Page 78 of Pucking the Single Dad
In the parking lot, I sat in my car and tried to straighten my leg. The joint locked at forty-five degrees, frozen in its own rebellion. Tomorrow we would play Dallas. Dallas players would dance circles around me while I dragged this dying piece of machinery up and down the ice, pretending I was still the player who'd won championships instead of what I'd become—a liability in skates, held together by cortisone and delusion.
My phone buzzed. Finn had sent a video from practice, his tiny form weaving between cones with surprising grace. "Dad, look! I did the move you taught me!"
Below it, a text from Serena:He's been practicing all day. Says he wants to score a goal like you.
Like me. Like the player I used to be, not the broken-down imposter I'd become.
I started the car, swallowing three Advil dry. Three more weeks of pretending my body wasn't falling apart, my career wasn't ending, my worth as a provider wasn't evaporating with each grinding step.
Three weeks to secure my family's future before I became just another washed-up athlete with a bad knee and good memories.
At home, Serena took one look at me and diagnosed everything. Three months together had turned her into a human MRI machine—she could read the gradient of my limp, the specific angle I held my shoulders when the pain went past seven, the way I breathed through my teeth when I thought no one was watching.
"Kitchen," she said quietly, glancing at Finn bent over math homework, tongue poking out in concentration. "Now."
I followed her, trying to minimize the drag of my right leg. She already had the freezer open, pulling out the expensive gel packs we bought in bulk, the ones that stayed flexible at negative twenty.
"Scale of ten?"
"Six."
"Liar." She pointed to the kitchen chair. "Real number."
"Eight point five."
"New fractures?"
I stopped mid-sit. "How did you—"
"You're doing that thing with your jaw. The grinding thing you think I don't notice." She knelt, her hands impossibly gentle as she positioned my leg on the cushion she'd already grabbed. "How many?"
"Two."
"Surgery?"
"After playoffs."
She paused, ice pack hovering. I waited for the lecture—about toxic masculinity, about being a martyr, about what kind of example I was setting. Instead, she stood, walked to the cabinet above the refrigerator, and pulled down the prescription bottle I'd hidden there.
"New protocol. You take the real painkillers, not the over-the-counter bullshit you pretend works."
"I hate how foggy—"
"You hate not being in control." She pulled out her phone, already texting. "I'm coordinating with the wives for Finn coverage during road games. Maria's on backup for emergencies. PT exercises every morning, no exceptions."
"Serena—"
"And when playoffs end, you get the surgery. Day after. No delays, no excuses, no 'just let me see how it feels.'"
She was magnificent in her fury, this woman who'd learned to love us with the fierce efficiency of someone who understood that love meant war sometimes.
"Promise me, Brad."
"I promise."
She kissed me then, fierce and desperate, tasting like fear and determination. When she pulled back, her eyes were wet.
"Three weeks," she said. "We can survive anything for three weeks."
