Season's Change Page 10

  “Bud, DC is the capital of the fucking country.”

  “I don’t live in DC. I live in Northern Virginia.”

  “You’re going to be living in Dewitt’s basement or Hershey if you don’t watch it.” Poiro was the only one of the younger guys who lived by himself. Yelich was staying with Stormy’s family like a good Canadian; Lukesy and Bevvo had a very bromantic townhouse.

  “My soul would die.”

  “I guess you’re gonna need to stop partying so much.” Olly paused. “The league has resources to help guys if they’re having issues with alcohol, right?”

  “I don’t have an issue.”

  “Just thought I’d mention it.” Was this how Benji had felt, tiptoeing around telling him to get his ass to therapy?

  Poiro dramatically heaved himself to his feet. “Enough. Let’s go find your husband before he gets worried you’re going to leave him for a sexier model.”

  “Sorry to break it to ya, bud, but you’re not my type.”

  “Nobody has any fucking taste here,” Poiro moaned, and spent the rest of the walk back to the rink bitching about DC’s buttoned-up government-stiff vibes.

  Benji was leaning up against Olly’s car, scrolling through his phone, when they emerged from the elevator. “Hey, guys.”

  “See you tomorrow,” Poiro snapped. He slammed himself into his Benz and peeled out. As much as anyone could peel around the corkscrew turns of their parking deck.

  “What the fuck is wrong with him?”

  Olly filled Benji in on the drive home. He could see Benji going into fix-it mode. Everybody said Olly was the mom, but Benji had a lot of not-even-that-low-key parent energy.

  Olly poked him in the shoulder, trying not to remember how they’d woken up on the couch. The warmth of his hand. “Quit it. I can see you scheming to invite him to yoga and normalize mental health care.”

  Benji deflated. “Yeah, maybe.”

  “He actively engaged me in the conversation and could barely keep himself from cussing me out in the Starbucks. I don’t think Poiro is the fight that you will win.”

  He perked back up. “Does that mean I’m winning the fight with you?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Although maybe he could use the help, with the Eagles’ upcoming visit to the Wolves in Minnesota.

  “Okay, buddy.” Benji still sounded cheerful. It almost made Olly want to call a therapist, just so he could tell Benji he’d done it.

  * * *

  Predictably, since things had been going well—despite the Wolves game and the accompanying visit with his family dragging closer by the day—hosting Florida was a clusterfuck. Olly lost face-off after face-off, and that was the one thing he’d never stopped being able to do. The only reason they weren’t completely out of it by the end of the second period was because their blue line was terrifying.

  And then the third period happened. It started with a freak bounce on a Florida shot. The puck hit the ice, skipped, and then took a weird deflection off Bevvo’s knee to fly past Stormy’s stick. They were three goals in the hole. Their barn went totally silent.

  Olly was surprised that Coach O even sent their line back out. They were doing less than nothing, had barely gotten a shot off all night, but the other guys needed breathers.

  Olly lost a face-off, because of course he lost the fucking face-off. There was a melee in front of the Eagles net, and in the scramble for the puck Olly kicked it over the line. 4-0.

  Which was bad enough. But it wasn’t the problem.

  The problem was that Stormy lost his blocker in the scrum. And while he was scrambling for the puck that Olly had knocked into his net, his hand got slammed into the ice at the wrong fucking angle.

  He let out a strangled-off scream that Olly never wanted to hear again.

  And there went their starting goalie.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Benji started to offer Olly something—dinner, a beer—once they were back at the 505. He’d been tense on the drive home, white knuckles on the steering wheel and swearing under his breath at the traffic. “Hey, do you want...”

  “I don’t need you taking care of me,” Olly snapped, pulling a Gatorade out of the fridge and closing the door hard enough to make the condiment bottles rattle, before slamming into his bedroom. They’d showered at the rink, but he heard the water start running in Olly’s bathroom.

  “Fuck you, too, dude,” he said to Olly’s closed door, shut on whatever pinky-promise bullshit Benji thought they’d agreed to. He understood needing some space after a tough L, but that slammed door was rude as hell. Benji had been on the ice for the final whistle of that game, too.

