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“It was just a bad game,” I lied.
“The kids are already whispering about your good luck charm.” Robbie let go, but I didn’t make a move to leave our secluded corner. “Look,” he said, “I don’t know the full story between you two, how you went from nothing, to something, to married,” he holds up his hand “and honestly I don’t want to know. It’s your business, not mine.”
“So back off.” I tried to push around him, but he held me firm. I have a few inches on Robbie, but I can’t match his muscle. It’s a wonder he was never pushed into playing defense.
“You’re making it my business, stinking up the ice.” He glowers. “You’re playing like a fourth string rookie. In the juniors.” It’s a low blow, but he’s not entirely wrong. “I know you miss your pretty little woman, but playing like shit won’t change the fact that we have two more games to go. Look, if Spags has a shit game, the guys will TP his gear. If you keep having shit games, then we all lose our mojo. There’s a reason you’re the captain. So get your head screwed back on and then go home and screw your wife blind.”
I slap a gloved hand across the back of my neck. “It’s not real,” I tell my best friend. My teammate. “We need everyone to believe it’s true so she can keep her job. I guess Seever told her it was me or her, so…”
“So you made it we. Got it.” Robbie waves it off. “The question is, if she’s a distraction for you on the road, how long before you think they can her, anyway? Or trade you?”
Cold knifes down my spine.
“Play for her, man,” he grins. “Not to mention, she’s watching you make a fool of yourself for sure.”
I shake my head. “Doubt it.”
“Oh, she is. She has to. It’s literally her job, idiot. And today, when you were supposed to put another goal on the books, you let a twenty-two-year-old kid, on a team that only kills eighty percent of penalties, score. Pull your head out of your ass and be the flashy, cocksure bastard I know you can be.”
So that’s what I did. I lifted my head off my chest and threw myself into games four and five like my life depended on it. Or like Tristan’s did. We took game four to a shootout loss, but I scored once in regulation and once again during the head-to-head with Sorokin, the New York goalie. Five was a barn burner, both us and New Jersey throwing up three goals apiece by the end of the first period. We traded goals back and forth for the second and most of the third. Then Spags pulled out a dumpster fire of a goal that no one saw coming. And that was the end of the road trip from hell.
I turn my car toward the modest apartment buildings without even thinking about it. I didn’t text her when I landed. My phone was nearly dead, and I wanted to focus on getting my gear, hearing the debrief from Coach, and getting home to my almost-girl. The gift I secured for her is wrapped and buckled into my leather passenger seat. I waffled over getting it. Wondered if the strings I pulled were too much, but it’s too late to change my mind. Although I don’thaveto give it to her. I just want to.
I second-guess myself as I turn into the parking lot. Thirteen days is a long time to be away from anyone, and the limited messages between us stayed more superficial than I wanted. I wanted phone calls, video messages, more than words on my screen as she asked how a flight was, told me the dentist called to confirm my appointment, I’d gotten a package.
I miss you. I wanted to say.
I wish you were here.
I’m worried I need you more than you need me.
If Tristan missed me at all, she gave no sign. I would have told her to raid my dresser drawers. Sleep in my shirt. Tuck herself in to one of my hoodies.
Maybe I should have called her first. Told her we’d landed, that I’m heading her way. Headed home. Maybe she thought I was going to my mom’s—I mean, my—house. Geez, I almost forgot that my name is on the deed.
She opens the door before I can knock, her eyes wide at the sight of me, and I drink her in from head to toe. Even in the short time we’ve lived together, I’ve never seen her this casual. She’s in a pair of Arctic sweatpants and an old t-shirt that has my middle school travel team logo on the front. A green shamrock wearing a pair of sunglasses and holding a hockey stick, teeth clenched in a grimace. The Fighting Shamrocks. I haven’t seen that shirt in ages. It hasn’t fit me in almost two decades. I didn’t know I still had it.
“You’re home,” she says. It’s not a question and the edges of her lush pink mouth curve into a small smile. “Hi.”
“Hi.” I can feel my smile spreading across my face, my cheeks aching from the stretch. She’s still staring at me in my rumpled suit, duffle slung over my shoulder, when I ask, “Can I come in?”
She shakes herself, like she needed to be sure I was really here, and then steps back. “Of course.” She holds the door as I step over the threshold onto her bright pink welcome mat.
I toe off my shoes and drop my duffle to the floor. Anything to stop from hauling her into my arms. We’ve been sharing a bed, acting out a marriage for everyone’s benefit, but that doesn’t mean I have a right to pull her to me just because I couldn’t handle a few days on the road. It’s not like there’s anyone hiding behind her gauzy curtains with a telephoto lens. She’s twisting the hem of her shirt—my shirt—in her hands, shiny white teeth worrying her bottom lip and for a moment I wonder if I walked into something I shouldn’t have.
“Everything okay?”
There’s a muffled thud from the bathroom.
“Yep,” she says, her voice tinny and too bright. “Actually, no. I think I did something dumb.” A nervous laugh. “Really dumb. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing, and I remembered what you said, and I just. I don’t know. I’m feeling kind of stupid here. Because I thought I had this all figured out, how hard could it be? Right? I only raised five siblings. But I might be in over my head.”
This time the sound from the bathroom is a crash and Tristan flinches. It’s instinct to step into her space, cup the curve of her cheek, stroke the soft skin under her eye. She relaxes into my touch, just briefly. Her eyes flicker closed, and I can feel her sigh break over my chin. I’m going to kiss her. It’s inevitable. It has been since the moment she opened her door. Since the moment our plane touched down. Since the moment the final buzzer sounded during our fifth game.
I wait.
“I have a gift for you. Want to open it?” Maybe I can take her mind off her rising panic. Or maybe I just want her to have it. Them.
Another crash and this time some sort of scrambling sound. Is my mother hiding in her bathroom? I’m not really sure what else it could be, unless a raccoon broke in through a window and she’s waiting for animal control. I don’t think that’s what’s going on here. If it was Hayley, Palmer, Madison, Max, or the elusive Joey, I’m pretty sure they’d have barged into the living room to watch our reunion. Probably with snacks and their version of the director’s commentary.
