Page 32 of In It to Win It

He cocks his head. “You may not make the best decisions, but you always take responsibility for them.”

I lift my chin. “Yeah.”

He eyes me shrewdly. “Sometimes you take responsibility when it’s really not your fault. I know you were trying to protect your teammate when you got in that fight last year.”

I nod slowly. “I’m trying to do better, Grandpa. Really. I’m trying to make better decisions, on the ice and off. I screwed up with Théo and I’m not going to do that again. I really didn’t know there was anything between Taylor and Martinez, and he started that fight out of the blue. I mean . . . Ihadto fight back.” I grimace.

“Of course.” He nods. “Also, you cleaned his clock.”

I shouldn’t like it, but damn, I do enjoy his approval. “And I’m trying to do better on the ice, too. Control my emotions better.”

“Passion is a good thing. But it can also be a curse.”

I wait for him to say more, wanting his words of wisdom. Grandpa may be old and Théo worries about his decision-making lately, but he’s learned a lot over the years.

“The same kind of drive that leads to success can also be destructive,” he continues. “You can be so passionate about what you’re doing, you end up wrapping your whole identity in it and losing sight of the real reason for why you’re doing it in the first place.” He pauses.

I frown and nod slowly. “Because I love the game.”

“Yeah. We all love the game. But the best athletes in the world are at the top because they can control their emotions rather than their emotions controlling them.”

“Thanks, Grandpa. I guess I have some stuff to think about.”

His chuckle is dry. “You’ve already been thinking about them. How about lunch?”

“Okay.” We head inside, where Chelsea’s in the kitchen.

She looks different than when I usually see her, with her hair and makeup perfect, dressed in expensive clothes. Today she’s wearing jeans, a tank top, and flip-flops, and her face looks even younger with no makeup. She smiles at me when Grandpa tells her I’m staying for lunch. “Great.”

We eat out on the patio. Chelsea serves a salad with lots of healthy greens, chicken, and avocado, and pours us glasses of fresh juice that’s orange in color but is actually orange, pineapple, and carrot juice.

“Tons of nutrients,” she says, setting a glass in front of me.

“Good, I need that.”

Grandpa and I talk about my summer in Montréal and the workouts I did to stay in shape. He shakes his head. “Times have changed,” he mutters. “Training camp used to be when we got back in shape.”

“Can’t do that now,” I say. “If you show up at training camp fat and lazy, you’re gonna be in trouble.”

“They shouldn’t even call it training camp anymore. Did you know it was Conn Smythe who invented training camp?”

“No. No, I did not.”

“That was back in the twenties, after he bought the Maple Leafs. Well, they weren’t the Leafs; he changed the name to that. Made the players do a bunch of workouts and hikes and calisthenics. Guys complained, but they did it. Those guys didn’t even take their skates home with them at the end of the season!” He chortles. “In my day it started changing; they started doing more scrimmages as a way to see who should make the team.”

I’ve heard some of his stories before, but I still enjoy them. “Didn’t you refuse to sign up one year?”

“Yeah.” He grins and pokes his fork into a piece of avocado. “I thought I was worth more than they were offering. It was the day of the first game of the season when Joe Black, the Leafs’ CEO, met me in the lobby of Maple Leaf Gardens before the game and said if anyone recognized me, he’d give me what I wanted. No one did.” His grin goes crooked. “So I signed the contract, an hour before the game started.”

I laugh. I love hearing these tales of how hockey used to be, and Grandpa’s full of them. “Was that before expansion?”

“Yeah. There were only six teams and not many spots for rookies. What the hell was I thinking?” He shakes his head.

“You were thinking you were a good player,” Chelsea says. “And you proved it.”

Grandpa snorts, but he and Chelsea exchange a look, and I’m struck by the affection between them.

A lot of my family thinks Chelsea married Grandpa for his money. But they’ve been married almost thirty years and have four kids together, so it has to be more than that. Grandpa’s still pretty fit for an old guy . . . Ugh. I don’t want to think about Grandpa’s sex life.

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