  He’d maybe started to think that he could count on Olly, that he could trust Olly to do what he’d said he’d do—but obviously not.

  Benji stuck in his headphones and dragged his brain through his meditation app, forced himself to exhale the anger and frustration with his breath. They were leaving immediately for a nice long roadie. He couldn’t hold onto that twisted-tight knot of anger, not if he was going to show up for his team the way he needed to.

  And Benji didn’t disappoint people. His efforts behind the blue line didn’t matter, though. Things didn’t get better out on the ice: Poiro looked shaky, and suddenly they had a four-game losing streak. They clawed back an OT win against Montreal to close out the road trip, but it felt like less than nothing.

  Benji had been proud, okay. He’d been fucking proud of the official start of his NAHA career.

  And now this.

  It happened. It fucking happened. Benji had been on teams going through rough patches before.

  But the energy in the locker room was bad, all of a sudden. Olly was stuck so deep in his head that he could barely make a pass on time, much less crack a smile or keep a meal down. Poiro, on the other hand, hadn’t thrown up on anything, and as far as Benji knew—because Olly wasn’t talking to him (or anyone else, which should maybe make him feel better but didn’t)—he was sticking to curfew, but he was being such a fucking bastard that no one would talk to him.

  So Benji practiced restorative yoga, on his own, in hotels in Montreal and Ottawa and St. Louis. He called Alise, caught up with his coach from the Q. He took care of things on the ice, as well as he could. They lost, they won, they got a pity-point from OT, and lost, and won. None of them were good wins, just lucky bounces and grinding on D, but they weren’t on a free-fall losing streak anymore.

  “Focus on the work,” the coaches said. Benji knew how to do that. Maybe he didn’t have Olly or Poiro or whatever else he’d fucking maybe started to think he was going to have; but none of that meant he couldn’t throw himself into hockey, into full-body checks, flying down the ice, being the best at this one thing that he could possibly be.

  The rhythm of that work had been the only constant in his life since he was a skinny kid, suiting up in his secondhand gear and taking his first cautious steps out onto the ice, behind the other kids in his age group in skill but not caring because he loved it so, so much.

  * * *

  They flew to Minnesota. It looked like Olly was cracking further apart in front of Benji’s eyes, the closer the bus got to Olly’s former home arena.

  Olly suited up in the Wolves’ visiting locker room like he was heading to his execution. His skin was gray and clammy, and he ducked out of Coach O’s pregame speech to run to the bathroom, probably to throw up. He looked worse when he got back, wiping his wrist across the back of his mouth, almost shaking. Benji watched his leg bounce in place instead of listening to Dewitt try to get everyone hyped, watched the frenetic energy in his hand as he knocked his pregame tennis ball up and down, up and down, up-down-up-down-up-down.

  He’d been a mess before the last few games, ever since fucking Florida. But this was next-level. He looked terrified.

  Benji didn’t bother asking how he
was, though. Just wrapped an arm around his shoulders and squeezed. Dropped it when Olly tensed up further and pulled away.

  So much for being buddies.

  But Benji got it as soon as Olly hit the ice for his first shift: these fuckers hated him.

  Every time the refs had their eyes on a different end of the ice, he got slashed, slew-footed, checked late. Coach O was screaming his head off at the refs from behind the bench, but it didn’t make any difference.

  The first period ended scoreless. Benji followed Mils back down the tunnel. His jaw was clenching tightly enough to bite through his mouth guard. He could hear his therapist’s voice, all the way from his office in Quinnipiac: “When you recognize the patterns that tell you you’re getting close to your tipping point, tell me what strategies you’re going to use.” Benji shut his eyes, took deep breaths, stuck in his earbuds, and listened to a five-minute meditation sequence, visualized himself calmly floating down the Mount Vernon Trail with the quiet water of the Potomac murmuring next to him.

