Chapter 2 Avi
Richard Hastings has a framed photo of his kids on the desk, angled so visitors can see it. I've been in this office maybe a dozen times over seven years, and the photo has moved twice. The frame gets nicer, but the angle stays the same.
Laura sits to my left. Hastings sits behind the desk with the assistant GM beside him, a guy whose name I know and whose presence I understand. Witness. Record-keeper. The organizational equivalent of a dashcam.
"Avi, I want you to know this was one of the hardest decisions we've made as a group." Hastings leans forward, hands clasped. The posture of a man who has practiced looking pained. "Your contributions to this franchise, your leadership. We were lucky to have you."
I watch him talk. I count the platitudes the way I count passes in a neutral zone.
Contributions. Leadership. Tough decision.
Valued member. He uses the word trajectory once, about the organization's future, and I feel Laura shift beside me.
She's too professional to react, but I've learned her tells.
The slight adjustment means she's angry on my behalf and containing it.
"We think this is a real opportunity for you," Hastings says. "Atlanta is building something exciting, and a player of your caliber is going to be central to that."
An opportunity. When someone takes something from you and hands you shit wrapped in pretty tissue paper, it’s still shit no matter what they call it.
"Thank you, Richard." My voice is level. "I appreciate the transparency."
Which is ironic since there was no transparency.
I found out from a beat reporter while standing in running shorts on a public trail.
But the sentence does what I need it to do.
It ends the meeting without giving him anything.
Laura asks two questions about contract logistics.
Hastings answers both. The assistant GM writes something down.
We shake hands. His grip is firm and brief and tells me nothing I don't already know, which is that this man made a decision about my life without telling me and would like to feel good about it.
Laura walks me to the hallway. "You okay?"
"I'm fine."
She looks at me the way she does when she knows I'm not but also knows pushing won't get her anywhere. "I'll send you the timeline tonight. Atlanta's moving fast. That's a good sign."
"Okay."
"Avi." She pauses. "You handled that well."
I nod. She means it as a compliment. I hear it as confirmation that I have, once again, performed control so convincingly that even the person paid to know me can't see past it.
The locker room is empty, which is the point.
Late June means the building is a ghost. Skeleton crew, lights at half, the particular hum of a hockey facility in summer when the ice is still maintained but nobody's using it.
My locker is the same one I've had for seven years.
Third from the end, left wall. The nameplate is still up.
IKONEN. Block letters, the same font they've used since I got here.
I brought one bag. It takes less than ten minutes.
Tape, a pair of gloves I like, an extra mouthguard.
Deodorant. A photo I'd stuck to the inside wall years ago.
My grandmother's house in Finland, taken the summer I was sixteen.
The edges are curled from humidity, the tape residue leaving a mark on the metal. I peel it off and put it in the bag.
That's it. Seven years and it fits in a single duffel.
I'm zipping it closed when I hear footsteps in the corridor. The rhythm is familiar before the person is. Four years of hearing someone walk toward you on concrete floors, the specific weight and pace of a man who is six-one and chronically unhurried.
Sean Brennan comes around the corner in workout clothes, a towel over his shoulder, and stops when he sees me.
"Hey." He stands in the doorway. Not surprised, because he knew I'd come for my things. More that he was prepared for a moment, and then the moment arrived and the preparation meant nothing.
"Hey."
He walks in. Sits on the bench across from me.
The distance between us is the same distance it's always been.
Two lockers apart, close enough to talk without raising a voice.
Four years of pre-game silence and post-game assessments and the particular nonverbal language of two defensemen who've learned each other's timing so well that words become redundant.
"This is bullshit," he says. Not loud. Just factual.
"Yeah."
"You know that, right? Everyone knows. The guys are. We're all..." He stops. Runs a hand through his hair. "I just want to make sure you know it's bullshit."
"I know."
He nods. Looks at his hands. Looks at my bag. I can see him calculating the weight of it, the way I would. One bag. Seven years. The math doesn't work, and we both know it.
"Listen, before you go. Dinner. You and me, before you head out." He says it like it's simple, like two people eating a meal together is an uncomplicated thing. "Claire's been asking about you. She makes that salmon you like."
Claire. His wife. The salmon with dill. The dinner where I sit at their table and their kids run through the room and I watch the connection that is easy between them. A handful of dinners every year, and each time feels like I’m glimpsing the life I can’t have.
"Maybe," I say. "Things are moving fast with the transition."
He hears the deflection. I can tell because his jaw shifts, just slightly, the same micro-movement he makes on the ice when a play breaks down and he's resetting. He doesn't push.
Instead he stands. Crosses the two lockers between us. And pulls me in.
His arms come around my shoulders. Firm.
Warm. I stand inside it with my arms at my sides and my bag in one hand, and I don't know what to do.
My body doesn't know what to do. The last person who held me like this, without asking, without feeling like I had to hide myself. I can't remember who that was.
One hand comes up. Late. Lands on his back for two seconds before dropping.
He steps away and wipes at his eyes, clears his throat. "Atlanta's lucky," he says. "They don't know it yet, but they are."
I nod, as if I agree, and pick up the bag. "Take care of yourself, Brennan."
"Yeah." His voice is rough. "You too, Avi."
The drive home takes eleven minutes. I go past the arena because the route requires it, and I keep my eyes on the road. The building is on my right. Massive, familiar, the parking lot where I've parked a thousand times. I don't look.
I look.
It's just a building. Glass and concrete and a logo I've worn on my chest for seven years. It doesn't look back.
At the condo, I pull out a moving box and a roll of tape.
I assemble the box. I take one book off the shelf, a collection of Finnish poetry my grandmother gave me, and place it inside.
The box is enormous around the single book, all that empty cardboard holding almost nothing.
Outside, the city keeps going. I stay where I am.