Page 2 of Gravity
But Valery snatches the puck as if Etienne passed it directly to him, not like he just tried a world-class fake that half our team fell for and would have beaten most goalies in the league.
Cheers and sticks rise as we hoot and holler, giving Valery and Etienne equal measures of shit and applause. It was a great fake on Etienne's part, but Valery is simply greater in goal.
Alors, instead of Etienne kickstarting us today, it is Valery. We skate to the goal and slap our sticks against Valery's leg pads and his goal posts. It's a salute to him, and he weathers the accolades with a goalie's stoicism. Eyes wide, chin forward, shoulders spread, stick at the ready. Always ready.
We rush through practice, too fast for finesse and too hyper for discipline. Skating routes and puck handling drills turn into chases and keep-away until Coach gets tired of our antics and shouts us into a scrimmage. Then we bang the puck around carelessly and sprint the length of the rink on wild pursuits. We come in hot, snowing each other's skates and hacking at each other's sticks to steal the puck, then skate away with triumphant heckles. A wild shot, a pursuit, and the cycle begins again. Our voices fill the arena—squawks of outrage, shit talking and full-throatedyour mamajokes echoing across the ice.
When Coach blows the whistle to bring practice to an end, most of the guys head right off the ice. The laughs and the teasing continues, and the cacophony of the team stampedes from the rink and down the tunnel, toward the dressing room. I stay on, gliding in a lazy circle beneath the arena spotlights. My stick is loose in my hands, heavy where it lays across my burning thighs. Sweat soaks the inside of my pads, running down the valley of my spine and between my pecs.
I gaze up into the lights until those dark spots return and the world bubbles into purple and black holes. Fear gallops in so suddenly it makes my lungs stutter, and my eyes squeeze shut as I come to a sudden stop. Hands clenched, thighs and muscles now like boulders, my spine so taut it's humming.
This is our moment, but black holes are opening all around me. Parts and pieces of my world are fragmenting. I'm having thoughts I shouldn't have. Thinking things, late at night, that could changeeverything.
Non,pas maintenant. Not now, when the stars are aligning and this team is on the verge of destiny. Not now, when a distraction is the last thing any of us need. Not now. Maybe not ever, but definitely notnow.
I have given every shred of my existence to these men. I have skated through the agony, the torn muscles, the full-body bruises, the blood-red urine. I've helped MacKenzie and Etienne and Slava wipe away their tears and their puke and get back on their skates.
Everything we've worked for our entire lives has built up to this season.
Tabernak, not now.
Finally, when my heart rate comes back down from the rafters, I skate off and head down the tunnel. The dressing room is a disaster. Sweaters, shoulder pads, elbow pads, shin guards, knee pads, undershirts, socks, and skates lay in heaps, tossed carelessly to the ground. Half the team is through with their showers, and the other half just won't bother to shower. The funk is eye-watering. The energy is electrifying.
Everyone cheers when I walk in, and a wad of used tape bounces off my ass, thrown from over where Slava and MacKenzie sit.I collapse on the bench and smile at everyone. I get smiles back, and my heart lurches.
Non, not now. Not now,calisse, not now. Not with this in our hands.
Undressing is slow, especially since MacKenzie comes to sit by me to chatter while I strip off my gear. I'm neater than the others, and I hang my shoulder pads on the hooks behind me, lay out my shin guards and my knee pads to dry, and tuck my skates beneath the bench, all while nodding along at MacKenzie. Sweaty clothes into the laundry bin for the trainers to clean. Shorts pulled on over my compression leggings. I keep my t-shirt off for a while to let the chill sink into my overheated muscles.
“Calisse, stop showing off,” MacKenzie rumbles. He slaps his stomach. No six pack there, but MacKenzie is all strength and power. He'll slam you into the boards and not feel a thing, while you're left to pick your teeth out of the splinters in the hole you left behind.
I'm fast. It's why I am dominant and what I'm known for. ESPN says it’s like I teleport around the ice. Like I float over the surface, there and then not. I'm too fast for anyone to keep up with, even my teammates.
Fastmeans always honing that edge. Constant workouts, an abundance of fast-twitch muscles, and a high metabolism has granted me the figure of an Olympian etched in bronze. My abs are slabs of marble, my legs blocks of granite. I posed forMen's Healthonce, in a spread that ended upcomplètement scandaleux. One practice, my teammates pinned that picture of me from that article exposing my abs to the backs of their sweaters, and I spent the entire time trying to chase them down and tear it off.
MacKenzie gets some wolf whistles and more tape thrown his way when he stands, rubbing his pushed-out belly like he's posing. With the attention finally off of me, I slip into my t-shirt and slide on my sandals.
I don't want to leave. Not yet.
The All-Star Weekend is upon us, and that means a five-day break without a game for a majority of the league. During this mid-season break, the best of the NHL's players are sent to Las Vegas to show off their skills and play in a for-fun-only Eastern-versus-Western Conference championship. I’ve been selected as an All-Star for the fourth year in a row, and tomorrow morning, I'll wake up in Vegas.
Alone. Without my team, without my coach, without my life holding me down.
Uneasiness pricks at the underside of my skin. I don't want to leave this team. Or this day. I don't want to face my fears or these questions that keep piling up on the other side of those black holes I'm ignoring. I don't want a long flight without MacKenzie's bullshit, or Slava's snoring, or Janne's commentary on the state of the world.
Slowly, the dressing room empties. It's mid-afternoon, and half the guys are going to grab a late lunch. Everyone is invited, but there are wives and girlfriends waiting for some, kids for others. This is the start of a long weekend for everyone but me, and they all have plans.
Valery finally enters. He's usually the last off the ice. Like me, he prefers his quiet and his space. I am the boy from upriver who wanted nothing more than to skate with my puck for hours alone,perdu dans mes rêveries. Now, I have learned to share parts of myself. I like to be there in the quiet ways, with a shoulder to lean on or a hand to help you off the ice. MacKenzie takes a different approach. He's the bold and brash friend, as loud as can be to show you he loves you.
Valery nods. I nod back. He sits at the far end of the opposite bench and starts methodically removing his gear. He always does it in the same order, the same way. I watch for a moment until I realize where my eyes are lingering, and the discomfort makes me turn my gaze upward.
There are no lockers in this room, and there never have been. It's a simple space: we share two benches on opposite walls, and we hang our gear on hooks mounted behind us. There's a cubby above for our wallets, keys, and cell phones, and each one bears a small plaque with our name and sweater number. Those plaques can be ripped off with one hand, though. Nothing is permanent here.
Overhead are photos of past Étoiles royalty—Hall of Famers, Stanley Cup champions, and some of the greatest players of all time. They sat like us, suited up like us, shoulder to shoulder without pageantry. And beneath all those photos of all those great Montréal Étoiles who came before us, isle difference. No other team in the league has what we have on their dressing room walls. Two sentences, in French and English, painted in red for over seventy years:
“To you from failing hands we throw the torch be yours to hold it high!”
“Nos bras meurtris vous tendent le flambeau a vous toujours de le porter bien haut!”