  By the end of intermission, he’d walked himself back from the brink. Even after he watched Olly scrape himself up off the ice after yet another late hit from behind. Even after some asshole in a Wolves sweater tripped Lukesy right in front of a ref, and he did fucking nothing.

  Benji had it under control, okay. He was channeling his anger into the productive, therapist-approved channel of flattening Minnesota like a fucking bug.

  He got Dewitt an assist. He scored himself five minutes later—his first NAHA goal, holy shit—tapping in a rebound. He barely even felt it, though: Olly jumped on him, looking like he was about to cry from happiness, and all Benji could see was the fat lip he’d gotten from some fucking goon’s elbow.

  Not some fucking goon, though: fucking Crowder, the former teammate who had apparently reduced Oliver Järvinen to a bombed-out shell of himself.

  And, okay, Benji had learned to let the chirps roll off his back. But there were chirps, and then there was this fucker, looking him in the eye with a nasty smirk and saying some real fucked-up shit.

  And Benji could take it. Benji could fucking take it. He was a big boy. He was tough. He had dealt with worse shit in his life than this fucker.

  That’s what he was telling himself on the bench, squirting Gatorade in his mouth and yelling encouragement at his boys. They were up 3-2 and they fucking needed this win. Olly needed this win.

  Soko headed toward the bench, and that was Benji’s cue. He swung over onto the ice. Fucking Crowder got right up in Benji’s ear. “Järvy gonna suck your dick later? That what you like, huh?”

  Benji winked. “Jealous he got himself an upgrade, baby?”

  Crowder’s face twisted, going from ugly to uglier. He slammed the butt end of his stick into Benji’s chest. Did a referee give a fuck? Nope.

  Mils dragged him back; Benji gritted his teeth and followed his cue. Crowder still looked vicious, though, and he went after Olly as soon as he was out for his next shift. Benji watched Olly push himself up off the ice, again, while Crowder’s mouth kept moving.

  And he was abruptly, suddenly, and completely. Fucking. Done.

  The rage roared through him like a jet engine at takeoff. He was across the ice before he was even aware of it, gloves off. And his fist was smashing into Crowder’s face. Again. And again. And again. He didn’t stop when his knuckle split open on Crowder’s teeth; he didn’t stop when Crowder went down; he didn’t stop when blood was splattered across the ice.

  Benji didn’t know when he would have stopped. But there were finally enough bodies to drag him off.

  Crowder wasn’t moving. Benji wasn’t done.

  “Fucking touch him again,” he said, in a tone of voice he’d never heard come out of his mouth before, “and I’ll kill you. That is a fucking promise.”

  Benji shrugged off the arms across his chest and took himself down the tunnel without a backward glance.

  * * *

  All Olly wanted to do after the game was punch Benji right in his crooked nose, and then maybe give him a hug. And then punch him again.

  Benji was laughing about his Gordie Howe, getting congratulated on bagging his first NAHA goal and first NAHA fight in the same game. But there was a look in his eyes that Olly didn’t know what to do with. His taped-up knuckles made Olly want to find Crowder and smash his orbital bone again for good measure. Olly should have taken care of it himself, maybe, given him some payback for that night in February, but Coach O had pulled him aside before the game to talk about not rising to provocation and focusing on moving the puck. Like that had done any good. At least Minnesota had been too busy playing smear the queer to do anything else.

  He also hurt. Nothing broken or cracked, but fuck.

  The team doc had put a stitch in his lip during the first intermission, so it wasn’t leaking blood anymore. Still stung like a bitch. He didn’t want to think about his ribs. His knee and hip had gotten jammed into the boards at unnatural angles. And it would all hurt worse tomorrow when he started to tighten up.

  But in a way, he felt better. They’d done their worst, and the Eagles had pulled out the W. Olly was going to live to skate another day.

  Benji made a sound when Olly pulled his tarp off, like Crowder had managed to get in a delayed-reaction sucker-punch.

  “It’s not that bad,” Olly told him.

  “You can’t see it.”

  Benji looked ready to storm over to the Wolves dressing room and start throwing haymakers. Olly whacked him in the shoulder. “Simmer down. Nothing’s broken.”

