Chapter 3 - New Friend?

It was Tuesday morning and Nef was working at her internship but she had classes in the evening. She was currently working on creating an organizational structure for her boss. She was in the process of documenting the firm’s global structure. Half way through the morning her phone beeped signaling a text message from Sasha S.

“Baby puke, you come to morning skate?”

She texted back “No, I have to work.”

“You come to game?”

“No, I have class tonight. ”

“University?”

“Yes. Play well tonight.”

The caps were playing the Rangers tonight and by the time the puck dropped Nef had been in class for about an hour. She tried to pay attention but her professor reminded her of Ben Stein. Jesse and Stephanie had been texting her updates but it wasn’t long before she decided to watch the game online instead of taking notes on her laptop. Nef loved her classes but a 4 hour seminar was torture. When she turned on the game it was about 6 minutes into the second. One of the guys sitting next to her noticed the game on her screen and wrote “you’re amazing” on the top of his notebook. Sasha ended up scoring two goals with the caps winning 5-1.

There was a game on Thursday and Nef would be able to go because her class was only one day a week with a great deal of the work being done online. When she got home she sat in the living talking to Jesse and Stephanie about the game.

“It was amazing!” Stephanie said. “I had never been to a hockey game before. It seems really cool.”

“Haha, I’m glad you enjoyed yourself. Sasha texted me before the game to ask if I was going.”

“Which one is that?” Stephanie was still unfamiliar with the individual players.

“Number 28.”

“Oh, he’s one of the cute ones!”

Jesse and Nef laughed at Stephanie. It was true that Alex Semin was one of the cute ones but they had been trying to get Stephanie to like hockey because of the game and not because of how hot some of the guys were. Hopefully as Steph learned more about hockey and understood the ins and outs of the game she would enjoy the skill that each player had.

Thursday evening came and Jesse and Steph were getting ready to go to the game. The Caps were playing the Maple Leafs. Nef sent a text message to Sasha. “Play well. I want to see a good game tonight!” It wasn’t long before she received a reply asking if she would be there. She responded that she would be there in section 100 across from the home team bench. She told him her row and seat number just in case he decided to look for her. They arrived at Verizon center about a half hour before the game started and the team was warming up.

She saw Sasha scanning the section, stood up and waved. He saw her and smiled. Nef and Sasha had been texting back and forth. Sasha was nearly fluent in English. Nef had always thought that Sasha knew more English than he let on. She believed that Sasha knew English, he just didn’t speak reporter. It seamed like he avoided the American media at all cost. She now had confirmation that she was right. She couldn’t understand why Sasha had wanted to talk to her or hang out with her. Yes they had had a good time at the amusement park but was that really reason enough to want to make a new friend? It seemed like it.

The game was much like the Rangers game. The caps won 6-2. They did not allow a goal until the second half of the third period. Sasha had another 2 goal game including the game winning goal. He had been playing strongly. He was announced the first start of the game . Once he got back to the locker room he sent a text to Nef asking if the game was good for her.

She said that it was very good. Sasha began to undress quickly. He wanted to get out of the locker room without talking to the reporters. He wasn’t that lucky. Dmitry Chesnokov walked up to him along with Tarik El Bashir. They wanted to talk about how he was playing. He been working on not taking bad penalties and so far he had been doing well.

He spent a few minutes with them briefly going over what he had done for training over the summer and his plan for the season. His phone beeped signaling a text message so he excused himself from the interview. He grabbed his bag and headed to his car. He had been texting and talking back and forth with Nef since they exchanged numbers at the Season Ticket Holders Party at Six Flags. He and Ovie had saw her talking to her roommate, Jesse, trying to convince her to get on a roller coaster. She was cute - 5 foot 5, caramel brown skin, curly dark brown hair, and big brown eyes.

They had spent the few hours that they had riding every roller coaster in the park. It was nice to be able to do something normal for a little while. He loved his career and wouldn’t trade it for anything but it was nice to be able to go to an amusement park, hang out with friends, meet new people, and have fun.

He was looking forward to Friday and being able to just have fun.