Chapter Thirty-Six
FINN
At Seattle development camp, I have a panic attack in front of a professional goalie coach.
This is not the ending I wanted.
It is the ending I need.
The attack happens on day three after a medical meeting, two poor scrimmages, and a crowded elevator ride I should have exited before the doors closed. I reach the locker room, tell the trainer, and use the plan.
No hiding. No invented stomach illness. No call to Mara until I am safe and the medical staff knows.
The Comets do not send me home.
They adjust the schedule, require follow-up, and evaluate the hockey.
On day six, I stop thirty-four of thirty-six shots in the final scrimmage.
On day seven, they offer a one-year development contract with the Cascade Rapids, their professional affiliate four hours from Seattle.
I call Mara from an empty hallway.
She is in Chicago, three days into fellowship orientation.
“I got an offer,” I say.
She screams.
Someone near her screams too.
“Tessa?” I ask.
“She came to help me move and has refused to leave.”
“I heard that,” Tessa shouts.
Mara returns to the phone. “Do you want it?”
“Yes.”
“Then say yes.”
“What about—”
“No. Separate decision. Do you want it?”
“Yes.”
“Accept.”
I close my eyes.
“Okay.”
“Then we solve geography.”
Not I will move. Not choose me. Not love should be easier.
We solve what belongs to both of us after choosing what belongs to each.
I sign.
Long distance is not elegant.
We miss calls. I fall asleep during one of her edits.
She forgets a game because a field recording runs late, then cries harder than I do.
I have a panic attack on a flight and call Theo because Mara is interviewing a grieving family and should not have to abandon the work.
Mara has a terrible day in Chicago and calls Sophie before me because I am in warmups.
None of this means we matter less.
It means we have other people.
In December, I fly to Chicago for thirty-six hours.
Mara meets me at the airport wearing the silver boots.
I see them before I see her face.
Then she runs.
I catch her against my chest.
Six months of screens and schedules disappear beneath the physical fact of her.
“You are real,” she says into my neck.
“Mostly.”
“You made a joke.”
“Professional development.”
Her apartment is smaller than the Stoneharbor one and louder. Records, boots, cables, fellowship notes. My radio sits beside her bed.
On the wall hangs the boundary list from our reunion, framed in pink.
“Seriously?” I ask.
“Governance can be romantic.”
We spend the weekend walking through Chicago, eating food Mara claims is essential research, and saying ordinary things in the same room.
Sunday morning, before the flight, she plays me the rough cut of her first fellowship story. It follows a night-shift bus driver who memorizes the regular passengers so no one disappears unnoticed.
The piece is quiet, precise, entirely hers.
When it ends, I say, “You sound like yourself.”
Mara turns in her chair.
“So do you.”
My first Behind the Mask episode aired last month. I chose to discuss panic, therapy, and the quarterfinal. Tessa conducted the interview. Mara listened only after the final edit was locked.
The episode received thousands of messages.
Some cruel. Most not.
One came from a fifteen-year-old goalie who wrote that he told his father he was scared.
I keep it in my wallet beside Dr. Patel’s old business card.
At the airport, Mara asks, “Next thing?”
“Flight.”
“And after?”
“Practice. Your edit. Call at ten.”
“And after?”
I kiss her.
“Again tomorrow.”
She touches two fingers to my heart and opens her hand.
Room.
I board the plane.
Fear comes with me.
So does love.
Neither one gets to decide alone.