Chapter Twenty-Four Travis
Chapter Twenty-Four
Travis
The ice feels different now.
Not the surface—that's the same as it's always been, cold and smooth beneath my blades.
But something else has changed. The weight I used to carry out here, the pressure that sat on my shoulders every time I stepped onto the rink, it's gone.
In its place is something lighter. Something that feels almost like joy.
I'm playing hockey again. And for the first time in years, I'm playing because I want to.
The arena is packed. Twenty thousand people, maybe more, all of them screaming so loud I can feel it in my chest. Team USA versus Canada, the 4 Nations Face-Off, the biggest stage I've ever stood on.
Six months ago, I thought my career was over.
Six months ago, I was hiding in a cottage in Virginia, convinced I'd never skate professionally again.
Now I'm here. And she's here too.
I found her during warm-ups. Section 112, row C, seat 7—the seat I asked Dave to arrange, close enough that I could see her face.
She was wearing my jersey, number seventeen, my name stretched across her back like a declaration.
She waved when she saw me looking, this little self-conscious gesture that made my chest ache.
That's my person. In the stands. Wearing my name.
The puck drops and I stop thinking about anything except the game.
Hockey is simple when you let it be. Skate, shoot, check. Read the play, anticipate the movement, be where the puck is going to be before it gets there. I've been doing this since I was five years old. My body knows what to do even when my mind is elsewhere.
But tonight my mind isn't elsewhere. Tonight I'm locked in, present in every moment, feeling the game in a way I haven't felt it in years.
Every pass is crisp. Every shot is on target.
I'm not the fastest guy on the ice, but I'm smart, and I'm strong, and I know how to make space where there isn't any.
There's a moment in the first period when I get checked hard into the boards. A Canadian defenseman, big guy, catches me with my head down. Six months ago, that hit would have set something off in me. The anger that used to live right beneath my surface, waiting for an excuse to break free.
But I just bounce off the boards, find my skates, and keep playing.
The anger isn't there anymore. Or maybe it is, but it's different now.
Controlled. Channeled into the game instead of spilling over the edges.
Kelly did that. Not on purpose, not through any specific conversation.
Just by existing. Just by loving me in a way that made me want to be better than my worst impulses.
The first period flies by. We're up 2-0, and I've got an assist on both goals. The crowd is electric, chanting U-S-A between plays, and I can hear them even through my helmet, even through the roar of blood in my ears.
During the intermission, Coach Morrison pulls me aside.
"You're playing like you've got something to prove," he says.
"Don't I?"
"Maybe. But it's working." He claps me on the shoulder. "Keep doing whatever you're doing."
I know what I'm doing. I'm playing for her.
Not in a cheesy, movie-montage kind of way.
I'm not scoring goals and pointing at the stands like some kind of show-off.
I'm just... aware of her. Conscious of her presence in a way that grounds me, that keeps me focused.
Every time I feel my mind starting to drift—toward the past, toward the scandal, toward all the people who said I was done—I think about Kelly, and I come back to the present.
She believed in me when I didn't believe in myself. The least I can do is play well for her.
The second period is harder. Canada pushes back, scores twice, and suddenly the game is tied. The crowd gets nervous, the energy shifting from celebration to tension. I feel it in my teammates too, the tightness that comes when momentum slips away.
But I'm not tight. I'm loose, easy, almost relaxed. Because I know something that most people don't: there are worse things than losing a hockey game. There are worse things than failing in front of twenty thousand people. I've been through worse. I've survived worse. This is just a game.
That thought frees something in me.
Midway through the third period, I get the puck near center ice. Two Canadian defenders are closing in, trying to trap me against the boards. Six months ago, I would have dumped it, played safe, let someone else make the play.
Not tonight.
I deke left, then right, slipping between the defenders like water through rocks. The crowd rises—I can hear them, feel them—and suddenly I'm in open ice, nothing between me and the goalie except forty feet of frozen water.
Time slows down. I see the goalie shift, anticipating a shot to the left. I see the gap on the right side, just a few inches of open net. I see everything, all at once, the way I used to see it when I was young and hungry and convinced I could do anything.
I shoot.
The puck leaves my stick and I know—I know before it even crosses the line—that it's in. The goalie lunges, his glove reaching, but it's too late. The puck hits the back of the net with a sound I've heard a thousand times, but never like this. Never when it mattered this much.
The arena explodes.
My teammates mob me, a pile of bodies and screaming and joy so pure it almost hurts. I'm at the bottom of the pile, laughing, my face pressed against the ice, and I think: this is what it's supposed to feel like. This is why I play.
When they finally let me up, I do my lap around the ice. Stick raised, crowd cheering, the whole arena on its feet. I've done this before, but it's different now. Everything is different now.
As I pass section 112, I look up.
She's there. Standing, screaming, her hands pressed to her mouth. Even from here I can see she's crying—happy tears, I hope—and something breaks open in my chest. I point my stick at her. Just a small gesture, probably invisible to anyone who isn't looking. But she sees it. I know she sees it.
That's for you.
We win 4-2. I get third star of the game, which means I have to skate out after for another ovation, another wave to the crowd. The announcers are talking about comebacks and redemption and second chances, all the narratives they love to spin. But I'm not thinking about any of that.
I'm thinking about after. About walking out of this arena and finding Kelly waiting for me. About driving home to Longshore, to the cottage, to the life we're building together. About all the things that matter so much more than hockey.
