Chapter Text
Hope slings her gear bag over her shoulder and waves goodbye to her aunt as she climbs out of the car. As she makes her way into the rink, she can tell that she’s a little earlier than she meant to be, given how few cars are in the parking lot. It doesn’t really bother her though. She likes being at the rink, even if Ethan and Maya make fun of her for being there all the time.
As Hope walks through the lobby, one of the rink attendants gives her a smile and a wave. Hope doesn’t know their name, but their face is one she has seen countless times during practices and games, so she smiles back. Hope goes to put her bag down on the ground before hesitating and wandering into the back rooms of the rink. She looks for the door that says manager on it and pokes her head inside.
“Hey, Bill,” Hope says when she sees the middle-aged man at his desk. “We’re on the concession side of the rink tonight, right?”
The manager doesn’t bat an eye at Hope intruding into his space. “Yeah,” He answers simply, not looking up from whatever he is working on.
“Cool, thanks,” Hope says, slipping back out of the door.
Hope makes her way out of the back rooms and around the rink to her team’s side and plops her bag down. She stands there for just a second, appreciating the calm of the empty rink. She reaches her arms up in a stretch until her shoulder gives a little pop. She shakes out the joint with a small groan before taking her coat off and starting to run laps. By the time Hope is finishing her warm-up, Ethan and Maya are walking through the front doors.
Hope laughs a little to herself, knowing that Ethan and Maya also tend to show up early but only because Hope forced them into the habit when they gave her rides.
“Hey, Hope!” Maya calls across the rink as Hope heads toward them, completing her last lap.
“Hey, guys,” Hope says when she reaches them, slightly out of breath. She gives them both a smile, bumping her shoulder into Maya’s playfully and giving Ethan’s a pat as she passes by them to sit down next to her bag.
“Well, you’re in a good mood,” Ethan says with a chuckle and an incredulous look.
Hope shrugs as she starts her stretches. “Yeah, I don’t know. I guess it’s just nice having my aunt back in town. That and statistically this game should go well, given the last couple,” She says with a laugh.
“What about things with the cheerleader?” Ethan asks, putting his stuff down.
“Lizzie,” Maya corrects, sounding slightly irritated.
Hope immediately draws in on herself at the mention of Lizzie. “What about her?” She asks, feigning ignorance as she stays in a stretch for much too long in order to avoid eye contact.
“Have you asked her out yet?” Ethan asks, giving Hope an expectant look.
“No…” Hope answers reluctantly.
“Seriously?” Ethan exclaims a little too loudly, his voice echoing slightly in the empty rink.
Hope frowns, surprised by the little bit of harshness in Ethan’s tone.
Maya scowls at her brother. “Ignore him, Hope. He’s just pissy because he thinks he failed a math test today,” She explains, although it doesn’t sound particularly convincing. “But I thought we agreed that Lizzie definitely likes you after she came to the away game. Why don’t you just ask her out?”
“Yeah, but what if I’m reading it wrong? I mean, those could all be friend things, right? Friends support each other and their interests and stuff,” Hope argues timidly, her insecurity obvious in her voice. “I mean, given what happened at the last game, maybe she just thought I could use some support,” She adds darkly.
Ethan lets out a frustrated sigh and opens his mouth to argue, but Maya stops him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Let me, okay?” Maya whispers to her brother, giving him a little shove in the opposite direction of Hope.
Ethan throws up his hands and gives a little huff as he walks off to start his warmup.
“Hope, I thought we talked about this,” Maya says gently, crouching down next to Hope. “It’s not weird for friends to support each other in their interests, but it is weird for someone who wasn’t even your friend yet to become obsessed with the sport you play. Not to mention the staring, the protectiveness, the way she used to hate you, which just screams repressed crush.”
Hope stares at her hands for a long moment. “I just don’t want to fuck it up, you know?” She says softly.
Maya’s heart aches at how small Hope sounds. “I know. But you’re just going to have to trust me that she likes you and that it’s very obvious to everyone but you,” Maya says with a small, teasing smile. “And if I have to point out every time I notice it, I will.”
Hope chuckles at that. “Maybe.”
“If that’s what it takes, then you’ll be hearing a lot from me tonight.”
“Okay, thanks,” Hope says with a laugh as she gets to her feet. “I’m going to go gear up, see you guys in a bit.”
Maya nods and watches Hope walk away, her eyes lingering for a moment even after Hope has disappeared into the locker room. Maya then heads over to where Ethan is on the ground starting his stretches.
“Hey,” Maya says sitting down next to him.
“Hey,” Ethan responds tightly, not looking at his sister.
