Home Ice (Top Tier #4)

Rafe

Chapter one

The passing lane to Varga closed about half a second before I would have used it. My body pivoted, and I pulled the puck back through my feet, let the defenseman commit to his read, and slid it to Heath on the far side. He buried the puck top shelf as if that had been the plan all along.

“That’s rude,” Varga announced to the entire rink. He bent over his stick at the far post, sweating through his practice jersey. “I was open.”

“You were not open,” Heath said.

“I was open in theory.”

Coach Markel blew the whistle and waved the next group down. We circled back to the line, and my lungs informed me, politely, that eleven days off and Mom’s cooking would be two things I’d be paying for through the end of the week.

There were more reporters in the hallway than on any Tuesday in the fall. Camera operators staked out space where they could find it. It wasn’t hard to figure out why.

Rook and Varga coming out was the biggest story in hockey over the break. A photo Rook posted of Varga asleep on their couch under a cat that wasn’t even theirs went viral. Mark from PR described the numbers as “genuinely deranged.”

Trier glided in beside me at the line while we waited our turn. He looked me up and down.

“Good break?” he asked.

“Yeah. Went home. Quiet.”

“I can tell. You’ve got a farmer’s cut.”

“My mom’s neighbor does it,” I said. It was true, but I immediately regretted saying it.

Trier nodded. “A neighbor,” he repeated slowly. Somewhere behind us Varga was loudly continuing to proclaim he’d been open.

I took my rush. My legs were tired, but my hands were fine. The puck went where it was supposed to go, and for the moment, as long as I didn’t think about the rest of the morning, all was well.

I’d avoided thinking about it the entire drive in. I kept it up through stretching and the first three drills. A thing sat heavy on my chest, and it had been there since Saskatchewan, since a phone call with my agent on New Year’s Day where he’d asked me a question and I’d answered it honestly.

After the last drill, Varga skated up alongside me on the slow lap to the gate, not saying anything. Varga quiet was a little scary. He looked at me once and tipped his head toward the tunnel and the locker room beyond.

“Whenever,” he said. “I’m here. It’s your choice.”

Then he peeled off and yelled at Trier about the haircut comment, defending me at full volume. I skated the last thirty feet to the gate by myself.

The room was loud. Half the guys were lying to each other about how much they’d trained over the break, and there was a smell of fresh tape that I’d missed.

Heath was telling a story about Kieran’s dad and a snowblower that had at least three guys paused in their undressing, sitting there waiting for the ending.

I got to my stall and started on my skates. Varga sat down next to me. His stall was four down from mine, and he was in Pratt’s spot. Pratt looked at him, and Varga stared back. Pratt moved his shower stuff eight inches to the left and let it go.

Varga said nothing. He didn’t nudge me or start giving a speech. He just sat there beside me, taking up space and untaping a shin pad like it was a normal Tuesday.

The snowblower story ended. There was that lull in the noise. I stood, and I heard myself clear my throat and say, “Hey, can I say something real quick?”

I wasn’t loud, but the room was quiet. Twenty-odd guys in various states of undress all looked at me.

“I’m gay,” I said. “I wanted you guys to hear it from me. That’s it. That’s the whole announcement.”

There was one full second where nobody said anything.

My right hand shook, and then Cross nodded from his stall.

“Good. Okay,” he said. “Hey, while everyone’s listening—second unit, we’re changing the entry on the power play.

Markel’s going to walk us through it in video. It was soft all last month.”

And that was it. The sky didn’t fall.

“Come over for dinner next week after the road trip,” Heath said to me, pulling his practice jersey over his head and muffling the words. “Kieran’s doing the Korean short ribs.”

“Don’t miss my short ribs,” Kieran said, and threw me my water bottle. He went back to sorting his tape.

“Well,” Trier said. He looked at me for a long moment, and I braced for a comment. “This explains the haircut not at all. I want to be clear about that. I’m still looking for answers about the haircut.”

A couple of guys laughed. Varga, next to me, leaned forward and whispered, just for me, “See?” Then he spoke at full volume to the room. “He still has a character flaw. He’s passing to Heath when I’m wide open.”

“You were not open,” Heath said.

Rook said nothing at all. He was across the room at his own stall, working at his laces, and when I glanced over, he was looking back at me with a slight smile on his face. He gave me a half-nod and went back to his skates.