The locker room is crazy. A massive celebration of guys spraying each other, while the media tries to do interviews.
I do the required media, answer the questions I've been asked a hundred times before.
Yes, it feels good to be back. Yes, I learned a lot during my time away.
Yes, I'm grateful for the second chance.
The one question they don't ask is the one I actually want to answer: what changed?
What changed is Kelly. What changed is Longshore. What changed is finally understanding that I don't have to be defined by my worst moment, that there's more to me than the headlines and the video and the mistake I made in a hospice parking lot.
I thought hockey was my whole identity. I thought without it, I was nothing.
But these past six months taught me that's not true.
I'm a lot of things—a man who fixes things, a man who helps with books, a man who leaves his porch light on just in case.
Hockey is part of me, but it's not all of me.
And that makes coming back to it feel like a choice, not an obligation.
After the interviews, I shower and change and head for the tunnel where Kelly is waiting. I see her before she sees me—standing by the wall, phone in hand, my jersey still on. Nicole must have left already because she's alone, and something about that image hits me right in the chest.
She came all this way. She wore my name. She stood in that crowd and screamed for me even though six months ago she didn't know a hockey puck from a dinner plate.
She looks up and sees me, and her whole face changes. Lights up. Like I'm the only thing in the room that matters.
That's how she always looks at me. I don't think I'll ever get used to it.
I drop my bag and cross the distance between us, pulling her into my arms. She fits there perfectly, the way she always has, like the space was made for her.
"Hi," she says into my chest.
"Hi."
"You were incredible."
"I had good motivation."
She pulls back to look at me, her eyes bright. "This is what you were meant to do, Travis. I could see it out there. You were... alive. In a way I've never seen before."
"I felt alive." I touch her face, trace the line of her jaw. "But you know what? I feel alive with you too. Different kind of alive. Quieter. But just as real."
"So you're going to keep playing?"
"Yeah. I think I am." I think about the future—games and travel and the grind of a professional season. "It's going to be hard. I'm going to be gone a lot. There'll be more media, more attention, more people having opinions about our relationship."
"I know."
"Are you okay with that?"
She smiles, this slow, certain smile that does something to my heart. "I'm okay with you. Everything else, we figure out as we go."
"That's very optimistic."
"I'm feeling optimistic." She rises on her toes and kisses me. "We survived your family and a tabloid scandal. A hockey season seems manageable."
I laugh. I can't help it. This woman—this incredible, steady, funny woman—is mine. She chose me. She keeps choosing me.
"I love you," I say.
"I love you too."
We stand there for another moment, just looking at each other. Behind us, the arena hums with post-game energy. Ahead of us, the night is cold and dark and full of possibility.
"Ready to go home?" I ask.
"So ready."
We walk out of the arena together, hand in hand. There are cameras outside, questions being shouted, but I don't stop. I just wave, smile, keep moving. I've done enough press for one night. Everything else can wait until tomorrow.
"Travis! Kelly! Can we get a comment?"
"Travis, how does it feel to be back?"
"Kelly, are you two officially together?"
Kelly squeezes my hand but doesn't falter. She keeps walking, head high, unbothered by the flashing lights. That's new—that confidence. Six months ago, she would have frozen. Now she moves through it like she's been doing it her whole life.
I'm so proud of her. I'm so in love with her.
The car is waiting in the lot. I open her door, close it behind her, walk around to my side. Before I get in, I take one last look at the arena. The lights are still blazing, the crowd still filing out. Somewhere in there, my teammates are celebrating. Somewhere in there, my future is taking shape.
But the best part of my future is already in the car, waiting for me.
I get in, start the engine, and pull out of the lot. Kelly's hand finds mine on the console, and we drive in comfortable silence for a while, the city lights giving way to darker roads.
"So," she says eventually. "What happens now?"
"Now we go home. Sleep. Maybe eat something—I'm starving."
"I meant bigger picture."
I think about it. The season stretching ahead of me. The team that welcomed me back. The career I thought was over but isn't. And Kelly, beside me through all of it.
"Now we live," I say. "Whatever that looks like."
"That's not a plan."
"It's the only plan I need." I lift her hand and kiss her knuckles. "I spent so long trying to control everything. My career, my image, my family. And it didn't work. It just made me miserable."
“So what’s change?"
"Now I've got you. And hockey. And a cottage in Virginia that needs a new roof." I smile. "That's enough. That's more than enough."
She's quiet for a moment. Then she says, "I finished my book."
"What?"
"The thriller. I finished the first draft last week. I was going to tell you after the game."
I pull off to the side of the road, put the car in park, and turn to look at her. "Kelly. That's amazing."
"It might be terrible."
"It's not terrible. Nothing you write is terrible." I unbuckle my seatbelt so I can lean over and kiss her properly. "I'm so proud of you."
"I'm proud of you too." She touches my face. "We did it, Travis. We both came out the other side."
I pull back onto the road, and we drive the rest of the way home. The cottage appears through the trees, then the main house, familiar silhouettes against the starry sky. I park in my usual spot and cut the engine.
Home.
Not just a place anymore. A person. A life. A future that's still taking shape but already feels more real than anything I've ever had.
Kelly opens her door. "You coming?"
"Right behind you."
I grab my bag and follow her across the yard, past the cottage, toward the main house. The porch light is on—she must have left it burning when she went to the game. A beacon, waiting for us to return.
We go inside, and the door closes behind us, and that's it. That's everything.
Just us. Just home. Just the beginning of whatever comes next.