I drain my soda and stand up. My face is still burning, but at least I tried. My coach always reminds us that you miss all the shots you don’t take.
Propositioning bearded bartenders isn’t really his milieu, though.
“Thanks for the soda,” I mumble, pulling my wallet out to leave a fat tip. Tipping well is one of my rules. That, and never eating gas-station sushi, no matter how fresh it looks.
As I push back my barstool, I realize several people are staring at me. Oh man. Let’s just pray none of them are Ice Cats fans. Maybe I just ruined my sexual fantasies, but it would really suck if I managed to wreck my privacy, too.
I head straight for the door, stepping out into the freezing cold in just my sweater. All my jackets say Ice Cats on them, so I never wear a coat to Sportsballs. I jog to my Jeep and climb inside to start the engine.
My playlist starts right up, blasting a song by the Smiths called, “Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me.”
“Shut up,” I growl, advancing to the next track. “That’s way too on the nose.”
Most of this album is depressing, though, and the engine takes ages to warm up, so I have plenty of time to stare gloomily at the exterior wall of the bar, wondering why everything having to do with other humans is so difficult for me.
I mean—Forest is attracted to men. I know this because I hang on every damn word he says. I don’t really do hookups, he’d said, but that’s gotta be a lie. The way Scully teases him, I know Forest has had plenty of sex.
My self-esteem slides down another several notches as I put the Jeep in gear and head for home. But the self-recriminations keep on coming. Because—why not me? Every time I go to Sportsballs, I see guys picking up. Sometimes they barely exchange more than a few words before they leave together. You down? Let’s bounce.
It gives me life to see that. Dudes hitting on other dudes. Living their best lives. Like maybe I will someday. But today is not that day for me, and given the streak I’m on, tomorrow doesn’t look good either.
Maybe I am ugly, as well as awkward. And maybe defeat has an odor, and the bartender gets a whiff of it every time I sit down at the bar.
It’s an hour’s drive home, which is plenty of time to question my whole existence. I let in four goals last night, and we lost to a team near the bottom of the division. If I don’t turn things around, I’ll get sent down to an even more minor league. Or worse, I won’t get renewed at all.
These are the things I should really be focusing on. Not hot, grumpy bartenders with big, brown eyes.
My phone rings, and it’s my mom. Against my better judgment, I accept the call, if only for a pause in the doom cycle of my thoughts. “Hey, Mom. How are you?”
“Great!” she practically yells. “We just finished putting all the ornaments on the tree!”
“Cool. What’s the theme this year?”
“Lobsters! Ron Junior chose it.”
Five years ago, my mother married Ron. He has two adult sons—Junior and Trevor—and the four of them live on Ron’s family compound and run a few small businesses in a beach town about a half hour from where I grew up. I get a lot of updates about their lives but very few questions about my own.
“There!” she announces. “I just sent you a photo.”
“Cool. I’ll look at it later, Mom. I’m driving.”
“Did you have a game tonight? How are the Wildcats doing?”
My team is called the Ice Cats, not the Wildcats. But whatever. “The team is doing fine,” I say, not wanting to discuss it.
But I must sound low, because she pounces. “If things aren’t working, Becker, you can always come home and work for Ron. He’s adding a hot-dog stand next to the mini golf this spring. You could manage it. We’re always hiring.”
Managing a hot dog stand. My mother honestly believes that to be a step up from professional hockey. “I’ll keep it in mind.” Especially when I’m lying awake at four a.m., feeling tortured over my stat sheet.
“Are you coming home for Christmas this year?”
I hold back a sigh. “No, sorry. Our schedule doesn’t break for long enough.” I’ve explained this several times already, but she doesn’t seem to believe me.
“That’s criminal,” she says gravely. “Everyone needs time off to be with their family at the holidays.”
Do they, though? The last time I had Christmas with Ron and his sons, they watched the ice fishing championships on TV. Is there a dumber sport? Perfectly good ice just sitting there, and nobody wears skates. They drill holes in it instead.
I don’t even want to go “home” for Christmas. I don’t even know what home means anymore. My mom has moved on to babbling about entering her gingerbread whoopie pie in a cooking contest, and I’m suddenly exhausted.
