Searching for Terry Punchout

by Tyler Hellard

  “Not really. Makes them happy, we get to have a few drinks, so what are ya gonna do?”

  About thirty minutes before the game starts, J.J. Johnstone himself walks into the bar named for him. J.J. was always a large man, but now he’s fantastically fat. He’s wearing a fur coat and a boxy fur hat, which seems like overkill for early November. The only skin you can see is his bulbous pink face, his chins stacked like folded bath towels. He moves like a planet through the crowded bar, dragging a small group of men, Paulie’s dad among them, behind him like moons. J.J. moves a few feet and stops to shake hands, moves a few more feet and does it again. You’d think he was running for public office. If there were a baby, he’d kiss it, dooming the poor thing to a lifetime of nightmares involving sweaty pink furry balloon monsters. When he reaches the windows overlooking the rink, a group of people clear out, leaving seats for him and his cronies. Someone comes along and takes his coat. The whole thing feels like a bad imitation of The Godfather.

  Mac and Shitty come back to the table and sit, looking tired from their social travels. Mac takes a long pull from his beer and immediately refills it. Shitty takes a half-full pitcher and drinks straight from it. I notice Dave has made his way to over to J.J.’s mafia circle, smiling and chatting with a stiff posture that doesn’t quite suit him.

  “Jesus, what’s that about?” I ask.

  “Oh, those guys love Dave,” says Paulie. “He’s as good at telling stories as any of them.”

  “Kid’s gotta earn that walking-around money,” says Shitty. Paulie snorts, but Mac gives them both a stern look and they quiet down.

  “They give him money?” Shit, maybe they really are like the mafia.

  Paulie tilts his head back and forth. “Not a lot. J.J. and Dad and those guys are sort of like boosters. They take care of the players.”

  Shitty laughs, “Yeah, boosters. They’ve been boosting Arsehole’s wallet since he was seventeen.”

  “It’s none of our business,” says Mac.

  Shitty puts his hands up and opens his mouth mockingly, but doesn’t actually say anything.

  “I gotta piss,” says Mac, putting his beer down and moving away.

  Mac was the only other one of us who played for the Royals. He was too big not to put on the team and was a pretty good defenceman. Growing up, Mac was always Dave’s protection. Whenever someone had the nerve to take a poke, Mac would be there instantly, imposing his will, as well as his giant right fist. It wasn’t any different off the ice. One weekend there was a party at Beth Gillis’s house and three guys from New Glasgow showed up looking for Davey Arsehole for reasons involving one of their girlfriends. They found Mac first. He broke a guy’s nose and escorted him out by his hair, the two buddies following behind quietly after deciding whoever’s honour they were defending wasn’t worth it. Dave never even saw them before Mac had them on their way home.

  “Did Dave ever try to leave town to play?” I ask. “Major Junior or university hockey?” Dave was talented and, much as I might not like the guy, watching him suck up to J.J. for a handout bothers me. Shouldn’t he have done more? Dave was a dick, sure, but he was also a good hockey player.

  “Yeah. He went to some place in Quebec,” says Shitty. “Got cut after a couple weeks.”

  “He really wasn’t good enough?”

  “I don’t know, he probably was. But he don’t want to be just another player in some fuckhole town when he could be the best player in this fuckhole town,” Shitty says, evoking a strong sense of Pennington pride.

  “He went to St. Thomas, too,” Paulie adds. “When he was too old for junior. They even gave him a scholarship or whatever. He came home just before Christmas and didn’t go back.”

  “You mean he couldn’t go back,” says Shitty.

  “Why not?” I ask.

  “Well, word was he got tossed for beating the shit out of some kid. He never said nothing about it. Just came home like it was no big deal.”

  “You know what he’s like,” says Paulie.

  “I don’t think I do,” I say.

  “Oh, right. Yeah, I don’t suppose you do. Trust me—it was totally a Davey thing to do.”

  “Classic Arsehole,” says Shitty.

