by R J Scott
The game was ours from that moment, and we played with fire. Ben wasn’t there tonight—there was too much to do at the center, and I’d encouraged him to stay away. I wasn’t sure I wanted him to watch my blood lust.
We won by three goals, two of those from a still-grinning Tennant Rowe.
We were tied in the Stanley Cup final—the goddamn Railers were tied. Three games left, and if we could win two of them we could be the fucking champions.
Two more wins was all we needed.
The next game was back in Arizona, and that was the only bastard thing about this final match-up; away games meant a long-ass flight.
But you know what? Ben stayed up for that game and watched us win by a slim margin in our opposing team’s barn. We were flying.
We could win this Cup at home. All we needed was one more game.
Walking into the shelter was like coming home. I had the code for the gate memorized, and didn’t need to buzz for entry, and no one blinked at me standing inside the entrance staring at what was left of the office building.
Ben stalked over to me from the kennel area, paperwork under his arm and his expression unreadable.
“Was this you?” he thumbed over his shoulder at the men huddled in a group talking and pointing at the offices. They all wore hard hats, and there was a lot of pointing. Of course it was me. The day after the fire, I’d asked my agent to source the best builder, the best architect, and I wanted it done now. I’d never asked for anything like that before, never used my money to grease the wheels of city hall, but who could have known the head of the agriculture department was a hockey fan? Spaces in a box for him and his hockey-loving daughter, and he hurried through whatever needed to be done.
But I couldn’t read Ben’s expression, and I wondered if maybe this thing I’d done was so completely wrong it would never be right. I wasn’t entirely sure how to answer the question, and he was up in my face before I thought of the right words.
“What do you mean?” I stood my ground.
“They want to start clearance today. Three weeks and they think the center will be back again.” He didn’t sound excited, or angry; I think if I was going to sum it up, it would be that he was blindsided.
I couldn’t hold it in. He could be pissed if he wanted to, but I was proud of what I’d done for him, and I was proud of the Railers fans who had donated at the game last night and raised over thirty thousand dollars for the shelter. He couldn’t know that yet—I had the final tally in my pocket, along with personal checks from half the team. It was easy enough to get the shelter rebuilt and enhanced. Maybe even hire some more staff at this location and possibly open a second location, one where I could work alongside him after hockey.
The team all knew Ben and loved what he did. What was there not to love?
He cradled my face, and then he smiled, just a little smile, and understanding filled his eyes.
“Thank you," he said.
We kissed, and then hugged, and I knew I’d done the right thing. Now if only I could think more about my life post hockey, a life with Ben, then maybe I’d begin to focus on the percentage that was positive, on the fact Doctor Warner kept telling me the bleed was unlikely to happen again.
After all, who knew how long a man’s life would be? It was what you did with that life that mattered.
Tension was high in the room. Coach had morphed back into Quiet Guy, but he was focused and determined, and he took a stance in the locker room that was implacable.
"They’ll be gunning for Ten. They’re a team as desperate as us.” He didn’t need to say that, we all knew it as a fact, but to hear the words made everything so damn real.
Right here, in front of seventeen thousand Railers fans who’d stuck with this expansion team, we could take home hockey’s biggest prize.
The game started slow. I want to say it was cautious, with us not wanting to make stupid mistakes and them holding back to avoid penalties, but it was more like we were sizing each other up. I’d already gone face to face with Lankinen. We’d exchanged chirps, got up in each other’s spaces, but tonight wasn’t about fighting.
Tonight, Coach needed me to skate the hell out of this and generate chances for our forwards. We had to play right.
The first period was scoreless, and the second had only two minutes left on the clock when the Raptors found a way past Stan. I wasn’t on the ice, part of the next D-pair going over the boards, but even if I had been I wouldn’t have been able to stop the lucky bounce that clipped Adler and went in off Stan’s knee.
Stan turned to his pipes, didn’t react to the goal, but I could imagine what he was doing. Asking for their help, apologizing—who knew exactly.
“It’s okay, boys,” Coach said in the locker room. “It’s one goal.”
One goal was one too many, and we all knew it. Twenty minutes stood between us and winning the cup. We lost this game and we’d have to go back to Arizona.
“Arizona is too hot,” I said in a lull in the conversation. “I’m not going back there.”
Silence, and then one by one the guys agreed.
The last period of twenty started well enough, Ten was all over the fucking ice, and the resulting goal from his fast skates and even quicker hands was beautiful.
Tied. With ten minutes left.
Still tied with three minutes to go.
The Raptors had used their timeout, we still had ours, and Coach called it. I knew why; it wasn’t to discuss strategy, but to give Ten’s line a breather. The kid was on fire. He leaned over to us, huddled around him, and he said one thing he knew would give us the last push.
“Finish this already.”
The clock counted down, and we were so evenly matched that there were limited chances. The Raptors had three shots on goal in one minute, and a rebound, all dealt with by a deadly efficient Stan. We matched them at their end.
One minute. Still tied. Sixty seconds on this game, and there was no way through.
Their star forward was heading for our goal. I was there, skating backward, blocking him, the puck leaving his stick and hitting my thigh as I leaned to block it.
