Page 148 of Full Contact

He’d had a crazy week. He’d told me he was leaving as soon as the game horn sounded, turning the postgame over to Leah to have a quiet night at home.

Four blocks from home, it started to sleet. At a red light on Clybourn, with the wipers going, I called Mark and put the phone in its holder.

“Hi,” he said.

“I wondered if you wanted company. Or you could come to mine, if you’d rather—“

“Trier,” he said. I heard the weariness in his voice. “I’ve spent the whole week saying no to people with requests about the playoffs while we still have five games to play. Somebody asked me today whether we’d filed a parade permit.” He paused. “I just got home. I’d like to keep tonight to myself.”

“Of course,” I said.

The light changed. I crept forward in the icy precip.

“I’ll see you soon,” Mark said. “Get some rest. That was a hard one to watch.”

“It was harder to play,” I said. “Enjoy your evening.”

“Goodnight.”

He hung up first.

At home, Peaches met me at the door and yowled once. I took that as a comment on the game. I gave her a treat and filled her water. I changed into sweatpants and the Michigan T-shirt and sat down on the couch.

The condo was quiet enough that I could hear Peaches’s tags ticking against the rim of her bowl in the kitchen. I thought about the Sunday before Holst, when I’d called Mark from the couch and asked for the afternoon back. I’d been tired. I’d expected him to understand, because he’d asked for his Tuesdays not long before.

His reasons tonight were as good as mine had been. Still, the couch felt empty.

Peaches climbed up and settled against my hip. I typed: If you change your mind, call. Even late.

I read the message twice and deleted it instead of hitting send. I turned on a documentary about a man who’d forged his way into owning a submarine.

***

By morning, the internet had decided the pen cap was never about St. Louis. It was about our upcoming game in Nashville. Her record, everyone agreed, was intact. She’d simply been misinterpreted.

Varga read multiple theories aloud at his stall after practice.

“This one is very persuasive,” he said. “She looks at the couch before she pushes the cap. The cap goes under. Nashville goes under.”

“Nashville won’t go under the couch,” Cross said.

“Metaphorically.”

Pratt was lacing his skates. He listened to the end of the Nashville theory. “The correlation isn’t meaningful,” he said.

“The correlation is everything,” Varga insisted.

Mark called that evening while I was at the stove waiting for water to boil.

“How’s the wrist?”

“Better. She says I can stop taping it in two days.”

“Good.” A pause. “How are you?”

I turned the burner down. “I understood why you wanted last night to yourself,” I said. “I want you to know that.”

“Okay.”