Chapter Twenty-Seven
Frankie
Frankie Callahan did not like rest days.
Rest sounded passive.
Rest sounded like sitting still with too much brain and not enough puck.
Rest sounded like giving fear a chair.
Coach Sutter disagreed.
Coach Sutter had written REST AND SHARPNESS on the board that morning in block letters, underlined it once, and looked directly at Frankie while saying, “This is not optional.”
Frankie had not argued.
Out loud.
Instead, she sat in the team room with her Westbridge folder open, a black coffee at her elbow, and her skates nowhere near her feet.
Cruel.
Birdie sat beside her, wearing a hoodie that said BACK THE FIRE and chewing on a pen cap with the focus of a person trying to eat her own anxiety.
Dani had three tabs open on her laptop.
Wren had two media schedules and one expression that suggested she had already threatened several people before breakfast.
Reese stood at the front with Sutter, binder open.
The board funding approval sat behind them like an invisible banner.
Westbridge sat in front of them like a dare.
“Rest day means no extra ice,” Sutter said.
Birdie raised a hand.
“No,” Sutter said.
Birdie lowered it. “You didn’t know what I was going to ask.”
“You were going to ask about stickhandling in the hallway.”
Birdie blinked. “That’s upsetting.”
“Because I was right?”
“Because I felt seen.”
Wren murmured, “A common hazard.”
Frankie stared at the Westbridge shot map and tried not to move her foot under the table.
She wanted ice.
She wanted the crease.
She wanted to take every weak-side crash and two-on-one lie and second-chance scramble and put them into her body until fear became muscle memory.
But Sutter had locked the rink schedule.
Actually locked it.
Frankie had checked.
Twice.
Reese said, “Today is short film, walkthrough, class, food, and sleep.”
“Sleep is fake,” Birdie said.
“Sleep is recovery,” Reese said.
“Recovery is branding.”
Sutter looked at her.
Birdie sat up. “Sleep is important.”
“Good.”
Frankie turned a page in the folder.
Weak-side crash.
Low chaos.
Screens.
Second chances.
She had read these notes so many times the paper had started to feel warm under her fingers.
Sutter’s voice cut across the room.
“Callahan.”
Frankie looked up.
“Close the folder.”
“No.”
The room went quiet.
Not because she had said no.
Because she had said it too quickly.
Sutter’s eyes narrowed.
Frankie held the folder tighter.
“I’m reviewing.”
“You are chewing.”
“I’m not Birdie.”
Birdie lifted a hand. “I am chewing.”
Sutter did not look away from Frankie. “Close the folder.”
Frankie’s jaw tightened.
Every part of her wanted to refuse.
The folder was useful.
Information was useful.
Preparation was useful.
The more she knew, the less space there was for old noise.
Except that was not entirely true.
Sometimes more information became another kind of noise.
She hated that.
She closed the folder.
Slowly.
Sutter nodded once. “Good.”
Frankie looked away.
Not hers.
Not yet.
Sutter continued, addressing the room. “You have prepared. Today is about letting preparation settle. Westbridge will not be beaten by panic cramming.”
Birdie whispered, “But I am excellent at panic cramming.”
Dani patted her arm. “We know.”
Sutter pointed at the screen. “Ten minutes of film. Then done.”
The room took that seriously.
Ten minutes meant ten minutes.
Sutter showed only three clips.
One weak-side crash.
One power-play rotation.
One neutral-zone entry that fed the low cycle.
Frankie called the read.
Reese called the defensive support.
Birdie called her responsibility loudly enough to satisfy herself and maybe a nearby county.
Dani marked timing.
Wren noted media angles for tomorrow and then, seeing Sutter’s face, stopped noting media angles for tomorrow.
After the third clip, Sutter turned off the screen.
Frankie felt betrayed.
“That’s it?” Birdie asked.
“Yes.”
“But—”
“No.”
Birdie looked at Reese.
Reese said, “No.”
Birdie looked at Frankie.
Frankie wanted to say yes.
Wanted to ask for two more clips.
Five.
All of them.
Instead, she looked at the closed folder.
Then said, “No.”
Birdie’s mouth fell open.
Frankie stared at him. “Don’t make it weird.”
“You said no to more film.”
“I heard myself.”
“Growth,” Birdie whispered.
Frankie pointed at her.
Birdie shut up.
Mostly.
The team broke into walkthrough groups after that. No skates. No gear. Just positioning on the rubber floor outside the locker room, using tape marks and cones.
It should have felt ridiculous.
It did feel ridiculous.
It also worked.
Reese moved everyone through the weak-side crash coverage. Dani explained the timing. Wren held the low lane. Birdie practiced calling early until Sutter told her the words were good and the volume was “municipal.”
Frankie stood in the imaginary crease and moved without pads.
Wrong.
Too light.
Too exposed.
But useful.
Coop arrived halfway through with Hayes and Tanner for the two-on-one walkthrough.
Not boyfriend.
Shooter.
Alternate captain.
Someone who listened.
