Page 131 of Puck You Both

Well, then. He managed to find one that wasn’t in my draft. "No."

"Then I don't care." He goes back to the line sheet. "Door's always open if anyone makes it your problem, though."

That's it. That's the whole meeting. Somewhere in my bag, a folder of contingencies dies unopened.

One band-aid off. One to go.

Lindqvist walks me down the hallway in his usual silence. Then, at the door to the locker room, he tips his head a degree. "The Wallace part," he says. "Is that why your save percentage went up?"

I try not to smile, and fail immediately. "You can't prove causation."

The room, I do standing in the middle of the floor, before practice, gear half on, on purpose. The more casual this looks, the better.

"Sixty seconds," I start. Sticks stop being taped. Somebody turns the music down. "You're going to see something online soon, and I'd rather you hear it from me. I'm—“ I clear my throat. “I’m…” My pulse kicks up a thousand notches and beads of sweat start forming all over my skin as momentary panic overwhelmes every cell in my body.

The next couple of breaths come with effort as I dart my eyes from person to person, twenty pairs of eyes scrutinizing my face, because ‘I’m’…what? My mind tries desperately to read my notes, but the pages appear blank. I’m…? And just as I’m about to finish it with, ‘Nevermind,’ my eyes lock with Theo’s. There’s no worry in them. Forehead scrunched, no eyebrows raised, just a smile, soft and small. You’ve got this.

I do.

There is no noun I need to provide to make my point. They’re not owed my identity. No one is.

I nod to myself. “I’m with Moreau and Wallace, both. Questions come to me, not to him." I nod at Theo, who has arranged himself on his stall bench like an exhibit. "That's all. Thursday, we have Detroit. Let’s make sure we’re prepped."

Silence. One full breath of it, the room deciding what it is.

Then Dziedzic, standing by the gear rack with a skate in one hand, starts to clap, slow and pointed. It catches. It rolls around the stalls, speeds up, picks up a couple of stick taps on the floor, somebody whistles, a rookie yells "Let’s go!" at full volume, and most of the team is grinning at me, and at Theo, and it's already turning back into a Tuesday, tape and music and someone asking about the Detroit flight.

Under all of it, from the far stalls, at a volume designed to be heard and denied: "Didn't need a press conference about it."

Theo's already off the bench before I’ve finished saying, “Don’t.”

"No, no, no. Hold on." He raises both hands like a conductor. "Quiet, everyone. The man has notes." He crosses the floor and stops in front of Eric’s stall with his skates still untied. "A press conference? He said six words and gave you a travel update, you absolute expired coupon. You participation trophy with a mortgage—" the room is already going "—you know what an actual press conference is? It's what your agent begs for after every game. You, you, you human beige." He leans in a half inch. "He is the only reason your plus-minus can be read aloud without a priest present. So next time he tells you anything, you clap like Dziedzic, or you donate your jaw to somebody with something to say. May both sides of your pillow be warm forever, you rented thumb."

The locker room is gone. Half the team is doubled over their stalls, the rookie wheezing, Dziedzic wiping his eyes with the skate still in his hand. Eric opens his mouth, finds the entire room laughing in the wrong direction, and develops a sudden fascination with his tape job, and whatever his mutter was trying to be dies right there, of embarrassment, in front of witnesses.

I came in here braced for containment. Nobody told me I'd be defended. It goes through my chest sideways, the way the plate under the foil did, and I have to put my mask on earlier than I need to.

At the drill's first whistle, Lindqvist glides past me, still not fully recovered. "Keep both of them."

I smile. "That's the plan."

***

THE WOLVES FIND out the Vipers know by lunchtime, because Theo can’t sit on a secret to save his life, and by dinner a couples' thread forms and is immediately mobilized. "Coming out logistics support," they're calling it, which in practice means my phone becomes a receiving dock.

Mateo sends a document. Four pages, cited, on media framing of polyamorous athletes, with a cover note apologizing for the length and a second attachment labeled cross-cultural literature review (optional, for your own curiosity, no pressure).

It's good, actually. I read all of it. I will never admit how much of it I highlight.

Devon doesn't send anything. Devon video-calls, studies me in silence for three seconds, and delivers two findings. The beard stays, it's working. And if I hurt either of them, he knows a parrot who can find me.

He hangs up before I can respond to either item.

"Our in-laws are insane," I tell Theo, still looking at the dead screen.

"Our in-laws," he repeats, glowing like I've handed him a trophy.

***