NOWromeo
I look across the aisle. Rodriguez has one eye cracked open and sighs when he sees my face.
“She snitched,” he says and shoves a plastic container at me.
Me
got them
Mackie
good
don’t let him have any, he doesn’t deserve good luck cookies
Their building is louderthan ours. Their fans have been drinking since noon and they’ve already started theyou can’t winchant before I’m out of the tunnel for warmups. Somebody against the glass is holding a sign with my picture on it and an X through my face.
They score on a power play in the first. Their center cycles it low, my defense loses contact for half a second and I can’t get my stick down in time.
Another in the second.
Two more in the third.
Rodriguez finally scores on a breakaway and the bench erupts and for one second the team sounds like itself. He skates to me with his arms over his head and taps my pads and says something I can’t hear because the crowd is booing him loud enough to drown out his voice.
4-1.
Late in the third there’s a scramble in front of my net. Four bodies, sticks everywhere. The puck deflects off someone’s skate and trickles past my pad. This lazy little roll that shouldn’t beat anyone. I was a half-inch out of position. The horn blows.
5-1. 0-3 in the series.
The visitor’slocker room in Miami is smaller than ours.
Guys are stripping gear without talking. Brody is sitting forward on the bench with his head between his knees. Dex is staring at his phone. Roman is leaning against the wall with his eyes closed.
“Where’s Coach?” somebody asks.
“GM pulled him aside,” Rodriguez says. “They’re down the hall.”
I set my helmet on the bench next to me and start unstrapping my pads. Footsteps thump across the locker room and stop in front of me. I look up and Anderson is standing there.
“Get up.”
I stand, one pad half off and hanging at a weird angle from my leg. From the corner of my eye I see Dex put his phone down and put his hand out to stop Rodriguez from standing up, too.
“Stop seeing her,” Jack says.
“Anderson, I–”
“Stay away from her. You don’t talk to her. You don’t text her. You don’t touch her. She’s my kid. She’smykid.”
“That’s not what–”
“I have one. I haveonedaughter, Almardon. One. And she’s nineteen and she’s in your apartment and she’s been lying to me for eight months fucking around with you. Some backup goalie nobody who only has a shot at the playoffs because-”
I open my mouth and nothing comes out.
“You know what she’ll be in three years. You KNOW. She’ll be twenty-two in some city she’s never been to because you got traded and she’ll give it up. The reporting thing. She’ll give up herentire career for you. Because you’ll be on a road trip when it matters and she’ll have to choose.”
