Page 35 of Why Not Us?

“We’ll have to rent you some skates,” I say. “But I have other things for you.”

“Whose things are these?” she asks over her shoulder. “Taylor’s again?”

“Yeah. You need gloves, a stick, and a helmet for this. The Tuesday night Stick and Puck tends to be a little less crowded than the Saturday one, so we should have plenty of space.”

We get the skates and head out onto the ice. Adalie holds tight to the boards.

“I don’t know if this was a good idea,” she says. “I’m going to fall on my ass.”

There are only a few other people out today, so I lean my sticks against the boards and take Adalie’s hands. Of course, we’re both wearing bulky hockey gloves and I can’t help but wish we weren’t.

“Come on,” I say, pulling her out onto the ice. “We’ll take a couple laps, get you used to being on skates.”

She moves her feet, gliding over the surface, a lot more sure now that she has my hand.

“Okay,” she says. “This isn’t so bad. I think I can do it without holding on.”

She lets go of my hand and I catch myself before I snatch it back. She’s more confident as we make our way around the rink.

“Who’s watching the taproom tonight?” Adalie asks as we skate behind the two nets set up on one end.

“Taylor. He said I would owe him one, but I’m not worried.”

We continue along the long side and behind the nets set up on the opposite end.

“You’re doing a lot better,” I say.

She grins up at me. “I just needed to remember the movement. When I was a kid, my uncle used to take me and my brother skating every week in the winter. We did it for about two years until he moved to Alberta.”

“Calista never got to go?”

Adalie shakes her head. “She was too little. He probably would have taken her the next year if he hadn’t moved.”

“Let’s grab the sticks,” I say as we return to where I’d left them. “We’ll start with moving the puck down the ice.”

She takes to the movements like a natural, pushing the puck in front of her as we skate from one end of the rink to the other.

“Have you done this before?” I ask after the third trip back up the ice.

She smiles again, her eyes alight with happiness. “I played floor hockey a few times in high school. I remember, it was my favourite unit in gym class. I liked playing offence and shooting the puck. I was pretty terrible at most sports, but hockey I wasn’t bad.”

I chuckle. “So youhavedone this before.”

I stop us in the middle of the rink. Most people are at one end or the other, practicing shooting, so I figure we can stay here to practice some passing.

“Not on ice,” she says, pushing back a stray curl that’s come loose with her wrist. “What’s next?”

Before I can tell her, I hear someone call my name, and any happiness I was feeling drains away. A man, about my age and a lot smaller than me, skates over.

“I thought that was you. You playing in the game tomorrow night?”

“Tim,” I say with a nod. “I was planning to.”

He turns to Adalie and I want to punch his teeth in with the way he looks at her. She smiles at him, tugs off her glove, and holds out her hand.

“Hi. I’m Adalie. Do you play with Nate?”

He shakes her hand. “No. Nate’s team is playing mine. I’m the lead centre for the Frozen Fury. So, Nate’s teaching you to play? Are you going to join a team?”

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