  •

  When we were kids, the Royals were everything. We idolized them. I kept whole sets of signatures from Royals players from the mid-eighties into the early nineties. Perspective is weird, though. Back then, as I sat in these same seats near the visiting team’s blue line, these players looked like men. Now, sitting here huddled between Paulie and Shitty in a stadium crowded with screaming Pennington locals, they look like the children they are. When did I get so old?

  All these kids are between seventeen and twenty and have spent their lives as less than gods, sure, but certainly more than just boys. Or at least more than the boy I got to be. Not that I’m bitter. My high school years were as formative as anyone’s, but I look back at that time as a hard-fought victory. I overcame high school. A lot of these kids will grow up and look back at this as the best time of their lives.

  Maybe that’s how people get stuck in places like Pennington. They peak early and never learn how to try harder or aim higher or do whatever it is that makes the rest of us want to get the fuck out. In small towns, there are two kinds of people: those who can’t wait to leave and those who can’t imagine being anywhere else. I’ve never done the math, but I bet a lot of that second group is made up of good hockey players. And then they get older and are forced to take sweaty wads of money from fat guys in fur hats just because it’s there for them to take. It’s sad and vulgar and makes me wonder if my lack of athletic ability may have been a blessing.

  The game is fun. People cheer and boo in response to what’s happening on the ice. Shitty passes me a flask and I pour rum into my paper cup, stirring it into the Coke and ice with a straw. The kids play hard. I’ve watched a lot of hockey across the country, but there’s something different about East Coast hockey. It seems more violent. Watching boys slam into each other, swing sticks, and throw punches is barbaric. Everyone here should be ashamed to be spending fifteen dollars for a ticket. I hate that I’m enjoying myself.

  When the period ends, the Royals are up 2–1 and I want more of those soggy fries. In the canteen, I bump into Jennifer when I turn from adding ketchup to my gravy-soaked plate.

  “Hey you,” she says, holding a hot chocolate between dark mittens.

  “Oh, hi.” Last night I’d been so stunned to see her, I got a bit shy. Between that and Paulie and Shitty refusing to shut up and leave us for a bit, Jennifer and I didn’t get much further than basic pleasantries before she had to go.

  “Gone for years, then two days in a row. It’s really all or nothing with you,” she says.

  “Yeah. I like to wear out my welcome, then disappear long enough for people to forget why they don’t like me.” Having seen this woman naked years ago, it’s impossible for me not to picture her that way now. I wish I were more mature than that, but I’m also not convinced anyone really is.

  “Oh, I’m pretty sure I remember why I don’t like you,” she says, and I can feel my cheeks flush. “You dumped me. A girl doesn’t forget something like that.” She’s obviously teasing, and I wonder if this is flirting.

  “Yeah, well, I was young and stupid. Don’t hold it against me.” Before she can say anything else, there is a small person—a boy about eight or ten years old—pulling at her sleeve.

  “Mom, can I have money for the fifty-fifty?” the boy says.

  Mom? Of course, she has a child. It’s the direct result of being pregnant. I’d just never thought it through before. Choices, consequences, harsh realities, and all that.

  “Yes, sweetie. But if you win, we split the money,” she says, handing the kid a five.

  “Who are you?” the boy asks with that directness only kids have.

  “I’m Adam. I used to know your mother,�
� I say, pausing a little too long after “your” and using a little too much inflection on “mother.”

  He doesn’t say another word, takes his five bucks, and rushes off into the crowd, ducking under elbows and between legs.

  “So,” I say, “that’s him, I guess.”

  “Yeah, that’s him. Elvis.”

  “You named your kid Elvis?” I laugh, and then try to cover it with a fake cough. Ugh. I’m such an ass. But Elvis? Really?

  “Yeah. Phil picked it, and I was burned out from the whole delivering-a-baby thing,” she says. “It grows on you.”

  I forgot Phil was even a thing. “How is Phil?”

  “Well,” she says, shrugging, “he’s good, I think. He’s been gone for a while. Out west.”

  “Not Father of the Year. Got it.”

  “No, not Father of the Year,” she says, and looks down at the floor. This isn’t a subject she wants to pursue in a crowded canteen over hot chocolate and bad french fries. Or, probably, at all.

