Chapter 24 Dawson
The diner echoes with Harper’s absence, even though business is as bustling as ever.
Maybe more, as we approach winter break and midterms. My fellow juniors can keep one booth monopolized for hours, taking advantage of endless Diet Coke refills and picking at a plate of cooling onion rings while they quiz each other with AP Bio flashcards.
I have to force laughs and lie about how hard I’m studying in the back. I couldn’t be less focused on midterms.
All I can think about is Harper.
Honestly, it’s a good thing she’s not working this week, because I have no idea what I’d say to her if she were here.
I want to apologize, and I want to ask her if she meant what she said, but I don’t know how to say any of it.
Even though the idea of talking to her makes me freeze in panic, I still want her to be there.
Like I’m going through some sort of weird withdrawal.
With every table I bus and burger I plate, the same questions keep cycling through my mind. Why isn’t she there? Is she avoiding me?
I need to get her out of my system. I’m doing my best to keep my head totally clear at practice to convince Dan that I deserve to play in Friday’s game.
I need to play in Friday’s game. If I don’t, I’m going to smell like onion rings forever.
Instead of learning how to pass and shoot with the pros, the only skills I’ll be honing are tomato slicing and lettuce draping.
I arrive early for the Northview game so I can center myself, blasting the country music Harper always mocked in the locker room and trying not to think about the podcasts she’s always listening to. “Good luck,” Scott the Zamboni driver says with a twinkle when I pass him his bribery pumpkin pie.
And then I slice onto the ice, one smooth stroke after another, hoping the calm I always feel here will kick in.
Long loops of the rink, easy does it. Just getting my skates back under me, getting the rhythm in my bones.
Letting all the training and studying over the last few weeks settle into my muscle memory.
For a minute, I find the peace I had at the start of the season.
When Harper was just a vaguely annoying, pretty coworker, when my whole career was still in front of me, when Coach Red held all the keys to my future—
“Dawson!”
I blink. It takes me a minute to resurface from my trance. Am I still daydreaming? Because the voice shouting my name sounds like Coach Red’s. That even looks like his bushy mustache in the stands, his oversized leather bomber jacket.
“Coach?”
The title falls easily from my lips, even if he hasn’t been my coach in months.
Because he is here—when his mustache twitches above his grin, I know for sure.
I guess the school can’t keep him away from a public game, and seeing him in the bleachers fills me with an unexpected warmth.
My shoulders release an extra inch as worry I didn’t even know I was holding drains from my muscles.
I skate closer, and Red gestures at the guy next to him. “Dawson, meet my friend Leo. Leo, this is that forward I told you about. He’s going places. You’re going to love seeing him play.”
My pulse races. Time slows.
Leo. His friend, the scout.
Is here. Is going to watch me play.
As long as Coach Dan still lets me play.
A little of the warmth drains from my chest. Because Coach Dan is the one who should be making calls and inviting scouts around here.
Red isn’t acting like someone who’s been fired. What’s going on?
“It’s great to see you, sir,” I say. I do my best to keep my voice level and professional.
What’s the etiquette for meeting up with your fired ex-coach?
Dad didn’t prepare me for this. “I think you’re going to be proud of what we’ve done this season.
We’ve been trying out this new lineup, and Alex has really improved—”
“Sure, I bet,” Red says. His voice is distracted.
He turns back to the scout, bending toward him as if he’s saying something confidential, but his voice is still loud enough for me to hear.
“It’s a solid team, but most of the players are mediocre.
Every year there’s at least one to watch, though.
This year it’s Dawson here. One of the highest scorers Hamilton Lakes has ever seen, and a damn hard worker.
Any team would be lucky to have him. You know his dad is Randall Dawson? ”
The scout’s eyes flick over me, and I do my best to smile even though my gut is churning.
I should be happy. I’m getting the recognition that I craved at the start of the season.
Red has come through just like I knew he would.
And his good opinion used to fill me with pride—where’s that warm glow in my chest? But…
Has Red always been like this? Putting me on a pedestal at the expense of everyone else? Alex is good, okay? Maybe he’s not quite as good, but he deserves attention. But Red is only highlighting me.
I frown. He probably has always been like this.
But I never saw it until today. Not until I’d been coached by Dan for the last few weeks and gotten to see his strategy.
The way he mixed up our lines, the way he gave guys like Alex and Patrick and Louis as much coaching as the rest of us.
