Page 44 of The Forbidden Center

“Unfair standard.”

I restart the clip.

The camera is high enough that the players flatten into lanes and numbers. Twenty-seven opens his left skate before the puck drops. The opposing center follows the movement, loading toward Colt’s right side, and Colt steps away from the contact he has been offered.

The puck goes backward. Mack takes it. Roman scores.

“You changed the angle,” I say.

“I did.”

“Because of the shoulder?”

“Partly.” He reaches toward the screen, then changes hands before he points. “Go back. Watch Mack.”

“I am assessing you.”

“You’re assessing the play.”

I go back.

Mack shifts before Colt does. Not much. Half a blade width toward the middle.

“He knew where you were going.”

“Before I did, almost. Their center kept loading my right. Mack saw what he was giving us.”

Colt rewinds again, not to his own movement but to Mack’s.

The man beside me has a contract ending and a shoulder I am paid to worry about, and he has taken the only chance he will get today to make me look at somebody else.

I play it again.

This time I see the defenseman turn his hips early.

“There.”

I turn toward him, pleased before I remember to hide it.

He is watching me instead of the screen.

“You knew I would find it.”

“I was hoping.”

“That sounds generous.”

“I contain multitudes.”

“You contain noise.”

His smile widens. “You like the noise.”

I look back at the screen.

The replay catches the boards flexing when Roman drives into the glass. The small speakers flatten the crowd into static.

“The sound is wrong,” I say.