Checked

by Cynthia Kadohata

  I swoop in for the rebound and send a hard pass to Jae-won. The pass isn’t smooth, but he manages to control it. I love Jae-won’s hands! I can feel how into the game he is. Then, suddenly, just like that, he passes on his focus to me, like it’s contagious. Every time I’m in a fight for the puck I come up with it and flick off a decent pass. I challenge every opposing player trying to skate in for a shot. I stop all except one: he scores. Still, somewhere in the back of my mind I know I’m doing good. I’m not thinking, just feeling my way through the game. It’s like a few parts of the playbook are suddenly second nature. And I can see half the ice at a time, sometimes the whole ice. We’re all in sync, like Jae-won’s focus is so huge it can be used by all of us. We win the game 6–1. That one goal is on me, but overall I played a strong game.

  We line up and bump fists with the other team, then head back to the locker room, swaggering triumphantly, totally different people than we were in the locker room before the game.

  Coach tells us we did “a pretty good job,” but he doesn’t want us to get on too big a high, ’cause we have another game tonight. We’re on a pretty big high, anyway. We can’t help it.

  When I leave the locker room, all the parents are waiting. Dad and Mr. Kang are laughing together, Mr. Kang gesturing wildly with his hands whipping through the air. I hurry excitedly up to them and say, “That was so much fun! That was one of my most favorite games ever!”

  “You played great,” Dad says.

  “Everyone play great,” Mr. Kang says. “You skate fast today, Conor. You skate five mile an hour faster today.”

  That’s actually not possible for me to have improved that much, but it makes me feel good anyway.

  “Even Jae-won skate fast today!” Mr. Kang says as Jae-won walks up. In fact, Jae-won scored a hat trick and was basically the beast to end all beasts today.

  Lucas’s whole family is here—they always travel together—and they’re huddled around him like he’s a rock star. He looks kind of embarrassed and pleased at the same time.

  The team is going out for pizza. At the team table we roast the other team. “Did you see that big guy? He couldn’t even skate.” “I can’t believe they’re a Tier I team. They only got twelve shots on goal.” Coach Dusan isn’t sitting with us, but I see him look over unhappily; he always says we have to respect the other team.

  Then everyone goes their separate ways until the game at seven p.m.

  CHAPTER 40

  * * *

  DAD, ME, THE Kangs, and Lucas’s family decide to all go to a movie. We have to see a G film, ’cause that’s all Lucas is allowed. His two brothers are both older than him, but they don’t complain. We end up at a comedy about a spy who goes home for Thanksgiving, and he has to pretend he works as a department store manager. This is probably a goofy thing to say, but Lucas has a really cool laugh. I mean, the movie’s pretty average, but he keeps bursting out laughing like it’s really fun and funny. It kind of makes me feel good to hear him. In fact, Jae-won and I look at each other and smile about it a few times.

  Back at the same rink, there’s a lot of chatter as we get our gear on. All the guys are in a good mood.

  We’re on one of the rink’s other sheets of ice for this game, and the surface is a little rougher, but still acceptable. But during the game, it seems like I’m just floating around. Coach can see I’m having a bad game, and he doesn’t play me as much as usual. At one point, he even leans over me and asks, “Are you okay?” I don’t know what’s happened. It’s like I’ve lost my spirit temporarily. One of my issues is that despite how hard I work, sometimes when I play two games in the same day, I don’t perform well in the second game. That’s a problem, ’cause if we make the finals, we’ll be playing three games on Sunday.

  I tell Coach I’m fine. We win 7–5.

  More than half the team goes to a Denny’s, but since the restaurant’s not expecting so many people at once, it takes us forever to get our food. We order a ton of stuff to eat, and there’s nothing left at the end. All the parents joke with the waiters and waitresses about hungry boys.

  It’s actually good that the food takes so long, ’cause nobody has a chance to get into any trouble at the hotel when we return. Last year at a tournament in Minnesota, we almost got kicked out of a hotel for stealing all the apples in a Halloween display and throwing them off the roof. Now, when we get to the lobby, there’re several kids in hockey jackets getting lectured by a hotel employee.

