Rocket Blues

by David Skuy

  How sweet would it be to get Raja on the ice for even one minute, one forecheck? He’d hit him so hard the boards would shake for a month.

  Rocket’s teammates began to file out. He didn’t relish the idea of them seeing his pathetic little-kid shoulder pads. Fiddling around with his skates, he stalled while they cleared out. Hopefully, he’d have new pads by the weekend.

  André was looking for something in his bag, and as each kid left, Rocket’s anxiety level grew. André was dressed. What was he looking for? The last kid left and André got up.

  “I hope you don’t think you joined a bunch of losers,” André said. “We can win. We only need some guys to get a bit more serious and, like Coach Sonia said, we’re going to work on that. She’s a good coach, you’ll see. Played on our National team. Knows more about hockey than anyone I’ve ever met. As for the Blues, we weren’t ready to move up last year. We are now.” André looked so serious and intense; Rocket had to force himself not to laugh.

  “We should get out there,” André said.

  Life was one big pain. Couldn’t he go already? Then inspiration hit. “Is the Zamboni off? It’s a stupid superstition of mine: can’t leave the room until it’s off the ice. Dumb, I know but …”

  “I’ll check it out,” André said, and he turned toward the door.

  Quick as a flash, Rocket stuffed his pads over his head, followed by his sweater to cover them up. He reached for his elbow pads.

  “Is that another superstition?” André said, watching as Rocket put his elbow pads on under his sweater.

  “I know. I’m pathetic. I started putting my elbow pads on like this in house league,” Rocket said to cover up. “Now I think there’ll be a zombie apocalypse if I don’t.”

  “Do it then,” André said. “The season will get real messed if we have to deal with zombies.”

  “Hockey stick is a good weapon with zombies,” Rocket said.

  “I’d go with a baseball bat. That’s assuming zombie skulls are mushy. If they’re hard like ours, then you’d probably want a sword or a gun,” André said with a grin.

  Rocket put on his helmet, snapped up the face mask and grabbed his gloves. “Go Blues,” he said.

  André slapped Rocket’s shin pads. “We do ‘Go Big Blue!’ Intimidates the other team — or, that’s what we tell ourselves.”

  “Works for me,” Rocket said. He took his stick and gave André’s shin pads a tap. “After you.”

  André looked at him. “And you have to be the last guy on the ice?”

  “Sorry.”

  Laughing, André went out first. Rocket could only shake his head. Goodbye Rocket: hello Superstition Kid. All because of that Raja idiot. He hopped onto the ice and took off up the side wall, swaying his shoulders from side to side to loosen up.

  Last place.

  Same players.

  Go Big Blue!

  CHAPTER 17

  The whistle blasted.

  Rocket slammed on the brakes at the blue line, snow spraying, controlling the puck with the tip of his blade. André and Reid continued drifting backward. On his right, Noah curled slowly to a stop. Blake put his stick across his knees and continued gliding forward.

  The whistle blasted again. Coach Sonia skated toward them.

  Rocket was a bit surprised. She could really motor.

  “When the whistle blows, I need you to stop right away,” she yelled.

  This was a different Coach Sonia — a lot less motherly.

  “One player stopped immediately — Bryan!” she said.

  He wished she wouldn’t single him out. She’d already done that during a skating drill. He’d been out in front and she told them all to watch how hard he worked. Last thing he wanted was to be pegged the coach’s pet.

  “You know why Bryan stopped?” the coach said.

  No one answered.

  “Blake, do you know?”

  He shook his head.

  “Noah? André? Reid? Anyone? What about you, Bryan? Why did you stop like that?” she said.

  He had no idea what to say.

  “Let me ask it another way. What would happen in a Huskies practice if the coach blew his whistle and you didn’t stop right away?

  Rocket had to laugh. It meant a whole lot of pain. “The entire team would probably have to do suicides for ten minutes — or, if you were lucky, you’d only have to sit on the bench for a few drills.”

