Not words. Just a low sound, almost a murmur, coming from the alcove near the equipment room. I slow down without deciding to, and then I see Ikonen.
He's crouched against the wall. The cat is in front of him, the black stray with the white chest patch that's been roaming the facility since the first week. Ikonen has something in his hand. Scraps from the cafeteria, maybe chicken, pulled apart into small pieces. He's setting them down one at a time, and the cat is eating from the floor near his feet, and Ikonen is watching the cat with an expression I have never seen on his face.
It's soft. That's the only word. His shoulders are relaxed and he's murmuring words I can't make out from this distance. Maybe not even English. The biggest man on the team, folded down to make himself small, feeding a stray cat in an empty hallway with the patience of someone who has nowhere else to be.
I should keep walking. I know this immediately. I'm not supposed to see this.
I take a step and my shoe catches the floor wrong. Just a squeak, not even loud, but in the silence of the hallway it's enough. Ikonen's head comes up.
The shift is instant. The softness is gone. His posture straightens, his face resets to the neutral mask I see every day. The cat doesn't move. The cat doesn't care. But Ikonen is alreadystanding, already the captain again, and the thing I just saw might as well not have happened.
We look at each other for a beat. I don't know what my face is doing but I try to make it do nothing. Pretty sure I am not successful.
"Davis." His voice is even.
"Cap." I nod once and keep walking. Don't slow down, don't speed up, don't look back. My footsteps sound too loud but I focus on keeping them steady.
Behind me, silence. I don't know if he's still standing there or if he's gone. I don't check.
In the cafeteria, I make a plate I don't really want and sit at an empty table and think about what I just saw. Not the cat, exactly. The way Ikonen looked at it. That thirty seconds in an empty hallway, where he was maybe a little different. And the way it disappeared the instant someone else was present.
I think about my nameplate in its slot above my stall. I think about the empty stalls that used to have nameplates too. I think about the twenty-three spots and the math that doesn't care about my edge work or my positioning or how sharp I felt today. But I'm not going to think about that. It's not mine to think about.
Instead, I think about this team. The rookies I eat lunch with every day. The group chat that lights up my phone at odd hours. Marchetti and his hockey romance book. Mueller freezing after two words from the captain. Novák seeing everything and saying nothing. Hájek texting his chicken emoji. The sound of guys on the ice in the morning and the way it echoes off the glass and the way it already sounds like I'd miss if it was gone.
I want to stay. I want it so badly it scares me, because wanting something this much means losing it wouldn't heal clean. Just this once, I let myself want it.
Fresh Meat: Group Chat Two
Mueller
What time is puck drop tomorrow?
Davis
Seven.
Mueller
Seven. Okay. Seven is good. I can work with seven.
Novák
You can work with seven. As opposed to what? Refusing to play if it were eight?
Mueller
I mean I have time to prepare. Morning skate, film, meal, nap, get to the rink.
Novák
Thank you for explaining how a game day works, Mueller. None of us have ever played hockey before.
Mueller
I'm organizing my thoughts out loud.
Novák
