Page 38 of Home Ice

I got out and carried the flowers to the front door. It opened before I reached the top step.

“He’s here!” It was Max’s mom. I’d only seen her in the background of one of his videos. She was shorter than I expected, moving faster and reaching for my forearm. “Oh, look at you. Gus! Gus, he’s here, come and see how tall.”

“I’m coming.”

“He’s not coming. Come in, you’re letting the cold in—Max, your friend is standing in the door with his arms full.”

Somewhere behind her, my voice said, “It’s a great team and a great organization.”

That threw me. I heard somebody say, “There. Run it back. Let’s hear him say it again.”

Max appeared. “They’ve been watching that for the last twenty minutes.” He had a dish towel over one shoulder. His mom reached for the flowers.

“You didn’t have to. You shouldn’t have. This is too much.” She turned and called over her shoulder. “Come with me to the kitchen. Sit anywhere. Niko! He’s here.”

Max took my coat. A group of people in the living room watched as I dutifully headed for the kitchen.

The house was noisy.

There were four conversations running at once, a TV with the volume turned up high, and water running in the kitchen sink.

A blend of spice smells filled the air. It was cinnamon layered with oregano and lemon.

At my house, you could hear the refrigerator opening and closing. Here, everything else buried it.

“Rafe.” Max’s dad entered the kitchen, reaching out to shake my hand. He had his phone in the other hand. He was shorter than both Max and Niko, with a strong, stout build, and he was still carrying on a conversation using his phone. “Theo, he’s here. Say hello.”

“HELLO,” said a loud voice from the phone.

“That’s my brother, Theo. He’s in Milwaukee. You can call me Gus.”

“MILWAUKEE,” the voice on the phone confirmed.

“Hi,” I said.

“Theo watched the game.”

“GOOD GAME.”

“He wants to ask you about the goal,” Max’s dad said.

Max’s mom guided me to a small, round kitchen table, and his dad sat opposite me.

“So the goal,” he said, holding the phone out between us like a microphone. “The second one, in the third.”

“I didn’t score the second one. That was Heath.”

“THE FIRST ONE,” said Theo.

“The first one, Theo says.”

“That was mostly the entry,” I said. “Their D stepped up early, so we bumped it back and came in behind him, and then it was a point shot and I got a stick on it. It’s not really a goal I did much for.”

There was a brief silence in the kitchen. The water stopped.

“He says he didn’t do much for it,” Gus reported.

“HE PUT IT IN THE NET.”