Adler collected the fallen puck on his stick, and sharply passed it to Ten, who crossed it to Larson, and then everything seemed to slow. I could read the play; it was something I’d seen Ten and Addison do before, cycling the puck between them as the seconds counted down.
The first shot was blocked by their goalie, but he couldn’t collect it and instead it was right on Ten’s stick, and the kid went down on one knee, slapping the puck so fast no one had a chance of stopping it.
The lamp lit, the home crowd was on their feet, and we gripped Ten hard.
We were a goal up with twenty-three seconds on the clock.
Now it was our job to keep them shut out to every goal possibility for every heartbeat of those seconds.
When the klaxon sounded to signal the end of the game, we’d won.
The game.
The series.
The goddamn Stanley Cup.
I was a Stanley Cup Champion, and it was everything I’d ever wanted.
But. Up there, with the families, Ben was watching this, and I realized I actually had him as well. Winning the Cup had been the only goal in my life, but now it was Ben who was my everything.
This was my last ever professional hockey game, and what a way to go.
The chaos was loud and manic, and the pile we made with Stan at the bottom was full of laughter and shouts, and then we moved back in a huddle, Stan lifting Ten up and swinging him around. We shook hands with the opposition, who looked exhausted but took the time to congratulate us. That was the thing about hockey. Under it all, most teams respected each other.
Except for Lankinen who cursed at me under his breath and called me names I chose to ignore. Fucker.
We hugged and whooped and only stopped when they rolled out the red carpets for the Cup. Then it all became so serious.
We grouped around Connor, and then he s
kated over after the announcement of the win. He took the Cup, and the look on his face was priceless. They’d said it couldn’t be done, that this expansion team was made up of cast-offs but they’d been wrong. So wrong.
Connor passed it to Ten. We knew he would—the kid was a star, the shining light of the Railers, and a future Hall-of-Famer for sure. I watched my team skate with the Cup individually, and then it was my turn. I took it from Adler, who was grinning manically.
"There you go, old man!” he shouted in my ear.
I took the weight of the Cup; it was heavy, but God, skating my lap of the rink with it, it began to feel as light as a feather. I stopped briefly where I knew Ben was, and gestured with the Cup, hoping he’d see what I did. Then I saw him, right by the ice, and he was grinning and clapping, and there it was.
The Stanley Cup in my hands, the man I loved right there where I could see him, and the arena ringing with cheers.
Life couldn’t get any better.
They let family onto the ice, and that included Ben, and I hugged him, refused to let him go, posing for pictures with the team, then acting up for the cameras recording all this. Adler had started some kind of weird shimmy dance, and I was so up for that, joining him and Ten in a weird dance-off even as Connor joined us and pulled me aside. He’d done the same for everyone, and it was my turn.
"Hell of a game," he shouted over the cacophony of noises around us.
"Hell of a series, Cap," I shouted back.
He clapped me on the back. This was my last game, my last time on the ice like this. The excitement was intense and Ben was right there. I skated toward him, held out a hand, wanting to touch him.
And then everything went black.
Chapter Seventeen
Max
The voice was soft but insistent, calling my name, the light so bright I shoved it away. At least, I thought I did, but I couldn’t feel my hand connecting with anything, and I hurt. Everywhere.
“He’s waking up,” that voice said, and there was relief in the tone. There was nothing but quiet. What had happened to the roar of the crowd, the shouting, the celebration? Where had it gone?
“Hey, Max?”
That was Ben’s voice, and I wanted to say something. What happened? Why am I warm? My head hurts.
None of it happened, and I was tired. I closed my eyes again. A nap would help.
The nap left me feeling sick. At least I thought it was the nap. Someone held my head when I was sick. I heard Ben’s voice, and I focused on him completely.
Ben? I asked, but the words weren’t coming. Ben, I love you. What happened?
The light lessened, the pain in my head with it, and I wasn’t feeling sick. That was the appraisal of my situation when I next opened my eyes.
“Hey,” Ben said to me immediately.
“Wh’appen?” I managed, and this time the words worked.
“You had a bleed,” Ben said, softly and without explanation.
Shit. I couldn’t have. I’d believed in the positives. Why had it gone wrong?
“It wasn’t a major bleed, but Doc Warner was here, and he… It’s too complicated, but you’re okay. You’re going to be okay. The fire, the stress, the game, the hit you got from that D-man, the pressure of the final, the win…the Doctor thinks it was enough to bring this on. It wasn’t a stroke, just a small bleed. You made the papers—collapsing at the final was kinda dramatic.”
I wanted him to stop talking, I could hear the fear in his voice, and I wanted to address that.
“I love you,” I managed to say, my tongue thick, my words a little slurred. He gripped my hand, then he kissed me. I felt his touch, I responded, and I felt his kiss.
I wasn’t broken. I could get back from this.
I was in the hospital for three days, mostly under observation, and after day one I was feeling good enough to get out of there. By day two, I was irritable. Ben gave me news about the shelter, showed me pictures, told me about donations and the puppies moving back and how Stan and Erik had taken two of the labs and a crossbreed no one could tell what it was at all. Apparently, it was so tiny it could sit in Stan’s hand, and had made friends with his cat.
