Body Check by Deirdre Martin

certifiable .
    It was the Monday following her weekend shuffle ’round the dance floor, and inner Janna was cursing on an endless loop.
    Mistake! Mistake, mistake, MISTAKE!!!! What on earth possessed you to tell Captain Perfect you hadn’t followed your entrepreneurial instincts?! Now he knows what a loser you are! Now he thinks you’re a quitter! You know how some men sleep with a woman they feel sorry for and call it a “Mercy Fuck”? Well, your dance with Ty Gallagher was a Mercy Dance! He asked you to dance because he felt sorry for you. And who can blame him? You’re pathetic. As if a man like him could feel anything for you. God, you are an idiot, you know that? A total idiot.
    Theresa’s imagined voice then joined with inner Janna’s, the two beginning a harmonizing duet of charge and counter charge.
    You and Gallagher have chemistry. Can’t you see that? When are you going to DUMP that DRAIN on society, Robearr?
    Chemistry? Look who’s talking! You’re a perfect match for Michael Dante but you couldn’t see it ’cause you were too busy batting your eyelashes at Lex like some deranged Mae West impersonator! Chemistry? What a stupid soap-opera word. How many insipid press releases did we churn out at The Wild & the Free gushing about “incredible” or “undeniable” chemistry between two actors who hated each other off the set?! Chemistry, shmemistry!
    Then a third voice chimed in, making it a trio in her head. A deep, rich, confident voice. Ty Gallagher’s voice.
    You’ll hate yourself if you don’t start your own business.
    HEL-LO! I already hate myself about that.
    But the voice sounding loudest in her head wasn’t inner Janna, or imagined Theresa, or imagined Ty. It was a real voice, complete with New York accent, and it belonged to Lou. Two nights from now was one of the largest fund-raising events in the city, a black-tie dinner to raise money for the United Way. Janna had managed to coax former Blades Captain Roy Duncan, one of the most beloved players in New York hockey history, to attend, which was no small feat. But less than an hour ago, Lou had called her into his office to tell her that Duncan wouldn’t be able to make the dinner, because his brother had died in Vancouver. They needed someone else—fast. Someone who was as big a draw as Duncan, so that those who’d paid a helluva lot of money to hobnob with a hockey legend under the guise of a good cause wouldn’t be disappointed.
    â€œGet Gallagher,” Lou had commanded, while murdering an egg and cheese sandwich. “Do whatever you have to do—beg, cry, sell your firstborn child—I don’t care. Just get him.”
    â€œI’ll try,” Janna promised as she tried hard not to cringe at the yellow river of egg yolk cascading down all three of Lou’s chins.
    â€œGet him,” Lou repeated. “Today. Now. And pass me a napkin on your way out.”
    So here she was, less than an hour until game time, on her way to try, once again, to sweet talk the world’s most uncooperative man into doing the one thing he clearly despised. The timing couldn’t have been worse: while the team was usually available to the press on an informal basis around four-thirty P.M. or so while they worked on their sticks and skates, after that it was a closed shop except for the players, coaches and trainers.
    And now her.
    Maybe, she thought, as she hurried along the labyrinthine concrete hallways beneath the arena, he’d cut her some slack. They’d turned some kind of corner on Saturday night, hadn’t they? Maybe he’d have pity on her and agree to help her out just this once.
    The locker room door was shut tight. Discreetly, she tried the handle. Locked. Not good. Swallowing, she rapped hard on the door, twice. A second later, the door jerked open just a crack. In the crack stood Ty. He already had his “game face”