Page 62 of The Coach

“You like her?”

He balks, but I can tell my words hit their mark. “Of course not, it’s a friend of my sister’s, and she drives me fucking crazy.”

A friend of his sister’s? Shit, I do not want to know that. The last thing I need to do is get myself involved in the drama there. “Then what’s the problem?”

“He’s my best friend. I don’t want him to be dating one of my sister’s best friends and causing issues.”

I shrug my shoulders and say, “Sounds like jealousy.”

He glares at me, his fists clenching at his sides. “I’m not jealous, Coach.”

“Fine,” I reply, letting it go. “If it bothers you, let him know without using your fists this time and maybe he’ll back off. But if he likes her, let him date her. You never know, it could be good for both of them.”

This is advice that I truly hope resonates, that I hope he can remember when the time comes. Because if he has an issue with his best friend dating Mick’s friend, I can’t imagine how upset he’ll be when he finds out his coach is in love with his sister.

“Hey, Coach?” He asks as we start to skate off the ice.

“What?”

“Thanks,” he says, making me turn back with his words. “I know this season’s had a lot going on, but you’re a great coach. You make us all want to be better players.”

I feel something tug in my chest. This right here is why I chose to go into coaching instead of broadcasting or management. I want to give back to young players the way other coaches did for me. “It’s easy to coach a team with great players. You guys had that on lock before I came here.”

“Yeah.” He shrugs. “We weren’t sure how it would work out with you when they hired you. We thought it might not work, but we respect you. You were a great player, now you’re a great coach.”

I clap my hand on his shoulder, “Thanks, Ellis. But it’s present tense.”

“What is?” he asks, confusion showing on his face.

“I am a great hockey player, not was.”

He laughs and steps out of the rink, heading to the locker room, and I stay put for a minute, wondering if that easy banter between us is going to stay, or if finding out the truth will blow it to pieces.

twenty-six

MICK

“Thank you, Mr. Sanders, we’ll see you next week, yeah?” I keep my hand on the shoulder of the man who’s walking with a walker out of the clinic, his daughter and wife on his other side.

Mr. Sanders is a wounded veteran who just came home from deployment about a month ago.

Today was his first physical therapy session.

“We’ll be here,” he replies, only a little bit of grump left in his tone.

He didn’t want to come to OT, he wanted to stay home and let his body heal naturally, to work in his shop like he always did, to mow the lawn, to be normal, as he put it.

But his wife knew that he needed more and so did his other doctors, so he finally agreed.

Erik allowed me to take him on as a client, albeit a part-time one for myself, with the hope that I would be taking him on full-time once I was a full-time employee here.

“How did that go?” Erik asks from behind the desk where he’s working.

I smile wide, sure that a glow is radiating out of my pores. “Amazing. We have a lot of work to do, but I think I can get through to him.”

“Good.” He glances back at the computer. “He requests that he only work with you.”

I give him a small smile. “He did?”

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