gave into these people who have no idea what’s really going on which means they did this because they wanted everybody to shut up.  But people aren’t going to.  They’re just going to want more or criticize what they did receive.”

As they walked out the doors of the stadium, Emma nearly toppled over because another group of people ran into her.  No one from the group had apologized or helped steady her.  They kept talking as though they hadn’t even noticed her, hadn’t noticed bumping into another human being.  Luckily, Jeremy reached over and helped his daughter regain her balance.  Emma noticed the warm brown of her father’s eyes darkened which usually happened when he was upset with something.

“Watch it!” he called after the group.

It was the first time in a while that Emma felt herself get embarrassed by something her father did.

“Dad,” she hissed in a quiet voice.  “Come on.  It’s not a big deal.”

“They didn’t even apologize,” he muttered. 

It wasn’t long before they managed to get to their car, but both knew it would be at least fifteen more minutes before they got out of the lot due to the number of pedestrians and other cars trying to get out as well.  Emma rested her forehead on the cool window, her eyes sculpting the remaining crowd.  The press was still there, hoping to get a comment from someone important – like Seraphina Hanson or a player or even a coach – but probably settled from a fan’s point of view on the current situation the Gulls’ were in.

“Honey, you know how people are,” Jeremy said.  His tone was filled with annoyance but Emma knew it wasn’t because of her.  Jeremy looked tired; whatever case he was working on was really getting to him.  “The fans want the Gulls to win and at the same time, they want Thorpe to take responsibility for Ken’s death.  They need to blame someone for the death and it’s easy to target Thorpe because of the fact that he wanted more money in exchange for remaining on team.  Fans were already turning against him.”

Emma nodded but there was something she didn’t quite understand.  “But I don’t get it,” she murmured.  “One day, the cops are all gung-ho about it being the uncle and now they’re questioning Thorpe.”

“Well, The Orange County Register’s website has this video up where Alan basically takes a stand not only against Thorpe, but against Seraphina as well,” Jeremy continued.  “I’m certain he’ll be all over the news tonight and in the papers tomorrow morning.  Apparently, the police have officially cleared him as a suspect.”

Emma rolled her eyes, too frustrated to speak.

“It’s the Miller kid I’m worried about,” Jeremy went on.  He had pulled out of his parking spot and was now in a long line of cars waiting to exit the lot.  “He’s twenty years old, brought up from the AHL.  The kid’s got some confidence issues he needs to deal with.  You saw how shaky he was, and yeah, we might have won and everything, but I think that’s more in thanks to our defense rather than Miller.  He did let in four goals after all.  And all the pressure to step into Thorpe’s shoes, so to speak, is getting to him.  I think he needs to practice more and build up his confidence.  The fans have no problem being vocal and” –

Emma decided to tune her father out now that he was obviously going on a tangent.  It normally happened when he got tired and was frustrated about something.  He just went on and on and on.  Which Emma had no problem pretending to listen to his
rumblings.  Jeremy needed someone to vent to, and he barely asked any questions or her opinion, so her attention wasn’t totally required.

Instead, Emma let her mind focus on the dance, going over the moves in her head.  She would probably get home and practice the routine some more even though she’d be up in the morning, practicing it again.  There was one part of the song – the breakdown in the middle of the song where things slowed down even more – that she wanted to tighten up.  Especially since this Friday, she would start teaching her team the dance.  She wanted to make sure she had perfected it before she started teaching it because if she couldn’t get it perfect, then she had no right to expect her team to get the moves down perfect.  And she wanted them to get it perfect – as high-
strung and anal as it sounded, she would accept nothing less than perfection.  To be fair, though, she was the best choreographer on campus – possibly in Newport Beach and Irvine – and she told those that auditioned for her team that her expectations would be high and they would stay high throughout the fall quarter.  If they couldn’t handle it, they needed to leave then.  If Emma thought they couldn’t handle it throughout the quarter, she would ask them to leave.  And once she did that, there would be no return for the dancers.

As of yet, Emma couldn’t tell how the team would do with this particular group.  The auditions she held were rigorous and she chose the best twelve people – six girls and six guys – but that didn’t mean this particular routine would sit well with them.  But it was fun.  It was tough but
fun, and she hoped that that would inspire her team to enjoy the routine to the point where they want to do it to the best of their abilities.

“-the fighting is just getting completely out of hand.  If Henry Wayne doesn’t get a hold of the team, I wouldn’t be surprised to see an increase in injuries at the start of the season, and that’s not going to go over well with the team.  There’s already a chance that Thorpe might not be back for the season – even if he isn’t arrested or is found not guilty, there’s his reputation to take into account, and not only that, but he might decide not to resign with the Gulls and get traded to another team – and if Alec Schumacher keeps fighting – you saw that cut on his forehead.  I have no idea why he didn’t bandage that up, even if it was received a few minutes before the game ended – he might get some serious damage down, and if we lose him, our first line takes a hit.  Plus, Kyle Underwood – he’s a beast on the ice – but he’s also an instigator, ready to get into the heads of the other team.  Which is fine, a good tactic.  But he’s that type of guy – like Alec – who can say the wrong thing at the wrong time and piss people off.  And the crazy part is that the refs are actually letting them fight which” –

Yup, he was still on a roll.

At least they were on the 57 freeway now.

Now, it would probably take twenty minutes, if that, to get home.

Emma felt herself yawn and she sank deeper into the passenger seat.  Even though she was determined to work out the last few hits of the routine, she was exhausted.  School had barely started and she could already
feel her summer social life slip away from her.  It was her last year though, so in a way, she figured that perhaps this last push would be worth it.

Since she had listed everything she wanted to fix in terms of dancing, she felt her mind drift away to something else: Kyle Underwood.

They decided they would be friends.  She knew it was the best thing.  Both of them were busy with their own thing and both didn’t really have incredibly positive things to say about love and relationships, so it made sense.  And she was glad there was no pressure on her to impress Kyle Underwood, as a potential girlfriend.  There was no need to be perfect, no need to try too hard.  She could just be herself around him, her goofy, slightly anal, and naively optimistic self with him.

Except, it would be harder to do whenever he smiled at her the way he had when they locked eyes on the ice.  Even though she told her heart that the connection they had between them was completely platonic, her heart jumped at the sight of him. 
Forgot to beat.  And the butterflies in her stomach amassed to rocks being thrown into its walls.

No, she didn’t want a relationship – with him or with anyone – but she
did
feel something different.  And she didn’t know what that was.

“Okay, time to stop that,” she murmured to herself under her breath.

“What was that?” Jeremy asked, stopping in midsentence to address his daughter.

“Um…”  She pressed her lips together before coming up with something quick.  “Why won’t the refs stop the fight, exactly?”

Nice save, Winsor
.

“The only time, really, that the refs let fights go on is when they feel that there’s a lot of tension between the team,” Jeremy explain.  “The fighting might alleviate that tension.  But it never happens during preseason. 
Never
.  Sure, fights break out, little scraps here and there, but nothing as big as what’s been going on here, and if it did turn into what we’ve been seeing, the refs are normally really good at breaking it out.  I have no idea why they continue to let the players fight, but if any of our guys aren’t able to play at the beginning of our season, I will be livid.  I would even be tempted to consider bringing a lawsuit against the league about it.”