Page 51 of Puck Shots
“You don’t owe them the version of you they have in their minds, only the version of you that you can live with.”
“Did you just come up with that?”
“Yeah, why. Too much?”
“No. It was perfect. I guess I’m just worried I’ll lose everything I’ve worked for if I don’t make it.”
“How do you feel when you are on the ice?” I ask.
“Like… I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Try, take me through it. Close your eyes and imagine you’re stepping out onto the ice in a completely empty rink. It’s just you. What do you do first?”
“I breathe in the cool air, and it fills my lungs.”
“Keep going.”
“I step out onto the ice. It’s smooth as glass, a clean sheet, and my blades cut through like butter. The cool air zooms past, spreading its calm over my whole body. My feet are so light. It’s like I’m flying.”
“Are you happy?”
“I’m so happy. My smile is wide as I skid to a stop, throwing up a wall of snow. It’s perfect.”
“So you’re just skating, not playing.”
“You said there was no one here.” He laughs.
“Okay, well, if you have a choice, what do you see? Are you seeing you in the middle of a game or are you alone, free skating?”
“If I’m being honest, I’m back home on the small rink by my parents’ house. It’s where I went with Dad every weekend since I could walk. The others hated the cold. But I loved it out there. I’d stay on the ice until they kicked me off for figure skating lessons, and then I convinced Dad to let me do that, too, just so I could get more time out there.”
“You did figure skating?”
“Yeah, umm, maybe don’t tell anyone that. I know it’s pretty common for hockey players, but still, I’d prefer people not to go looking for the photos from the Christmas recital.”
“There was a recital?”
“Please?”
“Fine. Your secrets are safe with me.”
“I know,” he says, hugging me tighter.
“So you picture skating on the rink back home. That’s your happy place?”
“What? Like Happy Gilmore?”
“Pretty sure the concept of a happy place was a thing before the nineties.”
“Doubt it. But yeah, I guess you could call it that.”
“And I don’t know much, I mean I looked up a few things, but if you don’t get drafted this year, you can still get signed to a contract as a free agent, right?”
“You looked a few things up?” he asks, leaning back and tilting his head to look down at me.
“I didn’t want to look so hopelessly lost in conversations with your friends.”
He chuckles and kisses my forehead.
