Page 28 of The Slapshot and the Single Mom
Even though she’s still looking at the paintings, I’m watching her, loving the way her gaze gets soft at the memory. “That sounds like a great trip.”
“It was. I got to spend a bunch of time playing with my cousins, who I didn’t see often but always had fun with. My grandma had a kitchen full of cookies and other treats that I didn’t get very often. And I got to go to two baseball games with my parents.” She shrugs, finally looking at me. “It was about the best trip I could’ve asked for at the time.”
“And now? What would be a perfect trip for you now?”
Screwing up her face in thought, she sips her water and turns, leading the way into the living room. There’s a crocheted afghan folded and draped over the back of the brown couch sitting against the wall across from a bookshelf-turned-TV stand. A dark green comfy-looking chair sits against the adjacent wall, a small end table holding a dated lamp in the corner between them. Another end table with a mismatched lamp sits on the other end of the couch. There are a couple of bookshelves flanking the picture window, books on most of the shelves, but a few decorative knickknacks here and there. A vase of fake flowers sits on top of one and a collection of decorative boxes on top of the other. Framed photos hang on the wall, school pictures of her son, photos of Maggie holding a baby—I’m assuming also her son—an older couple standing in front of a lake with a mountain in the background. Her parents, I’m guessing.
“I’d like to take Liam more places,” she says at length. “Further down the coast, maybe, then more inland.” She shakes her head. “I haven’t really given it much thought, so I don’t have a good answer. Travel isn’t really in the budget right now, so …” Another shrug.
I don’t know if it’s just that I’m in this mode where I’m trying to make sure she gets to do all things she wants to but doesn’t get to normally, or if it’s more than just that, but I’m seized with the desire to tell her to start planning her dream trip and not to worry about the cost. I keep my mouth shut, though, sipping my water instead.
“What about you?” she asks. “Any dream trip you’d like to take but haven’t gotten to yet.”
Leaning back against the couch, I consider that. “You know? Not really. I travel so much during hockey season that I like staying in one place on my time off.”
“Really?” she sounds genuinely shocked by that statement. “But it’s different, isn’t it? Or it would be. It’s not like you have time for sight seeing when you’re traveling for hockey, do you?”
I shrug. “Not really. I’ve lived a bunch of different places, though, and when I’ve been picked for the Olympics or other international exhibition teams, they always make sure we have some time for sight seeing and exploring the local area.” She just blinks at me, and I can’t help laughing. “What?”
“I, uh, I guess I didn’t realize you’d been to the Olympics. Go USA!” She pumps her arm in the air, making me laugh again.
“Nah.” I shake my head. “Canada. I grew up in Ontario.”
Her eyes go wide again. “Wow. Okay. That’s cool. I had no idea.”
I chuckle. “Didn’t bother to Google me, huh?”
She shakes her head, smiling now. “Nah. I didn’t feel like I needed to run a background check on you or anything.” She cocks her head and gives me side eye. “Wait. Should I have?”
Grinning as well, I shake my head, holding up my free hand in a gesture of surrender. “Obviously you can if you want to. I won’t be offended. But I’m an open book. Ask me anything you want to know.”
Her smile fades as she purses her lips, studying me, obviously considering what she wants to ask. “How old were you when you left Ontario?”
“Eighteen. I was traded to a team in Saskatchewan. Before that, I was able to stay pretty local, which was nice. Made it easier to see both my parents.”
“Do your parents still live in Ontario?”
I dip my chin in a nod. “Not in the same city. I grew up in Kitchener, a city a little bit west of Toronto. My mom still lives there, but my dad moved to the Toronto area when I started playing for the CHL team in Brampton. He’s bounced around the greater Toronto area since then.”
She settles into the couch, setting her glass on the end table closest to her and turning to face me, warming up to this line of questioning. We’ve mostly swapped stories about our lives in Seattle. She’s made a few allusions to her marriage but doesn’t seem to like to talk about her ex much, not that I can blame her based on what I know about him. She hasn’t really mentioned her life growing up—a couple stories about her and her friends when she was a teenager, and a few about college, but that’s it about her more distant past. I know she’s an only child, but not much else about her family. I didn’t realize her grandparents lived in Illinois before today. If she gets to ask me a bunch of questions, do I get to do the same soon?
“I remember you saying your parents got divorced when you were a kid. How old were you?”
“They split up when I was in grade eight, so I would’ve been fourteen. And my little brother was almost eleven.”
She nods, her face solemn. “Was that difficult for you?” Her voice is quiet, like she’s almost afraid to voice the question aloud.
Hooking my mouth to the side, I lift one shoulder. “I guess? It wasn’t great. I remember Chris having a really hard time with it. I sat in his room with him while he cried a bunch of times. I remember being glad I didn’t have to listen to them fighting anymore, though. Or somehow worse, the cold silence when Dad’d do something that pissed Mom off, but she knew that talking to him about it wouldn’t help. I’m pretty sure she was planning to leave for at least a year before she did. That year was probably the worst. So it was almost a relief when they split. Mom was so much calmer, and she worked really hard to make everything okay for us. For Chris especially. He was still in grade five, and it seemed to hit him harder than anyone else. Or at least it surprised him. I remember feeling a little … I dunno.” I pause, scratching my cheek as I think back to that time. “I guess surprised is the best word. Like, I wasn’t expecting it. Not really. But after that initial shock wore off and I had time to think about it, it made sense.”
I glance at Maggie, and she nods, her brows knitted together.
“Did your son have a hard time with your divorce?”
She sucks in a deep breath, almost like she’d forgotten to breathe for a minute there, blinking rapidly, her long, dark hair swishing as she nods. “Yeah.” The word comes out hoarse, and she stopsand clears her throat. “Yeah. He was just barely seven when we split up. And he just kept asking why. All the information about divorce says to reassure kids that it’s not their fault and to let them know that they’ll be taken care of, that it’s important they understand the schedule so they know what to expect and all that. And at first, that was pretty easy. His dad kept up the pretense of involved father during the negotiations and mediation. It was stressful and hard, of course, but compared to some of the horror stories I’ve heard and read about online, it wasn’t all that bad. The whole process from filing to finalizing everything really didn’t take all that long—about seven months. We didn’t have a trial or anything messy like that. The custody part was easy”—she gives me a sardonic look—“at first. I had no reason to doubt that he’d take Liam to school or activities, and as hard as it was for me to agree to be away from my seven-year-old for a week at a time, it seemed like a reasonable agreement. The hard part was the finances.” She waves a hand, brushing all that aside. “Anyway. Divorce sucks for everyone, but I’m an adult. Even if I don’t have a good understanding of the reasons for my ex’s behavior, I can at least learn to accept reality, you know? It’s a lot harder for a first grader. And none of the parenting advice I found had any good ways to handle when your kid won’t accept any of the non-reason reasons you’re told to give them.”
I rub my hand over my mouth, wondering if I’m about to stick my foot in it when I open it. “Can I ask why you got divorced?” I hold up a hand before she can even answer. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to talk about it, of course. I’m just being nosy.”
She gives me a tired smile, a humorless chuckle escaping. “No, it’s fine,” she says quietly. “I don’t mind.” Taking a deep breath, she stares at the couch cushion that separates us. “It was little things at first, you know? And I always tried to explain it awayas stress or whatever. I was stressed too. His nitpicking was because of stress at work or the stress of parenting or the stress of his dad having a prostate screening come back concerning and needing a biopsy.” She meets my eyes briefly. “His dad’s fine, by the way.”
