Epilogue
Two Years Later
The first thing I noticed was how loud it was.
It wasn’t just the low hum of conversation or the occasional burst of laughter from reporters who had known each other for years who treated these things like reunions, it was the layered, overlapping noises of a room filled with bodies.
Chairs scraped against the concrete flooring.
Camera shutters clicked in impatient bursts.
Someone near me kept tapping a pen against their notebook in a steady, arrhythmic beat that had worked its way under my skin.
Everyone was waiting for her.
It felt different from other press conferences I’d covered in the past—bigger somehow, even though the media space inside the practice facility wasn’t anything special.
Staff had constructed a slightly elevated stage at the front of the room.
At its center was a long table draped in navy fabric with the team’s logo screen printed across the front.
A dozen microphones were clustered together at the table’s center like they, too, were eagerly leaning in.
I stayed near the back of the room, half-shadowed by camera rigs I no longer belonged to.
My fingers curled loosely around the strap of my messenger bag out of habit even though there was no need to look like I was working.
I had no lanyard around my neck. No press badge clipped to my jacket.
There was no producer in my ear telling me where to stand or when to speak.
Two years ago, I wouldn’t have been able to imagine standing here without all of that—without the structure, without the safety net of a network behind me.
I would have maneuvered myself closer to the front of the room, my notebook open, pen poised, ready to capture her words and translate them into something consumable, polished, and detached.
Now, I simply watched and waited.
It had been Dani’s idea.
Bet on yourself, Reese.
I could still hear the way she’d said those words, like it was the simplest thing in the world, like it didn’t require separating myself from everything stable and familiar and stepping into something uncertain and terrifying.
Like it didn’t mean walking away from a steady paycheck and a job title I’d spent years building toward.
She’d been right, though.
Freelance hadn’t been easy—not at first. There were months where I questioned everything, where I took assignments I didn’t particularly care about just to keep the lights on, where I wondered if I’d made a mistake trading job security for the vague promise of fulfillment.
But slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, it shifted.
The work got better. The stories got more personal and more honest. I started pitching pieces I actually believed in.
I was telling stories that mattered beyond the Xs and Os of athletic competition.
The room quieted in a ripple rather than all at once, conversations tapering off as movement at the front caught everyone’s attention. My shoulders straightened instinctively, my breath catching as Dani stepped through the side door with her head coach just behind her.
Her hair was a little shorter than it had been last season, tucked neatly behind her ears. The dark strands were damp like she’d just come off the ice—even though I knew she hadn’t skated that day. She wore joggers and a three-quarter zip top with the team logo stenciled over her heart.
She took her seat at the table, adjusting the microphone directly in front of her—a small, absent movement before glancing out over the room. Her gaze swept across the rows of reporters and cameras, and then, just briefly, her eyes found me.
It shouldn’t have been possible from the distance between us. I was tucked away just enough that I should have blended into the background, just another body in the crowd. But Dani had always been good at finding me, even when I didn’t want to be found.
Her mouth curved, just a fraction.
Then she looked away, clearing her throat as the last of the room settled.
“Thanks for coming,” she started, her voice easily carrying without needing the amplification of the microphones in front of her. “I’ll keep this relatively short, and then I’ll take questions.”
She paused. It wasn’t a long break, but it was intentional.
“I’ve spent a lot of time over the past year thinking about what I wanted the end of my career to look like,” she began, her hands folding loosely on top of the table.
“Hockey has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. It’s given me more than I ever could have imagined—opportunities, relationships, a platform.
And I’ve been incredibly lucky to play this game at the level that I have, for as long as I have. ”
The room was completely silent. Tapping pens had stilled. Whispered side conversations had come to an end.
“And because of that,” she said, “I wanted to make sure that when I stepped away, it was on my own terms. That I could look back and feel like I gave everything I had to give.”
She exhaled, a small breath that seemed to carry years with it. I felt my throat tighten before the words even came.
“This past season was that for me.”
A murmur moved through the room, quiet but noticeable. Pens moved again. Cameras clicked.
“I’m proud of what we accomplished as a team,” she went on, nodding slightly toward her coach.
“I’m proud of the way the league has grown, the direction it’s heading.
And I’m especially proud to have been part of the work we’ve done off the ice—particularly in helping shape the league’s new gender-inclusive participation policy.
It’s been a long time coming,” Dani added, a hint of a smile touching her mouth.
“And it’s not perfect. There’s still work to do.
But it’s a step in the right direction, and I’m proud to have had a small role in pushing that forward. ”
She paused again and her gaze dropped briefly to the table. It was a long enough pause that the room seemed to collectively twitch with discomfort. Finally, she lifted her head back up.
“With all of that said,” she finished, her voice wavering just slightly, “I’m officially announcing today that I’ve played my final season. I’m retiring from professional hockey.”
I’d watched her practice those very words in the mirror in our bathroom over and over again, and still, they hit like a body check.
Questions erupted almost immediately, hands shooting up across the room as the moderator nodded toward a reporter in the front row.
“Dani, can you talk a little more about that decision?” he asked. “Was this something you’ve been considering for a while?”
“Yeah,” she said easily. “It wasn’t something I decided overnight. Like I said, I’ve been thinking about it for the past year, maybe longer. There are always going to be reasons to keep playing if you look for them. But at a certain point, you have to ask yourself what comes next.”
Another hand. Another question.
“You mentioned your work on the league’s gender-inclusive policy,” a second reporter observed. “Given your history with USA Hockey and some of the criticism you’ve had of their previous stance—how does that factor into your next steps?”
Dani’s smile perceptively widened. “I figured that might come up.”
A ripple of soft laughter moved through the room.
“Look, I’ve been pretty vocal in the past about where I thought the organization was falling short,” she said, “especially when it came to their blanket ban on transgender athletes. And I still stand by that. I think it was the wrong policy, and I think it caused harm.”
She leaned forward in her chair, more focused and intense than before.
“But I also believe that organizations can grow,” she continued. “That people can listen, learn, and do better. And over the past year, I’ve had some really productive conversations with leadership at USA Hockey about what that could look like moving forward.”
She paused long enough to let her words register, to let the assembled journalists get it right.
“Which is why I’m excited to share that I’ll be stepping into a new role as Assistant Executive Director of Hockey Development with USA Hockey,” she announced.
“The goal is to help expand access to the game at all levels—to make it more inclusive, more equitable, and to ensure that every kid who wants to play hockey feels like there’s a place for them in it. ”
The room was hit with another wave of murmurs, louder this time.
“It’s a bit of a full-circle moment,” she added, her gaze flicking out over the room again. “Hockey has given me so much. And now it feels like the right time to give something back.”
I didn’t realize I was smiling until my cheeks started to ache. God, she was so good at this.
It wasn’t just the public speaking, or the handling of reporters’ questions, or even the way she could command a room without it looking like she was trying.
It was the way she knew exactly who she was and what she stood for, and how she didn’t shy away from it even when it would have been easier to stay quiet.
It was one of the first things I’d loved about her. It was also one of the things that had scared me the most.
The questions kept coming, cycling through her career highlights, her favorite moments, the inevitable “what will you miss the most” and “what won’t you miss at all.” She answered all of them with practiced patience and grace, giving each reporter just enough time without overextending herself.
By the time the moderator finally called it, thanking everyone and signaling the end of the press conference, the room felt lighter somehow. More celebratory than somber.
Chairs scraped again as people stood, conversations picked back up as reporters compared notes and packed away equipment. A few journalists lingered near the front, hoping for quick follow-ups or one-on-one comments, but Dani was already being guided toward the side exit she’d first come through.