Chapter 4
4
Liam
W e won the Stanley Cup. In overtime. A god damn story book ending. Harrison scored the prettiest goal. A total sweetheart from behind the net. A little chip shot that had made its way over McNamera’s shoulder into the three-hole.
The goal light blew up and my soul left my body.
It might still be gone. It might never come back. Lifting that cup, passing it from teammate to teammate. Kissing it. Hugging the damn thing – it was a childhood dream come true.
My whole body was sticky from champagne and sweat. A fair number of tears. Call me whatever you want – the press probably would - but you stand in my skates and tell me you wouldn’t cry?
Bullshit.
Except all my happiness came with a dark cloud. The Bruisers winning, meant the Peaks lost.
I had won. My brother had lost.
It was all…what was that expression? Sour candy?
Drunk on victory and fighting tears, I showered with a champagne bottle in hand.
“To Rousseaux!” I shouted, and in the steam surrounding me, was the echo of my teammates joining me in my tribute. My brothers from another mother. My family. I loved these guys.
But right now, I especially loved Rousseaux.
The game had come down to goalies and our belligerent Quebecois was just better tonight. Stand-on-his-head, nothing-got-past-him good. I would tell him that once he got out of the ice bath. Poor guy’s groin was probably never going to be the same.
Pushing my face in the hot shower spray, I winced as the water met all the scrapes on my skin. It had been a battle tonight. Epic. I’d been right about my brother’s legs. They’d burned him out in games five and six. Putting it all on the line, and tonight, Wyatt had been good, but he was missing a step.
And no one knew how to capitalize on my brother missing a step quite like me. It almost didn’t seem fair. I knew my brother’s weaknesses better than I knew my own strengths.
Just like I knew right now he was beating himself up something vicious.
The music was pumping through the locker room and the party that they were putting together over at a Denver nightclub was going to be lit. It sucked that we’d won on enemy ice, but in some ways it was better, because tonight would just be our night, the team’s night.
Later we could celebrate with the fans back home.
I wondered if I could get my brother to go. Fuck winners and losers, we were still brothers. Although knowing Wyatt, he’d probably just want to feel shitty. Maybe break some shit.
But if instead he was surrounded by some pretty girls? A few drinks? All in the celebration of the brotherhood of hockey? Maybe he’d relax. Maybe he’d forgive himself for that second period and his tired legs.
Doubtful.
“Hey Liam!” Natalie Dempsey shouted from just beyond the row of showers in the visiting locker room. Natalie was our media relations expert and she’d been working overtime.
“Hello Natalie!” I shouted back at her. The steam was so thick in the shower room I knew she couldn’t see me, much less my junk. Not that it mattered. We were used to women in the locker room at this point. The only guys it seemed to bother were the corn-fed rookies, who stammered and blushed and put their hands over their business. Or the chauvinists who made a point of trying to make the female staff uncomfortable.
Whenever we got one of those, Rousseaux and I made a point of teaching him some manners.
The steam surrounding me echoed with all the guys saying hello to Natalie.
We were loose and giddy. Inside each of us was the kid who’d dreamt of this moment and we were letting that kid have his flowers.
“I just wanted to give you a heads up,” her voice drifted over to me. “Your brother is up next in the press room.”
I cranked off the water. Finished my champagne and went out to get dressed.
I wasn’t going to let him do that alone.
On the dais, in front of all those microphones, my brother looked… grumpy. I mean, he always looked grumpy. But this was a level of crestfallen that only losing on the biggest stage could give a guy.
It was an awful feeling being so happy for myself and so sad for him. For a second, just a second, I was glad my mom wasn’t here. These big hard feelings would tear her apart.
My dad was here though. Standing in the back of the room. Looking like a mall Santa on the off season. I caught his tear-filled eye and winked. It made him smile in the face of his sadness.
Because that’s what I did. That was my job in our family. I was the guy who brightened the mood. Changed the dynamic. I was the guy who made all those hard moments a little easier.
I stood in the back of that room and just let myself feel sad for my brother. Sad that Wyatt lost. Sad that he had to answer a bunch of stupid questions about it. Sad that he was answering those questions in a pair of Timberlands and hooded sweatshirt that he got on the one and only family vacation we took with our mom to Ft. Lauderdale when we were in high school.
It was his lucky sweatshirt.
Though, maybe not anymore.
It had a good run.
“Our guys were champions,” he said. His voice gruff with emotion. His playoff beard was dark with pinpricks of silver. “Total gladiators. I am proud of each and every one of them. We had a couple of calls that didn’t go our way. And frankly, Rousseaux played like a man possessed. We threw everything we had at him, but he was a brick wall tonight.”
