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Eli’s phone rang as he was heading out of the arena after practice, and he winced when he checked the caller ID. Tempted to send his agent to voicemail, he ducked into an adjacent corridor, tucking himself between a couple of bulkheads, and swiped to answer.

“Hey, Tom.”

“Hey, Eli.” Tom’s voice was as friendly as ever, so maybe this wasn’t the dreaded your sponsors are going to drop you if you don’t step it up this season talk. “How’s your day going?”

“Not bad. Practice went great.”

That was the problem—practice always went great. But as soon as he stepped onto the ice for a game, it was like he all of a sudden had two left feet and the laces of his skates were tied together.

“Glad to hear it,” Tom said. “Have you given any thought to my offer of having my team manage your social media account?”

“I have, and I still want to run it myself. At least for now. I’ve only got the one, so it’s not hard to do.”

“True,” Tom agreed, somewhat tentatively. “But if you let us do the heavy lifting, we can block or delete negative comments. That way that bullshit doesn’t get into your head.”

A fair point, Eli had to admit. Two days ago, he’d posted a photo of himself and his teammates after his birthday game of mini putt. He’d taken the group selfie after the eighteenth hole, and in the photo, he was proudly holding up the scorecard showing his first-place win.

More than one commenter had questioned why he could win at mini golf when he hadn’t been able to light up the lamp even once this season.

That had stung.

It wasn’t like he wasn’t putting in the work. He just didn’t understand why that work wasn’t translating into true action on the ice.

Last season, a documentary filmmaker from Los Angeles—who also happened to be Zanetti’s boyfriend—had shot a six-part docuseries about the Trailblazers. He and his camera crew had filmed the team from training camp all the way to the final game of the playoffs and conducted interviews for several days after the Trailblazers had won the Cup for a historic third year in a row.

Eli had helped his teammates win the goddamn Stanley Cup during his rookie season—had even scored during game seven—and that journey to the Cup was documented in Trailblazing the Way Forward, all six episodes of which had released a couple of weeks back. Nobody could watch that and believe they weren’t putting in the work.

But last season wasn’t this season, and no matter how often the team’s director of player engagement told him not to let one bad game define him, Eli couldn’t seem to find his footing. Especially since one bad game had turned into almost a dozen. He kept expecting to be told he was being sent back to the Trailblazers’ AHL affiliate in New Hampshire for further development, but considering he’d just purchased an oversized couch for his new place, returning to the Groundbreakers was the dead last thing he wanted.

“Eli? Did I lose you?”

“Sorry, no, I’m still here. And thanks, but I’ll keep managing my own account for now.”

“All right, but if you change your mind . . .”

Eli nodded. “I know where to find you.”

“Listen, I also wanted to talk about Class Seven,” Tom said.

Eli glanced down at his running shoes from the Canadian Certified B Corp. A rust orange color, they were made with FSC-certified tree fibers, responsibly sourced wool, and sugarcane. He wiggled his toes in his shoes and released a long sigh. “Let me guess—they’re dropping me.”

“Actually, they want you to film a commercial for them.”

“Wait, really?”

“Mm-hmm. November sixteenth and seventeenth. They’ll fly you into Vancouver the day before, and you’ll be back in Burlington in time for practice on the eighteenth.”

Eli didn’t know his schedule by heart, but he could’ve sworn those were the days Tom had told him to set aside for the shoot in Boston. “Aren’t I supposed to be in Boston for Sport U Apparel at that time?”

“They had to cancel. I’m working on rescheduling.”

Cancel. His biggest sponsor, who also happened to be the largest sports apparel and equipment company in the country had canceled his upcoming commercial shoot.

Probably they were waiting to see if he could turn things around this season and make their investment in him worth it.

Stomach curdling at the thought, he concluded his call with Tom and tucked his phone away. If Sport U wanted to drop him, that was fine. Well, no, not fine. It sucked. There was a lot of money on the line, and after growing up firmly lower-middle class, he still tended to count his pennies. He had other smaller sponsors, sure, and that wasn’t nothing. But still. Aside from losing the income, having a sponsor drop him would be embarrassing as hell.

He texted Nolan.