Page 99 of The Last Guy On Earth
“Hey,” I say, sitting down beside him. “Forty-two of forty-five shots, man. That’s hardcore. Better than ninety-three percent.”
He gives me an incredulous glance. “That game sucked.”
“Not your save percentage, though.”
He gives his gym bag a kick of frustration. “Are you this patronizing to every player who has a bad night?”
“Jesus Christ. Are you this rude to all your coaches?”
We’re standing now, facing off against each other, both of us angry.
“Let me ask you this,” he says quietly. “Did you sweat a lot over the goalie decision for tonight?”
I hesitate.
“You did, right? You got a cramp in your neck wondering if you could be objective about putting me in the net. And now you’re going to go stare at the ceiling in your room and brood about it some more.”
Get out of my brain. “Hale, it’s not like that.”
He gives me a look of fury.
“Last bus to the hotel leaves in five!” the GM’s assistant calls.
Jethro grabs his bag off the floor. He gives me a macho goalie look, all bushy eyebrows and cynicism. “Don’t stew over it, Clay. We can both take this loss like men.”
“Whatever that means,” I grumble, because I’ve always hated that expression.
He strides away from me without another comment, leaving me perfectly positioned to admire his ass.
Like a man.
Two hours later I’m spread out on the silken king-sized bed in my expensive hotel suite. And staring at the ceiling. It’s a nice ceiling, but it’s not helping.
Tomorrow is going to be a busy day of setting up for game four. I’m supposed to be sleeping, but I’m brooding about the second line’s positioning. And also about that bad call from the refs tonight. And about that last, punishing goal from Seattle.
Most importantly, I wonder if there’s anything I could have done tonight to coach the game to victory. I’ll never know the answer.
But there’s one thing IknowI could have done better.
I grab my phone off the nightstand, open our messaging app, and bang out a text.
I’m sorry I was patronizing. I didn’t mean to be.
A reply pops up a minute later, and it’s the eye-rolling emoji. And then:
Don’t stew over it.
Oh you should talk, at 1:30 in the morning.
I’m not stewing over the game.
Then why are you up???
Family crap. But I know you’re lying there doing a play by play with your neck in that electric massage thing.
With an angry groan, I yank the stupid massager out from under my neck and fling it onto the carpeting. The thing doesn’t work anyway.
I was just trying to be nice.
