Page 61 of Hard Check
Dawson was watching the ice. Not the Jumbotron, not his phone. The ice.
Leo headed for the tunnel with his pulse running a few beats faster than warm-ups should’ve left it.
Rockford came out hitting,but Leo’s legs were under him from the first shift. He drove wide along the boards, cut underneath the D-man, curled back toward the slot. Carter found him with a pass that threaded two sticks. Wrist shot, top corner. The net snapped back, the horn blew, and the building went wild
Jonesy got to him first, both arms around Leo’s neck, helmet crashing into his.
“V! You absolute animal!”
Carter was next, glove tapping his back. Leo skated past the bench and knocked gloves down the line. Every pass had connected. Every shift mattered. Those cheers were for him, and Dawson was here to see his goal.
He didn’t look at the stands. He didn’t have to. The awareness of Dawson watching had been sitting low in his stomach since the puck drop, steady as a second heartbeat, and it was making him play harder than he had since his rookie year.
The second goal came off a one-timer from the top of the circle, Carter feeding him through traffic. The horn again. Leo’s hands went up before he processed it. Carter skated past with a nod that carried more weight than Jonesy’s celebration. The assist came in the third, a stretch pass that caught Novo in stride, and Jonesy grabbed Leo’s shoulder on the bench and shook him.
“Hatty watch! Come on, V, one more!”
“I’ll settle for the win.”
“You’ll settle for nothing. You’re a menace, and I love it.”
When the buzzer sounded at the end of the third period, the Stags had won four to two.
The locker room was chaos. Jonesy had the speaker at full volume, something with too much bass that rattled the stall dividers, and Carter was doing a dance that Leo hoped was ironic. Riggs pelted Leo with a wadded-up roll of tape from across the room.
“Two and an apple, V. That’s a steak dinner.”
“You’re buying?” Leo caught the tape and fired it back.
“I said it’s a steak dinner. I didn’t say I was paying for it.”
Leo shook his head. “Real generous, Riggsy.”
“Best game I’ve seen you play in blue,” Ford said.
“Best game I’ve played in blue.”
Ford leaned back in his stall. “Keep that up, and I’ll stop worrying about you.”
“Were you worrying about me?”
Ford smiled, tired and knowing, and didn’t answer. Carter, two stalls down, folded his jersey with his usual precision and said without looking up, “Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it.”
Leo toweled his hair and reveled in the win. Jonesy was telling Russ a story with his full body, bare-chested and gesturing, and Russ was laughing so hard he couldn’t get his shin pads off. Novo leaned against his stall and shook his head at both of them. Ski threw a water bottle at Jonesy and missed by a foot, and Jonesy didn’t even pause.
In Orlando, the locker room had been careful around him. Friendly enough, but structured. Guys standing close without ever closing the distance. Here, Riggs threw tape at his head, Jonesy announced his stats to the room like a town crier, andFord had just called his game the best he’d played in blue. Leobelongedin this locker room with these men.
His phone buzzed in his jacket. He reached for it while Jonesy argued with Ski about music.
Mom
Have you talked to Phil this week?
Leo looked at the screen, then looked around the locker room. Russ still wheezing, Jonesy dancing like a fool, Carter watching all of it with the quiet satisfaction of a captain whose team had just won by two.
He put the phone back in his jacket. It would’ve been nice if his mom had even mentioned tonight’s performance, but in her eyes, putting up numbers like he had was the way to get a ticket out of Wisconsin. For Leo, it was starting to feel like a way to guarantee he stuck around here unless he was lucky enough to get called up to the majors, which would be a quick trip down the interstate to Chicago.
Leo camethrough the door of The Penalty Box with Jonesy, Carter, and Russ. Jonesy made straight for the big booth. Leo was greeted with handshakes and shoulder claps on the way through, people he recognized from the hardware store, the diner, and even the barbershop. Leo took all of it—the noise, the hands on his back, the win still hot in his blood—while his eyes moved past every face until they found the right one.
