Page 53 of Triplets for the Pucking Playboys
I scroll back to the first page, add a new bullet underThings I Can Still Control. It says,6. The Story. Own it, or someone else will.
I close the laptop, the screen fading to black. The room is silent, the world reset to its default state of too much night and not enough time. I sit with my hands in my lap, then one migrates, almost unconsciously, to rest on my belly. The city outside is waking up, the first hints of morning leaking through the blinds. I have weeks, maybe less, before the secret gets out. But for now, it’s mine.
18
BEAU
If you want to know what a hockey player looks like in his natural habitat, don’t go to Madison Square Garden. Go to a middle school charity skate at seven-thirty on a Sunday morning, when the air smells like three brands of disinfectant and the old Zamboni exhaust lingers in the cinderblock vestibule. No TV cameras. No PR snipers waiting for your next fuckup. Just a hundred kids in neon parkas wobbling around the rink with their parents, most of whom couldn’t lace up a skate if their lives depended on it. This is where you see what matters: not points, not stats, but whether you can make a roomful of children believe the world is magic for ninety minutes.
I cut tight around a knot of third graders, pop a backward crossover, and stop on a dime in front of the blue line. My blades leave a rooster-tail of ice that makes three kids shriek with delight and a chaperone raise her eyebrows in alarm. I grin at her, teeth and all, and then point at the Storm jersey on her kid. “Solid taste,” I say. “Did you pick the number, or did you let your mom do it?”
The boy flushes, but I see the light in his eyes. He’s wearing my number. Has to be, with that hair and that lopsided smile. Itap his stick, give him a low five, and then pivot to see how many other little monsters are in Storm blue. At least half the rink, which means PR did its job. The kids swarm me in a minute, tugging at my sleeves, wanting to race or be bodychecked or just hear me say their names. I oblige. It’s easy. Being the center of gravity is what I do best, especially when there’s no one here to judge how hard I’m trying.
I don’t see Sage until my third lap, because she’s not wearing the armor I’m used to. She’s pressed up against the boards on the near side, half-hiding behind the assistant coach’s wife. Her hair isn’t in the usual severe bun, just loose and tucked behind one ear. The Storm wellness hoodie she’s wearing is at least two sizes too big, zippered halfway down, and showing a black tank top underneath. She’s got a thermos in one hand and her face tilted up, not toward me, but toward the cataclysm happening at center ice, where a pack of five-year-olds has staged a coup against the PE teacher. Sage is laughing. Not a polite titter, not the exhausted huff she gives after a hard day in the rehab room. A real laugh, unguarded and bright, which is maybe the rarest thing I’ve seen in my entire life.
I almost miss the turn. I have to double back and come up on her from the other side, sliding to a stop with enough snow to pepper her shoes. She barely notices. I have to knock on the glass to get her attention.
“Is that actual cocoa?” I say, loud enough to carry. “I thought you banned that from the approved Storm hydration plan.”
She doesn’t even blink. “It’s organic. I spiked it with flaxseed and despair. Want some?” She lifts the thermos, eyebrows up.
“I’d die instantly. I’m 90 percent high-fructose corn syrup and MSG.”
The assistant coach’s wife snorts and walks off to save her toddler from an impending faceplant, leaving us alone at the edge of the rink. Sage sips her cocoa, eyes crinkling at thecorners. She looks better than she has in weeks. There’s color in her face, and the shadows that usually live under her eyes are replaced with something close to sleep. I want to ask her how she managed it, but I can tell she wouldn’t answer.
I lean over the boards. “You ever get out there? Or just judge from a distance?”
She rolls her eyes, but it’s playful. “I’ll have you know I was the junior figure skating champ of Hudson County two years in a row.”
I look her up and down. “No tights? No sequins? I call bullshit.”
“I don’t need costumes to be better than you, Kingston.”
It’s an old game, but this time there’s no edge to it. I pop the gate, step onto the rubber mat, and stand so close I can see the ghost of a smile still flickering on her lips.
“You good?” I ask, soft.
Her face goes flat for a heartbeat, the real Sage breaking through for just a beat. “I’m fine. Just…tired of pretending it’s not a shit show.”
“Isn’t that what we do? Perform until someone buys the act?”
She looks at the chaos on the ice, at the kids and the parents and the volunteers stacking donuts at the snack bar. “They buy it,” she says. “We don’t.”
For a second, neither of us talks. The only sound is the relentless scrape of skate blades and the squeal of sugar-addled children. I watch her, the way she holds the thermos with both hands, the way her hair falls into her eyes and she doesn’t bother to fix it. The only thing sharper than her tongue has always been her sense of control, but here, now, she’s letting it slip, and I can’t decide if it makes her more beautiful or just more real.
“Want to make a bet?” I say, tapping my stick against the bench.
She side-eyes me. “What are we talking?”
“You race me, blue line to blue line. Loser gets a hundred bucks.”
She sips her cocoa, thinking.
“Scared?”
She grins. “Of you? Please. I bench more than your body weight.”
She sets the thermos down and gives me another, full-bodied smile, and for a second, I forget how to breathe. She pulls a pair of gloves from her back pocket, slips them on like she’s putting on surgical scrubs. I step out onto the ice and wait for her at the blue line, heart thumping like I just killed a penalty.