  Jae-won and I are so bloated we’re worried we won’t be able to sleep. But then when I get to my room, I call Aunt Mo, she tells me Sinbad is doing fantastic, and I collapse. I sleep for thirteen hours. Dad’s doing push-ups in the living room when I get up. He makes me do stretching, and then we’re off to the rink. Next up, a team from Alaska. We can probably lose and still make the finals, but you never know.

  CHAPTER 41

  * * *

  SO WE DO lose our morning game 1–0, but we win our night game 10–0 and come in second in our division with a 3–1 record. We’re animals!! I play fantastic!! At our level, there are twenty teams divided into four divisions. HoneyBaked wins their division undefeated, as does the Alaska team that beat us. Then on Sunday, we’re in the play-offs: quarterfinals at eight o’clock, semifinals at eleven thirty, and championship at three p.m. All the games kind of blur together, but we get lucky and play two 3–1 teams in the quarters and semis. Bad luck for the Alaska team—they get knocked out by HoneyBaked 5–3. We make the finals!

  The whole team’s got this major adrenaline thing going, and nobody even feels tired. Per usual, I aced the first game but played so-so in the second game. I’ve never played three games in a day before, but suddenly I don’t feel tired at all.

  It’s so crazy, ’cause I’m literally right here in my dream. Right here. I look up in the locker room after our second game and see Lucas sitting there half-dressed, not moving, just half smiling and staring into space. Jae-won is talking really quickly, like he does when he’s excited. “So Aidan’s mom went to the HoneyBaked game to scout them—she’s going to tell us what they’re like—they got scored on three times so they’re human—someone pointed out their best goalie to me—he’s not that big—I think I can score on him.”

  I don’t answer, ’cause I’m not sure he would even hear me. He’s more talking to himself.

  The teams have an hour to eat, and like us, HoneyBaked decides to just have pizza at the rink. A couple of them are pretty big, but they’re mostly small to average height. Our team becomes kind of quiet, but their team is loud and happy. At one point, they start chanting, “HoneyBaked, HoneyBaked, HoneyBaked!”

  So Jesus yells out, “Grizzlies on three, one-two-three!”

  “GRIZZLIES!”

  It’s the worst pizza ever, and then we have to stretch and get dressed again.

  In the locker room, Coach has us all sit with our eyes closed and envision winning the game. Envision playing well. Envision us scoring, and scoring again. We keep our eyes closed as he says, “Focus . . . focus . . . ,” like he’s hypnotizing us. I have my palms on my knees, and I’m leaning slightly forward with my head bowed. Then Coach says loudly, “Matt is the goalie. Let’s win this thing!”

  Jae-won, Lucas, and I huddle with our eyes closed, then follow everybody else to the ice. On the bench, I close my eyes again and think Focus . . . focus . . . Then Coach says, “Warm up!”

  I skate onto the ice, feeling like the rink and the other players are somehow not quite real, and I’m the only living thing. I try to shake that out of my head. Usually when I’m on the ice, it all feels so real. I skate around our half of the rink, over and over, as fast as I can. We shoot for a few minutes at Matt. I blast a slap shot past him and figure that’s good luck. The buzzer sounds in what seems like half a minute, though I know it’s longer.

  We huddle. “Let’s win this thing! Who’s gonna win?!” Aidan 1 shouted.

  “GRIZZLIES!”

  I’m still on the first line
, since I played a superstrong morning game. I skate out. I push the rest of the world out of my head and stare at the puck. At this moment, the puck is the most important thing in the entire world. It’s the almighty puck, god of all things.

  The ref tells Jae-won he’s crowding too much and needs to stand back. Jae-won takes a half step back, but then he’s focusing so hard that he moves forward again. The ref gets annoyed and makes him change places with Jesus. That’s bad—Jesus is godly, but he’s not as good as Jae-won at face-offs.

  The ref drops the puck. There’s a short struggle, and HoneyBaked gets the puck and makes three quick, perfect passes to move close to our net. They’ve got a guy who just explodes off his first step. Lucas anticipates a pass and manages to get a piece of the puck.

