Page 74 of The Legend Next Door
“Yeah.” He sounds surprised by the admission. “I did. I had a really good time. Did you see that kid over there, the one with the blond hair? I showed him how to adjust his grip on his stick, and his form changed completely. It was…like magic.”
We sit in companionable silence for a while and watch the kids play. Some of them are a few years older than Luca, a good head or two taller than he is, but that doesn’t deter him. It doesn’t seem to affect him at all. His little face is pinched with determination, eyes narrowed in concentration, a flash of his mouthpiece showing when he attacks.
“Gosh, he’s good,” I say after watching for a while. “My God, Luca is damn good…Wait, holy shit, is it just me, or is heamazing?”
Beside me, Ben’s chest rumbles.
“No, I mean it.” Now that I’ve seen it, I can’t unsee it. Luca is good. Very, very good. The way he moves isn’t like the other kids. His center of gravity is low. His balance is sure and his talent far exceeds anything I’ve seen today. “He’s the best one!” I cry. “He’s better than all the other kids.”
“No, no,” Ben explains quietly. “We don’t compare children at this age. They’re all learning and having fun. They play at different levels.”
“Bullshit,” I hiss in his ear. “He’s the best kid here by a linear mile.”
It’s true. Luca is skating rings around every other child on the ice. He’s leaving little piles of them in his wake. Crumpled little bundles that crash into each other when they try to get close to him. I don’t even know how many times he’s put the puck in the net, I haven’t been counting, I only know that every adult here is watching him with slack jaws.
I look at Ben in amazement. He’s told me so much about Luca since we met. He’s told me about his food preferences and the soft toy he sleeps with. He’s told me cute things Luca used to say when he started talking and things he does that get on Ben’s nerves. He’s told me that the surprise flowers we planted made Luca sad because they reminded him of Liz, and we’ve talked for hours about the school he’s chosen for Luca and whether it will be a good fit for him. He’s told me so much about him, this seems like a glaring omission.
“Ben,” I say accusingly. “Is Luca a prodigy?”
“Shhh.” Ben starts to giggle, looking around to see if anyone heard me. “I don’t know,” he whispers, butting his shoulder against mine. “I don’t know what the technical measurement of a prodigy is.”
“It’s being the best,” I whisper back. “It’s being the best at something, or being like, ridiculously, unnaturally talented.”
“Oh,” says Ben with a broad grin on his face. “Well, um, yeah. In that case, Luca’s a prodigy.”
I shake my head at him in mock disgust and say, “I’m telling Ness about this the next time I see her. Don’t think I won’t. I’m telling Marcus too, and I’m calling Lissa and telling her as well.”
Ben’s chest rumbles again, a deep, rolling sound. Rainwater moving through river rocks. To my surprise, he drapes a heavy arm around me and pulls me close to him. I sit frozen in total amazement. There are people everywhere. People who know who Ben is. For a second, I wonder if I should warn him or tell him people might talk.
Before I’m able to do it, he levels me with his eyes. There’s a seriousness I haven’t seen there before. A wall. A brick wall. A principle. A deep-seated belief.
He leans in close, mouth no more than a breath from my neck, and says, “Fuck ’em if they don’t like it.”
I can’t tell if I’m hot or cold or if I’m going to laugh or cry. Either way, I’m vibrating with shock and euphoria from being close to Ben, and on top of everything else, Luca’s a prodigy, and I think the endorphins from playing hockey have kicked in and are making me drunk.
My laugh starts as a snort but quickly devolves.
“D’you know what Luca told me the day we met?” I say when I can. Ben shakes his head, still smiling. Still perfect. “The first day, the day you arrived in Seattle. The movers were inside carrying boxes in, and he wandered into the back yard and spotted me at my wheel through the fence. He had a lot of questions for me, as you can imagine. He covered everything from my name to my age to my third-favorite color in a matter of minutes, and when I asked him who he was, he said, ‘I’m Luca Stirling, and someday, I’m going to be a better hockey player than my dad.’”
Ben barks a loud, rough laugh that comes from his core. “Little shit,” he mutters.
On the ice, Luca wins the puck and runs with it. Players drop in his wake. He gets around a much bigger boy with ease, raising his stick and unleashing a backhand that sings on its way to the back of the net. The play is so quick and explosive that several kids look around, bewildered and unsure of what happened or where the puck got to.
“You know what the crazy thing is?” Ben turns to me, eyes soft with pride. “He’s not wrong.”
My mood is beyond buoyant by the time we get in the car. Unfortunately, Luca is showing signs of unraveling.
“A couple of the big kids asked if I could play on their team when the season starts, and I said yes,” he says in a cutting tone.
“Hmm,” says Ben.
“Yup, they said I should be playing in the ten- to twelve-year-old group.”
“Absolutely not.” Ben’s voice is calm but infinitely steady. “That’s not happening.”
“Whyyynot?” I can tell from the way Luca says it that it’s not the first time they’ve had the conversation.
“Because you’re six.”