My hands needed something to do, so I set my gloves up on the shelf of my stall and squared them to the edge until the cuffs sat even with the lip of the shelf.

I had a strange feeling, a little like stepping off a plane after a long flight.

You’re happy to know the ground is right where it should be, but your legs are still a little shaky, thinking there might be another step down.

Coach Markel stuck his head in the door. “Video in ten,” he said. “Second power play unit, especially.”

Everyone groaned and started to move. I got up and moved with them.

The designers of the practice facility’s video room understood hockey players.

The chairs were comfortable enough to sit in for forty minutes, but not comfortable enough to sleep in.

I took my usual seat, second row, and Varga dropped into the one beside me with a coffee he’d gotten from somewhere. I didn’t ask.

Coach Markel ran the session the way he ran everything: exactly forty minutes of material with no extra padding.

He didn’t talk about the break being over or share a story about his holiday.

The lights went down, and the power play from our last game before the holiday went up.

He let it play for about eleven seconds before he paused it.

“Okay. Second unit. What’s wrong with this picture?”

“We don’t have the puck,” Trier said.

“That’s the ending. I’m asking about the beginning.” He walked it back. “Entries. We’ve been carrying it in soft all month, right into their pressure, and then we’re surprised when the pressure pushes back. That’s going to change. We’re going to a bump-back at the line. Rafe.”

I sat up straight.

“Your entry, December thirtieth.” The clip changed. There I was, carrying it up the wall, and I watched myself hit the line just as their defenseman stepped up. I didn’t force it. I pulled it back, found the bump to Heath, and we came in behind their pressure with all five guys attached.

“That,” Coach Markel said. “Whatever that was, that’s the entry now. You saw it close, and you didn’t argue with it. Half this team argues with it.” He looked around the dark room. “Don’t argue with a closed door. There’s always another door to open. Questions?”

I looked at the clip frozen up there, and I wrote bump-back at the line in my notes app. I tried to ignore the eyes focused on me.

“Question,” Varga said, raising his hand. “Play it for four more seconds.”

Coach Markel hit play and stopped after four seconds ticked off.

“There,” Varga said. “Freeze. Who is that in the middle of the ice, alone, unguarded, ready for a one-timer, waving his stick like he’s trying to land a plane?”

“It’s you,” said half the room.

“It’s me. And where does the puck go? To Heath. On the wall. I’m just saying, if we’re watching film, let’s watch all of it. Let’s have the entire conversation.”

“You had two guys sagging into your lane,” Cross said, from the front row, without turning around. “Mikkelsen made the right play. Next slide.”

That was that. Cross was captain. Varga slumped back and muttered something in Hungarian. Under it, he knocked his knee against mine—you good?—and I knocked back, yeah. The video continued for twenty more minutes.

The lights came up and chairs began scraping. Varga appeared at my side and clapped me on the shoulder. “Come on. Media’s in the hallway, and if you stand next to me nobody asks you anything. I’m very loud.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“It’s a service I offer for free.”

Painted cinderblock lined the hallway outside the video room, with a sponsor board bolted to the wall. A dozen or so media stood in a loose semicircle under the lights they brought. Varga stood next to me, beaming.

They wanted him first. He waded in, and I stood just behind him in a little pocket of shadow thrown by his broad shoulders. The camera lights put out heat, a small dry summer you stepped in and out of, and the phones came up to chin height in a ragged row.

“Lucas, did you imagine the league would have such a positive response?”

“No.”

A beat while the reporter waited for more.

“Any advice for young players watching how this room—“

“Play better. Next question.”

“The cat photo got four million—“

“The cat’s not even ours. Next.”

Varga’s voice echoed off the cinderblock, and the scrum laughed and shuffled. The boom mic dipped low enough that Varga swatted at it like a mosquito.

I was almost out the far side of it when one of the beat guys, Deckert, a decent guy I’d met in the fall, turned and found me. “Rafe, the guys in the room were talking this morning like there was some news from you today. Anything you want to say about that?”

Every phone and camera swung toward me at once.

“Yeah,” I said. “I told the guys this morning that I’m gay. Wanted them to hear it from me first, and they did, and then Cross changed the power play, so.” A couple of them laughed. “Honestly, the power play was bigger news for us.”

“How are you feeling about—“