Chapter 16 #2
She pulled out two mugs—the ones with faded cartoon bears we'd had since I was in elementary school—and set them on the counter. Dropped a tea bag in each. The kettle started its slow climb toward boiling.
I sat at the table and waited.
Mom wiped down the already-clean counter, rearranged the salt and pepper shakers, and adjusted the dish towel hanging from the oven handle. When the kettle finally whistled, she poured water into both mugs.
She brought the mugs to the table, set one before me, and sat across from me. Steam rose between us, fogging the bottom half of her glasses.
We both watched our tea steep.
"You should add milk before you forget," she said.
"I drink it black now."
"Since when?"
"A few years."
"Oh." She added milk to hers—two splashes, no more—and stirred. The spoon clinked against ceramic. "I didn't know that."
She took a sip, set the mug down, picked up the spoon, and stirred again.
"I saw the Chronicle photo," she said, not looking at me. "New Year's Eve. You and your—" She stopped. "Your friend."
There it was.
I pulled the tea bag out of my mug and set it on the spoon rest she'd put between us. "His name's Hog. He's my boyfriend."
Mom's spoon stopped moving. She set it down carefully, precisely aligned with the edge of her placemat.
"Okay," she said.
That was it. Okay.
She removed her glasses and wiped the steam off with the corner of her cardigan. Put them back on and looked at me directly for the first time since I'd sat down.
"He looks kind," she said, and her voice was softer. "In the photo. He was smiling."
"He is kind." I wrapped my hands around the mug, the heat seeping into my palms. "He's also loud and complicated and takes up more space than any person should physically be able to take up. But yeah. He's kind."
"That's good." She sipped her tea. "Kind matters more than people think."
We sat with that for a moment. Outside, someone's dog barked twice and went quiet.
"Your father—" Mom paused. "He would have—" She stopped again, staring into her mug. "I don't know what he would have thought."
"I don't either."
"Does that bother you?"
I thought about Dad's hand under mine, cool and still. About thirty years of being told what I was supposed to want without anyone asking what I actually did want.
"Not anymore," I said.
She nodded slowly. "You're building a good life. The business, the coaching, the—" She paused. "Everything. It's good."
"Thanks, Mom."
"Is he—" She picked up her spoon again, set it down. "Is he staying? In Thunder Bay?"
"I don't know. His team might get sold. Moved." I sipped the tea. "We're figuring it out."
I finished my tea, stood, and brought my mug to the sink. Rinsed it and set it in the dish drainer.
"I should go," I said. "Need to get back to the Underwood job early tomorrow."
"Of course." She stood and smoothed her cardigan again. "Thank you for coming. For sitting with him."
"Call me if anything changes."
"I will."
When I stepped onto the porch, I turned back.
Mom looked smaller in the doorway—tired and sad, trying to hold herself together with tea and sheer stubbornness.
"I'm glad you're happy," she said. "With your friend. With Connor. I'm glad."
My jaw tensed. "Thanks, Mom."
I kissed her cheek—quick, the way we'd always done it—and walked to my truck.
The engine turned over on the second try. I sat there for a moment, watching her close the door.
My boyfriend.
I'd said it out loud to my mother, in the kitchen where I'd eaten ten thousand meals and learned that some things were easier not to talk about.
And she'd said okay.
Relief flooded me—warm and disorienting, like stepping into heated air after hours in the cold. Underneath it was something else. A distance that had always been there but was even more apparent now.
She was glad I was happy.
That was something.
It wasn't enough, but it was something.
I pulled out of the driveway and headed toward my apartment, past the shuttered tourist shops on Red River Road and the marina where boats sat locked in ice, past the Common Thread's dark windows.
Somewhere behind me, my father was dying.
I didn't plan to go to the game.
Planned to drive home, heat up something frozen, and maybe text Hog that I was fine even though we both knew I wasn't. Instead, I took the long way. Then made it longer. Turned down streets I hadn't driven in years, past the high school where I'd learned I wasn't leaving.
When I finally looked up, I was in the Fort William Gardens parking lot.
The arena sat squat and ugly against the night sky—half the floodlights out, paint peeling around the main entrance, a building that got the job done without trying to be pretty about it. Cars were still pulling in, late arrivals hustling toward the doors with scarves wrapped around their faces.
Storm versus North Bay. Thursday night hockey. Nothing special.
Through the windshield, I watched people stream into the building. Hog would be skating inside.
