Page 4 of Mile High Coach

Thank you so much for submitting this proposal for this program. While the administration loves the idea, we would like to wait for more feedback before taking any further steps. As you know, the franchise has recently invested in anoptimization and modernization consultant who will start this week.

We feel it would be erroneous to approve this proposal until we have the input of this new valuable member of our team. If it receives approval in that regard, we’d look forward to providing you with the resources and funding necessary to make this initiative a reality, as we believe it would be a great benefit to the community and an excellent representation of the Baltimore Blue Crabs’ principles.

Sincerely,

Ki Park

General Manager, Baltimore Blue Crabs

P.S. Excited to have you back!

Letting out a puff of annoyed air, I click the phone screen off and slide the thing into my pocket. I’m no old geezer by any means, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss the days when I could go on a fucking vacation without bad news arriving straight into the palm of my hand.

Of course, they probably wanted to send me that email before I got back, so they wouldn’t have to tell me to my face. Waiting for approval from someone who doesn’t know the city or the team—probably some yuppie from New York—is basically killing it outright.

Settling back into the chair, I take a deep breath and throw the hat over my face again. The entire point of the vacation was to relax. That’s what Ki and Colt said—that I needed to relax. That it was impressive enough that the team made it to the Stanley Cup at all.

That put a sour taste in my mouth. Like I’m supposed to just be okay with a consolation prize, settle for good enough afterorchestrating my entire fucking life around this singular goal: to lift that cup over my head, just one more time.

Instead, we got all the way to the game only for the team to blow it.

“…puck bounces past the right post, and into the air on a blast to the goal—but it’s into the glove of Roman Petroff! A great save by this Atlanta Fire’s goalie…”

As if God himself wants to shove the loss down my throat, I start to hear the faint, staticky sound of announcing from that game. The tenor of that grating voice on my ears instantly evaporates any calm that I’ve conjured from this vacation.

If I managed any at all.

At first, I think that it’s all in my head—that I’m torturing myself—but when it pauses, rewinds, and starts again, I pull my hat off, sitting up and glancing to the side.

The knockout is back, head bowed over the final game in the Stanley Cup from last year. Atlanta Fire vs. Blue Crabs. Fumbled in the last period when the Blue Crabs started to lose cohesion and let up pressure.

When the coach could not, for some reason, get his players to perform the way he knew they were capable of.

I speak up almost without meaning to.“If he’d hustled his ass up there and back checked, we could have avoided that shot altogether.”

Knockout, as I’ve started to think of her, startles, her eyes flicking over to me, a single brow raising. For a second, I think she might tell me to mind my own business, but she surprises me by tilting her head and asking, “Are you a hockey fan?”

Something inside me lights up. A volley back my way. I can work with that. Shifting toward her, I say, “Something like that. What about you? Big Blue Crabs fan?”

“Not really. I’ll be honest with you—until a week ago, I’d never watched hockey a day in my life.”

“Never?”

“Never. Probably insulting to something like a hockey fan.”

“Not insulting. So why are you watching hockey now?”

She pauses, glances at me, tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. I follow the movement, but when I bring my gaze back to hers, she holds it, saying, “It’s for an assignment.”

“An assignment?” I sit back, eyeing her. I’d read her as being at least thirty. Maybe she just looks older, acts mature for her age. I’m not interested in flirting with a baby. “Are you in…college?”

“No—a work assignment,” she puffs out, “though maybe I should give you that whole line about being flattered.”

That makes me laugh—she’s straightforward and blunt. It’s refreshing.

“Why?” she goes on. “Are you?”

“Am I what?”

---