"Maybe the coach sees something on the wing."
"The coach sees a kid who's easy to coach. That's different from seeing a kid who's playing to her potential."
"Have you told the coach?"
"Laura told me not to tell the coach."
"Laura's right."
"Laura's always right. That's the problem." He pushes his plate back. "You good?"
"I'm good."
"You seem quiet."
"I'm always quiet."
"You're quiet-quiet." He picks up his beer. "I'm not pushing. Just saying."
"I appreciate it."
"If you ever want to talk about whatever you don't talk about, I'm around."
The sentence lands and my hands go still on the table. Whatever you don't talk about. The phrase could mean anything. It could mean nothing. Paulson is looking at his beer and not at me and I cannot tell if the sentence is general or specific.
"I know," I say.
"Good."
"I'll get the check."
"You always get it."
"You always let me."
"That's because you make more money and I've got a kid who needs shoes every six weeks. The kid goes through shoes like they're disposable."
"She's growing."
"She's growing at an unreasonable rate. I'm going to start buying them in bulk."
I look at the calendar on the fridge when I get home. It has Thursday circled. Atlanta at Miami. Seven o'clock. three days. He will be here and after the game he will come to this apartment, bag on his shoulder, key in his pocket. He will walk through the door and I will tell him.
I stand in the bedroom doorway and look at the bed. The pillow on the other side is flat the way I make it flat every morning. I go to the linen closet and pull out the gray sheets, the ones that are softer than the ones I use alone. I learned in the first month that he sleeps better on the soft sheets. I strip the bed and make it fresh.
***
Thursday morning the apartment is clean and the sheets are gray and the balcony door is open and the ocean air comes through the way it has for eight years, salt and warmth and the low hum of the building. Pregame skate at eleven. The building is ours for a few more hours and then both teams will be on this ice and one of the players on the other bench will be the man I am going to talk to tonight.
I come home and shower. I stand in the kitchen with a glass of water and the late afternoon pressing against the windows. He is in this city right now. At a hotel with his teammates. Stretching, taping, headphones on. The pregame he has done a thousand times that I have watched him do, the eyes closed, the body settling into the thing the body knows.
My phone buzzes.
leaving the hotel in 20. see you after.
key works. door's open.
you're leaving your door unlocked in miami?