  Rocket suddenly realized he’d said something incredibly stupid. Coach Sonia would make them do suicides — and it would be his fault. Coach Neilson’s suicides had been brutal: sprint to the blue line, drop to their knees, get up and skate to the red line, back to the blue and then all the way to the other end. First five times were fun — the next twenty were brutal. What a great way to meet your teammates at the first practice!

  The coach turned to the rest of the team. “Did you hear that? It’s been drilled into him for years, after countless practices. Whistle: stop! Whistle: stop!” Her face was red and her tone was angry. The other kids drifted closer to listen. “If you don’t immediately stop on the whistle, you won’t be in the right spot to see the problem. Like on that rush — Bryan was going to dump the puck into the right corner, but Noah had slowed down and was too far back. He wouldn’t have beaten Reid to the puck. But I can’t show him that now because Noah skated for another two metres after the whistle.”

  “Sorry,” Noah said.

  “Don’t be sorry,” Coach Sonia snapped. “Do it next time. Because this is an example of what’s wrong with our game. We don’t do things seriously, over and over, until they’re second nature. Things like having two hands on the stick, moving our feet and going hard on the puck — a good player practises these until he doesn’t have to think about them anymore: he just reacts. Then it’s fast, it’s direct, it’s efficient. We’re always a half-second too slow, because we think too much, or because we don’t practise at a high tempo.”

  “We’re very sorry,” Blake joked.

  “Smarten up!” she said. Her eyes looked like they’d pop out of her head. “Jokes and fun are great, but — news flash — this isn’t the time.”

  Blake remained perfectly still.

  Rocket had the impression this was a side of Coach Sonia the team didn’t see often.

  “And the conditioning?” she said.

  There was apparently no stopping her now.

  “Has anyone noticed the slight difference between Bryan’s fitness level and theirs? Who do you think is going to dominate in the third period, or at the end of a long shift? We are absolutely not in good enough shape.” She stopped for a moment, then nodded. “Okay … hissy fit is over. But we definitely need to step it up. I simply cannot lose every game again next season. It’ll kill me.”

  “You won one game,” Rocket said.

  The words had just come out without thinking. He felt like an idiot.

  Everyone began laughing, including Coach Sonia. Rocket didn’t know what to do — so he joined in.

  “You know what, Coach?” André said. “Maybe those suicides aren’t such a bad idea.”

  “Let’s do it,” Noah said.

  Blake laughed. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but okay.” Then, looking at Dominic, he asked, “Hey, Bryan. Did goalies do suicides on the Huskies?”

  “Yeah,” Rocket said. “Why not?”

  Blake let out a huge roar. Dominic stared blankly at Rocket — and then he laughed.

  “I guess I could be fitter, too,” Dominic said.

  “You guess?” Blake said. “You’re like a beach ball.”

  “I’ll beat you down the ice, Mr. Slow Motion,” Dominic said.

  “I like the spirit,” the coach said. “Everyone down at the far end.”

  Twenty minutes later Rocket dragged himself off the ice with his teammates. Sonia had obviously heard of suicides, too — she’d even thrown in a few new variations, including ten push-ups at each blue line. After three rushes, his arms ached. He’d done pretty
well, though, winning virtually every rush.

  “You’re lucky I can’t breathe, André. Otherwise, I’d have to kill you for telling Coach that we need suicides,” Blake said. He flopped onto the dressing room bench and lay down.

  “I did it for you,” André said.

  The rest of the team trudged in and threw themselves down.

  Blake sat back up. “Actually, I think it’s Bryan’s fault.”

  Rocket felt a rush down his spine. They were going to blame him. This happened with the Huskies — they always made life miserable for one kid every year.

  “You have to stop working so hard,” Noah said. “Makes us look like …”

  “Like we’re not working very hard?” Blake said.

  “If it means we don’t lose every game this season, I’m in,” André growled.

  “Hey, I didn’t say I wasn’t going to do it,” Blake said. “I’m just going to complain about it.”

  Dominic came in and fell on the floor. “Kill me now. It’s only a matter of time until I die.”

