Curious

“You know, sometimes, when I see these assholes, I actually want to throw myself off of the roof,” Peyton told me.

I lifted my head up from the file of papers I was sorting through to see who she was talking about, noticing the giant Fall Out Boy poster and laughing, “Peyton, you have no reason to dislike these guys.”

She turned to look at me, her mouth hanging open in offence. “Sure I do! When I was 17 I paid forty bucks to see them in concert, and do you know what happened?” She asked. I opened my mouth to make a guess, but she continued on before I could do so, “I was in the front row and Joe spit in my face. Then, as if that’s not bad enough, when Pete jumped into the crowd, his shoe fell off and hit me in the face.” She turned to look back at the band as they made their way through the foyer. “Assholes.”

I shook my head at her, going back to sorting through all the papers that had been left on my desk.Peyton sat back down in her chair, letting out a dramatic sigh and blowing her dark hair away from her face before she faced me once more. “How do you just not care about all the people walking through here all the time? I mean, you’re my age, and I swoon every time any artistwalks by. You don’t even look up.”

I shrugged, stapling a couple of pages together before I looked at her. “I don’t know. I mean, I think it’s cool to come into work and see everyone from a group of kids playing midget in the daytime, then coming in at night and seeing Dane Cook-”

“DOUCHE!” Peyton interrupted, shooting me a grin afterwards. “I’m sorry. It’s just, he’s not funny.”

I stared at her for a moment before shaking my head and continuing, “Anyways, it’s cool, but it’s still my job. I need to act as responsibly as possible or else-” I stopped as I noticed the next group of people shuffling their way through the front doors awkwardly, all of them looking completely confused as to why they were dropped off at this arena and not the usual University campus. “Oh sweet Jesus, it’s Jordan Staal.”

Peyton frowned, turning to look at the group of guys I was currently staring open-mouthed at. “I have no idea who that is. But that blonde guy over there, the one with the questionably stylish hat? He needs my number.”

I pulled my eyes away from the group to look at her and then back to the guy she was pointing at. “That’s Jordan Staal.”

“Oh. Well…I’m a bigger slut than you, so I think I win.”

I laughed. “I’m not sure he’s that kind of guy-”

“Oh he totally is.”

I jumped about a foot in the air, knocking all of the papers I had been shuffling earlier to the floor and my hand to jump up and cover my mouth. I turned to stare at the grinning man beside me, who was clearly trying his hardest to not burst out in a fit of hysterics at the way I had just reacted to his comment. “Okay, as big a fan as I am, I am not happy with the results of your sneaky ways.” I pointed down to the scattered papers around my feet. “That was three hours of alphabetizing that you just ruined with one unexpected comment.”

“Are you French? Or do you just not speak English well?” Peyton asked him.

He stared at her for a long moment, seeming to debate on whether he should say something offensive back or completely ignore. Eventually he turned back to face me and extended a hand, as well as a surprisingly flashy smile. “I’m Max.”

I nodded, shaking his hand. “I’m Hanna. The really charming girl next to me is Peyton.”

Peyton shrugged. “I was just curious about the accent, that’s all.”

Max sighed, placing both of his hands on his hips. “Yes, I’m from Quebec.”

“That’s too bad,” Peyton muttered. “My next question is if you’re gay.”

I turned around so that Max couldn’t see me as I tried to get the bubbles of laughter under your control. I took a few deep breaths and turned back around to see the unimpressed look across his face. “I’m sorry. It’s just…well, you’re sweater is very feminine.”

Max frowned at both of us before he turned around and headed back over to the rest of the group and saying something to them, pointing over at Peyton and I with a very intense facial expression that was probably meant to be intimidating, but instead made me think of the way Michelle would look when she yelled, “how Rude!” on Full House. Peyton eyed up the group for a moment before she turned to look at me once more. “So, who the hell are these guys?”

I grinned, a wave excitement rushing through my veins as I glanced over at the group once more. “The Pittsburgh Penguins.”

“Is that the football team?”

“No, that’s the Steelers. This is the hockey team,” I corrected.

Peyton nodded, shrugging her shoulders. “Whatever, I know that all the good looking ones will soon lose their attractive features to unfortunate puck bounces and dirty head shots. What’s the point?” She threw her arms up dramatically for a second, but had to end her actions quickly as the phone began to rang.

