Page 34 of The Fall
“I’m proud of all of you.”
I’ll follow him anywhere, into the unknown, into the depths of my own soul.
He looks away, and I can breathe again. Oxygen rushes back into my lungs.
“Let’s run the table.”
The cabin erupts, a single roar that fills me. The sound burns away the questions and the guilt, leaving only a clear and total purpose: I will not fail him.
How could I ever tell him? How could I ever confess that my memory is a ruin and I can’t be the man he needs right now, when the team is right here, at the edge of greatness and glory? I look at Hayes, at Hollow, at all of them; hope shines in everyone’s eyes.
I cannot be the one to extinguish it.
Eight
The chillof the Philadelphia practice rink smells of scoured ice and damp rubber. The air is thin in my lungs, and my body feels foreign inside the familiar armor of my pads.
The team is a loose knot of jerseys and helmets at center ice, their chatter a rumble of inside jokes and confidence. I hear Divot’s laugh and the low rumble of Simmer talking to Hollow, but the sounds seem to travel through water to reach me.
Can I still do this? Can I be the player they need me to be?
Blair catches my eye, and the corner of his mouth lifts.
“Let’s move, let’s go!” Coach’s voice booms over the ice, and the knot of guys unravels.
We fall into laps around the rink. The rhythmic scrape of thirty blades on ice is a cadence I know by heart in my muscles. I follow Hollow and Hawks, letting their pace pull me along. A burn starts in my lungs, a scream in my thighs with every push, but it is a clean, sharp pain, a good pain.
Blair materializes at my side, his stride impossibly smooth. I dig my blades deeper, matching him, pushing into that place where the body works, where thought recedes.
“Pick up the pace!” Coach barks. “Hawks, keep your stick on the ice!”
We shift to tight turns and sharp bursts of speed. My lungs are burning and my legs are screaming, but it’s glorious. It’s the fire of coming home. Blair is beside me, stride for stride, and we’re flying.
“All right, boys, let’s get a good skate in! You know the drill!”
I hope I do.
Pucks begin to fly, sharp cracks against sticks and boards. My own movements are a surprise; each stride, each shot, each pass is a memory that exists in my sinews and joints. I take a pass on my backhand, pull it close. A slight feint, a push of the puck through a defender’s skates, a quick snap of my wrists, and the twine bends at the back of the net.
We break into offensive drills, forwards up, defensemen back. I line up on the blue line, and across from me is Blair, facing off against Hayes. Hayes is shit-talking a mile a minute, promising us that we won’t get through him, we will never score, we’re going to embarrass our families and our future children.
“Show us something sweet, Kicks! Shut this mother up!” Hawks shouts.
Our eyes meet. A wave of certainty passes between us. The wide expanse of ice shrinks, becomes a channel between us.
“Go!” Coach calls.
He doesn’t look away as we take off. The puck is a whisper of rubber on ice when he passes it, a solidthwackwhen I receive it, the impact humming up the shaft of my stick into my arms. His return is flawless. Every pass is a perfectly weighted sentence in a conversation only we are having. We exist in our own pocket of time, a closed circuit of purpose.
The minute shift in his grip, the way his fingers tighten around the stick, tells me everything. He wants to push the pace. I welcome it, crave it.
He weaves, picks apart Hayes, leaves him scrambling to catch up, and then dekes Mikko. He angles his stick—one quickshift of his wrist—and the lane is there. I’m already moving, my skates digging, kicking up a spray of ice. I pivot, feel the torque in my core. The puck hits my stick, settling perfectly into the curve of my blade.
“Shoot it, Kicks!” Coach bellows.
I’m not playing for Coach. I’m playing for the look in Blair’s eyes.
I don’t watch my shot dance over Hayes’s diving attempt at a save or find the millimeters between Axel’s shoulder and the crossbar. I don’t watch the net bend or turn to celebrate with the rest of my practice team. My eyes are locked on Blair.
