Page 49 of Glitz & Goals

The team spends a lot of time on the plane to and from away games, which means that they’ve had plenty of opportunities to come up with dumb, time-wasting activities to make the trip pass. At first, they did normal shit, like play cards. Then they played Cards Against Humanity. Now, we’ve reached a point in the season where they’re coming up with their own games.

Their current game is called Casual Nuts. I’m a little hazy on the point system, but as far as I can tell, the general aim of Casual Nuts is to tell the group a story while sitting with your legs spread. At random, other members of the team will try to balltap the speaker, either by hand if he’s within arm’s reach, or using some sort of impromptu projectile. After a few mishaps, rules have been implemented about the size and heft of acceptable missiles. If the speaker can deflect the balltap, he gets a point. If he fails, the person who achieved the balltap gets a point.

At this point in the explanation, I tuned out, because life is too short to memorize all the rules of a game I never intend to play.

“Jesus Christ,” Noah mutters under his breath as he watches the guys play. “Were we ever this dumb?”

Ranger snorts. “Honestly, I’m surprised that Latham didn’t come up with this game.”

Noah smirks. “Or Briggs.”

“Besides, I’m pretty sure your son was the one who devised this little gem.”

“Yeah, well.” Noah sighs. “Past a certain point, you’ve got to let them do their own thing, don’t you?”

One of the right wingers takes a hit to the groin in the form of a thrown granola bar, and his turn ends.

“How about you?” Ranger asks. “Did you have a game like this back when you were their age?”

I tap my phone screen.

“Grady?” Ranger asks.

I whip my head up. “What?”

“Did you ever do dumb stuff like this when you were in your twenties?”

“Dumb stuff like…?” Before I can finish the question, my phone vibrates again. I turn the screen face-down. Fortunately, my brain catches up with the random nonsense they’ve been talking about. I’ve been listening, kinda. I’m just a wee bit distracted. “Oh, sure. We had the towel game.”

Viktor twists in his seat to look at me. “What’s the towel game?”

I shake my head. “I’m not putting ideas in your head.” My phone buzzes again, and I can’t help but glance at the screen. As expected, it’s another text from Viv. We’ve been trying to one-up each other’s tree-related puns.

VivaLaViv: My bark is worse than my bite.

Grady: I can’t believe you went for such low-hanging fruit.

VivaLaViv: You’d better be-leaf it!

Grady: That one SAPped me of the will to live.

VivaLaViv: Hah, that was good, but I guess some puns are evergreen.

Grady: How do you FIGure?

VivaLaViv: How come all of your puns are so acorny?

“Holy shit, Coach. You’re smiling.” Viktor’s voice drags me back to reality. Casual Nuts has apparently been put on hold so all the guys can stare at me, assistant coaches included.

“You never smile,” Camden adds. “At least not with your whole face.”

“Who has you grinning like that?” Knight asks.

At least fifty percent of my brain is still trying to think of tree puns. The words slip out before I can think twice. “My future wife.”

Viktor’s eyes just about pop out of his skull.

Camden snorts. “More like your imaginary wife. Has anyone ever actually seen Coach around a woman?”

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