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I couldn’t work out like I did when I was playing hockey full time; I had my hands full with the kids. I still did what I could, though, taking them for bike rides and hikes and getting in a run on the days they were with my parents.
Avon walked up and handed Grady a water bottle, saying hi to me on the way. She was on our team. I couldn’t imagine the tension in their house if she had drawn a spot on the other team like last year. Grady was all in. This was game seven of a world championship for him.
For his sake, I hoped we pulled it off.
“Use your legs!” Grady bellowed at Dina a few hours later. “Grip it!”
The rest of our eight-person team had completed the pole climb, the first event in the showdown. Several hundred people were watching, yelling and cheering for either Team Grady or Team Curt.
Curt Painter, the Sven’s Beard fire chief, was every bit as invested in this competition as Grady was. I understood now—this was between the two of them. A showdown between the police and fire department heads to prove who was stronger.
Dina was making her way up the pole one inch at a time, sweat dripping from her face down to the ground.
“Come on, Dina!” I called up to her, clapping. “You’ve got this! Just a little bit at a time. You’re almost there!”
Grady was about to lose it. Curt’s team had already finished this event and there were cheers coming from the archery station, meaning people were hitting targets over there.
Fortunately, everyone on our team was strong in archery. Dina climbed a couple more inches and reached for the button at the top of the pole, smacking it and lighting it up. Our team erupted into cheers.
Grady cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled up to her. “Lean all the way back in the harness and use your feet to get back down! Lean back, you’re safe!”
Dina was skittish about leaning backward while fifteen feet in the air, which I understood. Poor Grady was jumping up and down as she slowly made her way down the pole.
Once on the ground, she dumped her gear and breathed a sigh of relief.
“Let’s move, people!” Grady called out like a drill sergeant. “We’ve got ground to make up on archery! Keep your heads in the game!”
All eight of us lined up to complete the archery event at the same time. I hadn’t practiced archery much over the years, but I did so much of it as a kid growing up in the Beard that it was second nature to me. All of us finished the station quickly and moved on to the ring toss.
“Go Dina!” Marley cheered from the front of the group of bystanders. “And Daddy!”
The ring toss reminded me of putting a puck in the net at close range. It took finesse. The kids and I had been practicing it on this lawn all week, and I was ready.
Dina struggled to complete the ring toss, but one of Curt’s team members was having a hard time with it, too. They finished the station about a minute before our team did.
“Go, go, go!” Grady called behind him as he led us to the obstacle course.
I wondered how he and his sister could be so different. They were both level-headed and mostly easygoing, but Grady could be intense and impatient. She was one of the most patient people I’d ever known; she never lost her cool or got frustrated with my kids or her staff. The washing your hands after you piss thing Spence had told me about sounded like Shea letting an employee with a shitty attitude know who was boss, and that was a good thing.
We ran around stacked tires, climbed a rope wall and belly-crawled through mud to complete the obstacle course, finishing before Curt’s team.
Grady led us to the final event, which was also the hardest. We had to row a double scull out into the lake, maneuver it around a buoy, and bring it back to shore, then run through the finish line.
“Let’s go, people!” he yelled out as we all scrambled into the boat. “Sit your ass down and grab your oars!”
Once we pushed away from the shore, we got into a good rhythm with the rowing. Out on the water, I hardly heard the roaring crowd. The swish of the oars in the water and the view of the expansive lake were peaceful. I could hardly wait to take my own kayak out on this very lake.
My home was miles away, but it was on Lake Karlsson, too. I’d paid a lot for a massive, private lot on the water with woods behind it, but it was worth every penny.
Curt’s team was in the water now, and they were closing in.
“Row!” Grady ordered. “Come on, this is it! Don’t choke now!”
We’d practiced going around the buoy, just a few of us rowing for the maneuver. As soon as we’d cleared it, Grady told everyone to start rowing again.
“Home stretch!” he called out. “Give it everything you’ve got!”
He picked up the pace and we rowed hard. I could hear someone behind me breathing hard. Rowing was no joke; it took a lot of energy to go this fast. Curt’s team was on our heels, but we made it to shore first, Grady helping people out of the boat before taking off last from the shore.
