Chapter Five December #4
Or any dimensions, if he was being honest. Normally he handed them over and got them back in better condition than they started, and that was the end of the transaction.
He’d maybe heard some numbers in passing, but they’d seemed more…
normal than 7/16. He had an ear for numbers; he felt he’d have remembered that one.
“Seven-sixteenths,” the kid said again with a confident smile. “All the pros are doing it these days.”
Nick took a step back and looked around. Was he dreaming? Was this random kid at the friggin’ Columbia Ice Rink seriously telling him what the pros were doing?
“I’m serious, bro,” the kid said. He couldn’t be more than sixteen, probably a player on a local high-school team who they trusted with sharpening skates because who else would work at an ice rink at 10:00 p.m. except for some kid who lived down the street and wanted any excuse to make money and stay out on a school night?
“Everyone on my team does it. My girlfriend’s boyfriend plays for a college team, and all his boys do it. I’m telling you, it’s money.”
Nick wanted to point out that none of the people mentioned were professionals.
He wanted to say that he would prefer a more standard cut, because dicking around with something like that before a game probably wouldn’t go his way.
He also wanted to reach across and take his skates back, say he’d changed his mind, no thanks, and get them sharpened somewhere else.
Pressed for time and wanting this whole ordeal over with, what he actually said was, “Yeah, sure, fine. Do it.”
The kid looked happy but unsurprised that Nick had yielded to his obvious expertise. The whole time he sharpened Nick’s skates, Nick stood there in dread. This wasn’t a mistake, right? He wasn’t ruining his skates or his ability to use them, was he?
Well, if this is a mistake, I’ll at least know what the mistake was. If I hadn’t agreed, the kid might’ve done it anyway and then if I’d had a problem, I would’ve never known… Hell, if it worked out, I wouldn’t’ve known.
The kid winked as he slid them across the counter. “You’re gonna get a hatty today, bro.”
Nick snorted. He’d never even had a two-goal game, so the chances of suddenly scoring three were slim to none.
There were no hat tricks in his future, that was for damn sure.
“And I get my money back if I don’t, right?
” he grumbled and accepted the skates. Would it be bad form to inspect them right now?
“No refunds, bro. But I promise, if you don’t feel amazing after stepping on the ice, I’ll re-sharpen them for free.”
Nick looked at the clock. 9:45 p.m. Their game was at 10:15, and there was no way he could reasonably expect to be on his way home much before midnight. Even if by some miracle this kid was still here then, the sharpener would be shut down, and they’d be cleaning up.
“Thanks, kid,” he said all the same. Whatever. How bad could it be?
The whole ordeal made him late onto the ice to warm up, and he rushed through getting dressed so he could get some practice. He grabbed his stick, bolted onto the ice and—
THUD!
Instantly, he hit the ice hard. What the fuck?
He tried standing up and could even get his feet under him, but the second he tried to actually skate, it was impossible to do anything but fall.
Oh shit. Shit shit shit shit shit—
His fourth time landing on his knees, he looked up to find Brady towering over him.
“What’s wrong?” Brady asked, no-nonsense and straight to the point. “You hurt?”
“Just my pride,” he gritted out, cheeks burning.
“You lose a blade or something?” The genuine concern would normally make Nick’s heart melt, but now all it did was embarrass him more.
“At least that wouldn’t be my fault… I uh… I got a new cut and I can’t… uh, I can’t skate?”
“A new—a new cut?” Clearly this was beyond Brady’s understanding, a problem so far from his expectations that his bewilderment was almost comical. “What cut is it?”
“Seven-sixteenths?”
“Seven… seven-sixteenths? Is that even a cut? Why are you trying a new cut before a game? Why are you trying some random-ass cut like that ever?”
Nick wanted to defend himself and blame the persuasive kid, but he knew that wouldn’t cut it.
Pun unfortunately not intended.
“I don’t even know.” Nick accepted the hand Brady offered and was surprised how easily Brady pulled him up.
“You think you can skate with…” Brady looked at the scoreboard, counting down the minutes left before puck drop. “Uh… three minutes and twenty-ish seconds of practice?”
Nick took a tentative stride forward and almost ate it again. Only Brady’s solid grip kept him on his feet as he scrambled to keep his balance.
“That’s a huge no. Fuck, should I just… should I go back to the locker room? Should I tell Benns—?”
“What size skates do you wear?”
“Huh?”
Brady’s expression bore the determined resignation of someone who knew what they had to do and hated that they were the one who had to do it.
“What size skates do you wear?”
“Ten.”
A grimace, but otherwise he didn’t react. “I’m ten and a half. Come on, let’s get you to the bench.”
“Wha—?”
Strong arms guided him to the bench, pulled the door open, and forced him in. Nick, suddenly no more graceful on solid ground than he’d been on the ice, sat down like a sack of bricks. The path back to the locker room had never looked farther away.
“Jens, I can’t—”
Brady took a seat next to him, forcibly shoving him farther down the bench. He braced his right foot against the boards and started unlacing his skate. Nick watched in stunned silence until Brady pulled off his skate and shoved it into Nick’s chest.
Nick took it more out of reflex than actual understanding.
“Take off your damn skates,” Brady hissed and set to work on his other foot. “We got like two minutes.”
“You’re… trading skates with me?” he asked dumbly.
“Only if you fucking take yours off. Go.”
Nick jerked into motion, gently setting Brady’s skate aside and getting to work on his own.
His hands could barely work on the knot, couldn’t loosen the laces.
His heart was thudding in his ears, because this was ridiculously unnecessary of Brady.
