Page 132 of Puck the Coach's Son
Paul hit me four times.
I let him.
I could have put him on the floor with one shot. I have two inches and thirty pounds, and I've been in a lot more fights than he has. His form was garbage. He was throwing out of his shoulder, not his hip, and his second punch tipped him forward so far I could have caught his wrist and ended it. I didn't. I ate them because the kid who loves his father was standing two feet away from me and I was never going to be the man who beat his dad in front of him.
I would eat four more. I would eat forty. I would not have hit Paul Laurent tonight if he had broken my jaw.
My hand opens and closes in the spray. The knuckles are fine. I check them. No split. That's the part I'm going to be proud of later, when I have the capacity to be proud of anything. Tonight, I just note it.
I shut the water off. I wrap a towel around my hips. I stand in the bathroom mirror and look at my face. My face looks like the face of a man who lost everything he loves in forty minutes and made it look like a traffic incident.
The cut over my eye will need glue. I don't care.
The knock on the door happens while I'm pulling sweats on.
I freeze with one leg in. I don't own a gun. I own a hockey stick. That's what I pick up walking to the door. I look through the peep.
Building management. Two of them. One I know. Ramirez, the daytime guy, nice, once got my DoorDash up when I was napping. The other I don't know. Suit. Clipboard. The clipboard guys are multiplying tonight.
I open the door. I keep the stick low.
“Mr. Creed.” Ramirez won't meet my eye. “I'm sorry. We got a call.”
“From who?”
The clipboard answers. “Frosthaven Huskies front office holds the lease on this unit, Mr. Creed. As of twenty-two hundred tonight the organization has terminated its tenancy. Per the tenant-in-residence clause, you have seventy-two hours to vacate.”
I look at him.
“Seventy-two hours?”
“Yes, sir.”
My grip on the stick tightens, loosens.
“It's after ten on a Saturday.”
“The clock starts at ten tomorrow. You have until ten Tuesday.”
I look at Ramirez. Ramirez is looking at the floor.
“Jorge. Is this real?”
“It's real, Mad Dog.”
Nobody has called me Mad Dog in this hallway before. He says it soft, like condolences.
The clipboard holds out a piece of paper. I don't take it. He sets it on the entry console and backs up one step.
“Also, sir, the organization asked me to convey that your access to team facilities has been revoked. Effective immediately. Please don't attempt to enter the Frosthaven Arena practice or main building. Security has been notified.”
“I'll never play again. Is that what you came to tell me?”
The clipboard goes carefully blank.
“I'm not authorized to speak to your contract, sir.”
“Right.”
