Chapter Eleven
The Shift
Archer
The Bruins score first, seven minutes into the opening period, off a rebound I should have covered.
The puck spins loose from my blocker, and their center buries it top shelf before I can reset, and the Garden goes quiet for about three seconds before twenty thousand people start making noise again.
I tap my posts. Shake it off. Stay in the crease.
The thing about being a goalie is that you don’t get to dwell.
Forwards can miss a shot and skate back to the bench and sit with it for a shift.
Defensemen can blow a coverage, and the next whistle gives them a breath.
But I’m out here for all sixty minutes, and every puck that gets past me lives on the scoreboard for the rest of the night, so you learn early to let it go, or it eats you alive.
I let it go.
The second period is mine. I stop seventeen shots in twenty minutes—glove save on a wrister from the circle, pad save on a two-on-one that had no business staying out, and a full-stretch blocker save on a one-timer from the slot that the crowd reacts to before I even realize I’ve made it.
My body does the work, and my brain stays quiet, and this is the version of me that functions best—reactive, instinctive, every thought reduced to angle and depth and the weight of the puck.
Zayden ties it up late in the second on a power play goal, wristing one over the goalie’s glove from the hashmarks. He points at me on the way back to the bench, which is our thing—he scores, he points, I nod. We’ve been doing it for two seasons, and neither of us has ever discussed it.
The third period grinds on. Both teams tighten up, chances get scarce, and the clock bleeds down, and I’m tracking everything—sticks, eyes, the angle of the shooter’s hips before he even loads up.
I stop two more dangerous shots in the final five minutes, including a deflection from the crease that I get a piece of with my shoulder because my glove was out of position, and sometimes you just throw body parts at the puck and hope for the best.
We go to overtime.
Overtime in hockey is a different animal.
Three-on-three, wide open ice, the game moving at a speed that makes regular play look like it’s happening underwater.
Every save matters twice as much because one goal ends it, and the crowd is standing, and the building is vibrating, and I love this.
I hate it and I love it. My hip is screaming, and my glove hand has been numb since the third period, and I’m running on adrenaline and muscle memory and the particular calm that settles over me when the stakes get high enough that there’s no room for anything else in my head.
Banks steals the puck at center ice, goes wide, feeds Zayden cutting to the net, and Zayden roofs it over the goalie’s shoulder, and the building explodes.
I pump my fist once, then I’m already skating to the bench, already pulling off my mask.
Postgame is the usual—handshakes, media, the locker room happy but chill. It’s still early in the season—way too early to celebrate.
I shower, dress, and check my phone.
Nothing from Sydney since 8 PM, when she sent a photo of the twins in their pajamas with the caption: Bedtime negotiations have begun. Lily is demanding two stories and a song. Luke wants to know if you won yet. I told him the game just started. He said, “Tell Daddy to win.”
That was three hours ago. It’s 11:14 now, and she hasn’t texted since, which means either bedtime went smoothly, or it went so badly she’s still recovering.
I drive home through quiet streets, the city winding down around me, that post-win buzz still humming in my chest. The house is dark from the outside.
I pull into the garage, come in through the kitchen, and set my bag by the door. The house is quiet. The TV is on, volume low, playing the end credits of something animated.
I walk into the living room and stop.
Sydney is on the couch. Both twins are on top of her.
Lily is draped across her chest, face buried in Sydney’s neck, one arm hanging off the side.
Luke is tucked against her left side, his thumb near his mouth, his head resting on her ribs.
Sydney’s arms are around both of them—one hand on Lily’s back, the other curled around Luke’s shoulder—and all three of them are completely, deeply asleep.
The TV flickers. The blanket is half on the floor. There’s a sippy cup on the coffee table and a picture book wedged between the cushions, and Lily’s stuffed giraffe is on the floor where it must have fallen, and Sydney is holding my children the way you hold things that are precious to you.
I don’t move.
I stand in the doorway of my own living room and look at this—my kids, my couch, my best friend, all of them tangled together in the blue light of the television—and I can’t be in this room right now.
I can’t stand here and look at this and keep pretending I feel what I’m supposed to feel, which is gratitude, friendship, appreciation for a woman who’s helping me out.
Because what I actually feel, looking at the three of them, is a longing so sharp it takes my breath away.
I go to the kitchen. Put my hands on the counter. Lean forward and breathe, slow and deliberate, the way I breathe between saves when the game is close and my heart is going too fast.
Then I go back.
I pick up Luke first because he’s easier to extract.
He stirs when I lift him, makes a small sound, and then his head drops against my shoulder and he’s out again.
I carry him upstairs, put him in his bed, pull the covers up, and set his shark blanket next to his pillow where he’ll find it in the morning.
Lily is harder because she’s wrapped around Sydney like a vine, and I have to peel her arms away slowly, one at a time, trying not to wake either of them.
Lily mumbles when I lift her but doesn’t open her eyes, and I carry her upstairs and tuck her in, and she rolls over and grabs her giraffe from the pillow where I placed it and pulls it against her chest without waking up.
Two trips. Both kids in bed. Now it’s just Sydney.
She’s still on the couch, curled on her side now that the twins aren’t pinning her down. Her hair is across her face, and her mouth is slightly open, and she’s wearing my Knights sweatshirt again, the navy one, and it’s so big on her that her hands have disappeared inside the sleeves.
I should wake her up. That’s the right call. Tap her shoulder, say, “Hey, you fell asleep,” and let her walk herself to the guest room like a grown adult who doesn’t need to be carried anywhere.
Instead, I pick her up.
She’s light. I knew she’d be light—she’s five-two and maybe a hundred and ten pounds, and I’m a professional athlete who lifts weights every day—but I wasn’t prepared for how she’d feel in my arms. She fits against my chest like she was measured for the space, her head finding the curve of my shoulder, her body tucking into mine with an ease that feels practiced even though we’ve never done this before.
She stirs. Her face turns into my neck, and her breath hits my skin, warm and steady, and my arms tighten around her without my permission.
“I can walk,” she mumbles, half-asleep.
“I know.”
She doesn’t argue. Her hand comes up and curls around the back of my neck, and her face presses closer against my throat, and I can feel her eyelashes against my skin.
I walk slowly. Down the hall, past the kids’ rooms, to the guest room door. I nudge it open with my foot and cross to the bed and lay her down.
I pull the blanket up. She rolls onto her side and tucks her hands under her chin and exhales, long and slow, and I stand there.
I stand there too long. I know I’m standing here too long. I can feel the seconds passing, and each one is a small, quiet reminder of the lie I’ve been telling myself since she showed up on my porch with a suitcase and a grin.
Her breath on my neck. Her fingers on my collar. The weight of her in my arms and the way my body responded to it—not with surprise but with recognition, like it had been waiting to carry her and finally got the chance.
I leave the room, close the door behind me, and go to bed.