The cameras flashed and the reporters all started yelling more questions at him. He pointed at Dick Dyer in the front row, which, frankly, was an odd choice. Dick was an instigator and not one of Wyatt’s favorite journalists. But Wyatt was clearly punishing himself for the loss.
“That second period?” Dick started.
“Not my best twenty minutes of hockey.” Wyatt said.
“You looked tired out there,” Dick said. “Dare I say-”
“Don’t fucking say it,” Wyatt said, but he said it like he was joking and the room laughed. Only I saw he was serious. Dick was suddenly on the endangered species list.
“What’s your question Dick?” Wyatt asked.
I laughed, enjoying the smear of shit my brother managed to put on the guy’s name.
“Does it make you think it’s time to call it quits? Go out with some pride?”
Before my brother could say anything, I cleared my throat and stepped forward. Which predictably resulted in an absolute fire storm of camera flashes. Everyone turned my way.
“I can answer that question,” I said. “The game of hockey needs Wyatt Locke. We need his experience and his heart and his professionalism. He’s no closer to hanging up his skates than I am. He’ll be back next year. Hungry, mean and on top of his game.”
“Liam!” one of the reporters shouted. “What are you feelings about your brother losing and your team winning?”
“It’s sour candy,” I said.
Everyone looked at me puzzled until finally Wyatt leaned into the mic and said; “He means bittersweet.”
My brother’s eyes met mine over the microphones.
I love you, I said with a nod. I’m sorry you lost.
He pursed his lips and nodded at me. I’m real proud of you, I love you, too.
And that was all we would ever say about it.
“Alright everyone, we’ll have a team meeting when we’re back in Portland on Monday. But tonight,” Coach Davis shouted to those of us still lingering in the family greeting area, “tonight is for a celebration. Be smart out there boys. Don’t do anything too dumb.”
Coach Davis looked right at me and I tried to play innocent. Everyone around us laughed at the joke.
Last year, when we lost in the playoffs, I rented a giant yacht off Cabo San Lucas and filled it with super models and my teammates. We drank champagne and made a ruckus until the loss didn’t sting quite so bad.
Social media got ahold of it and turned it into a whole thing. Like it was some damn orgy or something.
I had my wild side. But I liked my sex with one woman and one woman at a time. Otherwise, I couldn’t focus, and when I was with a woman I really, really liked to focus. I did my best work that way.
It flashed, like it flashed every single damn time I thought about sex.
That night in Nashville. When being with Kit hadn’t felt like just sex. It had felt like more.
Immediately, I pushed the memory away and smiled wickedly at the guys gathered around.
“I’ll be an angel,” I said, folding my hands together like I was praying. Around me my team cried bullshit, but they did it with love. The cars were waiting out front to take us to the club. I pulled out my phone and gave it one more shot with my brother.
Me: Come have one drink with me.
Wyatt: No. I’m heading home. I’ll pick you up at your place next Wednesday.
Me: What’s Wednesday?
Wyatt: You better be joking.
Me: Totally joking.
I wasn’t joking.
Wyatt: We’re going to fucking Boston. Remember? Our brother?
Shit. I forgot.
When our mom died at the beginning of the post-season, she’d left a letter telling us about Nick Steffens. Her child from a previous marriage. A child she abandoned. Our mom had plenty of demons. I’d spent my childhood getting to know them and loving her despite them.
But leaving behind a kid? It was awful.
After we read that letter we hired an investigator to try and find him, which took weeks. Nick Steffens had some sealed juvie files and had changed his name when he got adopted. But eventually, we found him in a tiny fishing town up north in Maine called Calico Cove.
Wyatt had convinced him to sit down with us on neutral territory after the season was over.
Wednesday in Boston.
Me: Course I remember. I’ll see you Wednesday. Looking forward to it. You going to stick around Portland for the parade on Saturday?
Wyatt: Fuck no.
Smiling, I put my phone in my pocket, but it immediately buzzed again. I hoped it was my brother changing his mind, but I was shocked to see a text from Kit.
Kit: Nice one.
She was not a woman who should make me smile. But fuck if she didn’t. That cat costume? Come on. She was ridiculous and adorable at the same time.
Me: Nice what?
Kit: Game, asshole. What do you think I’m talking about?
Me: My smile?
Kit: I am not talking about your smile.
Me: What about my ass? I hear it’s pretty great.
Kit: You were insufferable before, but this win is going to make it worse.
