Page 3 of Tempest

A phase Tori cried over for two weeks after our move. Luckily, her eye caught some new guy when she started high school here and things eased up.

Until she graduated and Caroline chose to leave me and move back to New York. Tori went with her, but she’s back now. After a gap year, she’s decided to go to school here in Seattle. I think she feels bad about the attitude she’s given me since the separation from her mother. She shouldn’t, but I won’t complain about whatever reason sent her back to the West Coast. I love having her around.

Maybe she’s making a mistake not attending school in New York. She is studying fashion, after all. But the school she was looking at there has a satellite program here in conjunction with one of Seattle’s universities. So, she can always transfer if it doesn’t work out. Though I’ll miss her face if she does.

Professional hockey is a hard life. I’ve missed so much of her childhood by being on the road. Now that I’m close to retirement, it’s hitting me hard just how much I wish I would have been there for.

“Oh my god!” It’s definitely excitement in her voice when she slides on socked feet up to the breakfast bar.

“What’s up,” I ask, looking over my shoulder as she sets her laptop on the counter, flipping it open.

“You have to see this.”

“Let me finish this up,” I say, cracking a few more eggs into the bowl. “You want ham and cheese?”

“Yes, please.”

Continuing to make our omelets, I smile when I hear her chanting under her breath.

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my fucking god.”

Victoria has always been animated and theatrical. A trait I think she picks up from her mother. Her determination is from me, though. One hundred percent. There has never been anything in her life that she wanted and didn’t work hard until she got it. She’s privileged, sure. My career offers a lot of financial comfort. Her being an only child meant she was fairly spoiled her whole life. But she’s never been a brat about it. If we put limits on things to help her grow into a responsible adult or evoke some work ethics, she never complained.

She’s a smart girl. Smarter than her old man, that’s for sure. That’s probably something she got from her mom, too. Caroline was supposed to attend Michigan State University after high school. She’d earned a full academic scholarship, wanting to go into biomedical sciences. That changed because of Tori.

Caroline maintains that her decision to become a mother instead of a college graduate was her decision, and her decision alone. That’s never stopped me from blaming myself, though. My career path didn’t really allow me to be the primary caregiver for a child, leaving her to take that roll on. I’ve tried to get her to go back to school on numerous occasions, but she always declined.

“I’m a full-time mother until she’s an adult,” she’d say every time I brought it up. How else could I respond to that but with acceptance? Tori has always come first. Motherhood wasn’t on the top of Caroline’s to-do list at eighteen years old. Of course, it wasn’t. But from the day she found out she was pregnant; the baby was the most important thing in her world. Mine too, despite everything.

The day she told me is a day I’ll never forget. I didn’t know shit about being a dad. Fuck, I didn’t know shit about being an adult, a man. You learn quick when you’re suddenly responsible for another human. Or two. And I was responsible for both Tori and Caroline. Her whole world altered because of sex with me; I wasn’t about to abandon her. She’s been my best friend since we were seven years old. You don’t turn away from a friendship like that. And although I may have been a dipshit teenager, I was never the type of guy to turn my back on responsibilities.

Well, mostly, anyhow.

To say I’ve always made the right decisions would be a boldfaced lie. There are regrets, things I wish I could change. But I have never been malicious. I’ve always cared about the people around me. Despite the circumstances, I think I’ve been a good dad and was the best husband I could be to Caroline.

“Oh my god, oh my god.”

I chuckle as I fold over her omelet. My skills in the kitchen aren’t many, but this shit, I have down. When I take Tori out to breakfast, she never orders omelets because they don’t make them as good as mine. It’s a small thing, but my dad-ego swells every time, like she’s just handed me the Stanley Cup of parenting or some shit.

She’ll be moving into her own place in a couple of weeks. One closer to campus since she doesn’t like driving in Seattle. I can’t blame her; this whole city was built on a cliffside. I’m going to miss having her here. It’s been nice not being alone. I’ve always had nights to myself when I’m on the road, but until Caroline moved out last year, I’d never come home to an empty house. The adjustment wasn’t the easiest.

Cillian, my teammate, tried to convince me to get a cat. It doesn’t seem right to leave a little furball home by itself while I’m away for days on end, though. Maybe I should buy some plants—I can name them and talk to them like they’re real-life friends.

Jesus. Is this what loneliness does to a person?

Looking back, I’ve been lonely in certain ways for a very long time. It was something I never focused on, though. Instead, I’d push the thought to that dark spot in your mind that you only peek into when absolutely necessary. It became necessary when Caroline left. Or inevitable, anyway.

I’m thirty-eight. Evaluating things I have avoided is imperative now. I’m young, but old for the sport, so this will be my last season. This time next year, I won’t only be a divorcee and the father of a grown daughter, but I’ll also be unemployed. Or retired. Whatever. It feels like the same thing. It feels like I’ll be useless. Purposeless. Not needed.

There is no plan after retirement. Some may look forward to that sort of life. One without plans or structure. The only part of it I look forward to is waking up without an alarm. The rest feels daunting.

Who am I if not a hockey player, a husband, and a dad? I’ll always be Tori’s dad, but it’s different now that she doesn’t need me on a regular basis.

I plate the omelets and turn to my girl. Her mass of dark hair is a nest atop her head. What looks like a messy bun to me is really something I know she spent at least fifteen minutes on. I like it when she wears it up, though; it lets me see her face better. It also shows off her new tattoo. A sample of black leaves creeping up from her shoulder and stretching up her neck. It’s pretty and reminds me of her mom, who has a similar tattoo on her side.

“All right, what’s all the excitement about,” I ask as I push her plate next to her laptop.

“Oh my god, Dad, you’ll never believe this,” she starts off dramatically. “You know it was, like, the weirdest decision to come to school here instead of attending in New York. Or even in Los Angeles.”

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