HENRY

IT’S HARD TO BELIEVE ALL the people telling me today isn’t a big deal, when every single person who knows me and Halle has checked in.

Last night after Halle went home, as a team, we decided what our perfect routine would look like. My history would suggest it was a pointless activity, but throughout today I’ve done every single thing we said we were going to. And so did the rest of the guys. Weirdly, it’s proven my own point that I feel better with a routine. Maybe this is the start of me being able to stick to it.

I haven’t skipped one stretch, one ounce of protein, or zoned out of one motivational talk. In a way, it’s reminded me how much I loved just being a player on the team, without this constant nagging in my head that I need to be doing something more, being better, being the leader. Today we’re on the same page: we all want to see Will cry at the end of the night.

Everyone is as invested in this as me, except Halle. Every silly superstition my friends have has been stuck to. Even as far as JJ wearing his lucky pants up in San Jose, Nate only listening to rock music, Joe always putting his right shoe on 1rst and getting his grandma to do her special prayer she used to do on game days.

It sounds extreme—paranoid, de1nitely—but everyone knows how much Halle means to me. Will is arrogant on the ice, and I know from Halle he’s had his ass kissed his whole life. There’s nothing I can say to him that’ll hurt him more than beating him this weekend.

I’m the last oI the ice when our warmup is done. I’ve been getting my head in the zone all day. I feel good, the team feels good—all that’s left for me to do is survive Faulkner’s motivational speech.

I’m about to pass no-man’s-land—a small stretch created by a planning error that connects our hallway to the visitors’ hallway—when I hear my name being called. I know immediately I should ignore Will, but when I hear him call me a fucking coward I can’t help but stop. The guys in front of me making their way into the locker room do the same, turning around to see what’s happening.

“Looking slow out there,” he says, in the most pathetic attempt to goad me.

I’m in the best shape I’ve been in. It’s the most eIort I’ve put in.

Pulling oI my helmet and tucking it under my arm, I ru e my hair to unRatten it and scoI. “Thanks for the feedback. Show me where I asked.”

I don’t understand what Will is hoping to achieve. Everyone who has ever played here knows this area is out of bounds. We don’t mess with each other oI the ice. It dates back to when the Titans were known for pranks and people would use this spot to get into the other locker room. There isn’t anything he can say to shake me.

I think he can tell he isn’t going to psych me out because he starts smiling. “How’re you liking my leftovers?”

“If you don’t think you can beat me out there just say that.” I turn to head back to the locker room with my teammates, who are still standing by, but he just doesn’t know when to stop.

“Have you seen all Halle’s scars yet? She has a few. Always saving Maisie from falling over and hurting herself instead. Or the birthmark on the inside of her thigh? I liked discovering that one.”

“Fuck oI, Ellington,” I call over my shoulder.

“Don’t walk away from me,” he yells. I turn to face him again, taking a few steps toward him. I’m bigger than he is, and the diIerence is, I don’t need to 1ght him. I don’t want to 1ght him. Halle laughing her way through saying, Fighting is for fools, and you’re not a fool, plays in my head like a song. She hates 1ghting and she’d hate me 1ghting. And I have her, and he doesn’t. “See? We can talk like adults. We should be best friends actually; we have a lot in common. I should be thanking you for keeping my side of the bed warm.”

“I already have a best friend, thanks. Her name is Halle. That isn’t something you can say anymore though, is it?”

I know I’ve hit a nerve. Bulldozed the nerve, in fact. “Do you like the things I taught her? I don’t feel like you’re very grateful for me making her less of a frigid bitch.”

The guy behind me lunges forward but I block him from reaching Will. It’s Bobby I realize afterward. “Shut your fucking mouth, you prick,” he snarls.

Will holds up his hands defensively. “I’m just trying to say thank you for breaking her in for me. You saved me a job when we go on vacation together.”

My blood feels like it’s boiling. I don’t need to react to him. I don’t want to. Halle wouldn’t want me to. I want her parents to like me, and they won’t if I beat the crap out of Will. I can’t let the team down. I can’t let myself down.

“She’d never touch you,” I say. “Fuck oI back to your own locker room. And don’t talk to me again. Don’t talk to Halle again.”

Bobby is still close behind me. I hear what sounds like Kris’s voice with him but I don’t check. Will seems like a punch-to-the-back-of-the-head kind of guy. I doubt he’d ever be able to win anything fairly.

He laughs, but even I can tell it’s forced. “I’m excited to see if she likes it rough. I bet she does, right? She’s such a fucking people pleaser I bet she’d do anything I asked. I’ll try to send her back to you in one piece, Turner.”

I feel sick. I don’t know how I ended up being the one holding the others back. They’re yelling at him right down my ear and I just want to be in my own locker room. There can’t be a 1ght on my watch. “I get it now,” I say to him calmly over the yelling.

“You get what?” he sneers. “Why she could never love you.”

Will snaps, lunging forward for me, but I’m quicker than he is. The guys behind me rush forward, and somewhere in the chaos an elbow hits beneath my eye. It’s all over quickly as someone drags me back and someone else pulls Bobby oI Will. I see Kris go for him and get yanked back. It’s all a blur. The shouting alerted Will’s team and they drag him back; looking at his split lip, I see Bobby de1nitely got the best of him.

