Page 68 of Unmanageable

I sit at the table for another hour, the clicking of my keyboard the only sound in the dark room. But every now and then, I look down at my left wrist, where the skin still feels warm, and I don’t feel like running at all.

18

Finn O’Connell

4:08 PM

Callie: You ever gonna tell her how you feel?

Me: eventually

Callie: Before retirement would be ideal.

***

“The guy is a complete fraud, Scottie. A lunatic. A licensed, certified con man operating out of a basement forty minutes outside of Washington.”

I’m gripping the wheel so hard my knuckles are turning the color of the ice we should have been skating on three hours ago.

We’re twenty miles into our drive to Charlotte, the highway stretching out ahead of us under a sky the color of a wet sidewalk, and my blood pressure is currently hovering somewhere near the roof of the Volkswagen van.

“He didn’t let me on the ice once,” I continue, the bitterness sharp in my throat. “Not one single time. I am a goaltender in the National Hockey League. I have a Vezina nomination. And Grant spent a full week treating me like an auditioning clown for a traveling circus.”

From the passenger seat, there’s an ominous, vibrating silence.

I cut my eyes sideways.

Scottie is sitting there with her knees pulled up toward her chin, buried under her oversized blue hoodie, her sneakers tucked against the seat. Her hands are clamped over her mouth, her shoulders doing this weird, rhythmic hitching motion that tells me everything I need to know.

“Are you laughing?” I demand. “Scottie, are you literally laughing right now while my career is being dismantled by a man who eats pickled eggs for breakfast?”

She lets out a high-pitched, muffled squeak into her palms. “I’m not laughing, Cash. I’m… I’m… I’m practicing deep-breathing exercises. The air quality in here is very dense.”

“You’re laughing at me. Your client. The golden goose. The man who pays for your corporate high heels.” I slap the steering wheel with one hand. “What happened to the Shark? What happened to the ruthless, terrifying executive who was going to turn me into a figure skater if my metrics dropped? You should be on the phone with the league office right now reporting a labor violation!”

“Cash,” she gasps, a real, full-blown laugh breaking through. She drops her hands, her face flushed, her green eyes bright with tears. “He threw a rubber chicken at you. And you caught it.”

“He told me that the chicken would help with my hand-eye coordination!” I yell, though the corners of my own mouth are trying to betray me. “It was a scientific proposition, Scottie!”

“You looked like a giant, sweaty seal, Cash. I expected someone to throw you a herring after the third racquetball.”

“Scottie, I am outraged. Truly. You have to be on my side here. Clause 1.1 of the representation agreement: Agent must validate the player’s immense ego at all times, especially when he’s been humiliated by a man wearing an orange hunting jacket.”

“Herb wore the hunting jacket, Cash. Grant was wearing a sweat-stained cutoff shirt,” she corrects me, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye with her thumb. “And for the record, I am on your side. I’m just also capable of recognizing high-quality comedy when it happens three feet away from me.”

The highway stretches out into the gray mist, the rain changing from a light drizzle into a steady, heavy drumbeat against the metal roof of the van. The wipers are doing their best, but the driver’s side blade has a tear in the rubber that leaves a massive, crescent-shaped smear right in my field of vision.

“We should be in Atlanta by seven,” Scottie says. “The shooting coach there actually has ice booked. Real ice. With lines and nets and everything. I verified it twice. No chickens allowed in the building.”

“Thank God,” I mutter. “If another elderly man throws a small, dense object at my face this week, I’m going to start using my blocker as a weapon.”

The words have barely left my mouth when the steering wheel suddenly rips out of my grip.

The van veers sharply toward the guardrail, the tires letting out a wet howl against the asphalt.

“Cash!”

“I got it! I got it!”