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“So did I.”

***

The playoff war room was a long room under the press box with three folding tables pushed end to end. We were playing Minnesota, and by the day of the first game, the tables were covered in chargers, laptops, two radios, and an untouched sandwich beside somebody’s headset. The broadcast feed played on a monitor above it all.

I was on the phone with the credentials desk. Minnesota’s visiting television crew had arrived with nine people and six credentials. Their producer insisted the extra three were essential, including someone named Doug whose job nobody could describe.

Leah, at the next laptop, was rearranging the postgame order because Markel wanted Cross first and Cross wanted to shower first.

The broadcast feed cut to that morning’s pregame scrum. Trier stood at his stall with four microphones in front of him.

“Has Peaches issued a prediction for the series?” a reporter asked.

“She doesn’t issue anything,” Trier said. “She has an agent do that for her.”

I laughed out loud. Nobody else in the room did.

***

The third period began with the score tied at one each. Two minutes in, the broadcast followed a puck into the corner below the glass. Behind it, a man in a Varga jersey held up a hand-lettered sign: PEACHES KNOWS, with an orange cat drawn in marker. The camera stayed on it long enough for me to read the smaller lettering under the cat.

AND SHE ISN’T WORRIED.

During a television timeout, Leah took off her headset. “Broadcast asked whether Peaches could come to the next home game in a box, with a camera on her. I asked Trier.”

“What did he say?”

“One word.”

“What was that?”

“Kidneys.”

I laughed again. Leah put her headset back on, smiling.

We won two to one. During a quiet stretch after the game, Leah forwarded a note from the librarian at the Humboldt Park branch. Thought you’d want these. Nothing needed.

The reading program’s spring finale had been that afternoon. The librarian had scheduled it around Callahan’s obligations. They negotiated directly.

In the photographs, children held up their reading certificates. One girl had hers upside down and didn’t care. Behind them in the last photograph, out of focus, Callahan sat in a chair built for a six-year-old with a book open on his knees.

I thanked her for the photographs and for the work she’d put into the program, and sent the message. It had gone well with no input from me.

Across the room, the postgame show had started. Trier was on the screen in front of his stall with a towel around his neck, tired and pleased, saying something that made the reporter laugh. I watched him until someone asked me where the extra power strips were.

***

Rook and Varga’s backyard had green grass by the second week of May. We’d beaten Minnesota in six games, and the second round was set to start in two days, leaving us a day completely free. Varga decided to fill it with brisket. I drove to Trier’s, and we rode together.

The players looked younger in ordinary clothes, though the season’s toll was apparent. Heath lowered himself into an Adirondack chair one vertebra at a time.

Pratt waited until most people were within earshot of the long table. He didn’t tap a glass. He delivered the news in five words: “Sully and I are engaged.”

There was a short silence while everybody caught up. Sully had his arm through Pratt’s and was already smiling.

“When did you pop the question?” Heath asked.

“Last night.”