Page 63 of Thin Ice

Brick pointed at me.

"That," he said. "That right there is why I'm not worried about you and the tall guy. A man who watches a room that close and feeds it to get it back on track—he's going to figure out what to do about a guy who told a lie but still matters. Maybe you won't have the answer tonight, but you'll figure it out."

"You've been saving that story for years, haven't you?"

"I save everything. Ask Jen." He leaned and put his hands on his knees. "Maddie's cake is at six candles, by the way. She wants it known she's planning for seven. We can't disappoint her."

"Seven's a good number."

"It is, but now you have to get out. Jen and I are on fourteen down, and she thinks I quit on her."

***

I got to the Boston arena early and did my stretching at a stall that wasn't Vern's. Around me the room filled up one man at a time.

Wes embraced the Captain part and moved stall to stall saying one thing to every man. They weren't speeches, just a quick boost. Jamie bounced his knee until Brick reached over and put a hand on it. The bouncing stopped, and neither of them said a word.

Misha was the last to arrive, and he performed a traditional ceremony. He set a row of little carved wooden bears on his stall's top ledge one at a time. He carefully turned each one to face the room. Then he sat and closed his eyes, drifting to wherever it was he went.

The coaches came in and said less than they'd said all series. The whiteboard had four things on it. Three were systems and the fourth was the words: EVERY MINUTE.

Boston put everything on the ice. They'd done the math. Win one game at home, and it's over.

Nobody scored in the first period, and that was a win for us. Misha only had to be sharp twice.

Boston scored six minutes into the second. The goal was nobody's fault. It was the fates smiling on our opponents. Their winger chipped a puck off the wall past our defenseman. Suddenly, it was two-on-one going the other way with our tired legs chasing. Misha interrupted the pass, but it hit the far post and went in on a bounce.

One-nothing. The crowd sounded like they'd already won.

We didn't fold up our tents. Wes said the same four words after every shift, right back at them, and we stayed in the game. Boston did their best to stop chasing the puck and sit on the lead, creating an impenetrable wall between us and the net.

Between the second and third, in the tunnel, my season nearly ended on a rubber mat.

It was nothing, like always. The runner had rucked up half an inch where it met the concrete, and I hit it with my left toe. My hip failed to correct, and I started going down in the hallway.

A hand caught my elbow. It was Elias. He put me back on my feet with zero drama and then whispered, "Win the game."

Elias didn't let go right away. We stood there one beat, his hand on my arm, my heart going, both of us looking at the mat like it mattered. Neither of us said anything. Neither of us pretended it hadn't happened, either.

He didn't step back into being furniture, and I didn't shake him off. Then the horn sounded up the tunnel for the third, and he let go.

We tied it 8:12 minutes in.

It started with me on the wall. Their defenseman had been rubbing me out all night, and this time I didn't fight him for the puck; I let him win it. Or, I let him think he'd won it. He barreled past me to play the puck, and I spun off the contact on the good side. The puck sat between his skates, and I chipped it loose to the point.

That was where Brick should have been.

He wasn't there. He had decided to sneak backdoor. The puck went to Wes instead, and he saw the play a half-second before anyone else. He threw the puck backdoor to Brick.

Brick buried the goal in the net as if he'd been scoring his entire life, and then he briefly looked horrified.

The bench lost its mind. Jamie hugged everyone he could find. Wes laughed so hard that he barely set up for the next draw. Brick skated past the bench and yelled, "I've been saving that!"

It was one-one, and regulation ended that way. I could practically see the fans back home standing in front of their TVs.

Overtime is brutal in hockey. All the systems fray, and so do the bodies. Four minutes in, their center tried to force a pass through the middle of the neutral zone. I read it leaving his blade and got my stick on it. It cost me a sharp pain down the outside of the thigh. Jamie was already moving, and I got the puck to him while he slowed up against the boards.

His eyes went top shelf. The goalie bought the fake, and Jamie shot low, blocker side, six inches off the post, into the spot he'd hammered in the practice rink.