Page 55 of Mile High Coach

Like I have every morning since she left, I shove those thoughts down to the bottom of my mind, force myself to get to my feet, and shuffle into the bathroom. I shower and shave and pull on my clothes like there’s a reason to.

I drive to the complex. I get out of my car in the freezing cold and try to pretend I’m not royally pissed that the air hurts my face, that the parking lot is thick with muck and salt, that the snow seems to come down harder the second I’m in its direct fire.

“Good morning, coach.”

“Jay,” I manage, not sure I can push out a good morning when it’s still the furthest thing from what I’m feeling. Thesecurity guard gives me a knowing look, then clears me through, handing my bag back to me.

“Try to have a good day, man.”

I thank him and head up to my office, sitting down heavily in my chair. I should be checking in on the guys at training, make sure they’re following the routines set forth by Lovie and the team of physiologists she hired. But I don’t have the energy for it.

Instead, I pull up the film from that game.

The pre-Christmas game, after I’d ripped that stupid fucking Santa hat from my head and was forced to go down to the ice, coaching even though the only thing I wanted to do was get on a plane and follow Lovie home.

Talk to her about this.

Convince her to stay. I knew that I could, and from the look on her face, she knew that I could, too.

On the screen, I watch the team falling apart. Maybe if I’d been fully present, I could have pulled them back together after the loss of Greenhill. Maybe I could have told them to get their minds off the shit about me in the press and focus on the game.

Instead, I shouted at them to get their heads out of their asses, and made one of myself in the process.

As the morning goes on, I run through our most recent games, knowing that Deacon and Samir have been stepping up a lot. That the games we won were likely in spite of me, rather than because of my excellent leadership. Every day I leave this place, I promise myself that the next day will be different, that I’ll finally break out of my funk, that I’ll finally get over her.

And every morning, I wake up feeling like I’ve been hit by a two-ton truck.

“Coach.”

I look up to find Ki Park in the doorway to my office, lips pressed together like he’s had to say my name more than once. I close the videos on my monitor.

“What’s up?”

“The meeting?” Park says, raising his eyebrows, and when I glance back down at my screen, I see that tomorrow is the first of February, and that means we’ll have our monthly huddle.

“Right,” I say, pushing myself to stand, wanting to do anything else in the world than go sit in a room with those assholes. “Be right there.”

Ten minutes later, I’m sitting in a room filled with stakeholders, eyes focused on my pen as I tap it against the table. Every time I’m away from the ice, the only thing I want is to get back there and do some coaching.

But each time I take the ice, I can only think about being on it with her, feeling her gaze on me from the stands that night.

Her ghost hovers in every alcove of this building.

“…preparation for what will hopefully be a successful play-off run,” one of the marketing guys says, turning to me with a wide, white smile. “Right, coach?”

I blink at him—am I supposed to promise him that we’ll be making it to the playoffs?

“Sure.”

I see the corners of Ki’s lips turn down, but I can’t bring myself to care. Later, he’ll say something to me about attitude, about how I affect the overall atmosphere of the meeting. I’ll suggest he stop inviting me. That will likely repeat until he either quits or fires me.

The marketing guy’s smile slips a bit, and he turns back to the others, talking about special play-off passes and perks for the fans. A meet and greet before the games, the standard things marketing ropes us into for the sake of higher sales.

Then, it’s PR’s turn. Jared Davis clears his throat and begins to speak.

Since the article came out, I’ve been CC’ed on every PR email chain. Seen all of them talking about me and Lovie like we’re troublesome teenagers they need to reign in. In most of them, Jared Davis has been having a field day, gathering up every article and video about us, making it clear that the internet has a lot to say about me.

The opinions are all divided. Half of them think I’m just a guy going after a hot woman. They call me a player, say I’m a silver fox.

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