Chapter 18
Hazy
For days, Livy’s questions replayed through his head. What would he do with his life after hockey? At best, he had a decade left. At worst, his fucking leg would be the slow death of his career.
What would he do if he never won the Cup? All of his work would be for nothing. His parents would have nothing to show for the first thirty-ish years of their son’s life. And if he lost hockey, who would still come around? Would he be one of those guys who overstayed his welcome?
He focused on the positives. His recovery was coming along nicely.
Already mobile, he hoped to be bearing his full weight by the following week.
Christmas was only a few weeks away. His teammates would be out of his hair for a while on the longest roadtrip of the year.
Maybe he could decide on a backup plan. Figure out who he would be if hockey ceased to be his driving force.
Livy was upset for days after the horrible incident with her dirtbag ex. Hazy wanted to do something nice for her. He also wouldn’t be able to figure out what to focus on outside of hockey without help. His plan killed two birds with one stone. He called in the big guns.
Livy parked his G-Wagon behind Daisy’s SUV after their trip to the rink for his physical therapy. “Were we expecting company?” she asked.
“Yep! We’re having a girls’ day.”
She grinned. “You’re one of the girls today?”
He stared at her and unbuckled his seatbelt. “Bold of you to assume I’m not always one of the girls.”
They went inside and found Daisy and Roxie still getting ready.
Four easels stood in the living room, each adorned with a corkboard.
Big boxes of supplies sat on the floor. Various types of scissors and glue littered the coffee table.
Daisy never did any activity half-way. When Hazy asked her to put this together, she’d given a gleeful squeal.
“Oh, fancy,” Livy said, taking in the art stations Daisy had prepared. “What are we making?”
“Vision boards,” Hazy said.
Livy whipped around. “No way.”
“Way,” Roxie said.
Hazy grabbed the pictures he’d printed off the counter and handed half to Livy. “I already started ours.”
“You didn’t,” Livy said, her smile giving away her delight. She accepted the photos he offered and studied them. “We were so fucking cute.”
They had a tradition of starting their vision boards with a picture of them together.
When they did their first one, they both agreed their dream lives didn’t exist without each other.
The picture he chose for this version of their vision boards showed them at ten and twelve, barefoot in his front yard, Livy attempting to give Hazy a piggyback ride, and Hazy licking her face.
“Ooo, can I see?” Daisy asked.
Hazy handed her his copy of the photo.
“This is the cutest thing I’ve seen in my life.”
Roxie snooped over Daisy’s shoulder. “I bet your mom planned on using this picture in a slideshow for your wedding day, but you two never sorted your shit out.”
Livy looked like she might crawl under the table and die. “Oh, we’re not...” she looked to Hazy for help.
Hazy’s cheeks got hot. The normal lie about being more like siblings wouldn’t come. He stared in horror at Roxie.
Daisy came to their rescue. “Be nice, Roxie. Some people are meant to be friends.”
“Not everyone is you and Patrick,” Roxie said. But apart from the snarky remark, she let the subject drop.
Daisy handed the picture to Hazy and said, “If you weren’t so broken, that would be such a cute picture to recreate.”
Livy claimed a corkboard and pinned the picture to the center of it.
“What’s the other one?” Roxie asked.
Hazy commandeered the corkboard next to Livy’s and pinned the picture of them in the corner. Then he added the second picture he’d printed. “Post-haircut Taylor Lautner from Twilight. That reveal was everything. The muscles? Unreal.” Hazy did a chef’s kiss.
“We were team Jacob,” Livy said.
Daisy gasped and clutched imaginary pearls. “No. Edward all the way.”
“We kept fighting over who got to put him on their board, so we agreed to share,” Hazy said.
“I don’t know why we were both delusional enough to think we could pull Taylor Lautner,” Livy said. She laughed and pinned a far too young for them now, but perfectly age-appropriate at the time Taylor to her board.
“You guys are insane for the team Edward and team Jacob argument. Alice and Rosalie were right there,” Roxie said.
