I’m sobbing now, I can’t help it. I press my face into his chest. He wraps both arms around me and lets me have my moment.
The patio door bangs open behind us.
“Z. Bro.” Rodriguez is holding two beer bottles in one hand and somehow drinking from them at the same time. “Why is she crying? WHY IS SHE CRYING? We won, Mackie. Wewon. What did you do to her, Zach?”
“He didn’t do anything.” I lift my face and wipe under my eyes with the back of my hand. “These are the good kind.”
“Oh. Okay. Okay, good. Because for a second I was about to get into a goalie fight, and considering the entire team actually likes him now, I don’t think I’d have much backup.”
“Noted.”
“Anyway. Inside. Both of you. Z, you’re up.”
Zach’s hand stills on my back. “Up for what.”
“Speech. Barrett wants you to say something. Cup goalie. You know. It’s a whole thing.”
“I’m not making a speech.”
“You’re definitely making a speech.”
“Rodriguez—”
“Z. Goalie of the playoffs. Two minutes. You can do anything for two minutes.”
I slide off the picnic table and squeeze Zach’s hand. “I’ll be in the front.”
He looks at me. “You’re going to make me cry.”
“Then we’ll be even.”
Rodriguez throws his arm over Zach’s shoulders and steers him toward the door. He looks back at me from the doorway. I mouth,I love you.
He mouths something back that I’m pretty sure ishelp.
EPILOGUE: ZACH
Barrett callsthe end-of-season meeting two weeks after the parade. Which was a blur—an open-top bus through downtown, Rodriguez standing on the roof of it because nobody told him not to, confetti so thick I couldn’t see the street. Mackie was next to me the entire time, recording on her phone and crying so hard the footage is completely unusable. She posted it anyway. You can’t see anything but you can hear her screaming.
The meeting room looks the same as it did in October but the banner is hanging outside the building now and the whole place feels different in a way I can’t name except to say it feels finished. Or maybe I’m the thing that feels different.
Guys filter in looser and lighter than they’ve looked in months. Rodriguez is wearing a Hawaiian shirt and flip-flops because Rodriguez has apparently decided the offseason has a dress code and it’s beach. Dex is checking his phone every thirty seconds because his and Goldie’s baby is due in August and he somehow thinks he’s going to miss the birth if he’s away from her for more than five minutes. Roman walks in, sits down, and closes his eyes like he might nap through the whole thing.
Jack comes in after Roman and sits down two seats to my left. Three weeks ago that distance was the full length of a locker room so this feels like progress.
Barrett stands at the front. “I’m not going to keep you long,” he says. “You earned your summer. Go use it.”
He runs through the logistics. Training camp dates in September. Physicals, equipment fittings, the usual. Then he stops and looks around the room.
“Last thing,” he says. “I’m going to say this once and I’m going to say it clearly.” He points at Rodriguez. “I do not want to walk into camp next fall and discover half my roster is going to be out on paternity leave next spring. You understand what I’m telling you?”
Rodriguez grins. Dex goes red. I feel Jack’s eyes land on the side of my face like a laser.
“That means I’m too young to be a grandpa, Almardon,” Jack says without looking away from me.
The room erupts. Rodriguez is doubled over. Brody is choking. I stare at the whiteboard and contemplate a career in literally any other profession. But somewhere under the mortification there’s a thing I almost miss: Jack made a joke. About me. About Mackie. In front of the whole team. Three weeks ago he couldn’t say my name without his jaw locking.
Barrett catches my eye from the front of the room. His face is perfectly still but he’s definitely fighting a smile. He shakes his head once, very small, the way you shake your head when someone you coached through the worst month of his life just got publicly threatened with grandparenthood by the girl’s father in a team meeting and there’s truly nothing left to do but move on.
