Page 129 of Cross Ice

I didn’t sleep much. When I did, it was the shallow kind that didn’t help.

Monday morning, the Department of Player Safety called at nine thirty. Hearing at eleven.

I called Neil. He conferenced in. Fifteen minutes of questions—why I’d dropped the gloves, whether I understood the instigator rule, whether I had anything to say in my defense.

I didn’t have much. I’d made a choice, it was a bad one, and we all knew it.

Neil stayed on after the hearing ended. “That could have gone better.”

“Yeah.”

“You want to tell me what happened yesterday?”

“Not particularly.”

“Nico.” His voice shifted into the direct tone he used when he was done being patient. “I’m your agent. I need to know what’s going on. Utah, St. Louis, yesterday… that’s a pattern. And the ejection is going to cost you games.”

“I know.”

“So what’s going on?”

I was quiet for a moment. “Evan and I are struggling. It’s been affecting my game.”

“I gathered. You lost VortexStride, you’ve got a suspension coming, and I’ve got two brands who were interested after the statement who are now in a wait-and-see. Every bad game, every penalty, every fight is another reason for them to keep waiting.”

“I know.”

“Do you? Because right now it looks like you’ve stopped making decisions and started just… reacting. To everything, Evan. The ice, all of it.”

He wasn’t wrong. That was exactly what I’d been doing.

“I’m taking a few days,” I said. “Getting my head right.”

“Make sure you do.” A pause. “I’ll call when I hear from the league.”

At noon, he called back.

“One game suspension. Tuesday. Five-thousand-dollar fine.”

I closed my eyes.

“Could’ve been two games,” Neil said. “Take Tuesday, get your head straight, and don’t give them a reason to revisit it.”

“I won’t.”

“And Nico? Figure out the personal stuff. Whatever’s going on with Evan, figure it out. Because the team isn’t going to be patient forever, and neither am I.”

I put my phone down and called Miguel.

He picked up on the second ring. “You okay?”

“Not really.”

“I saw the replay. That fight was bad, man.”

“Yeah.”

“You want to talk about it?”