Page 19 of Home Ice

“This picture,” Varga said. “The internet has decided you are a golden retriever who learned to skate, and everybody is excited in a way that means the requests are coming.”

“What requests?”

“Appearances. That’s how it goes. First the photo, then the photo does well, then somebody wants the photo again but at their event this time. It might be a charity skate or a gala. Just say no to anything where you hold a product.”

“I know the yogurt story now.”

“Good. So my briefing is: it’s working, and it’s going to work harder, and they’re going to want more of it. When they ask, you’ll feel like it costs nothing to say yes because it’s just dinner, an event, or a photo.” He shrugged and tucked the phone away. “Mostly, that’s true. He seems like a good guy, the boyfriend. Professional. That helps.”

“He is,” I said. “Everybody was right about him.”

Varga resettled his pillow and closed his eyes. For a few moments, I thought the briefing was over.

He opened his eyes and turned his head to face me. “So what’s he actually like? The Max guy. Off the camera. You’ve done what, dinner and a thing at his brother’s shop? Don’t tell me if you’ve—“

“How do you know about the shop?”

“Rafe, there’s a picture of you biting into a cherry pastry with two million views. Everybody knows about the shop.”

“He’s easy to be around,” I said. “Which doesn’t sound like a big thing, but I think it is. He’s on all the time, and you’d think that’d be tiring to sit across from, but it’s the opposite. He asks questions and waits for the answers, and he’s funny, too.”

“Funny is good.”

“He ordered walleye,” I said. “I didn’t think anybody ate walleye in Chicago.”

“So you like him. Good. It’s easier when you like them. What about the shop? The brother’s the woodworker, right? The serious one?”

“Niko,” I said. “Yeah.”

And then I told him about the shop.

“There was a joint on his bench,” I said. “It was a dovetail, an interlocking corner joint. You’d know it if you saw it. There’s no glue, nails, or screws, and I asked him what’s stopping it from coming apart.”

“And?”

“He stopped everything and knocked it apart with his hand and made me look at the geometry. It’s a wedge. The tail’s a wedge and the socket’s the same wedge backward, so the only way out is the exact way it went in. If you try any other direction, it jams against itself. The harder you pull, the harder it holds.” I made a wedge out of my hands, demonstrating. I put them down.

Varga rubbed his chin.

“We had a grain drill at home with a tapered shaft and no key or bolt. Dad always said the work kept it together, and I just thought that was Dad being Dad. It’s not. It’s real physics. Niko showed me.”

“Huh,” Varga said.

“And he let me hold it. The joint.” I smiled.

Varga leaned back against the pillow, eyes forward.

“Sorry,” I said. “The pastries were great. They kind of made the entire visit.”

“Sure,” Varga said. “Sounds like a good shop.”

He said nothing else about it. He resettled the pillow, and the seatbelt light came on with the first soft drop of the descent.

Denver appeared out the window all at once while Varga chewed gum with his eyes closed.

***

I got a window seat near the back of the team bus while the bags thumped in below us. My phone buzzed in my pocket.