Page 6 of Mistlefoe
He grunts as he slides onto the ice. “Believe it or not, I was too full to fall asleep. Is that how pregnant women feel?”
“I wouldn’t know.” I snort and watch him as he finds his legs on the ice. He’s the one I got the hockey obsession from. I swear that at his ripe age of seventy-nine-years-old, he’s steadier on ice than on dryland.
“Now, let’s see if you’re still any good, kid.” His stick is an extension of his body and he uses it to skate a wide arch that takes him right to a faceoff circle.
I sigh loudly. “When are you going to stop calling me kid? I’m twenty six.”
“You’ll always be a kid to me.” He bends forward. “Are you going to keep an old man waiting?”
“Fine, you grump.” I grin.
I glide over to face him and drop the puck with little warning. A better grandson would slow down and let him win, except that would piss Gramps off. He smacks the shit out of my stick and one of my legs, trying to get away with the puck. I’m faster and my body moves on muscle memory alone, even though everything on my left is mostly a blur.
Gramps takes off after me. His huffing and puffing follows me as I break away and fire the puck at the empty net so hard that my stick bends in the air.
“Damn, son. You still got it.” He wheezes as he catches up.
“Never lost that, at least.” I lift the corner of my mouth. “I just lost half of one sense, that’s all.”
His bony hand grabs my shoulder tight. “But I still have you, that’s all that matters.”
I groan. “Ah, shit, Gramps. Didn’t we say we wouldn’t get cheesy today?”
He ignores my every word. “I’m thankful that you didn’t hit your head at a different angle three years ago, or there’d be no one to take me to my doctor’s appointments now.”
My face twitches. Too many things roil in my gut to possibly name them. I don’t laugh or cry or scream. Instead, I take off my glasses and rub my eyes. They’re wet and I’mgoing to pretend it’s because of the sheen of sweat covering my skin.
“Is this your way of asking me to drive you somewhere?” I ask, trying for levity because I really can’t take it when he gets sappy.
“Maybe.” He lifts his white, bushy eyebrows. “I may or may not have pissed off my dentist and may or may not need a new one.”
“I have no words for you, old man.” I sweep a puck towards me and pass it over to him.
“What can I say? He disrespected me.” He dangles the puck as if he hadn’t stopped playing hockey way before I was even born. “Not everyone had a great grandparent like you to raise them well.”
I shut my mouth because there’s no point setting him straight. Him getting disrespected is code for he wasn’t told what he wanted to hear. When Gramps gets something in his head, there’s almost nothing in this planet that can pluck it out—and I have a bigger issue to focus on.
Namely, his decision to sell this place.
I already tried the route of convincing him against it with words. And for all of a dork I am, I’m actually pretty damn convincing. It’s why I got a marketing degree. The problem is, that doesn’t work against this stubborn oaf—especially not when he showed me a balance sheet I couldn’t argue against.
However, coming home with a hefty bonus for Christmas will surely convince him otherwise.
I keep the conversation away from that elephant in the room. “We’ve basically burned through every medical practice on the west side of Connecticut. Can we keep it to a radius where I don’t have to take PTO to drive you?”
“I worked so hard to raise you right and this is how you pay me?” He clicks his tongue and shakes his head in an exaggerated way.
I roll my eyes. “When’s your appointment?”
“Monday at noon. That should work with your fancy job, right?”
“Sure,” I say right away, even though it technically doesn’t work. Sierra and I used most of yesterday brainstorming—separately. The idea is that on Monday we’ll have some sort of armistice to pick one idea or mesh them, I don’t know. I’m sure she won’t be happy if I have to cut it short.
Or… on contrary, she’ll be very happy to spend less time with me and this news will totally make her day.
“Great. And treat me to some pie after.”
I cut a glare to him that makes him chuckle. He takes a puck and makes a big show of skating a circle around me and shooting at the goal.