The minutes that pass become an adrenaline-1lled maze of people and doors. My ass hits the bench and it’s one second before my name is being screamed.

Months and months of this same room and that voice shouting my name 1lls me with the same sickening dread.

The locker room is in chaos, but I ignore it as I walk into Faulkner’s o ce and shut the door behind me.

“What in the fuck just happened out there?” Faulkner yells louder than I’ve ever heard him. My ears sting and my skin feels like it tightens across my whole body. Like it’s suddenly not enough to 1t me.

“A 1ght, Coach.”

“A 1ght about what?” he yells. I really wish I could ask him to stop yelling or that I had those earbuds Halle bought for me.

“I can’t tell you, Coach.” He brushes his hand over the top of his head, and I still haven’t had my answer about what he thinks he’s brushing. Now isn’t the time to ask. It’s never the time.

“You can’t tell me?” He spits out the words like they’re unrecognizable to him. “If you don’t tell me what on God’s green earth made the captain of my team get into a 1ght before the start of a game, then you’re not going on the fucking ice. Start explaining, Turner. Now.”

Will just said the most disgusting things about Halle and she’s going to be so embarrassed. Even though I’ll tell her she’s breaking a rule, and that she doesn’t need to be embarrassed about it, she’s going to be. Will might tell his team what he said, they might laugh about it. The thought makes me want to throw up.

I know Bobby won’t tell anyone, and neither will Kris. I don’t know who else on the team might have heard, but I trust my friends enough to know that they’re about to be told they didn’t hear shit. That there will be a problem if they utter even a syllable that sounds like what Will said. My friends are good like that; Halle’s friends are good to her.

“I can’t, Coach. I’m sorry.”

There’s only one thing I hate more than Coach Faulkner screaming at me: his silence.

I count his breaths, in and out. In and out. In and out, until he 1nally speaks. “There’s only one thing that’d make someone on this team act this damn foolish. Who is it?”

I clear my throat. Pointless. My mouth is dry. “It doesn’t matter who she is.”

“I’m not playing around with you here, Turner. This isn’t a fucking negotiation. I get to know what happens in my rink. You tell me. That’s the deal we agreed upon when you joined this team. You’re the captain, for Christ’s sake. I need better from you.”

It stings when all I’ve done all year is try to do my best. “You have two daughters, Coach?”

His eyes narrow at me. “You are on thin fucking ice, Turner. Think very hard

about what you’re about to say next.”

“Would you do something you know would hurt and embarrass them… for hockey?”

“I’m not running hypothetical situations with you. You fucked up.” He cradles his head in his hands and shakes his head so violently the desk moves. “We have a team out there that needs to go and win this game. Are you going to be honest with me or not?”

“I shouldn’t have to hurt someone I care about to prove to you I’m good enough to play on this team. It’s not what being a good leader is, Coach. If you’re going to sit me out because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time with someone looking for a 1ght, then 1ne.”

Faulkner stands from his desk, and I swear the whole room shakes. “If you’re not prepared to do things you don’t want to do, maybe we need to talk about whether you have the right attitude to be captain. Wait here. Hopefully when I come back, you’ll have come to your senses.”

The door slams behind me, the brief moment it opened telling me the locker room is dead silent. Something I’d have previously called impossible if I didn’t know they’d all be trying to listen to what’s going on in here.

I hear Faulkner scream that he doesn’t want to fucking hear it, and for everyone to get their head out of their asses and into the game. I rest my head against the desk and breathe out a sigh.

The idea of having my title taken away feels a lot like relief.

And I honestly don’t know how to process that. Sometimes it feels like I have too many emotions, and other times it feels like I have none. Sometimes I feel like I understand everything going on around me, and other times I feel like I’m surrounded by people who speak a language that I don’t speak.

Hockey and art have always been great equalizers for me. When it didn’t matter so much about what I said, and there was a guideline for how I acted. Rules I could follow, mistakes that could be easily identi1ed and 1xed. It’s almost the opposite of the Ruidity of art, where there isn’t a way for me to get wrong what I’m trying to create. It has the structure I crave coupled with the this-could-go-anywhere I love when I create something new.

I love being on the team, and when I’m honest with myself, I don’t love having the team look up to me. Becoming captain took away my great equalizer and overcomplicated my emotions that had previously been sound.

How can I be honest about how I’m feeling when I know it’ll let my friends down?

How do I let go of the thing I’ve clung to so tightly all year? Something that has always felt like I’m seconds away from being stung by wasps?

What if Faulkner tells me I haven’t been doing a good job, and it’s all been for nothing?

I hear the familiar sound of the guys cheering, hyped up to get out there and win.

Faulkner wants me to wait here, but I can’t. I can’t tell him to his face that I’m as relieved as I am. I wait until I know they’re gone, then I leave Coach’s o ce.

I get changed as quickly as I can, shoving my things into my bag and getting out of the locker room. As I approach the door out into the foyer I can hear people screaming at each other. Leaning against the wall beside the door, I open it the slightest amount to listen, and that’s when I realize one of the voices is Halle’s.