  “I thought we’d kill André first, but okay. Can you wait for me to get my samurai sword — I like how the blade takes a head off — less splatter,” Blake said.

  “Splatter’s the best part, bro,” Dominic said. “I’d prefer if you took me out with a hammer.”

  Rocket grinned at their banter.

  “No worries,” Blake said to his friend, his face full of compassion. “I’d be happy to smash your head in with a hammer. I’ve got a sledgehammer in the car that could do the trick in one hit.”

  “I’m in,” Dominic said.

  The door opened and a man came in.

  “Is there a Bryan Rockwood here?” he said.

  “Hey, Dad,” Blake said.

  Rocket held his hand up.

  “Your dad’s in the lobby and he wants you to hurry up.”

  Blake’s dad left. Rocket felt the blood rush to his face. He’d been having such a good time listening to Blake and Dominic, he’d forgotten Griffen and Maddy were waiting. He pulled his shoulder pads off with his hockey sweater so nobody would see them, and raced to get dressed.

  “Dads always tell you to hurry up,” Dominic said. “They never tell you why, though.”

  “I just ignore mine. It brings us closer together,” Blake said.

  “He’s not my dad,” Rocket said quickly.

  The boys left him alone, but he noticed Blake and Dominic give each other a look. No time to worry about that. He pulled his sweatshirt on. “Good practice, guys. I’ll see you at the exhibition game,” he said.

  A chorus of “see ya” rang out, plus one “slow down next practice” from Blake, which made him laugh. They were good guys. This dressing room had such a different feel to it. Sure, the Huskies had joked around and talked, but it was always competitive, like you always had to be careful of what you said or someone would burn you, and guys were always bragging about how they “dangled” someone or “roofed it.” These guys — they just had fun.

  Rocket went into the lobby.

  “Get your butt outta there in less than two hours next time, or you’ll walk home,” Griffen snarled.

  “Sorry. I … The coach went over some strategy.”

  “Like a girl’s going to know strategy. Ridiculous team. Can’t believe you bother. You should just quit.” Griffen nodded at the door. “Hurry up, the two of you. Waste of a night.” He muttered something under his breath and stomped off.

  Maddy reached out and took his stick, and they followed Griffen.

  “Would it be so wrong?” she said, motioning at Griffin with the stick.

  She was smiling, as if it were a joke. It didn’t seem that funny to him.

  They pushed through the doors into the parking lot, both lost in their own thoughts.

  CHAPTER 18

  Rocket leaned back in his chair. This was brutal. Three days in a row of eating at his locker and hanging in the library doing homework. He’d never been so up to date on his assignments. The first day hadn’t been too bad, but now it was killing him. To make it worse, looking out the window he could see the guys playing football. No one had told him about it, so no way was he going to show up — not with Kinger dying to burn him, Adam laughing at him and Ty … Well, Ty not doing anything. Rocket would rather eat lunch at his locker for the rest of the year — and grade eight, too — than hang with them.

  Ty and Adam hadn’t really said anything to him after he’d quit the Butt Kickers. He’d run into them a few times, of course. They’d say hi, and he’d asked them some lame question to do with school. But usually they avoided each other. It was less awkward to not talk. It was funny: he used to think he had a ton of friends. Now he wasn’t sure he had any.

  So here he was, holed up in the library. Bored, he put his pencil between his thumb and his first finger and tried to spin it around through his fingers. It went flying across the table and onto the floor.

  “Are you mad at your pencil or practising a self-defence move?”

  Rocket looked over.

  “Hey, Megan. Didn’t see you there.” She was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt again. This time her hair hung down naturally, thick and wavy.

  She opened her eyes wide and nodded. “Okay. I’ll buy that. Your pencil?”

  He smiled sheepishly. “I was trying to spin it on my fingers. Got to work on it, I guess.”

  “You mean like this?” she said. She picked up the pencil, held it between her fingers and began to spin it around and around without stopping.

  “Very cool trick,” he said. “Where’d you learn to do that?”

  “Years of geek training,” she said. “It’s compulsory.”