  Jae-won bats it to me, and I skate off, my feet flying. It’s a three on two. I pass to Jae-won, who passes back to me, and then I pass across the ice to Jesus, who passes to Jae-won. Jae-won scores! We score first!

  We jump into each other’s arms like we just won the Stanley Cup, but then we immediately realize we’re acting like idiots and skate back to the bench. The rest of the period is just bruising hockey. Totally intense defense on both sides, and nobody scores. We’re all fighting for the puck so hard, I can tell everyone’s gonna be battered and sore later.

  To open the second period, Jae-won loses the face-off, but I go right to where I somehow know my guy is going to be, and I bat the puck away. I feel a rush of happiness, but I push emotions out of my mind. My emotions don’t matter. Only the puck matters.

  But it’s too late. I lost focus for a second, and my guy gets around me. I blaze after him, but he’s got a head start and makes a wicked backhand into the net. I immediately skate up and slap Matt’s helmet and say, “Sorry!”

  Back on the bench, I feel like crap, and suddenly I’m kind of tired. I need to close my eyes to find my focus again. HoneyBaked scores again with a series of awesome passes, but then Avery slips the puck through in a crowded struggle in front of the net. 2–2.

  In the huddle before the third period, Coach Dusan says, “We need another. Come on, guys, let’s get that puck in the net.” He looks right at me. “Defense, Conor! They’re getting too many shots!”

  Back on the ice, the ref drops the puck. The other center hits it, but it flies to the boards, where I swoop down on it and immediately pass to Jae-won across the ice. I’m already flying, and then I make a bonehead play. The puck always needs to enter your offensive zone before any of your players, and I skate into the zone before the puck gets there. The ref whistles. “Offside!” he calls out. Truly, truly unbelievable. I haven’t been called offside all season. So the puck moves to our defensive zone.

  I wait to be taken out of the game, but Coach keeps me in. But I hear him laughing that maniac laugh he reserves for when we’re driving him crazy during a game. He bellows, “Wake up, Conor!”

  There’s some back and forth while nobody can control the puck. Then it’s time for a line change, and I skate to the bench and lean forward on the boards.

  Nobody can score.

  Then I’m on the ice again, and I’m moving like something liquid as I skate between the opposing players. None of this is in the playbook—we’re beyond that now. Even though I’m D, Jae-won and I are on a breakaway, passing the puck back and forth as we fly. Near the net I think about shooting, but instead I pass to Jae-won, who passes to Jesus coming out of nowhere. Jesus scores! We hop into each other’s arms, and this time we don’t care if we’re idiots. Jesus has been in a slump this tournament, so it’s especially sweet. But then we get right back into the game. The HoneyBaked goalie swings his stick hard against a post, and it splinters. So we all wait while he changes sticks.

  3–2. There’re only thirty seconds left, and I can already feel the win. Jae-won and Lucas are laughing together. I laugh for no reason but get serious for the face-off, which we lose.

  My guy ends up with the puck near the boards, but I chop my stick hard on the ice around his blade. I feel like an animal. I get the puck and mean to pass to Jae-won. I’m half smiling. Then somehow the puck slips off the end of my stick as Jae-won waits for it across the ice. AHGGGGH! Lucas swoops in and grabs it. He passes toward Jae-won, but it goes off the end of Lucas’s stick and dribbles off to the HoneyBaked center . . . who immediately passes to one of his guys, who’s already sprinting down the ice. He yells out, “Sebastian!” Sebastian catches the pass, flicks it softly into the net as the final buzzer sounds.

  They jump into the air while we stand staring. The tournament doesn’t have overtime. They do shootouts instead for some reason. We’re kind of dazed as the shootout starts right away. Sebastian starts, and scores. Jae-won’s first up for us. I’m clutching my stick so hard it hurts. He skates left slowly, picks up speed, leans hard right. And flips the puck into the post, making a ping. He falls to the ice and just lies there facedown while HoneyBaked celebrates. I skate out to stand next to him, but he won’t get up until the handshake begins.

  Shaking hands after a big loss is one of the hardest things about hockey. But we all man up, then stand there while the medallions are handed out. After that, we watch as HoneyBaked takes the banner and skates around the ice with it. Finally we’re allowed to leave as they’re still celebrating.

