Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
étienne
The locker room hummed with pregame energy—the kind that got under your skin during the hour before puck drop and didn’t let go until you were out on the ice.
Guys were moving through their rituals, half dressed in gear, the air thick with the smell of tape adhesive and that particular musk of hockey equipment that never quite went away no matter how thoroughly the equipment managers cleaned it.
I grabbed my stick tape from my stall and headed straight for Marco’s.
He was already there, right leg propped up on the bench, leaning into a hamstring stretch that looked painful even from across the room. His face was calm, focused inward the way it always was before a game. Pregame Marco was quiet Marco, and I’d learned years ago not to take it personally.
“Move over.” I settled onto the bench beside him without waiting for permission.
He shifted his leg without breaking his stretch, making room. Didn’t even look at me. Didn’t need to.
I pulled the first strip of tape and started wrapping my stick blade, the motion automatic after twenty-two years of doing it the exact same way.
White tape, overlapping each layer by half, starting from the heel and working toward the toe.
My dad had taught me this when I was six, back before everything with him got complicated.
It was maybe the only thing he’d taught me I still did his way.
Marco switched legs, dropping into another stretch. His jaw was tight. It always was before Columbus games. They’d beaten us twice last season, and Marco took every loss personally. Especially losses where he’d been on the ice for a goal against.
“You’re tense.” I kept my eyes on my tape job.
“I’m stretching.”
“You’re tense while stretching. Your shoulders are up by your ears.”
He exhaled and deliberately dropped his shoulders. “Better?”
“Slightly less gargoyle-like.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile, but close enough.
I finished the first layer of tape and started the second.
The rhythm was soothing—pull, wrap, smooth, pull, wrap, smooth.
I’d tried taping my stick at my own stall once, early in my first season with Colorado.
It had felt wrong, like showing up for a family dinner at the wrong house.
I’d lasted maybe ten minutes before wandering over to Marco’s and settling in like I belonged there.
Turned out, I did.
“Belov’s doing the thing again.” I nodded toward our goalie, who was standing in front of his stall, having what appeared to be a very serious conversation with his blocker.
Marco glanced over, still in his stretch. “Is he blessing it or threatening it?”
“Hard to say. Could go either way.”
“Last game, he kissed it three times before putting it on.”
“Yeah, but the game before that, he threw it across the room.”
“Volatile relationship.”
“Very passionate.” I grinned and finished my tape job, running my thumb along the blade to smooth out any bubbles. Perfect, as always. “You think it’s harder being married to Belov or being his equipment?”
“Equipment doesn’t have to listen to him talk about his save percentage.”
“Fair point.”
Marco straightened up from his stretch and reached for his shin pads. He adjusted the left one, frowned, and fumbled with the strap.
I set my stick aside and leaned over. “Here.”
He didn’t argue, just let me untwist the strap—easy fix, but Marco’s pregame focus made him clumsy with the small stuff sometimes. His brain was already on the ice, reading plays that hadn’t happened yet, already three steps ahead of everyone else in the building.
I tightened the strap to exactly the tension he liked. Snug but not cutting off circulation. I’d watched him do this enough times to know.
“Thanks,” he said quietly.
“No problem.”
I settled back and grabbed my stick again, starting on the knob tape.
Marco continued gearing up beside me, and we fell into the comfortable silence that came from three years of doing this dance together.
I knew when he’d reach for his elbow pads—after shin pads, before shoulder pads, always in that order.
I knew he’d check his skate laces twice, even though they were fine.
I knew he’d put his jersey on right before we headed out for warm-ups, because he hated wearing it in the locker room.
Just like he knew I’d tape my stick at his stall. I’d wrap the knob exactly twelve times. Bounce my leg when I got antsy, and that meant I needed to move, needed to do something with the energy building under my skin.
“You want to run the Columbus power play?” he asked, pulling on his shoulder pads.
“You’ve already memorized it.”
“Doesn’t hurt to talk through it.”
Which meant yes, he wanted to talk through it, because talking through plays was how Marco’s brain worked. He had to verbalize everything, had to build the game plan out loud before he could execute it on the ice.
Different from me. I learned by doing, by feeling my way through situations, by trusting my instincts in the moment. My father used to scream at me about it. “You need to think! You need to use your head!” But thinking too much just messed me up. I played better when I let my body take over.
