Page 92 of Grizz

Wide open at the far post, no stick on me, nobody sealing me off.Just empty ice and the net sitting there yawning at me.It’s the prettiest sight in hockey for a forward.

I angle my blade, ready.Knees bent.Hands soft.All I have to do is breathe and finish.The clock is bleeding out.

Five.

Four.

Tanner’s eyes catch mine once more.He’s got it now—the seam, the opening, the one line of daylight in a forest of legs.

He rips the pass.

A laser.

It leaves his stick flat and true, a bullet sliding across the ice right to me.Right to my blade.Right to the moment that either makes you a hero or haunts you.

Two seconds.

I lean in, already tasting it—hearing the eruption, envisioning the red light, feeling the team crash into me at the glass—

And then the puck hits a bad patch, snow buildup in the goalie’s crease.

A skip.

A tiny, stupid hop off the ice, like the rink itself decides it wants to ruin my life.

It jumps over my blade.

Over.

My.

Fuckin’.

Blade.

For a fraction of a second my hands still move like I’m going to catch it anyway.The puck sails past, harmless, sliding behind the net.

The buzzer screams and the horn blares.

The arena sound drops into this stunned, disbelieving roar—half outrage, half grief.I don’t think anyone processes what just happened.

I stare at the net.

At the empty space where the puck should’ve been.

Then I tilt my head back, looking up at the rafters.Is there an explanation written in the steel beams?

You have got to be fuckin’ kidding me.

I take one slow breath, and it feels like I’m swallowing fire.And then—right on cue—number 15 from the Wolves skates by.

He doesn’t even look at the puck.He doesn’t even look at the clock.He looks at me as he swings his stick hard.

It catches me in the back of the legs, right behind the knee pad—deep, mean pain that makes my muscles jerk.My skates scrape, and for a second I almost go down.

He leans in as he passes, voice low and ugly.

“Way to finish,” he sneers.“Fuckin’ pussy.”