Page 59 of Her Goal
Being back in Cobbiton has caused things I thought were long buried to surface. With the season starting soon, I have to get my head in the game.
Knowing I’m going to look sketchy, I get out and sit on the bench. The night is damp with cool air pushing out what little remains of the summer. My body remembers this time of year when it started getting darker earlier, when I’d inevitably leave my sweatshirt slung over someone’s mailbox when I got hot from playing street hockey, and the street lights would come on, prompting kids with a warm meal waiting to go home. I’m well down memory lane when footsteps approach.
On my guard, I peer into the darkness and a tall figure walks carefully toward me across the dead grass. She’s slender and wearing a hoodie with the Knights logo.
18
LEAH
Until now,there has never been a time when I didn’t want to go home. Or I should say, go to where I live. My apartment in Omaha is hardly a home. My real home smells subtly like peppers and onions, lemon, butter and sugar. It’s where the radio is always on softly in the background, tuned to a Colombian channel Dad hooked up via satellite. The laundry machine is usually running, though now that Mom has a room dedicated entirely to the washer and dryer, she left behind thethud,thud,thudof the drum rolling unevenly in the old machine in the duplex’s basement.
Home is where my family is.
Now, that’s in the fancy house on Stowells. But it used to be right across the street from the patch of grass that calls itself a park.
And of all people, Hudson is sitting on the bench.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
His tone is of honest surprise when he answers. “I’m not sure.”
I lower onto the cracked wooden slat next to him and draw my knees to my chest. “Me neither.”
As if speaking aloud his stream of consciousness, Hudson says, “My mom once said our father was in a band. I guess that’s what may have been what inspired Hunter.”
“Was she a groupie?”
He rubs his hand down his face. “No, more like a one-night kind of thing. She moved to the US from Sweden after she found out she was pregnant because her sister lived in Cobbiton. At the time, there was a decent-sized Swedish community here. She never liked it. Always had stars in her eyes. At her first chance, she left town.”
“Sounds familiar. Is she back overseas? Have you seen her?”
“A few times. The last time I was there for a hockey summit, I took her out to dinner. She left without saying goodbye. She ghosted just like Hunter.”
“That’s rude,” I say bluntly.
“Wasn’t the first time.”
As I think about how thankful I am for my crazy family, Hudson tells me that he went to a restaurant in Omaha tonight and the server said he looked like the former dishwasher. His twin comes to mind. Has been circulating there a lot lately. Hudson too.
“I think about him a lot,” I say.
“I don’t.”
I look sharply at Hudson.
“I used to. But he kind of faded,” he says flatly.
“Some brother,” I mutter.
Hudson angles himself toward me and his knee bumps mine. It’s like a stamp of warmth, then he doesn’t move it. “Before you judge me, I tried, Leah. I really, really tried. Poured my first NHL check into him and Swiss Vinegar.”
I let out a sudden laugh. “I forgot that was the name of the band. It sounds so cheesy now.”
“Ya think? When I moved to Boston and Hunter went to New York, I visited him and he was sleeping in someone’s car. Made him come north and live with me for a while. The rest of the band followed him. It’s almost like they worshipped him and I think he fed off it.”
My gaze on him softens because I wasn’t expecting that and a deep, young part of me identifies with that odd notion. “Seriously?”
“Of course. He’s my brother.” Hudson wears a pained smile.