Maya waits a moment before saying, “What was that, Ethan? I thought we agreed to support Hope in this.”
Ethan sighs heavily. “Yeah, I know, and I’m not going back on that, it’s just…” He pauses to gesture vaguely at the air around him. “It’s just frustrating to watch her act like it’s unbelievable that anyone could like her. I mean, we’re sitting right here, for god’s sake.”
Maya chuckles at that. “I know. I never expected Hope to be such a useless bisexual, but here we are.”
“Yeah. I mean at this point we might have more luck talking to that cheerleader than Hope,” Ethan says, his voice still a little bitter.
“Oh my god, will you quit that?” Maya groans irritably. “Her name is Lizzie, and you know it’s Lizzie. It’s not funny and you’re not subtle.”
“Excuse you, I’m very funny,” Ethan says in mock offense.
Maya rolls her eyes. “To an audience of one,” She says, giving her brother a hard shove as she gets up to run her laps.
“Are you coming?” Lizzie asks, poking her head into her and Josie’s room to see her sister still hunched over her desk.
It takes a few seconds for Josie to respond, reluctantly dragging her attention away from the screen of her computer.
“I’m kind of busy, Lizzie. I’m sure you’ll survive one game without me,” Josie responds irritably.
“This isn’t about me, Jo. This is about you taking a break from being a crazy person,” Lizzie says sternly. “And you said you’d come.”
“Yeah, well, I changed my mind,” Josie says sharply, turning back to her work.
“Fine,” Lizzie snaps as she turns to leave, closing the door behind her with a little more force than is necessary.
Lizzie grumbles to herself all the way to her car. Her mood starts to pick up a little once she pulls into the parking lot of the rink, feeling the buzzing excitement of a new game. She pulls her jacket around herself tightly to protect from the cold wind as she jogs over to the front doors.
It’s only slightly less cold inside the rink than outside of it and there are a good amount of people milling around inside in anticipation of the game. Lizzie recognizes a few faces from school, waving to them as she heads over to the performance area. She reluctantly strips off her jacket and goes to check in with her coach, shivering in the cold air.
Lizzie’s coach checks her off as present and Lizzie’s eyes immediately go to look across the rink, searching for a familiar face. She spots Hope’s jersey on the ice, running drills. It’s still pretty early, so Lizzie jogs over to the team’s area of the rink and catches Hope’s eye. Hope pauses briefly to smile at Lizzie before completing the drill she was in the middle of. Then, instead of getting back in line to go through the drill again, Hope skates over to Lizzie, easily ignoring the dirty look her coach sends her.
“Hey, Lizzie,” Hope says brightly. Her face is a little flushed and a few strands of hair poke out chaotically from under her helmet.
“Hey!” Lizzie says energetically, partially from excitement for the game and partially because she’s jumping up and down a little to stay warm. “You ready to kick some ass?”
Hope laughs. “You know it. West Lakepond doesn’t stand a chance,” She says with that effortless confidence that Hope seems to always have when it comes to hockey. Lizzie used to think it was the most annoying thing in the world, but right now, she has to admit that it’s a good look for Hope.
“Not a doubt in my mind. Can’t wait to watch you wipe the floor with them,” Lizzie says, trying and failing to keep a shiver out of her voice. “Of course, that’s assuming I don’t freeze to death in this uniform before the second half,” She adds irritably.
Hope frowns, concern passing over her face. “Where’s your jacket? Can’t you at least wear it between the performances?”
“It’s in a pile next to our equipment. And we’re not allowed to wear anything in the performance area that’s not school colors,” Lizzie says with a roll of her eyes. “Which is stupid because they aren’t even the team’s colors.”
Hope considers Lizzie’s words with a furrowed expression. After a moment her eyes light up and she says, “Wait here for a second, I’ll be right back,” before skating off toward the locker rooms.
Lizzie doesn’t have a chance to respond before Hope is too far away to hear her. She just watches Hope skate away curiously and laughs when Hope blatantly ignores her coach’s attempts to scold her back onto the ice. Lizzie wanders closer to the locker rooms as she waits for Hope to reappear. When Hope finally does emerge, she’s holding something under her arm.
“Here,” Hope says when she reaches Lizzie, holding out her bright blue and yellow Salvatore letterman’s jacket.
Lizzie’s eyes widen. “Wait, really? Thanks, Hope!” She exclaims, eagerly taking the jacket from Hope’s hands.
“Yeah, no problem. Those things are pretty warm, so I figured it would—” Hope voice trails off as she looks up to see Lizzie slipping the jacket on.