  “Well, um, it’s a cool trick.”

  She gave the pencil back. “I’ve been looking for you. You missed practice yesterday.”

  “Practice?”

  “You’ve forgotten the trivia team already?”

  He hadn’t forgotten; he just hadn’t bothered to look for them.

  “Come on. We’ve got half an hour,” she said. “We’re finishing up with some geography and then we can get to sports.”

  She said it like he had no choice.

  And it was better than nothing.

  “So Nigel was telling us you’re quite the hockey player,” she said.

  “Don’t know about that. I play.”

  She pushed the door open for him.

  “Thanks.”

  They walked down the hall.

  “I bet the boys would be pretty happy if you played on their floor hockey team,” she said. “They love to play, but the other teams seem to be … better. Bird has a friend who played with them last year, but he’s busy doing the lighting for the school play. They wanted me to play but, frankly, no.”

  She stopped and looked at him. “I mean, do I look like a floor hockey player?”

  She didn’t really look like anything to him — other than a girl, of course. But some of them played floor hockey, too. “I don’t know. Maybe?”

  Megan scrunched her eyebrows. “I maybe look like a floor hockey player?”

  “No,” he said hurriedly. “Maybe I’ll play. Maybe.”

  That was so not going to happen.

  She opened a door.

  “Capital of Mali?” Des asked.

  “Bamako,” Bird said.

  “Capital of Angola?” Des asked.

  “Luanda,” Daniel said.

  “Capital of Zambia?”

  “Lusaka,” Nigel said.

  “Capital of Senegal?”

  “Dakar,” Megan called out.

  Four heads spun around.

  “Oh, okay. It’s Bryan, right?” Bird said.

  “Uh, I was in the library …”

  “My fault,” Megan said. “I forgot to tell Bryan about the practice, so no harm. He’s here now. I rescued him from a flying pencil. He could’ve been killed.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t feel you have to thank me. I was happy to do it.”

  “I owe
you,” Rocket said.

  Nigel’s face was hard and angry. Arms crossed, he glared at Rocket. “Things are organized,” Nigel said. “We don’t need another player.”

  “We could always use the help,” Bird said.

  “We’re allowed six,” Des said. “And we voted.”

  “So what? We’re good with five; we don’t need a one-trick pony on sports. It’s stupid.”

  This was ten times worse than any library. “Okay. No worries,” Rocket said.

  His voice came out sounding sad. He was acting like a loser. Time to man up. “I don’t need to be on the trivia team. I was just killing time.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Megan said. “We’re always on the lookout for new members, and there’s nothing wrong with a little extra expertise on the sports side. It’ll let Nigel focus more on geography.”

  “We shouldn’t be adding people before the first match,” Nigel said.

  “Why not?” Bird said.

  Nigel pushed back in his chair. His eyes burned in fury, but they were also glossy, as if he were on the verge of losing his temper and crying at the same time. “I come here to get away from guys like him, and now he wants to join the trivia team?” He glared at Rocket. “I know what’s going on. Don’t think I don’t. You’re not part of the cool kids anymore, so you’ve decided to lower yourself to our level. That’s totally it. I say no way. Get your own team.” Nigel was shaking with rage, his hands gripping his knees tightly.

  Rocket was stunned. He’d barely said a word to Nigel in his life. “I never did anything to you,” he began. “Why the—”

  “No, not the Rocket!” Nigel cut in. “Not Ty or Ad-man or all the rest. You’re all so nice.” He leaned forward and pointed at Rocket. “My name’s Nigel, not Big Red, and your crew has made my life a nightmare since I got here, so don’t give me the Mr. Wonderful act.”

  Rocket started to get angry, too, but then he thought back to a gym class near the beginning of the year. They’d had to choose sides for a game of soccer, and Nigel was the last kid to be picked. Adam had made a big deal about having to pick him. He’d called him Big Dead, because, as Adam said, Nigel didn’t move on the field. Another time, Nigel had been accepting an award at an assembly, and Adam called him Big Red the Egg Head, and then Eggie. Then last week …