Drills are drills.
Drills are where I live. Drills are the one place on earth where my body knows what it is doing without consulting me. I have been doing drills since I was four. I have been doing Paul's drills since I was six. My edges are clean because Paul made my edges clean and because he used to film my edges and make me watch them on the living room TV while he pointed at what I had done wrong.
My edges are clean today.
My passes are not.
My first pass to Magnus is half a stride behind him. My second pass is on his tape but too soft. My third pass I put in his skates. Magnus does not chirp. Magnus knows enough not to chirp when Paul is on the bench with his arms crossed.
Grayson does chirp, a little.
“Wake up, Laurent,” he says, passing close, barely loud enough to register as chirping.
“I am awake.”
“You're not. You're somewhere. Come back.”
My edges cut the ice a little too sharp on the next turn. I am aware that my heart is doing something my heart does not do in drills. The heart in drills is calm. The heart today is doing a thing that has its own agenda.
Maddox is on the other line.
I can feel where he is without looking.
I do not look.
The chirping starts in the second drill.
Phoenix runs the second drill himself. Paul is at the bench making notes on his tablet. Players who are not in a rotation stand in a loose group at the far blue line. I am in that group for thirty seconds between reps. I stand with my stick across my knees and breathe through my mouthguard.
“Virgin.”
It's Magnus. Low, not bothering to lean in. Magnus does not whisper.
“Magnus.”
“Coach's boy. What do you think Coach is writing on that tablet, right now, about the bar.”
I do not answer. I look at my skates. The skate tip I have been favoring is the right because the left was retaped this morning and I do not trust it yet.
“I bet he is writing your name. I bet Virgin is going home early.”
“Don't.”
“Don't what, sweetheart.”
The wordsweetheartin Magnus's mouth is not the word in Maddox's mouth. It is the word a man uses when he wants to watch you flinch at the word. I flinch at the word. I do not mean to. My body flinches before I can stop it, and Magnus sees me flinch, and Magnus's face opens into the smile it has been wearing all week, the one that saysoh. Oh, this works on you. I am going to use this.
“Sweetheart,” he says again, softer.
My jaw locks.
“Magnus, stop.”
“Tell me to stop louder.”
My hand tightens on my stick.
“Magnus.”
