Page 156 of Slapshot Baby

They’re the right words, but she sounds like she's reading from a card someone else signed.

Heat builds in my throat. "Yeah."

"Maybe it's just a short-term thing. Front offices do that. They hedge until the numbers make them feel safe."

I don't want hedging or analysis.

I want the version of Ava who would have sworn at the phone and told me Hargrove doesn't deserve to watch me play.

That version isn't here tonight.

"Sure. Probably just politics," I spit out.

"Kai, I'm trying to help."

"I know you are."

"Then why does it sound like you're angry with me?"

Because you're not here.

Because I stood in a room full of men who used to follow me and watched my title get handed to someone else, and now I'm sitting alone in an apartment that feels like a museum and the one person who makes it bearable can barely hold a conversation.

"I'm not angry with you."

"You are. I can hear it."

"What you're hearing is a guy who lost his captaincy today and called his girlfriend hoping for something other than a strategy session."

"That's not fair," she says, her voice dropping.

"What’s not fair is finding out your girlfriend needed a blood transfusion from a phone call where she passed out."

It comes out before I can stop it. The thing I've been carrying for days, buried under the careful restraint I've had since I found her unconscious on her couch.

Now I've thrown it at her like a weapon.

"That has nothing to do with this."

"It has everything to do with this. You shut me out, Ava. Every time something real happens, you handle it alone and hand me whatever's left."

"I'm not shutting you out."

"Then what do you call today? I told you I lost the only title I've had since I was twenty-seven, and you gave me a consulting fee worth of advice and nothing else."

Her breathing gets shorter. "I gave you what I had. I'm running on empty. I've had the longest day and I don't have the energy to act the way you want."

"I'm not asking for a performance."

"Yes, you are. You want me upset. You want me furious. And I don't have it in me right now, Kai."

"All I wanted was for you to care."

"I do care."

"Then act like it."

The line goes quiet, the only sound is the faint hum of her TV in the background.