Page 98 of Zero Pucks Given
“Last week, I made a public statement after we lost game two to the Oilers. That statement was written by the team’s marketing department as a way of doing damage control. A lot of it was true. Josie Harper won the contest, and we were contractually obligated to go out on a certain number of dates. But that’s where the truths ended, and the lies began.”
The cluster of coaching assistants a few rows ahead of me were all standing up and watching me, now. Most of the background chatteraround me had ceased while everyone tried to eavesdrop on the recording.
“I hated Josie on our first date,” I explained. “Turns out, she hated me, too. She didn’t want to be there. In fact, she didn’t sign up for the contest. A friend signed her up as a joke. The date went horribly. It ended with us shouting at each other. And because we bailed early, we were contractually obligated to go on aseconddate. We smiled and pretended to have a good time at the Spurs game, but we were still faking it. We even faked a kiss for the kiss camera, thinking that would help put an end to things.
“But the truth is: I felt something real during that kiss. My entire attitude toward Josie changed, and she looked at me differently, too. We agreed to continue the dates because it was good for the team’s publicity. We slowly got to know each other. The teasing comments quickly lost their bite, and became more playful the longer we spent together. By the time we traveled to Edmonton for the first two games of the series, I couldn’t stop thinking about her.”
I took a deep breath. Nobody around me moved; you could have heard a pin drop.
“Josie isn’t just a fan I was forced to go out with. I now know that she’s so much more than that. She’s stubborn. She’s determined. She’s unflinching when it comes to what she believes in. She’s smart, and full of life, and so freaking beautiful that it stops me in my tracks sometimes. She’s not a distraction. She’s a rock.Myrock, a point of stability in my life that I desperately need. She’s the reason we won game one.”
“Why isn’t anyone—” Coach demanded while boarding the plane, but several teammates and members of the staff shushed him.
“And,” I said, “I’m falling madly in love with her. I know I may have lost my chance. It’s probably too late for us, especially since I allowed her to take the blame for my poor performance on the ice. But it was important to me to set the record straight. I owe it to her, I owe it to myself, and I owe it to the fans to tell the truth.
“And oh by the way,” I added, “that TMZ photo was bullshit. Idon’t know if I’m allowed to curse on here, but I don’t care. I didn’t drink wine at the restaurant before game two. I had water. In the photo, I was having a tiny taste of wine because it was extremely expensive. My focus as the captain of this team is, and always will be, winning hockey games. Nothing in the world can distract me from that.”
I cleared my throat. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to end a video like this, so… um, bye.”
As soon as I ended the video, Mason jumped out of his seat and clapped his hands together. “Holy shit, Captain. Are you seriously pouring your heart out on TikTok?”
“Don’t make a big deal out of this,” I muttered.
“Are you kidding? Thisisa big deal.”
My teammates behind me leaned over the seat and said, “Shit, Captain. We wouldn’t have teased you about your shit with that girl if we knew it was real.”
“I never thought she was a distraction,” our goaltender added a few rows back. “I’d be lost without my wife. She’smyrock, you know?”
While they bombarded me with questions and support, Bob Trent was angrily striding down the aisle toward me. “Do you know what you’ve done? You’ve ruined weeks of carefully-crafted marketing!”
“This is what I think of your carefully-crafted marketing bullshit.” I showed him my middle finger.
Bob’s eyes flared with rage as he pointed at me. “You’re fracturing the team dynamic with your selfish video. I’m going to talk to the owner and make sure you ride the bench for game six, and I don’tcareif he disagrees.”
“You want to repeat that?” Mason said, rising to his feet to put himself between me and Bob. “Because our captain led us to a big win tonight.”
“He’s not fracturing the team,” Hunter Callahan said, prowling up the aisle like a panther. “Butyou’redriving a wedge between us bythreatening the captain.”
My teammates rose to their feet in unison, shouting their agreement and slowly pushing into the aisle. Bob’s eyes went wide, and he took a few cautious steps back. Eventually, he bumped into the coach.
“You’ve done a good job marketing the Surge,” Coach said. “But Bob? Stay the fuck away from my players after a game.”
Bob mumbled something incoherent, then scurried to his seat at the front of the plane. My teammates all grunted their approval, but Coach only gave me a subtle little nod.
They had my back, just like I had theirs.
Relieved, I put my headphones on and closed my eyes. Was the video enough? Part of me wanted to watch it, review what I had said, and maybe make some changes. Josie had told me that it often took her five or six takes to get a video right.
But perfection wasn’t important to me. I didn’t make the video to win Josie back. I just wanted to set the record straight, to make sure she wasn’t treated like a punching bag for our losses. There was a weight off my chest as the plane took off and climbed to our cruising altitude.
I felt the soothing calm of someone who had done the right thing.
The plane landed at two in the morning. My teammates all looked like zombies, which I certainly sympathized with. All I wanted to do was go home and crawl into bed. I didn’t even check to see how many views I got on my TikTok video to Josie.
As always, there was a cluster of player girlfriends, wives, and children waiting on the tarmac. I had never cared about it, but now I felt a tiny little pang of jealousy. It would have been nice to have someone waiting for me, so I didn’t have to go home to an empty condo.
Maybe someday,I told myself.Maybe, with enough time, Josie will forgive me.