Or at least, I used to. Lately, my instincts felt broken. I’d second-guess myself, hesitate, miss reads I should’ve made automatically. The game that used to come naturally felt like moving through mud.
“Their first unit sets up with Cloutier at the point.” Marco strapped his chest protector into place. “He likes to walk the line, looking for the one-timer, but watch for the cross-ice pass to Morrison on the weak side.”
I nodded, but the information slid right past me. I was thinking about Papa’s call last night, about the stat sheet I’d seen this morning, about Coach Wilson’s tight expression when he’d looked at me during practice.
“Morrison’s got that quick release,” Marco continued. “So, when they set up, you’ll need to—” He stopped. “You’re not listening.”
“I’m listening.”
“What did I just say?”
I couldn’t answer.
Marco’s expression flickered—frustration, maybe, or disappointment—then smoothed back to neutral. “Never mind. Just watch Morrison on the weak side.”
“I will.” But we both knew that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that I couldn’t seem to focus on anything anymore. Not game plans, not opponent tendencies, not the fundamentals that used to come automatically.
Coach Wilson walked by, tablet in hand, and stopped when he saw us. “Savard. Tonight better be an improvement.”
“Yes, Coach.”
“I mean it. I need production from my first line, not passengers.” He kept walking.
Marco didn’t look at me. Just went back to his gear, the conversation clearly over. We both knew I was struggling. We both knew my first-line spot was in jeopardy. Talking about it wouldn’t change anything.
I finished my knob tape and tested the grip. Good. Solid. Ready.
Across the room, Kinnunen was rearranging his stall for the third time, muttering to himself. Equipment in perfect lines, stick propped at exactly the right angle, water bottles organized by fullness.
“Think Kinnunen’s going to make it through warm-ups without a nervous breakdown?” I asked.
Marco glanced over. “He’s been worse. Remember Minnesota?”
“Oh God, Minnesota.” I’d almost forgotten. “Didn’t he reorganize his stall four times?”
“Five. Wilson had to tell him to stop before he missed warm-ups.”
“And then he took that penalty thirty seconds into the first period.”
“Because his routine was off.” Marco shook his head. “Superstitions are wild.”
“Says the guy who won’t put his jersey on until the last possible second.”
“That’s not superstition. That’s comfort.”
“Whatever you say, man.”
The energy in the room was building now. Music pounded from someone’s speaker—something bass-heavy that vibrated in my chest. Guys were moving faster, talking louder, the pregame restlessness taking over. I felt it in my body, that need to move, to fly down the ice with the puck on my stick.
But I didn’t move yet. Marco wasn’t done gearing up, and I wouldn’t head back to my stall to dress until he was ready. He would follow me—always had and always would.
He reached for his skates and paused, his hand forming a fist.
“You good?” I asked.
He was quiet for a second. “Yeah. Just… thinking about that last game.”
The last game against Columbus. We’d lost 2–4. Not his fault that one of those goals had come when Marco was on the ice—weird bounce off the boards, nothing he could have done—but he’d still beaten himself up about it for three days afterward.
“That wasn’t on you,” I said.
“I should have—”
“Bad bounce. Random chance. Hockey gods being assholes.” I leaned my shoulder against his. “You played a solid game. They just got lucky.”
He didn’t argue, which meant he didn’t believe me but appreciated me saying it anyway.
That was Marco. Took every loss personally, carried every mistake, remembered every goal against like it was carved into his bones. I’d tried to talk him out of it for three years, and it had never worked. So now I just reminded him he was human and hoped some of it stuck.
“Tonight’s different,” I said. “We’re at home. We’re ready.”
“You sound like you’re trying to convince yourself.”
Maybe I was. “I just need to play better. That’s all.”
I stood and rolled my shoulders, feeling the pregame jitters starting to take over for real now. Couldn’t sit still anymore. Needed to move.
“I’m going to go gear up,” I announced. “You coming?”
“Give me two minutes.”
“Two minutes. Then I’m dragging you over there.”
“You can try.”
I grabbed my stick and headed for my stall, my pulse already picking up. Game days were what I lived for—that brief window of time when everything else fell away and the only thing that mattered was the puck and the ice and the clock counting down.
But even as I started gearing up, bouncing on my toes, part of my brain stayed back with Marco.