Lizzie sighs into the added weight of the jacket, feeling herself start to warm up almost immediately. Then she glances at Hope and strikes a pose. “How do I look?” Lizzie asks playfully.
Hope’s mouth goes dry and her mind goes blank. She stares at Lizzie for a long moment, an unfamiliar spark in her eyes. “Um, yeah,” She manages eventually, her voice sounding rougher than usual, “you look great.”
“Aw, thanks!” Lizzie replies exaggeratedly, something warm bubbling up in her chest that has nothing to do with the added layer.
“Yeah, uh,” Hope says, trying to fill the space before things become awkward or Lizzie notices her staring. “Stay warm and, uh, enjoy the game,” She stumbles awkwardly.
Lizzie laughs, and truthfully Hope has no idea what Lizzie is laughing at, but it’s a nice sound and it keeps the moment from becoming uncomfortable, so she’s not going to question it.
“Of course,” Lizzie says brightly. “Good luck and try not to break anything,” She calls as she starts to walk away.
Hope doesn’t even bother being embarrassed at the comment, she just laughs to herself as she watches Lizzie make her way back around the rink, her eyes lingering on the image of Lizzie wearing her last name. Hope probably shouldn’t dwell on that.
“Do I even need to say anything?” Maya’s voice calls from behind her, breaking Hope out of her thoughts.
Hope spins around to see Maya giving her a knowing look. She feels her face heat up. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” She huffs, avoiding eye contact.
Maya snorts. “Please, like you weren’t just imagining what your wedding would look like.”
“Shut up,” Hope snaps, her voice lacking the edge she meant it to have. She gives Maya a shove as she skates past her and pretends not to hear her laughing as she goes back to the lineup for drills.
“How do you even know she’s going to be here?” Penelope’s cousin asks, sounding exasperated.
“Of course, she’s going to be here. Her sister is one of the cheerleaders and drags her to fucking everything,” Penelope snaps, her eyes scanning the bleachers around them.
Cole lets out a frustrated sigh. “Look, I know a lot of stuff happened at the last game, and remember I’m not judging, but I didn’t bring you here so I could listen to you complain all night. If you don’t want to be here, you can just go do something else. I can come get you when the game is over.”
“Yeah, like there is anything else to do in Mystic Falls,” Penelope snarks.
Cole rolls his eyes. “I just don’t get it, Penny. You met a cute girl, she liked you. Then you did something kinda shitty and now she hates you. It wouldn’t be the first time that’s happened, to either of us.”
Penelope scowls. “It’s different this time.”
“What? She’s different?” Cole says, a little mockingly. When Penelope doesn’t respond, he adds, “I just don’t see what the big deal is.”
“Yeah, obviously,” Penelope snaps.
Cole just sighs and they fall into an awkward silence.
“I just, I liked her, okay? It was nice to talk to someone who didn’t care about hockey or playoffs or Bayport’s stupid undefeated streak. She was cute and funny, and she liked my arms.” Penelope laughs fondly at the memory before her expression darkens again. “And she didn’t care about who my family was, didn’t care about my brother or my dad’s stupid records and she didn’t expect me to be anything like them.”
“Okay, yeah, I get that,” Cole says sympathetically. “But what are you going to do? Apologize? No offense, but I’ve never seen you apologize in your life and based on the way that girl looked at you the other night, I’m going to guess that you would end up getting murdered anyways.”
“I’m not going to do anything. I just expected her to be here.”
“Well, she’s not, so chill out,” Cole says bluntly. “And if you’re gonna keep brooding, do it quietly, the game’s about to start.”
“Whatever.”
After a few more minutes, a whistle blows and the players vacate the ice in anticipation for the pregame show. Hope joins her teammates on the bench as their coach starts to talk strategy while the loudspeaker introduces the two teams and gives information on the sponsors of the rink and the league. Hope immediately tunes out of both what her coach is saying and the loudspeaker as soon as the cheer performance starts. She can’t help but smile as she watches Lizzie help hoist people into the air and cheer for the team.
Maya elbows Hope in the side and gives her a knowing look, clearly having noticed where Hope’s attention was. Hope rolls her eyes and kicks Maya’s stick out of her hands, mostly just to get Maya to stop looking at her like that. Maya laughs as she retrieves her stick, clearly proud of how she was getting to Hope.
“You know she’s looking at you too right?” Maya leans over to whisper to Hope, sounding incredibly amused.
Hope frowns. Wait, really? She quickly turns her attention back to the cheerleaders, and sure enough, for a split second Hope meets Lizzie’s eyes from across the rink. Hope immediately drops her gaze, feeling her face heat up.
“That doesn’t mean anything,” Hope mutters.