The way they’ve improved as a result, shooting percentages skyrocketing.
Maybe Harper was right about our team. Maybe I really was acting like I was better than some of the other guys—because Red treated me that way. Because I was afraid of not being the star he thought I was. Afraid of not proving my worth to everyone around me.
The stands are starting to fill with students, a wave of blue for the home team against Northview’s red and black. I hear my name a few times, raise my hand in a distracted wave.
Red’s grinning, looking around at the crowd. “Built this program from the ground up and look at it now! This team’s going to have a great season. Just wait. Incredible game ahead tonight.”
I mumble a goodbye as I turn away. Red doesn’t even notice.
Everything feels blurry and distant, like I’m watching it through thick glass.
I used to idolize this guy. But right now he just seems…
sad. Sad that he’s clinging to his own ego after he’s been knocked down a peg.
Sad that he’s acting like he’s the one responsible for the success of the program when it’s so, so clear that it was a team effort.
The wind’s knocked out of me.
He’s what Harper was always warning me about. The guy clinging to his glory days.
I was getting a little too close to turning into him.
Until I started hanging out with Harper, I didn’t realize how much of my own success was a team effort too.
The coaching from both Red and Dan, the edge that Noah gave me, the quiet support from Alex, Ryan’s reminders not to take myself too seriously on the hard days.
I take a deep breath, letting the sharpness of the cold pierce my lungs. Everything comes into crystal clear focus.
Ryan skates out for warm-ups, grinning, arms outstretched like the hockey messiah Harper once accused me of being. At first I just give him a distracted smile—but then my eyes snag on the dozens of bracelets loading his arms.
“Want a spirit bracelet?” he asks. “We have everyone’s number, or plain blue. Some have slogans on them. Ooh, but my favorites are the ones with little skates!” He dangles them in the air with the fervor of a man who’s just been gifted his first friendship bracelet.
A little silver coin hangs from the end of each one. It looks like…
I skate closer. “Can I see one of those?”
When I get a closer look, heart in my throat, I confirm it: They’re Harper’s. That’s her little BB engraving on the insignia, Beads by Braedon. “Harper’s making spirit bracelets?”
My voice comes out more desperate than I intend. Because if Harper’s making spirit bracelets, maybe she doesn’t totally hate me. Maybe she’s even sending me some sort of sign.
My pulse kicks up. Is she sending me some sort of sign? But why wouldn’t she just talk to me?
Ryan smirks. “I don’t know, some girl gave them to me… about five feet tall, long brown hair… pretty green eyes?”
“Don’t mess with me today, man.” I shake my head. “I’m too fragile.”
“Yeah, okay!” Ryan holds up his hands defensively. I wonder how crazy the gleam in my eye is. “Harper made them. She was selling them in the lobby with Marissa and Sabrina. They’re quite a trio.”
My mind spins. If Marissa’s helping her, did Harper tell her about me? Did she tell her all the shitty stuff I did and said, and did she tell her the good parts too?
I want to dash outside to ask her everything myself. To tell her everything I’ve been thinking but—stupidly, so stupidly—not saying.
Mostly, I’m sorry.
“Be careful Coach doesn’t see you wearing them,” Ryan says. “You know there’ll be hell to pay if one of these breaks on the ice and someone’s skates hit a bead. Oh man, oh man, I can see the injuries now—”
I cut him off, voice tight. “Got it. Gimme the bracelets, bro.”
Ryan presses a handful of bracelets into my palm, and I slide them onto my wrist one at a time.
One says FLY HIGH, HAWKS.
Another, decorated with tiny birdcages, makes me laugh. BIRD POOP = GOOD LUCK, in tiny letters. No one but Harper could come up with that peppy slogan.
And one says TRUST YOUR TEAM.
I have to swallow down the lump in my throat.
Red had it all wrong. It’s not just about being the best and not wasting your talent.
It’s about showing up for people. Like the community is doing for us today. Because that’s what community does.
Harper always knew that. In the car after Skate Night, she was trying to get me to see how amazing my team is—how special it is to have the guys on my side no matter what, always having my back.
What it meant to have community support like this.
Because she wasn’t used to getting the same treatment.
I knew I was lucky, but I’ve kind of been taking it for granted. Almost forgetting the most important thing Dad taught me.
That talent’s not worth anything if you don’t use it for the guys on your team.