Chapter 4 Avi
The remaining questions arrive over the next two days, in no particular order and with no regard for time zones or normal texting hours.
It is, in fact, that hot. I have no idea how the ice will hold up.
Hot. Not sure about the ice. Should be fine.
Fine like actually fine or fine like hockey-player-fine where fine means terrible but you're being stoic about it
I stare at this for longer than the question deserves.
Adequate.
lmaooo adequate. I'm quoting that in every interview. "Ikonen describes Atlanta's ice as adequate." They'll put it on a banner.
I don't respond to that. But I also don't put the phone down.
The pattern establishes itself. He sends a question, usually three to four sentences longer than necessary, with context and tangents and follow-ups embedded in the original message.
I respond in one or two sentences. He reacts to my responses that suggest he's reading more into them than I intended, and the strange thing is he's usually right. People rarely pick up on that.
Question 8 is about the defensive pairings. He wants to know if I've heard anything about who they're targeting, what the blueline might look like. I tell him what Laura's told me, which is general. He asks a follow-up about my playing style that's more specific than I expect from a forward.
You're a left shot, right? Do you have a preference on your partner or are you good either way
I've played with both. I adjust.
That's the most defenseman answer I've ever heard.
Question 9 is about the city itself. Restaurants, neighborhoods, whether I have opinions. I don't have opinions. I've been to Atlanta once and ate at the hotel.
You ate at the HOTEL? Ikonen. Avi. This is a crisis. Atlanta has incredible food. I've been researching. I have a list.
You have a napkin list of restaurants too?
I have SEVERAL napkin lists. I'm a napkin list guy. It's a system.
I feel a pull at the corner of my mouth that I register only because I'm sitting alone in my kitchen and there's no one to hide it from. I'm not a person who smiles at text messages. I'm not a person who smiles much at all, if I'm honest about it.
Question 11 arrives at midnight. I'm reading, or trying to. The book is open on my chest and the phone buzzes on the arm of the couch.
Ok this one's not a question. I just want to say that I know this whole situation is weird and probably not how you wanted your summer to go. And I know we don't know each other. But I'm glad you picked up the phone the other day. For what it's worth.
I read it twice. The second time slower. There's nothing to analyze. No angle, no professional maneuvering. Just a person saying a thing that appears to be true.
I type and delete three responses.
For what it's worth, I'm glad I picked up too.
I send it before I can reconsider, then put the phone face-down on the couch and stare at the ceiling crack for ten minutes, which is how I know it bothers me. Not what I said. The fact that I meant it.
Three days after the first text, my phone buzzes while I'm washing dishes.
IT'S OFFICIAL. Signed this morning. I'm a Firebird. I'm IN.
Below it, a photo. Ash at a table, pen in hand, grinning at the camera with such unguarded happiness that it makes me look away and then look back.
A Phoenix jersey is laid out behind him.
He looks like a person who has just gotten exactly what he wanted, and it strikes me that I don't know what that feels like. Not recently.
Welcome.
LET'S GO. Ok I still have three questions left but they can wait. We'll figure it out when we're both there. You ARE coming right? Please tell me you're coming and not retiring or something.
I set the phone on the counter. The dish soap is still on my hands. Outside the window, Philadelphia is doing what it always does, being a city that used to be mine and isn't anymore.
I dry my hands. Pick up the phone.
I'll be there.
That night I open my laptop and book a one-way flight to Atlanta and get back to packing.
I tape another box, this one heavier. Not full, but close.
Books, a few kitchen things, the blanket from the couch that I tell myself is practical to keep.
My grandmother's photo is on the counter, leaning against the wall, not packed because I haven't decided which box it goes in yet.
Which room of some unseen, unknown place I will move to.
I want to put it where I can see it, which is not a thing I would have said about many of my possessions before this week.
The condo is still quiet. Still mostly the same.
But there are four boxes now where there was one, and a flight confirmation in my inbox, and somewhere in California a person I've never met is packing too, heading toward the same city for reasons that overlap with mine but aren't the same.
He chose this. I was pushed. Yet, we arrive at the same place.
I don't know what to make of that. I don't know what to make of a lot of things. It isn't much, but the boxes are packed and the flight is booked and for the first time in weeks, I'm moving in a direction instead of standing still.