Me: Does insufferable mean better? This win is going to make everything better. See you Sunday,
As soon as I sent the text, I frowned. Did that make it seem like I was looking forward to seeing her? Excited even?
Because I wasn’t. That’s not what our arrangement was about. I wanted revenge. Pure and simple. Not for what her father did. Fuck that. That’s what prison was for.
No, I wanted payback for what she did. For making me think I’d found something I’d spent my life looking for, only to turn it into a lie.
She broke my fucking heart that night. So, if she wanted to pay me off a few hundred dollars every week to exorcise her soul of guilt, then I would pop the popcorn and turn the screws.
I wanted her to feel what she did to me.
If a tiny part of me looked forward to Sundays, that was nobody’s business but mine.
I didn’t wait for a reply. I put my phone away and my teammate Harrison walked by with a three-hundred-dollar bottle of Clase Azul in his hand.
“Let’s fucking go,” he said, clapping a hand on my shoulder.
Harrison and I had come up together. Teammates in a gold medal winning US junior team. I’d known him since we were billeted with the same family during an OHL scouting camp in Toronto.
He was sharp, competitive and an instigator. Scrappy. Like the whole world was on his shit list.
“We did it,” he said with a smile, revealing the gap in his teeth. He’d lost that tooth in the semi-finals at the Worlds seven years ago. I’d found it on the ice and given it back to him, but he said the gap made him look crazier.
We had such dreams back then. And tonight they all came true.
Without saying a word, we hugged it out, clapping each other on the back. Both of us, I knew, fighting tears.
“Holy shit,” I breathed. “We did it.”
The flight home from Denver the next morning was full of sad hungover puppies. Harrison had his head buried in a bucket for most of the flight. Rousseaux did nothing but complain about the smell of Harrison’s bucket.
“How come you’re not hungover?” Staski asked. He wore sunglasses and the pale pasty complexion of a man who’d had too much vodka.
“I never stopped drinking,” I said, sipping the Bloody Mary I’d ordered the second we got on the flight.
Crowds of fans were lined up on the tarmac waiting for our plane to land. As a team we all walked the rope line, happy to sign autographs and share some of the excitement with our best fans.
From there we were bussed to a fancy seafood place near the harbor to celebrate with the mayor. We all wore suits and smiled for the press.
Hours later and Harrison was passed out in a leather booth in the back of the restaurant. Rousseaux had just limped out the door with his arm around his wife.
It felt like only the bachelors remained standing, which was usually the case. Me, Staski and Henrik. Yep, all the lucky single bastards.
“Hey,” Staski said, his silver teeth gleaming in the low light of the bar. “Let’s go have real fun.”
From Staski, that could literally mean anything. I once went out with him and ended up on a fishing boat in the Atlantic Ocean. I knew I should go home to bed, but I still had this… energy. I felt like I could run a million miles. Climb a mountain. It seemed like a shame to end this night. To end this feeling.
“Real fun?”
“Strippers!” Henrik cried and I shook my head. Been there and done that. It had ended in nothing but trouble, when a stripper I’d barely smiled at decided I was her future, and claimed I was the father of her child.
None of that had been cool. It took some time for me to realize Gayle had been desperate and not maniacal, but it still left its scar.
“No,” Staski said. “Let’s go surprise some fans.”
Henrik looked disappointed. He’d get over it.
“This sounds interesting,” I said. “Where?”
“The End Zone.”
I laughed. The End Zone was one of those giant sports bars downtown with dozens of big screens along every wall, with a bunch of draft beer specials. And wings. Lots and lots of wings.
It was not a place we ever hung out because we knew we’d be crowded all night by fans wanting autographs, groupies wanting selfies, and old guys who wanted to tell us how much tougher hockey players were back in their day.
“Dude, we’ll get crushed,” I pointed out.
“That’s the point. The fans. We’ll be right there with them,” Staski said, clapping my shoulder. “They will be so happy.”
Henrik, a twenty-year-old Viking from Sweden, nodded. “I like the uniforms the servers wear.”
The uniforms were tight striped referee shirts and shorts so short they could pass for bikini bottoms.
I drained the martini I’d been nursing. “Let’s do it.”
Twenty minutes later we were walking into the giant sports bar. It was getting close to last call but the place was still full. A west coast baseball game was on a few of the screens, but most of them were filled with a replay of game seven and Rousseaux’s many saves.
The moment the three of us walked in, there was a ripple across the room. A sudden silence.
“Holy shit,” someone said, and a hundred heads turned our way. All eyes on us.
“Drinks on me!” Staski shouted, and the bar went apeshit.