I knelt down to begin picking up all of the scattered papers, muttering to myself as I did so. As excited as I was to see a hockey team in here, we very rarely get an AHL team, let alone an NHL, his startling me had caused Max Talbot to fall from one of my top three favourites on the team, to one of my least favourite in general. After I had the majority of the papers gathered up, I stood up, using my one free hand to brush a few pieces of hair out of my eyes. I frowned as I glanced down at the pile in front of me. I had literally just finished alphabetizing them when I had been distracted by the 6 foot 4 glory of Jordan Staal walking through the doors. I let out a long sigh, glaring down at the once again disorganized pile. “Damn hockey players.”

“Hey now, we have feelings.”

I was startled, once again, but didn’t knock anything over this time. I glanced up, way up, at the smirking features of Jordan Staal and just above fell over. I placed both hands on top of the desk in front of me to make sure I was steadied and then smiled at him. “I’m sorry. It was more directed at Talbot than all players in general,” I explained, turning my gaze so I was glaring at the back of Max Talbot’s head. “Bitch messed up my papers.”

Jordan laughed, a surprisingly loud sound that snapped my attention away from Talbot and re-directed it at Jordan as he shook his head. “Yeah, that’s what Talbsy does. He screws things up,” he joked. “Uhm, I actually had a question, and I’m guessing here is the right place to ask since there’s a giant ‘Ask Us Anything!’ sign on the front,” He began to explain. “Our coach and training staff are stuck in traffic, they’ll be here pretty soon, but we don’t know where to go with all of our gear.”

I nodded, moving a step over to my computer and checking to see which change rooms were available, and all that jazz. “Well, you guys are apparently in room 226, which I can point you to in a second,” I told him, glancing up for a brief moment, just to get an extra glance at him. “But, the ice isn’t free for another half hour anyways. So, if you guys want to drop your stuff off and head down to the cafeteria-”

“Nah, it takes at least a half hour to get all our stuff together,” he interrupted. I stuttered for a second,

“Oh. Well…I didn’t know that because I don’t play in the NHL.” I winced my eyes shut as soon as the sentence left my mouth. “I’m sorry, I’m a little frazzled by the fact that you guys are even here, and I think my crazy fandom is getting the best of me.”

Jordan grinned, seeming more flattered than weirded out by completely obvious, and also stupid, statement that I had made a moment before. “That’s fine. We’re not really sure why coach decided it’d be better to put us here to practice either.”

I nodded, deciding to not try and say anything witty since I was too nervous. “Well, I’ll just tell you where your change room are,” I stopped, frowning. “I’m sorry, that sentence wasn’t right. I’ll you where the change rooms are.” I let out a sigh again, “Was that right? I can’t tell anymore.”

Jordan let out a small chuckle, “Yeah, the second one sounded right.”

“Good. So, you’re going to go down that hall, take the first hall on the right and 226 is pretty hard to miss. If the cleaning staff remembered, there should be a giant Penguins logo hanging outside of it.” I explained.

He nodded. “Okay, thanks.” He pushed himself away from the desk and then paused, “Are you two coming to the game tonight?” He asked.

Peyton, who didn’t even seem to notice he was there until that question was asked, exchanged a curious look with me.

I shrugged, “We probably will, yeah. We have free tickets to all the games, it’s just a question of whether we can make it to GM Place in time.”

He nodded. “Well, let me know if you are going to be there. We have two days off after this and, since we rarely play out here, we don’t know our way around. And anyone who calls Talbot a bitch after questioning his English and sexuality deserves to be our guide.”

I turned to look at Peyton. “Pinch my arm, just to make sure I didn’t fall asleep on the jo-OW!”

Peyton laughed, moving her hand away from the back of my arm. “Congratulations, you’re awake.”

“Is this your really confusing way of telling me that you’ll show us around?” Jordan asked.

I grinned, “Yes, that is exactly what that was.”

He nodded. “Okay, cool. I’ll tell Bylsma to give you all the info you’ll need.” He gave a wave of his gigantic hand before turning and leading the rest of the team off in the direction I had pointed him.

“It’s going to be a good two days,” I told Peyton, watching the group head off towards the change room.