Page 14 of Pucking Inevitable: Bonus Scene

She grabs the sleeve of my jacket.

I let her grab it.

“—Daddy scored!”

The rink explodes.

Em does not explode. Em is three and she has decided she is too much her father's daughter for a display like that. She stands up straight and claps, three precise, satisfied claps, and says, “I knew he would.”

The man next to us, fifties, season ticket holder, here with his son every game leans over and says to Em, “Good call, kid.”

Em nods at him in a way that is deeply reminiscent of Xaden accepting a compliment.

I look down at her.

She looks up at me.

“What?” she says.

To teach is to learn. To learn is to excel. To excel is to thrive. To thrive is to live.

And in order for me to have a peaceful life, I shake my head and remain silent. I've learned from her father how to pick my battles.

Second period.

I get water and a snack from the concession stand. Em had strong opinions about both and when I come back to our seats, I find that the blonde from behind the penalty box has relocated.

She is now one row down and three seats to the right, which puts her directly in Xaden's eyeline when he comes near the boards.

I settle back into my seat. I hand Em her snack. I look at the woman with the particular assessment of someone who is not threatened but is paying attention.

She’s watching the ice with the expression of someone who has a plan.

Warm-ups, I think, and then I stop thinking about her because Xaden takes the puck off a defender with a move so clean it produces an audible sound from the crowd that is half gasp and half something else entirely, and I follow it with the rest of the rink.

He plays the second period the way he plays everything when the game is sufficiently important, like the outcome is not in question and the only variable is the margin. He scores again at eleven minutes. He assists a third at sixteen. Each time, he acknowledges it the same way he always does, which is barely a nod to Cas, a single tap of the stick on the ice, and then he is already repositioned and focused on the next thing.

He doesn’t look at the stands.

He skates past the boards near the blonde woman's row once and she leans forward and says something. I don't need to hear it, I know the shape of it. I have seen this before and he looks through her like she's made of glass and calls something to his left winger without breaking stride.

She sits back.

I take a sip of my coffee.

Em, who has been watching the ice, turns and looks at me. “She talked to Daddy.”

“Did she?” I say.

“He didn't hear her,” Em says.

“Seems like it.”

“He doesn't listen to people he doesn't care about,” Em says, with the authority of a person who has extensive field research on her subject.

She got that from watching him, I am almost certain. It is verbatim something he would say.

“You're right,” I tell her.