Sweet, but unnecessary. Nick was the one who’d made a mistake. He could sit out a game if he had to.
I wonder if he would do this for anyone else on the team…
“What on Earth is going on?” Benns asked. He was still on the ice warming up but stopped in front of them, eyes wide as he took in two of his players trading skates.
“There was a problem. We’re taking care of it,” Brady said. “Put on another D pair for the start of the game.”
Though Benns looked puzzled and definitely wanted to pry, the refs blew the whistle.
“We got a game or what?” one called to Benns.
“Yeeeah, okay. Lexi, Mags, you’re up.”
The game was barely a minute old when Nick clumsily finished lacing up Brady’s skates.
He wiggled his feet, weighted them a bit, and knew they were without a doubt too big for him.
Not much—he should be able to skate okay—but there was a noticeable amount of room in the toe.
If he stretched his toes as far as they go, they grazed the edge. Which meant…
“You sure those don’t hurt?” he asked nervously.
“It’s fine,” Brady gritted out. “I do a three-quarters cut, you should be okay. Take it easy your first shift ’til you get used to them.”
“Right. Thanks, man.” Once again, his stupid brain wouldn’t cooperate. He should say more, right? This deserved more. “I owe you a beer,” he said and yeah, that was better, but still dumb.
“You owe me a fucking pitcher,” Brady said and jumped over the boards. Lexi took his place beside Nick, eyeing him curiously like he wanted to say something but keeping his mouth shut.
Thankfully, his own turn to hit the ice came a moment later, and Nick rushed out to avoid the awkwardness of any potential questions.
The skates were… okay. They didn’t feel right, and they did bother him a bit.
Most of the time he was too caught up in the game, too busy trying to get into position or move the puck or otherwise successfully hockey.
He didn’t put a point on the board, but he wasn’t out for any goals by the other team, either, so he was more than happy to call this whole debacle a wash.
To his credit, Brady looked as amazing as ever.
His skating was flawless, his defensive work didn’t allow a goal and barely any shots, and he even assisted on Donno’s breakaway goal.
On the bench, he would quietly rest his head on the boards and position his legs so that there was no weight on his feet.
Gail took over the role of nudging him into action for line changes, and not once did he complain or slow down.
Obviously, Nick felt like crap about it.
The buzzer sounded, and mercifully this travesty of a night could end.
Brady was the first one through the handshake line (after Guy, of course) and off the ice before he’d even gotten his water bottle or extra stick.
Nick dutifully balanced his own extra gear with Brady’s and found him in the locker room, massaging his feet like he was trying to rub life back into them.
“I could do that for you,” Nick half-joked. “In case you want options other than a pitcher of beer.”
When he’d pushed into the locker room, Brady had looked grim and serious in a way reminiscent of when they’d first met.
He’d looked unapproachable, closed off from the world, like he would find any interruption bothersome.
And then he’d heard Nick’s voice, and he’d visibly softened.
The line of his shoulders relaxed, and his expression went from “stiff statue” to “actual living human being.”
It was a strange transformation. The end result was beautiful, but it surprised him that the grumpy Brady he’d originally met was still hiding in there.
That might be the Brady that a lot of the world knew and interacted with regularly, but Nick was lucky enough to get to see the real Brady, the softer version that would trade skates with a friend even if it hurt him.
“I want the beer,” Brady said firmly, the barest hint of color to his cheeks that could have easily been from the cold or the exercise.
“Yeah, figured. I’d probably just hurt your feet more if I tried to massage them. There an NHL game coming up you wanna meet up for?”
“Can’t.” Brady tossed Nick’s skates across the room.
They landed on Nick’s abandoned hockey bag, and it sounded uncannily like the wind going out of his sails.
“Heading up to Pittsburgh tomorrow morning and won’t be back for a bit.
Saved up my vacation time so I wouldn’t have to drive up when everyone else is traveling. ”
“Oh. Smart.” This would be it for a while. Rough, considering they hung out, well… a lot. “Guess I’ll, uh… text you?”
That sounded lame. Great, his last conversation with Brady before he disappeared hundreds of miles away was dumb because Nick was a mess.
“Yeah, I figured,” Brady said. “Pens play the Caps on like the twenty-seventh. I assume you’ll be bitching to me about the loss.”
“Fuck you, we’re gonna win.”
“Big words. You going to the game?”
“I fucking will now.”
“Uh huh. Game’s in Pittsburgh.”
Nick colored a little, embarrassed he’d let Brady trick him like that. “…well then no, probably not.”
Brady laughed, the sound filling the space enough that Nick couldn’t hear the other conversations in the background. It felt like it was just the two of them, alone.
“Gimme my skates back so I can get home and sleep,” Brady said.
“Riiight. Yeah. Thanks again, man—”
“It’s fine so long as this never happens again. I don’t think my feet can handle it.”
“Well, next time I’ll have gloves that are so small that I can barely get my hands in. And then maybe it’ll be a jersey that doesn’t cover my gear. Or I’ll forget my cup—”
“Do not. I’m going to require equipment inspections before every game. I got the A; I can make it happen.”
“Then half the team won’t pass. Mags doesn’t even wear shoulder pads half the time. Lexi’s elbow pads are held together by duct tape. That’s not an exaggeration, I saw him put the tape on them.”
“That is unfortunately all true.”
“So rain check on the beer?”
“Yeah. ’Til next year.”
“Yep, next year…”
I’ll miss you while you’re gone.
When Nick handed Brady back his skates, he couldn’t quite say the words out loud. But he did have the growing hope that maybe Brady might miss him, too.