Page 37 of Payback On The Ice

I don't say anything.

"He'd hate it, Dane. You know he would. He'd be sick about it."

"Nico's not here."

"Yeah," Wes says quietly. "I know. That's kind of my point."

I pick up my water bottle. I put it down again. My hands aren't steady, and I don't want him to see it.

"Stay out of it, Wes."

"Dane—"

"I'm running his integration. Coach gave it to me. Not you. So stay out of it."

He just looks at me. That big, kind, tired face. Then he nods, once, and he picks up his towel off the bike and he goes. He doesn't slam the door. Wes never slams anything.

I stand alone in the weight room. On the wall over the squat racks there's a banner with last year's conference final on it. GRAYMOOR WARDENS. CONFERENCE FINALISTS. Nobody wanted to take it down. Nobody wanted to look at it either.

I look at it.

I can't sleep Sunday night.

At one-fifteen I go downstairs for water. The kitchen's dark. I don't turn on the light. I stand at the sink with my glass and look out the window at the street, all blue snow and orange streetlights, nothing moving.

Then something moves.

A figure, coming up Birch Street on foot, from the direction of the highway. Hood up. Hands jammed in the pocket of a hoodie, no coat, in nine degrees. Walking fast, head down, the way you walk when you've done it a lot.

He comes up our front walk. He stops under the porch light to dig for his key, and I see his face.

He looks exhausted. Not hockey-tired. Older. His shoulders are up around his ears. He's got a name tag on a lanyard around his neck, and he sees it and swears under his breath and yanks it off and shoves it in his pocket.

I hear the front door. I hear him take his shoes off in the hall. I hear him come past the kitchen doorway and stop.

He can see me. I'm standing in the dark by the sink with a glass of water. He can see me fine.

Neither of us says anything.

He smells like a fryer. Like cheap oil and burnt coffee. He smells like the gas station on the highway.

He goes upstairs.

I stand at the sink until the glass is warm in my hand. I don't know where he was. I don't know why he was walking home from the highway at one in the morning in a hoodie with a name tag around his neck.

I don't ask.

I tell myself that's because I don't care.

11

THEO

Halvorsen calls it the Thursday Pit.

It's the last drill of the hardest practice of the week. Two lines, one puck, everybody in the zone at once, and the only rule is whoever comes out of the corner with it gets a shot on Dane. No whistles. Coaches stand at the blue line with their arms folded and let it get ugly. It's supposed to make you hungry before a weekend series.

I love it. I've always loved it. At Harrow we called it the Blender, and I was the one who came out of the corner with the puck.