Page 15 of Yo Ho Ho
Wait, what?"Excuse me, why are you here for me?"
"Well, you know, the whole newspaper thing." He hand waved to emphasize the newsroom that would be closed up for good in three weeks. "I just thought it would be a nice gesture to offer my services."
"Your services?"
She turned to see Amanda staring at her with wide eyes, the editor silently mouthing a very dramatic "Oh my god," before slowly turning back to her work.
Max looked up at the defenseman, trying to keep a straight face and play along. "And what services would those be?"
Logan swallowed hard, and Max could tell that she had got him — at least a little bit. "Well, um." His voice cracked a bit before he finally was able to compose himself again. "I thought maybe an interview would be nice. You know, anexclusivefeature on the Pirates' star defenseman."
"Oh, so you're offering to have Alex sit down for an interview?"
Amanda laughed from the other side of the cubicle wall, and Max took pleasure in the dramatic eye roll from Logan in response.
"I wasn't talking about Alex," he said with a teasing smile directed to Amanda before turning back to Max. "I was talking about me."
"Ohhhhh!" Max said dramatically. "So what would be the focus of this proposed feature?"
"I'm dashing and handsome and women love me."
"That's true," Amanda said without looking up from her computer screen.
"Is it though?" Max asked. "Besides, I'm not going to write that."
Logan gave her a teasing smile. "I'm open to suggestions."
Max would have to thank whatever hockey gods existed for remembering a press release that had landed in her email earlier that day. She had just taken a passing glance at it this morning while trying to sort through all the condolences from friends and colleagues and a few readers as well. But the press release stuffed in there suddenly took on a new hue. On Saturday morning, some of the Pirates players were going down to a local rink to play hockey with small kids. It would be perfect for a Sunday feature piece. At the very least, the pictures would be adorable. But Max had found over her years of covering athletes in all kinds of sports that if you can get them out of their comfort zone, they would open up in a way that they normally wouldn't in a locker room.
She pulled up the press release on her computer and started scanning it to see if she could find what she was looking for.
"Uh, what are you doing?" Logan asked from his perch on her desk.
"Reading," she said without looking up. There it was! "You're going to Southfield on Saturday for the Kids Can Skate program."
"How did you know that?"
She pointed at the screen. "It says so in the press release," she said, turning to see him looking at her with surprise. "So why don't I get my exclusive interview there? I can get a photographer to come along to get some pictures for the front of the sports section, and then we can sit and talk."
By now, Amanda had looked up and was leaning on her elbows on her desk. "That's actually a great idea."
"Really?" Logan asked.
"Really," she said. "Readers always love seeing players outside of the game, and it's an extra bonus if there are kids and puppies."
"I don't think we're going to have puppies," he said sarcastically.
A thought suddenly crossed Max's mind. "I could bring a puppy. That would make it even more awesome!"
"No!"
She knew it was a bad idea even before it was shot down by Amanda and Logan at the same time. But the look on Logan's face was still worth it. It was kind of like horror, but cute horror, so he was trying to decide exactly how to react.
"Fine," she replied, pretending to be defeated. "But seriously, Saturday morning. Southfield. Small children with little skates on. And then we can do an interview afterward."
Logan smiled, and she could tell he was proud of whatever he thought he accomplished. "Deal. Oh, and can you bring me some cookies from Amanda?"
Amanda looked over with a beaming smile on her face. "No, but you have no idea what that does to a married woman's ego."