  Benji shook his head. There was a sweaty curl plastered to his forehead; Olly’s fingers itched, for a brief and ridiculous second, to push it back.

  Instead, he took a shower and got ready to face the next obstacle in his night: his family. Getting his ass kicked all over the ice had been a decent distraction from that, at least.

  It was too late for dinner, but they were meeting for breakfast tomorrow. He’d probably stay up all night freaking out about it. But for now, even though Olly’s body ached absolutely everywhere, his mind had a scraped-out calm. He’d gotten through something that had taken up residence in his brain, metastasized into something bigger and darker than a game of hockey. The only way it was ever going to get worse than this was if Crowder or Barnard yapped to the media, which would bring the collective wrath of the North American Hockey Association and Olly’s lawyer down on their heads. For the small price of whatever tatters of his career he had left.

  He wasn’t going to think about that, though. His brain, for once, was willing to skip past the worst possible outcome.

  “Where are you going?” Benji asked, when he was starting down the hallway.

  “Saying hi to my family.”

  “Oh.” He blinked his offensively long eyelashes. “I didn’t know they were coming.”

  Olly felt a stab of guilt. He hadn’t been talking to Benji. He...couldn’t. The Minnesota game was taking up too much mental space, on top of his colossal fuckup against Florida, and then he’d been remembering every single play he’d ever screwed up. His lowlight reel. “Do you want to come meet everybody?”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Olly’s family was waiting for them out by the exit to the bus, bundled up against the frigid Minnesota night. Flurries scattered down from the steel-gray clouds, in and out of visibility in the orange halos of the streetlights. Benji stuck close to Olly’s heels. Now that he was back in the land of the living, or at least the land of talking to Benji, he felt weirdly unwilling to let him out of his sight.

  Maybe he’d ask Poiro to switch rooms with him tonight. But that would be...un-chill. And Benji needed to be chill, if he was meeting Olly’s family and his fuck-you hockey dad. That was one thing he had to say for his family background: nobody tried to stick an oar into his career or got so emotional they were thrown out of his youth games. Earl had kept
coming to Benji’s games for a while, even after he’d broken up with his mom, but he’d never tried to call the coach about his minutes.

  Olly introduced him to his parents, his brothers Sami and Joey—the third one hadn’t made it down from Duluth—and his sisters-in-law. The brothers all had the same sharp cheekbones and expressive eyebrows, but Sami and Joey had squarer jaws and blockier builds, obvious even under layers of down coats and sweaters. Olly looked more like his mother, who moved with the contained grace of a figure skater. They had the same eyes, a cool, deep-water blue.

  Olly’s father was a bear of a man, red-bearded and imposing. But Benji was taller, he noticed, while Mr. Järvinen was trying to break his fingers via handshake.

  Benji smiled at him politely and squeezed back harder. Early signs pointed to: fuck this dude.

  “So you do know how to fight,” he said, in a nice clapback to the Pittsburgh game.

  “When called for, definitely.”

  “Looks like you’ve still got your teammates fighting for you,” Mr. Järvinen told Olly. Which was exactly the kind of statement calibrated to pull Olly’s shoulders up to his ears. Benji watched it land. Decided this was one throwback fucker: nobody wanted their top-six forwards in the sin bin. Olly was clearly supposed to be in the top six, even if he was not, technically, at this moment, on the second line.

  “We watch out for each other,” Benji told him cheerfully, with a giant fucking smile. He wrapped an arm around Olly’s shoulders; tilted him toward his mom; summoned Poiro with a wiggle of his eyebrow, since he was lurking outside the bus staring at them like a creeper anyway; and went on a charm offensive while Poiro cornered the dad.

  Benji was good at parents, if they weren’t complete assholes. After a few minutes Mrs. Järvinen was looking at him like he was her long-lost fifth baby. Ditto Sami, the science brother, who invited him to breakfast.

  He slung an arm around Olly’s neck and dragged him into his side. He was a little surprised that Olly stayed put instead of shaking him off, but that was fine: he was exactly where Benji wanted him.