Still, when he walked in wearing a navy Brookfield sweatshirt and carrying a clipboard, Frankie’s body noticed before her brain could file him correctly.
Annoying.
He looked at her.
Not too long.
Just enough.
Question.
She gave the smallest nod.
Answer.
Birdie saw.
Of course.
Birdie made a sound.
Wren said, “Nguyen.”
“I’m internal.”
“Be more internal.”
Coop took position at the taped blue line. Hayes stood as the passing option. Tanner watched with arms folded, pretending not to care and caring enough to be useful.
Sutter said, “Walk it.”
They moved slowly.
Coop carried wide at half speed.
Hayes cut.
Frankie tracked.
“Freeze,” Sutter said.
Everyone stopped.
She pointed at Frankie. “Read.”
“Shooter wants me to bite pass,” Frankie said. “Shoulder opens early. Stick blade stays loaded. He’s lying shot-pass-shot.”
Coop’s brows lifted.
Frankie looked at him.
“Accurate?”
“Uncomfortably.”
“Good.”
His mouth almost smiled.
Sutter said, “Again.”
They walked it until the reads felt less like thoughts and more like pathways.
Then Sutter dismissed the men.
Coop lingered half a second at the door.
Frankie looked at him.
He lifted his clipboard slightly.
Later?
Not a word.
Still clear.
She nodded once.
Later.
He left.
Frankie hated that she liked having a later.
The rest of the day stretched.
Classes happened.
Badly.
Frankie attended, took notes, and retained maybe four percent of the lecture on motor learning because her brain kept circling Westbridge, then Coop, then her muted phone, then the folder, then Westbridge again.
At lunch, Reese sat beside her in the dining hall and placed a plate in front of her.
Frankie looked down.
Chicken.
Rice.
Vegetables.
A roll.
“Why?”
“Because you were about to call coffee lunch.”
“I was not.”
Reese stared.
Frankie picked up the fork. “Captain overreach.”
“Correct.”
Birdie dropped into the chair across from them with a tray containing pasta, salad, two cookies, and what appeared to be emotional instability.
“I texted Asher.”
Frankie put down her fork. “Why.”
“Lowercase why or uppercase why?”
“Legal why.”
Birdie winced. “She said good luck tomorrow.”
Reese’s eyebrows lifted.
“That’s nice,” Reese said.
Birdie looked pained. “She also said, ‘Try not to skate directly into our trap this time.’”
Frankie resumed eating. “There it is.”
“I told her to try not to trip over her funding.”
Reese closed her eyes.
Birdie added, “Then I said good luck.”
“After?”
“Yes.”
“Growth,” Reese said.
Birdie stabbed pasta with too much force. “I hated it.”
Frankie swallowed a bite of chicken and said, “You like him.”
Birdie froze.
Reese went very still.
Across the table, Dani choked on water.
Wren, appearing with a tray as if summoned by gossip, said, “We are finally saying obvious things?”
Birdie’s face turned red. “I do not.”
Frankie looked at her.
Birdie pointed her fork. “You cannot judge me. You are dating a human sunrise with boundary training.”
Frankie’s fork paused.
Reese made a noise into her napkin.
Wren sat. “Accurate.”
Dani whispered, “Very accurate.”
Frankie looked around the table.
“No.”
Birdie leaned forward, seizing momentum like a dangerous winger. “Yes. Coop Vale walks into rooms and makes people think maybe institutions can apologize.”
Frankie stared.
Wren blinked.
Reese slowly lowered her napkin.
Dani said, “That was… poetic.”
Birdie looked horrified. “I know. I’m unwell.”
Frankie picked up her roll and pointed it at Birdie. “Your Asher problem is worse than we thought.”
Birdie dropped her forehead onto the table.
“I know.”
For once, Frankie let the team laugh around her.
She did not laugh much.
But she stayed.
After lunch, Wren posted the official Westbridge preview.
No hype around Frankie.
No turning the game into goalie-versus-world.
The copy was clean.
Brookfield meets Westbridge tomorrow night in a conference showcase matchup. The Spitfires enter with momentum, backing, and work still to do.
Frankie approved.
Mostly because Wren did not ask.
At four, Sutter sent a team text.
REST MEANS REST. IF YOU ARE IN THE RINK WITHOUT APPROVAL, I WILL KNOW.
Birdie responded with a salute emoji.
Wren responded, No one reply.
Birdie responded, Sorry.
Frankie did not respond.
She was not in the rink.
She was at the library.
With the Westbridge folder.
Closed.
Sitting beside her notebook.
Open.
She had written one sentence at the top of the page.
Who am I in net without his voice?
She had no answer.
Not a clean one.
So she wrote facts.
I read well.
I adjust.
I overcorrect when I try to own everyone’s job.
Birdie will call weak-side.
Reese will clear the slot.
Dani will support low.
Wren will hold the lane.
Sutter will say again.
She stopped.
Then added:
Coop is not in the crease, but he is there.
Too soft.
True.
She stared at it for a long time.
Then wrote beneath it:
The crease is not empty.
Birdie’s line.