  We trudge to our locker room, my skates heavy on my feet. We all sit down next to our bags, but nobody starts getting undressed. I lean forward, elbows on my knees, face in my hands. I don’t feel like crying exactly. As a matter of fact, I can’t even remember the last time I cried. I just can’t believe I lost that puck—and Jae-won was wide open! I try to think about how that happened, but I can’t figure it out. Dad will have to tell me later what I did wrong. Usually I can remember every little detail, but somehow I’m drawing a blank on this. I’m a screwup! If that puck had reached Jae-won, we’d have won the game. That’s on me. Then somebody is crying. I don’t look up; I know it’s Lucas. Finally I look up and see his head hanging down, snot falling to the ground. “It’s on me, Lucas,” I say loudly. “I screwed up.” He keeps crying, and I realize he’s thinking it’s all his fault.

  Coach Dusan comes in holding his clipboard. We look at him, waiting to get yelled at.

  He nods his head at us, then says, “That was some of the best hockey you guys have played all year. I couldn’t be more proud of you. You held your own against one of the best peewee AAA teams in the nation. They’re ranked third in the country. Think about that. And you played them even for three full periods. That game could’ve gone either way. You’re one of the strongest peewee teams I’ve ever coached. And we’re going to go home and get even better, and if you keep playing the way you played today, we’re going deep into the state play-offs. So hold your heads high when you walk out of this locker room.” He pauses, eyes Lucas, who’s still crying. “Great game, Lukie, I mean it, you played amazing. All of you, great game.” Then he walks out.

  It’s not like that makes us feel good exactly, but you can feel the mood has shifted. Third in the nation . . . game could have gone either way . . . deep into the state play-offs. We all get dressed, and it’s hard but we do hold our heads high as we walk out.

  The parents are out there waiting. They don’t applaud the way they do when you win a big game. They all wear exactly the same look. I’ve seen it before. It’s like, Aw, my boy feels bad. Dad puts an arm around me, and as we head out of the rink, he says, “I’m so proud of you. So proud.”

  In the parking lot, I see Jae-won and Mr. Kang walking toward their rental. I don’t shout out, ’cause sometimes after a loss you really don’t feel like socializing. Then, out of total left field, a feeling of anger washes over me, like I’m not going to let this loss get me down. I mean, I still feel like crap, but I also feel like I’m right exactly in the center of where I should be at this moment in my life. I just played freaking HoneyBaked. If they’re number three in the nation, maybe we’re number four. Maybe!

  CHAPTER 42

  *
* *

  WE CHECKED OUT of the hotel when we left for the first game, so we head right to the airport. At first we’re quiet in the car. Then I say, “How did I lose that puck? I thought I had it.”

  “Hit it off the end of your blade instead of the middle.”

  “But how?”

  “It’s just poise. They were an incredibly poised team for a bunch of young kids. You guys will learn. Don’t worry. By the time you’re all bantams, you’ll be making those mistakes less and less. Don’t get me wrong, you’ll always make mistakes, that’s just sports. But less and less. Definitely less and less.”

  But we just played seven games in three days, and I suddenly don’t feel I have the energy to even open my mouth. I let my jaw hang open and stop thinking.

  Once we get into the air, Dad’s tired too. He naps for thirty or forty minutes, and when he wakes up, the first thing he says is, “Now that your tournament’s over, I thought I should tell you something.”

  It’s like he’s been waiting to say this. That sounds bad for some reason! So I kind of don’t want to know what he’s talking about. But I can tell he’s waiting for me to ask, so I do. “What is it, Dad?”

  “I’m going to be changing jobs.”

  “What?” I look into his face to see if he’s kidding. I just think of him as a police officer. It’s what he does; it’s who he is.

  “I’m tired,” he says. “I’m tired of being a cop.”

  “But Dad! You’re a good cop, I know you are. The world needs good cops.”

  “Over the past year, I just realized, this isn’t what I want to do anymore. I’m going to work at my friend’s construction firm. I’m really looking forward to it. He understands that I’ve got to take you to hockey, and we’re going to work around that.”