Page 10 of The Legend Next Door
No players. No lights. No arena.
Just me at home, knotted sheets, panting, sitting upright, and clutching my chest as I try to get air into my lungs.
“Feels like Saturday is good enough,” I concede, mainly because I had a grocery delivery yesterday and I’m absolutely positive we have pancake mix in the pantry, “but only if you understand it’s a treat, not something we’re going to do every day.”
Luca chatters happily as I whip up the batter and heat the pan. He checks that the playdate with Rory and Cam is still on twice and then moves his attention to Jeremiah.
“What time do you think Jelly wakes up, Dad?”
Jeremiah is a man in his mid-to-late twenties who doesn’t have a corporate job or a six-year-old waking him with the birds, so late would be my guess. “No idea, sweetie.”
Luca starts climbing down from the kitchen stool. “I’ll go and give him a yell through the fence. Don’t want him to oversleep.”
“No, no,” I say quickly. “Let’s let him be. Why don’t you come over here and pour the batter for me? See if you can pour it in the shape of a puck.”
“Dad, pucks are round and so are pancakes. You’ll have to think of something way harder if you want to trick me into staying here.”
I chuckle and say, “Got it.”
A short while later, we’ve produced two hockey stick pancakes that look like a pair of socks and my hockey number, which is one. I mean, which was one. Being such a skinny number, it burned on one side and looks more like a spear than a number. At Luca’s request we made a six, and even though the center is filled in, it’s our most passable attempt.
“Why six?” I ask, though I know the answer well.
“’Cause, Dad,” he explains with a hint of exasperation, “I’m six, so my hockey number is six. That’s how it works.”
“Uh-huh, and what happens when you turn seven?”
That stumps him, but he quickly recovers. “I think I’ll keep six. Luca Stirwling, number six.” He nods to himself and gets a faraway look. He drops his chin and lowers his voice into one that’s booming and reminiscent of a sports commentator. “Number six has the puck and he’s flying toward goal. He’s unstoppable. No one can touch him.” He throws his hands in the air and roars. “It’s number six for the win! Another gweat goal by Luca Stirwling.”
I try not to smile at his pronunciation, especially the way he says his last name. Sometimes, he gets it right for certain words, but so far, theRin his last name has eluded him. His speech impediment is something Liz and I talked about getting him therapy for a while back. Truthfully, we both dragged our heels getting it seen to because it’s just so damn cute, and we were pretty sure it was something that would sort itself out in time.
Since she’s been gone, I’ve been holding on to it, silly as that sounds. I know it’s inevitable that he’ll grow and change. I know there’ll come a day when the boy he was when she was with us will be replaced by a version with big hands and feet, a deep voice, and, most likely, an attitude problem. I know I can’t stop it. I know that kind of change isn’t a bad thing either. It’s good and right. Proof that life goes on. It’s just that I want to hold on to the Luca she knew for a little while longer.
“Now, remember,” I say, “you might have to be flexible about your number. You don’t always get to choose.”
“You got to choose number one, didn’t you?”
The blade enters my side through my intercostal muscle and angles up, slicing a path straight to my heart. There’s a blinding flash of pain as I see Liz and the way she looked in the bar that night years ago. We’d known each other for a while by then, but not very long. More than a month, less than two. She’d blown my hair back already. She was fun and unpredictable and something about her made it hard for me to tell up from down when in her presence.
It was hockey season, so of course, I was traveling a lot at the time. I’d see her for a few days and then leave town for a few days. Wash, rinse, repeat. All the coming and going made it hard to know what we were to each other, and it was eating at me. I was nervous as hell to ask her because something about the way she threw her head back when she laughed told me a question like that could make her bolt. I was losing sleep from the not-knowing, so I asked anyway.
“Are we exclusive, Lizzie?”
That’s what I said. I said it exactly like that, only a little more spluttery and a lot less eloquent. The song that was playing ended as I spoke, so my words echoed and sounded a lot louder than I had intended.
She gave me a wry smile. A deadly grin I felt in my knees, and then she took me by the scruff of my collar, pulling me down just enough to make sure I heard her reply clearly.
“You’re the one for me, Stirling,” she said. “The only one.”
When I got signed by the Blackeyes a few months later, I had them assign me number one despite a little kerfuffle over the fact that I’m not a goalie. I was determined. I pushed for it and made them write it into my contract. Liz raised a single brow and one cheek dimpled the first time she saw me wearing my jersey, and that time, I felt it in my chest.
“I know, bud,” I say, ruffling Luca’s hair, “but I’d been playing for a while by the time I got the number I wanted. I’d done my time and proven myself.”
Luca dunks his pancake into the syrup pooling on his plate and shovels it into his mouth. His eyes shift from me to the French doors that overlook the backyard. “Do you think Jelly has a wife?” It’s a radical change in subject that would take me aback if I didn’t know him as well as I do. For him, this is typical.
“I don’t think so.”
“A girlfriend?”
