Page 14 of The Longest Shot
But this one… holy fuck.
In the years since I last saw him, he's still larger than life, able to fill every available space with noise and that infuriating grin that says consequences are something that happens to other people. His presence is a hurricane that doesn't care what it destroys, as long as someone laughs at the wreckage. And, if I'm not careful, me and my team will be the china shop to his raging bull.
Three years, and he hasn't changed at all.
The memory tries to surface, so hard I can feel the sand between my toes, but I bite the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste copper. That girl doesn't exist anymore. She was weak, and I cremated her the night she walked away from that boy with her dignity barely intact.
"Morgan… are you OK?" Sarah, one of my freshmen, asks.
She still has innocent eyes, still believes caring about each other is enough to make us matter. She's from Iowa, I remember—corn country, where neighbors still bring casseroles whenyou're sick and high school hockey games pack the stands. Her concern is genuine, which makes it worse, because I don't need that.
What Ireallyneed is soldiers, so I give her a single, sharp nod. It's appreciation for the gesture, dismissal of the sentiment. "I'm good, Sarah," I say.
"Captain," Mills says, stepping forward, five-foot-four of compressed determination and built like she was designed to throw hits in the corners and come up smiling through blood. The scar through her eyebrow gives her a perpetual look of skepticism that I find oddly comforting.
"I see the question in your eyes," I say, keeping my voice controlled. "You want to know why I pulled you off the ice rather than stand up to the bullies."
A few of the girls shift uncomfortably, my words echoing off our bare walls. And, as I look at each of them, I can tell they're all a little uneasy and unsure about what just happened out there. I let it all sink in, because discomfort is good. It means they're thinking.
"Let's sketch out the play." I move to the center of the room. "We get in their faces. Throw some insults back and forth. Maybe someone shoves a guy, knowing they won't shove us back…" I let my voice trail off. "Then they laugh, film it for socials, and make us look like emotional fools."
Jen, ex-Michigan State, crosses her arms. She's got the build of someone who grew up throwing hay bales and fighting brothers. "We can handle ourselves."
"I'm sure you can." I keep my voice clinical, though part of me wants to agree. Part of me wants to see the surprise on James's face when my fist connects with his perfect jaw. "And when campus security shows up, or there's a viral clip, who do you think Art Galloway punishes?"
The name lands hard, because they all know him, the athletic director who scheduled our ice time for 5:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. because "the men need prime practice hours, dear," and who gives me condescending smiles during meetings like I'm playing dress-up.
"His national champions who bring in millions?" I say. "Or the women's program he was forced to create?"
Silence, because the math is simple, brutal, and undeniable.
"We would have lost before we even started," I conclude. "While I don't think Fitzgerald has any deeper motivation other than drawing a laugh out of his buddies, Idothink that reacting has the potential to backfire on us, not them. So I refused to give him that satisfaction or Galloway the ammo."
"So we just take it? Like we don't matter?" asks Rachel, a sophomore defenseman with linebacker shoulders, her voice cracking slightly.
I let out a sharp laugh with no humor, just recognition. "He already thinks that. Getting emotional about it doesn't change facts."
The door opens. Coach Walsh enters, expression carved from ice but eyes burning with the rage of someone who's lived this scene a hundred times. Bri played Division I at Minnesota, went pro in Canada, and would have made the Olympics if her hip hadn't exploded. And it's clear she knows exactly what happened.
Our eyes meet. I see my own exhaustion reflected back. We're both tired of this fight, at Pine Barren and a million other places, but we're the only ones who can teach these girls how to survive it. And, if we're lucky and strong and smart and we work ourassesoff and get some wins, wemightbe able to change it a little.
"Your captain is right," she says, her voice reinforcing mine with authority. "We play their game, we lose."
She moves with that slight hitch in her left stride that only shows when she's angry, but she's dead right. And this is why I wanted to play for her—not just for tactical knowledge, but for this ability to help forge a team—and she's what Galloway ultimately used to convince me to join.
"Out there, they have every advantage," Bri says. "The schedule, the budget, the administration's support. But in here?" She gestures to our concrete walls, one working shower head, the flickering fluorescent that maintenance ignores because it's just the women's locker room. "In here, we have discipline, we have each other, and we have the element of surprise, because they don't think we're capable of being more than an afterthought."
Her gaze finds mine again, and she nods. It's clear her little speech is done, and she's giving me the floor and the permission to be exactly as cold as I need to be. And, in that exact moment, something shifts in my chest, as anger catalyzes into purpose and strategy.
"He wants you emotional, Morgan," she says, her voice dropping so only I can hear it. "This moment is fuel that can burn hot and help you forge a team."
I look at my players. Sarah with her midwestern earnestness. Mills with battle scars and unwavering loyalty. Rachel with barely contained violence from years of being told she's too aggressive for a girl. Twenty women who are here because I sold them a vision.
Time to make it exist.
"Coach is right," I say, my voice dropping colder than the ice we left. "We don't fight children throwing tantrums."
I move to the whiteboard that someone had stolen from the science faculty, complete with rickety wheels and rust on the frame, where our pathetic practice schedule lives. I wipe what's there (5:00 a.m. Monday, 10:00 p.m. Tuesday, whenever-we-can-steal-ice Wednesday), and, in large letters, I write:FUCK EVERYONE ELSE.
