Page 130 of The New Guy
That’s how I’ve survived the past few years. Hockey is always there for me. It doesn’t care if I’m queer, or grumpy or worried about the next game or the next contract. When muscle and steel meet the ice, you glide forward. Every time.
We pass through to a set of stairs, descending to a back exit I’d forgotten about. Powers pushes open the doors, and then we’re approaching a state of the art running track I’ve never seen before. “Nice,” I say listlessly.
“It is. And there’s a view of the mountains on the opposite side. Come on.” He crosses the track and cuts through the oval of green grass in its center. I follow him, the slanting evening sunshine warming my face. When we reach the other side, there’s a broad dirt path through a stand of trees. And beyond that, a stone wall that’s guarding a rocky cliff of sorts. And a big view of the Rockies.
“This is where I go when I need to sort things out,” he says, his hip parked against the wall.
“Does it work?” I hear myself ask.
His lips quirk. “Sometimes. Depends on how fucked up the situation is. Try me.”
“Huh.” I lean heavily on the wall. “Five years ago, my father told me I got traded because I came out to management.”
He lets out a low whistle.
“You’re really telling me that didn’t happen?”
“Iknowit didn’t happen like that. But I can see why the timing would make your father suspect it. He obviously made an assumption.”
Except that’s not what he said.I have it from the inside. They didn’t want to deal with that from a rookie.
“He lied,” I say flatly. Honestly, it’s the only explanation that makes sense. If I’d been traded for being queer, my father would be thelastperson an insider would tell. Why incriminate the organization like that? We could sue them.
Fuck. My fatherliedjust to shut me up. He’s the one who didn’t want to deal with my sexuality. Not the team.
“That’s a hard thing to carry around for five years,” Coach Powers says carefully. “No wonder you look so pissed off to come back here.”
I turn my face away, feeling stupid. “I did wonder.”
Coach gives me a minute before he speaks again. “After I pushed the GM on it, he and Coach Reynolds had a post-mortem meeting. Reynolds thought he was right to ask you to hold back your statement to the team, until you had all the information about your trade. But I’ve always wondered if there wasn’t a better way we could have handled it.”
It’s so hard to rearrange my thinking. I’ve been carrying around a lie for so long. “That whole meeting looks completely different to me now,” I say slowly. “Everybody was so quiet. The silence was, like, deafening.”
“Because they weren’t sure what to do,” he says. “And you know they couldn’t just tell you about the trade before the league’s approval. It would have been a rule violation.”
“Yeah,” I say lamely.
“The silence bothered me, too, though. It still bothers me. Even in their confusion, words of support aren’t so hard to pronounce, right?”
“For some people they are,” I mumble.
“Not for me,” he says firmly. “Not anymore. I was the junior flunkie in the room back then, but if I could turn back time, I would have offered you those words of support. I’m sorry that I didn’t, Hudson. I hope you can forgive me.”
“You’re forgiven,” I say immediately. I stare at the red rocks in the distance, and try to regulate my breathing. My father betrayed me all those years ago. I wonder how he feels about it now—whether he has any idea how deeply it screwed up my life.
I pull my phone out of my pocket and send him a two word text.You’re fired.
Then I pound the rest of my soda. “Do me a favor?” I say to Coach Powers. “Don’t send that new contract to my dad. I need a change of representation.”
“All right,” he says. “You let me know where you land on that. I can probably get the GM to extend the deadline if you need to get the new guy up to speed. I assume you have friends you can ask for recommendations?”
“Yeah,” I grunt. Although it’s barely true. I have more acquaintances than friends. “Thanks.”
He claps me on the shoulder. “No rash decisions, okay? Sit with it. Meet the team. Get acclimated to the altitude. Drink a lot of water tomorrow, and take a break if you get winded or headachy.”
“Will do,” I mumble.
“And Hudson? There’s a long list of reasons I wanted you here. Last season’s success is only one of them.”