  “Look,” I say, “we should catch up. For real. How about, like, a date? Or not a date, just, you know, two old friends, a couple drinks?”

  “I don’t know. I’d have to find a sitter. How long are you in town for?”

  “Not long. A few days. I’m just here doing…a thing.”

  “Sounds mysterious.”

  “It’s not. It’s nothing.” I’ve been trying to impress everyone with my Sports Illustrated bit, and now I am downplaying it to an attractive woman—exactly the sort of person I should want to impress—but I don’t want to set expectations too high, here. It runs the risk of making me too disappointing later. If there is a later. I realize that means I care about how this date turns out, which is suddenly terrifying. “How about I buy you dinner and tell you all about it? Tonight, tomorrow, whenever. Or I can come to your place, if you can’t get a babysitter.”

  “That’s very nice of you to let me cook you dinner.”

  “Oh. No, I didn’t mean that. I’ll bring pizza?”

  “How about we go out for pizza and I’ll figure out the sitter.”

  “Perfect.” And just like that I have a date, but not a date, with Jennifer Clark.

  •

  My last year with the Marlies wasn’t so special. A bunch of the older players moved on, so there were a lot of new faces. Made for a long season of losing. By the time it was over, I was ready to go home and be with Vivian and get on with my life. Like I said, I didn’t think there would be any more hockey for me after juniors, and if it weren’t for Joe Hayes, that would have been the case. Joe was an assistant coach with the Marlies the whole time I was there and he always liked me. He was one of those coaches who thought hockey needed to be tough and his guys needed to grind and get their hands dirty. So Joe ends up getting a job as an assistant with the Leafs. Day before I hopped the train back home, he comes by and says he wants me in the Leafs camp—a walk-on, no promises, but he’d make sure I got a fair shake. I didn’t have a lot of choices. It was either that or go home and maybe play some old-fart hockey. I owe Joe for more than just the chance to try out, because it was him who pulled me aside the first day of camp and told me to put a beating on Duck Wilkins the first chance I got. He looked me straight and said, “You hammer Duck and you might have a shot of hanging around.” See, Duck was the tough for the Leafs, had been for years, but Joe thought he was past useful. I could see no reason not to listen to Joe, so first scrimmage I got hold of Duck and said, “Let’s go, old man.” He laughed, sure, but he obliged, and I made a real mess of him. That was all Joe needed to convince the people who needed convincing, and before the season started, Duck got shipped to St. Louis. Just like that, I was a goddamned Maple Leaf. I called Viv and Mum to tell them. Sure wish I could have seen the look on Dad’s face when Mum passed on the news.

  …

  I dunno. Dad and I never talked about it. I never really went home again, ’cept the odd short visit, and most of those were so I could see Viv. Dad’s heart gave out a few years later and Mum sold the farm. You know, it ain’t even a farm now, they covered the land with a subdivision in the eighties. They even filled in the pond I learned to skate on. Wouldn’t recognize it now if I was standing on top of it.

  …

  On the Leafs, I was just a pup. I went from being one of the older guys on the Marlies and back to bein’ a know-nothin’ rookie. I made friends with Pistol Pete Mackie because he was the only other rookie in the room with me. We got a place together near downtown, walking distance from the Gardens. Pistol liked to hit the town and he dragged me out with him most nights. He’d find the dingiest spots, I swear, smoky holes most people didn’t bother with where he could drink gin and listen to jazz music. I didn’t much like the music and I don’t think Pistol did neither, but he was a big fan of the sort of girls you could meet in places like that. They weren’t my type, mind you, and I had Viv back at home, anyways, but Pistol liked those city girls—cosmopolitan or whatever—and I had nothing better to do than follow him around most nights. We’d probably not be given the time of day in those places, ’cept Pistol liked to let everyone know we was with the Leafs, and that’d get us some attention.

  …

  Nah, it was just a small apartment, one room with two beds in it about four feet apart. It’s funny, it ain’t all that different than my place now, ’cept there was two of us in it. On the nights he’d get a girl to come home with him, I’d go for a walk or sit in the hall and write letters to Viv.