“Sure, right,” Maya says, rolling her eyes, “because it’s not like cheer stunts are dangerous and require focus to perform. It’s totally normal for cheerleaders to spend half their time staring at an attractive hockey player while they hold someone five feet into the air with one hand.”
“Maybe, Lizzie is just that good,” Hope counters lamely.
Maya laughs. “Sure, Hope, keep telling yourself that.”
Hope grumbles something unintelligible under her breath, turning away from Maya, to both hide the blush on her face and to go back to watching the cheer performance, neither of which go unnoticed by Maya, causing her to laugh some more.
Once cheer is done, the starting players are called out onto the ice, the puck is dropped, and the game begins. Hope easily loses herself in the action of the game and forgets about Maya’s plan to torment her for the rest of the night. After a few plays, a penalty shot is called, with Hope up to take the shot, and reality is forced back onto her.
“I know you tend to tune things out while you play, but you know she’s cheering for you right now, right?” Maya says with a smirk as she skates past Hope to her position for the penalty shot.
Hope’s head jerks up at that, suddenly aware of her surroundings, and sure enough, a distinct and familiar voice can be heard shouting from the stands.
“Woo! Go number 39!” Lizzie cheers animatedly, the only one standing up in the bleachers.
It takes Hope a moment to even remember that that is, in fact, her jersey number, and even longer to remember that she’s supposed to be taking a penalty shot and not staring at Lizzie, who is still wearing her letterman jacket in the stands. The whistle breaks Hope out of her Lizzie-induced daze, and luckily Hope has good enough reflexes to barely miss a beat before taking the shot, the puck just barely being caught by the goalie.
The game continues on, Hope dominating on the ice. It only takes a few more plays for Hope to score a goal, directly after hip checking a player so hard they fell face first onto the ice. Hope can vaguely hear the crowd cheer at the goal, but it isn’t until Maya nudges her on the way back to their starting positions that Hope actually tunes into what's going on around her, and what she hears and sees is a small group of Salvatore students in the stands chanting her last name, led by Lizzie Saltzman, of course. Hope won’t deny that the attention makes her a little uncomfortable, but she also won’t deny that she’s very glad her face is already flushed from playing, because, otherwise, she would never hear the fucking end of it from Maya and Ethan.
“Have I made my point well enough yet?” Maya asks once halftime is called, flopping down on the bench next to Hope, water bottle in hand.
Hope groans through a mouthful of water. “If I say yes, will you stop?”
“I’ll stop once you finally ask her out,” Maya says, giving Hope a look, like she knows Hope is going to try and back out of it.
“Well, it’s not like I can do it right now, we’re in the middle of a game.”
“So do it after. You know she’ll stick around to say hi to you and only you.”
Hope shrinks back at that. It’s not that she doesn’t want to ask Lizzie out, it’s just that she wants to do it right and at the right time and when she’s emotionally prepared, to minimize her chance of being rejected, even if that’s not really how that works.
“Well, no, I can’t do it tonight, it’s too soon, and I’ll be all sweaty and tired from playing, and…” Hope rambles weakly.
“Then when, Hope?” Maya asks a little more firmly, meeting Hope’s eyes pointedly.
Hope’s gaze immediately drops to her skates. “I don’t know…” She trails off for a second, brow furrowing in thought. “I was thinking maybe this weekend, at the winter fair.”
“Wait, why then?”
“Well, because I invited Lizzie to come volunteer and hang out, and she said yes, so I figured it’d be a good way to do it, because I’d have lots of time to find the right moment and we’d be hanging out and having fun all day, and, I don’t know, it just seemed like it would work well that way,” Hope explains bashfully, clearly having put way too much thought into this already.
“Hold up, you’re telling that you invited Lizzie to do free labor at a school she doesn’t go to, to raise money for a team she doesn’t play on, with the only benefit being she’d get to see you, and she agreed, and you’re still not sure she likes you?”
“Maybe?” Hope murmurs with a noncommittal shrug and a refusal to meet her friend’s eyes.
Maya bursts out laughing. “Holy shit, Hope, you’re so bad at this. You’re lucky Lizzie is so obvious about it, otherwise I don’t know how you would survive this.”
Hope laughs at that. “Obvious to you,” she argues slightly.
“Obvious to everyone but you,” Maya counters, shaking her head. “Just remember, Ethan and I will be at the winter fair too, so there is no chickening out this time, okay? Don’t make us bully you.”
Hope laughs, but nods in understanding, as the whistle blows signaling the end of half time. The players get up off the bench, switching over to the opposite side of the rink as the next half of the game begins.