Page 52 of Untouchable Player

“I guess Toronto is like the home of hockey or something?”

“They just have really good junior training programmes.”

Nate fixes me with his eyes now in a way that tells me I’m not supposed to look away.

“You didn’t do too bad here though. You got a scholarship to an Ivy League school because of how good you are.”

I don’t know whether to be proud or tell him to shut up. I can’t be that good.

“Out of high school, they don’t know what your potential is because you haven’t stopped developing yet, so they take a chance and watch to see how you’ll turn out.”See if you’ll get injured, which I did.

“You seem to know a lot about the process.”

I shrug. “I lived it.”

“But a lot of players don’t really care. They leave that up to the coach and just do as they’re told. Or at least, that’s what Harrison did.”

“Oh, I do as I’m told,” I laugh, trying not to sound bitter, “but I am interested in the development stuff.”

“Maybe you’d make a good hockey scout.”

“Maybe.” I shrug. I don’t want this attention. I turn it on him. “What are you gonna be when you grow up?” I flash him my best grin, showing my chipped tooth.

Nate blushes. “Honestly, I don’t know yet. There’s a lot of jobs I can do with my degree. I need to get a graduates degree for most, if not all of them, and I need at least a 3.3 – 3.7 to get onto an MA programme, but I learn about mathematics, analytics, computer science, chemical engineering…” Nate stops talking, his cheeks pink. He tucks his hair behind his ear and looks down at the table, “sorry, this must be really boring.”

“No, not at all.” It’s the opposite actually. Listening to Nate talk about all that stuff is nice. It’s good to remind myself there’s more to life than becoming a professional hockey player. There are loads of different versions of success, and most of them don’t involve the NHL or the AHL or even the ECHL.

“I think I wanna be a coach or a trainer or something,” I say. As soon as I say it out loud, it feels good. Right.

Nate smiles. “You’d be really good at that.”

“And by the way, Iknowyou’re getting a 4.0 in all your classes.”

He blushes and fuck me if that isn’t the cutest sight I’ve ever seen.

Nate takes his books out and we study for a couple of hours. The time passing nicely, though I get distracted a lot, especially when the sun starts coming in on Nate’s face and he doesn’t even notice because he’s so engrossed in his book.

When I look at what he’s reading, it doesn’t even look like English. It’s mostly equations and pages and pages of tiny footnotes. Fuck I hate footnotes!

When he finally puts his pen down and looks up, I find an opening and ask if he wants to grab something to eat. When he invites me back to his house, I have to work hard to look casual about it.

I think I might catch a hint of regret or guilt at leaving the library before it’s dark from Nate, but I can’t see any.

I wait until we get outside to ask how his mom is.

“They’re working it out,” he says.

“Oh, that’s good.”

“I don’t know.”

We take our time walking to the bus stop. I want to make sure he’s alright, but I don’t want to push it.

“I don’t want my parents to split up, but I don’t want my mom to forgive my dad for cheating either. Is that weird?”

“No, it’s not weird. I’d feel exactly the same way.”

“What would you do?”

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