  …

  It was near the end of that first year with the Leafs—and it was a good year where I got to make myself home on the team and prove I belonged. I also realized I wasn’t likely to be going home much anymore. I wanted Vivian with me, but the thought of getting down on one knee and all that, well, it’s just not something I could really see myself doing. So I wrote her a letter just like I done a hundred times: “I’m good, how’re you, this is what I ate when we went to play in Detroit” sort of stuff, and I tucked it in at the end: “P.S. Was thinking maybe you’d like to get married to me this summer.” I thought I was being cute with her, but she topped me a hundred times over writing back only, “Dear Terry, Yes. Can’t wait. Love, Vivian.” Wish I’d kept that letter. Damnedest thing anyone ever sent to me. We got married the next summer back here in town. I’d have just as soon gone to the courthouse and do it, but your mother wanted the whole kit and caboodle, and I wasn’t about to say no to her. It was worth it. I’m not romantic about much, but it’s hard not to be a little sappy about your own wedding day. Have you ever seen the pictures? She was sure beautiful, your mum.

  …

  So, anyways, we got married and she came to Toronto. We got a small place together and it was a bit of an adjustment for her. By the time she came, I’d been in the city for a few years, but I wasn’t much of a tour guide. The other fellas’ wives looked out for her, though, and I think that helped. I was busy those early years, we were on the road a lot, and I had a lot of learning to do. Seems silly to have to say out loud, but the guys in the NHL are pretty good at hockey, certainly better than the kids in juniors. I found my place, but I had to work hard to keep it and I had to get better as a player.

  …

  It’s true they weren’t really looking at me to be scoring many goals. I’m sure people’d be happy to call me a goon or whatever, but I was never bothered by it. I was a Maple Leaf same as the rest and I helped win games in all the ways I could. I didn’t put many in the net, but I did my bit. You know, I’ve always had a theory about what makes the good players good, you wanna know what it is? Peripheral vision. You know, like seeing out the sides of your eyes?

  …

  Exactly. I watched the best guys play the game: Johnny Bucyk and Gil Perreault and the Espositos. I played with Sittler and Lanny and later on those kids in New York. I skated with Dionne and against all those Canadiens teams in the seventies—Christ, they were good. Hell, I was still
around when Gretzky first started in the league. I seen ’em all, and you know what they could all do? See out of the backs of their goddamned heads, and that’s because they had good peripheral vision. They didn’t have to be looking at stuff to see it.

  …

  No, my eyes don’t work for shit. I can see well enough what’s right in front of my face, but that’s about it. But I had balance, hoo boy, nobody could knock me over. Even now I’d put my balance up against anybody’s.

  …

  Well, I’m telling you again. Balance is what got me to the NHL. That and I could take a punch like no one else. Anyways, I was a Leaf and your mum was there with me and we got comfortable—we made a life and I think it was a pretty good one. The team was shaky, though. Imlach was the coach when I got there, but people were tired of him and he got canned. There was some fighting between some of the owners, though I never paid it any attention. I still wasn’t comfortable with my place, you know? Always felt like someone would find me out for a fraud and send me packing, so I just kept my head down and did what I was told. We missed the playoffs a bunch, and the years we got in, we were shellacked and sent home early. You ever notice how a Leafs fan is a bit of a sad sack? Like they’re born that way, the feeling of being ready to lose is just a part of them. I think that comes from those years I was playing there. We kept losing and up the road the Habs kept winning. It got inside the fans, I think, and they passed it on to their kids. Made ’em all a bit deranged, if you ask me. They think it’s fate or something completely separate from anything we did on the ice. It isn’t normal to expect to lose the way people expect the Leafs to lose.

  …

  Oh, it bugged the hell out of me—all of us—all that losing. But it’s not like we weren’t trying. All you can do is play your hardest, let the chips fall, or some other horseshit.

  …

  I’m making it sound bad, but it was really just those first few years. We were losing on the ice and there was the stuff with your mother, but you don’t want to hear about none of that.