2. CHAPTER TWO #3
G smiles. “You want them to think a ghost lives upstairs.”
He nods. “I have not ruled that out.”
Blue takes a drink. “Percy and I will still be here.”
Percy looks at him. “Unfortunately.”
Blue glares. Percy keeps eating.
I look at the whiteboard and say, “I might be too.”
Stanley stops uncapping the marker. Benson looks at me. Gianna does too. I can feel it before I actually look at her.
“If I do my master’s,” I add.
Stanley lowers the marker. “You’re staying?”
“Maybe.”
“How long?”
“Year. Maybe two.”
“You have eligibility?”
I nod. “Two years. Redshirt.”
Benson’s fork stops halfway to his mouth. “You’re serious?”
“Yeah.” I say it automatically. Then sit with it.
I have been looking at programs for weeks.
Jobs too.
Detroit. Chicago. Operations. Facilities. Event management.
Tabs open on my laptop until I get sick of looking at them and close all of them.
The master’s tab is the one I keep opening again.
Maybe has started to feel like a word I use because I haven’t decided whether I’m allowed to say I want it.
Benson leans back. “Applications should already be open.”
“They are,” I say.
“You applied?”
I shake my head. “Not yet.”
He gives me the same expression he uses when someone skips film.
I eat my eggs.
Across the table, Gianna is still looking at me. Not staring. Just looking. Then Mara says something to her, and she turns away.
I don’t know what Mara said, but I look up at them, trying to figure it out. Mara smiles at me when she catches me watching. I look back at the whiteboard.
Stanley taps the marker against the board. “Back to the rules.”
Gianna raises a hand. “I have rule one.”
“No,” Benson says.
She scoffs. “You don’t know what it is.”
He does. “It’s about parties.”
She points at him. “Which proves you know me.”
Mara lifts both hands beside her. “Minimum one Hawthorne party per month.”
“No,” Blue says.
“Once every two weeks,” Gianna counters.
“You went the wrong direction,” Benson tells her.
She puts both hands on the table. “You people got girlfriends and ruined the history of Camden U.”
I laugh.
Her head snaps toward me. “What’s funny, Rowan?”
“You.” I take a bite of my eggs.
She narrows her eyes.
I eat a piece of bacon.
Stanley slaps the marker against the board. “Serious rules.”
That settles things slightly.
Benson looks at the empty board. Then at the guys around the table. “Nobody does anything that costs us.”
Stanley pauses. “That’s vague.”
“It’s supposed to be.”
Aspen leans forward against the counter to listen.
Benson explains, “Penalties. Missed practice. Missed film. Anything stupid off the ice that becomes a problem on it.”
Stanley starts writing.
Big black letters.
1. DON’T COST US.
Benson looks at it. “That isn’t exactly what I said.”
“It’s better.”
I point toward Blue. “No fighting.”
Blue looks up. “What?”
Melly starts laughing.
Aspen shakes her head.
I say, “No unnecessary fighting.”
“Define unnecessary.”
“If you have to ask,” Melly says to him, “it’s unnecessary.”
Blue opens his mouth.
Stops.
Stanley writes.
2. DON’T TAKE THE BAIT.
Blue looks at the words for a few seconds. Then nods. “Fine.”
The rule isn’t only for him. Everybody knows it. Benson has taken retaliation penalties because somebody said something about Gianna. Stanley gets pulled into stupid shit when people get under his skin. Every team we play in March will know exactly how to make a good team beat itself.
“Three,” Benson says. “Show up.”
Stanley turns. “Deep.”
“Practice. Film. Gym. Games. Nobody misses what matters. Not now.”
The room is quieter this time.
Stanley writes.
3. SHOW THE FUCK UP.
Benson looks at him.
Aspen steps closer to the board. “Four. Do the work before deciding it doesn’t work.”
Nobody jokes.
Not after this morning.
Stanley writes it automatically:
4. DO THE WORK.
I look at that one longer than the others. My shoulders are still tired from forty extra minutes of doing something I already knew how to do badly before I could do it differently. It fits.
“Four,” Stanley says.
“The fifth one should be parties,” Gianna interjects.
“No,” three people answer at once.
She looks offended.
For the next few minutes, everybody has an idea.
Most of them are bad. Mara wants something about maintaining morale.
Penelope suggests nobody be allowed to make decisions after three in the morning, which gets more support than I expect.
Lucy suggests honesty. Stanley calls it a therapy rule.
Lucy tells him therapy is good. He says he knows.
Gianna tries one more time. “Nobody gets boring.”
Benson looks at her. “That isn’t hockey.”
“It’s your last semester,” she says. “That is absolutely relevant to me.”
Something in the room shifts.
Small.
There and gone.
Stanley stops listening. He turns toward the board. Four rules. He stands there long enough that even Gianna stops arguing. Then he puts the marker down against the bottom of the board and writes. Slow. Larger than the others.
The marker squeaks.
5. WIN THE FUCKING THING.
Nobody says anything. Not immediately.
This morning, Aspen said we were good enough.
Coach said pick one thing.
We spent three hours on the ice finding out how much work there is between knowing what is wrong and being able to fix it.
Now it’s January. We have six weeks until postseason hockey starts deciding things for us. A semester until me, Benson, and Stanley graduate. A semester until rooms in this house belong to somebody else.
Maybe mine too.
Maybe not.
That’s the part I haven’t figured out.
But this part is simple.
I look at the board.
Win the fucking thing.
Benson is staring at it.
So is Blue.
Percy has put his fork down.
Stanley steps back like he has completed something important.
Gianna reaches over and steals the last piece of bacon from my plate.
I look at her.
She chews it, completely unbothered.
Then she nods toward Stanley. “Wow.”
He looks over.
“You’re so inspirational,” she says sarcastically.
His face brightens. “Thank you.”
“Put it on a pillow.”
The room breaks. People start talking again.
Stanley tells her she has no respect for leadership. Mara wants the party rule reconsidered. Benson reaches across the table for the marker before Stanley can add anything else.
I keep looking at the board.
Five rules.
One semester.