“So much for Stan wanting a guard dog,” Ben finished.
“I want to go home,” I announced, as if I hadn’t been listening to what he said at all.
“Westy said he’s checked in on your apartment—”
“No,” I interrupted, “your place, our home.”
I thought he might cry then, and I squeezed his hand. “I love you.”
He kissed my forehead gently. “And I love you.”
The doctor was blunt and to the point. I’d experienced a small bleed, nothing too dramatic, and he’d shut it down, and that was probably the last of it now. The weakness he’d never been able to pinpoint had exposed itself horribly, and that was the end of things. The positive percentage I had to cling on was higher, apparently. Ben seemed relieved, but at no point in the explanation did he let go of my hand, not once.
I had my moment in the spotlight. Ben kept the paper—Stanley Cup Champion Collapses on Ice at Final—and had links to YouTube videos of the moment I’d collapsed. All I could think was I’d gone to the ice as gracelessly as if I’d been punched out. It was embarrassing.
The third day was going home day, Ben’s aunts fussing, most of the team waiting at the small house.
Right in the middle of the tiny front room sat the thing I’d been fighting for. The Cup.
We took photos, alone, with the team, but the best bit was when they went and I was left with Ben.
Just as it should be.
Epilogue
Ben
I was beginning to think I could relate to all those new parents, the ones who say they wake up and listen to the baby monitor to make sure Junior is breathing. Three weeks after Max collapsed on the ice, I was still doing that. Jolting awake in the middle of the night, heart pounding in my ribcage while some foggy nightmare of me burying Max next to Liam faded away. I’d reach over and lay a hand on his chest or hold my ragged breath until I could hear him breathing. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever get over it. Guess the fear of loss was embedded too deep, like a splinter in my soul that could never be extracted.
Fear and love kept me tight to his side, or as tight as I could be and not be hanging off his back like a monkey. Every time he went off somewhere to do something, I worried until he came back. Thank God, he had the sense not to drive. I was happy to be his taxi. Sometimes I’d tease him about him being Miss Daisy just to get his back up, but I was happy to take him where he needed to be. Which, now that he’d retired, was not much of anywhere in particular.
“Earth to Ben,” Max said, pulling me from myself. I glanced to the right. He was riding with his window down, looking a great deal like Bucky in the back, clean country air blowing in his joyful face as we rode out to see yet another possible new home.
“Lost in the stuff,” I said, and reached for the stereo to turn up Earth, Wind & Fire.
“Bad things stay in the past, remember?”
“Yep.”
That was easier said than done, since we still had to deal with Rolf and all that legality. His trial was several months off, and he was out on bail. There was a restraining order in place to keep me, his family, my aunts, and the shelter safe, but still…
“Okay, so you’re not thinking about dickhead.”
“I am not thinking about dickhead.” I chuckled. “Get back on that app and make sure the realtor sent us the right directions.”
I’d never been this far into Lancaster County. I’d only come out here a couple of times with my aunts to do touristy things like shop and try to catch a peek at the Amish, who have a vibrant community in this county. We’d rolled into some beautiful farmland, and had passed a horse and buggy, which Max had been thrilled to see.
“On it,” my boyfriend said, flipping around on his cell phone as we cruised past green pastures dotted with sheep or dairy cattle.
This was where Max wanted to live. Away from the city. Breathing fresh air and opening a second no-kill shelter. One that we would run together. Every time I thought about our new life out in the farmland, together, I felt sick with nerves and giddy with love.
“Another couple miles on 340 until we come into Intercourse.”
He snickered at the town name, just as he did every time he read it. I loved hearing him laugh, even if it was kind of childish.
“And once we’ve passed Intercourse?”
“We have a cigarette.” He roared at that one. I shook my head and tried to hide my chuckle. “Oh, I amuse myself. Okay, all kidding aside, we jump onto 772. Maybe we’ll get to see a covered bridge out here. They’re all over the place.”
“Maybe.” I followed his directions, my inner-city boy starting to feel a little antsy out among all this farmland and roads with no street signs. “Are you sure you want to be so far out here? There’s nothing but cows and corn.”
“Yeah, it’s perfect, isn’t it? No neighbors, no zoning boards, no traffic or drugs or crime.”
“That’s true.” I also suspected he was trying to get me as far from Rolf’s line of sight as he possibly could. “I guess having a shelter out here would be good.”
“Yep. We can maybe even take in farm animals out here. Goats are cool. Let’s take in some needy goats.”
I pulled up to a stop sign that linked four dirt roads and gave him a look. “Goats. And what do we know about goats?”
“We’ll learn all we need to know on the internet.” He leaned in to kiss me. Bucky wiggled up to slather both of our faces. “See, even Bucky thinks we should do goats. Or a cow. I could milk a cow.”
“I could see you skipping to a barn with your milk pail every morning.”
It was said kiddingly, but I really could see him doing that. I could envision us making this new shelter into something bigger and better. A place for farm animals in need as well as small pets.