Page 12 of Gravity
“Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to monopolize your night,” I say.
“Non,non, you haven’t. It’s Vegas. The night has just begun. Would you like to grab a drink?”
What hangover?I’m a remade man, thanks to Bryce. “I’d love to.”
We end up at a dueling piano bar, another local place off the Strip, and we find a spot near the back and tuck into a two-person booth—somewhere we can hear the music, but can talk, too.
We steer the conversation away from the NHL this time, and instead trade stories about growing up. Bryce is one of a herd of brothers from a mining town in Quebec, and hockey was a part of his life before he could speak in full sentences. He was on skates before he could walk, gliding between his father's legs on the frozen river that wound behind their village. He held his little hands on top of his father's gloves when they brought out the family's old wooden hockey stick, and he helped shoot his first puck when he was only twenty months old. Hockey was everything, everywhere, from his earliest memory to today.
“What was it like growing up in Texas?” Bryce asks. “Was it all cowboys and rodeos?”
“A lot of longhorns, a lot of dust.” I’m from a town in the middle of Texas where farms and ranches outnumber the people two to one.I was destined for sports from the time I was in preschool and I stood a head taller than the oldest boy in the class. I was picked for the football team, the basketball team, the rodeo team, but it was when I took a field trip to the ice rink in Odessa that I really fell in love. Hockey was an unlikely choice, coming from the heart of Texas, but it was all I wanted after that first day on skates. I played lacrosse and street hockey to cross-train and begged my parents daily to take me to the rink. I spent my weekends on the ice, from almost sun up to sun down. When I was thirteen, I was tapped to join the state juniors, who had to all be sixteen or older. The coach made sure to write my birth year illegibly.
“I was the middle child surrounded by three sisters,” I tell him. “I used to barter time playing Barbies for equal time playing street hockey. I taught them all how to play, and we’d use stuffed animals as our goalies.”
“I only had brothers,” he says. “We bunked together, played together, did everything together. We were a hockey team all by ourselves. Still, I liked to be on my own as much as I could. What was it like with sisters?”
“Loud. And energetic. I was always in the way, and I was never alone. We had a sign-up sheet for the bathroom and a timer taped to the door. I learned how to brush my teeth in the shower and wake up in the middle of the night to have a few minutes of privacy.”
“Are you close?”He spins his beer bottle on his thigh. His eyes never leave mine.
“Yeah. We fought growing up, but we've always been close. When my junior hockey team won the regional championship, my sisters were first over the boards and rushing across the ice. They took me down at the blue line. I hadn’t gone down all game because I was the biggest guy out there—until them.”
The sound of his laugh carries over the dueling pianos.
Three a.m. comes and goes. I would gladly spend all of tonight and tomorrow with Bryce, but I've barely slept since I got off the plane. I can’t smother my yawns well enough to hide them from the best reader in the NHL.
Bryce pays the tab close to four a.m., apologizing for keeping me so late.
All great things end. We wait for our taxis outside, the February desert night as cool as the days are warm.
“What are you doing before the game tomorrow?” I ask. We’ve both been up all night, so the right answer is “sleeping.” But maybe…
“I was going to go out to Red Rock Canyon. It’s only half an hour away, but it feels like you have teleported to Mars.” Bryce eyes me, his hands in his pockets, biting down on the corner of his lip. “Would you like to join me?”
“I’d love to.”
We trade cell numbers, and he promises to text me the details as our taxis arrive at the same time. We split in opposite directions, heading to our vastly different hotels. He is at the most exclusive place in the city, of course, while I’m banging around in my mid-range, mid-player accommodation.
Thirty minutes later, my phone vibrates on the bathroom counter while I brush my teeth. I’m replaying the evening on a loop, zooming from Bryce’s hockey expertise to the stories he told and then back to the game. To the passes we made, to the goals we scored.
Bryce:Salut! This is Bryce. The guy that wears your number. :)
I bite down on my toothbrush and swipe the screen on to reply.
Me:Who?
Bryce:Eh, no one. Just a guy who likes to skate around with a puckde temps en temps.
I snort, and end up sucking toothpaste down the wrong pipe. By the time I spit and rinse and finish hacking up a lung, Bryce has texted again.
Bryce:I will reserve a car from my hotel in the morning. What time should I pick you up?
Five a.m. is on the horizon, and I am running on will power alone. If I fall asleep immediately, I can sleep until noon and hopefully not feel like a gargoyle. The game is at eight p.m., with an in-the-dressing-room time of seven p.m.
Me:Does 1 p.m. work?
I pad out to my bed and collapse like a felled tree into the pillows.