I exited the truck before I could talk myself out of it.
The cold hit immediately—breath-stealing, face-numbing cold that made my eyes water. I pulled my hood up and shoved my hands in my pockets, joining the stream of people heading for the entrance.
The guy at the ticket window looked half-asleep. "Standing room only, bud. Fifteen bucks."
I handed him a twenty and pocketed the change.
I climbed the stairs to the upper level and found a spot against the back wall where I could stand without anyone noticing me. Pulled my hood down just enough to see but not enough to be seen.
The teams were already on the ice for warm-ups—the Storm in their home whites and North Bay in dark blue. I spotted Hog immediately—impossible not to with his size and presence—skating lazy circles with Desrosiers, stick tapping the ice every few strides.
He looked loose, easy, and alive.
For two hours, I'd sat in a room that smelled like death, watching my father struggle to breathe while machines beeped and dripped and measured the distance between living and not. Here, Hog crashed into the boards chasing a loose puck during warm-ups and came up laughing.
The horn blew. Players cleared the ice. The Zamboni made its slow circuit while the crowd hummed with restless energy.
I stayed against the wall, arms crossed, anonymous in a sea of Storm jerseys and hopeful faces.
The game started fast.
Jake won the opening face-off, snapping a pass to Evan, who sent it deep. The puck bounced around the North Bay zone for thirty seconds before their defenseman cleared it with a weak shot that Branson—the Storm's backup goalie—caught easily.
First shift. The moment the puck dropped, everything about Hog changed. The easy warmth vanished, replaced by something focused and dangerous. He wasn't the guy who baked banana bread or knitted tiny whales. He was the guy who made other guys think twice.
North Bay's center tried to chip the puck past him. Hog stepped up, shoulder to chest, and the guy went down like he'd been shot. It was a clean hit—all timing and positioning—but brutal. The crowd roared.
"THAT'S IT, HOG!" someone yelled from three rows down.
Hog skated back to the bench, not even breathing hard.
North Bay scored first—a power-play goal off a screen that Branson never saw. The Storm tied it up six minutes later when Jake deked around two defenders and went top shelf. The crowd exploded, and I started to forget anything outside of the arena.
Second period, Hog dropped the gloves.
Their fourth-liner had been running his mouth all night, taking liberties in the corners, crosschecking Pickle every chance he got. Finally crossed a line—elbow to Pickle's head, late and high—and Hog was on him before the whistle finished blowing.
No preamble. No trash talk. Just gloves off, jersey grabbed, and punches landing before the other guy knew what was happening.
Hog caught him twice in the jaw. The guy got one in return—Hog's head snapped back—then Hog pulled him close and landed three more before the linesmen got between them.
Both players to the box. Five minutes each.
The crowd was on its feet. I was on my feet, I realized. My heart was pounding like I'd taken the hit myself.
Hog skated to the penalty box with his jersey half over his head, blood on his knuckles, and the crowd chanting his name.
In the hospice room, my father's hands had been still, mottled and cool to the touch.
Here, Hog had split knuckles, bleeding, and was very much alive.
The Storm killed the penalty, then scored shorthanded when Evan picked off a pass and went coast-to-coast. Two-one Storm. The building shook.
In the third period, Jake scored again—a wrist shot from the slot that went bar-down, the kind of goal that gets replayed forever.
Pickle sealed it with an empty-netter in the final minute, and the building shook like the whole city needed to remember how to cheer. Four-two. Storm victory.
The team mobbed Branson at the net—gloves flying, sticks raised, that moment of pure joy that made everything else worth it. Hog was in the middle of it, one arm around Pickle's shoulders, the other pumping his stick in the air.
The crowd cheered—the full-throated roar of people who'd needed this on a Thursday night in late January.
The players saluted the crowd. Hog skated past the section where I stood—too high up and too far back for him to see me, but I saw him. Saw the blood on his jersey, split knuckle, and the grin that said he'd do it all again tomorrow.
I stayed until most of the crowd had cleared out and the maintenance guys started sweeping popcorn from the aisles. Then I pulled my hood back up and headed for the exit.
Outside, the cold bit hard. My breath fogged in front of me, and I heard car doors slamming somewhere across the parking lot and engines turning over.
I walked toward my truck, keys in hand, and realized I didn't want to go home yet. I didn't want to sit alone in my apartment in silence and with the knowledge that Sloane would call when it was time.