“Team Alice is a given,” Daisy said.
“In the baseball outfit,” Hazy agreed.
They spent three hours flipping through massive piles of magazines and decorating their vision boards.
Roxie and Daisy chose to focus on their businesses.
They created one for their podcast and one for Daisy’s event planning business.
The woman stayed busy. Their boards contained beautiful venues, upgraded equipment, and dream guests.
Hazy struggled with his. He found pictures of the Cup, a bunch of vacation destinations he hadn’t visited yet, puppies, and a treehouse.
His board changed from ten years ago, but only because he had all the things money could buy.
His teenage self had put a G-Wagon on his board.
A sleek, modern house with a big backyard.
Fancy suits and watches. Different vacation spots he had already experienced.
More expensive hockey equipment. Before he was drafted, it had a picture of Minnesota’s jersey because he had hoped to be drafted to his home team.
He expected the activity to bring clarity, but it stung knowing he’d achieved most of his childhood dreams and still felt empty. He was no closer to figuring out what he would do without hockey than when he started.
Livy’s board was filled with basic necessities and no-brainers. A Range Rover, some modest apartments, a cute baby, a wedding dress and engagement ring, and a treehouse.
He pointed at the picture of an empty cubicle. “What’s this one supposed to be?”
“A job.”
“You have a job,” Hazy said. He didn’t want to lose her to some soulless office. Ideally, she would renew their contract in March.
“What type of job are you looking for?” Roxie asked.
Livy picked a piece of lint off her shirt. “None at the moment. I have time. I’m mostly qualified for administrative stuff.”
“It’s rough out there,” Roxie said. “I’ve had about a million jobs and everything is so boring. Why can’t there be a job where I get to be surrounded by sports and beautiful women all day? That would be the dream.”
“You have never sounded more like a man,” Daisy said. She gathered the obliterated magazines and tossed them into a big box.
“Don’t you get that with the podcast?” Livy asked. She pulled her finished corkboard off the easel and leaned it against the wall before dismantling the art stand.
“Oh, the podcast is great. I get the sports part, but it’s male-dominated and our peers can be super misogynistic. Plus, the podcast doesn’t pay the bills. It’s more of a hobby.” Roxie grabbed empty soda cans and plates and put them in the kitchen.
“Maybe someday Seattle will get a women’s hockey team. That would be so fucking cool. I’d pull a million strings to get you a commentating gig,” Hazy said. He wiped glitter and glue off the coffee table with a wet rag.
“I won’t hold my breath,” Roxie said.
“What’s your day job if the podcast isn’t paying the bills?” Livy asked.
“I work as a receptionist at a pediatric clinic. It’s fine. I see a lot of cute kids. Good hours. Benefits. Still boring though.”
“I’d prefer boredom to being broke.”
“For sure,” Roxie said.
“Do you work outside of the podcast and your business?” Livy asked Daisy.
“I do a million jobs. The podcast.” She gestured to the vision board with beautiful gardens and cocktails all over it. “An event planning business. And the Freeze hire me for a few team-building events each season. I honestly don’t have to work at all, but I get bored.”
Listening to them talk about their jobs made Hazy want to shower them with enough money to do whatever the hell they wanted. They were stubborn brats who would say no, but he wanted to nonetheless. Daisy didn’t even let Beanie do that, and they’d been married almost half a decade.
“If you had all the time and money in the world, what would you choose to do?” he asked.
“I’d do exactly what I’m doing now,” Daisy said.
“And that’s how you know you need to check your privilege,” Roxie said.
Livy grimaced but didn’t comment.
“Okay, Roxie, what would you do then?”
Roxie hesitated, seeming to search her mind for an answer. “I would travel. See every hockey arena in both the men’s and women’s leagues. Interview interesting people. Share the sport I love. And get more hobbies. I wish I had time for more hobbies.”
A lightbulb clicked on in Hazy’s head. Hobbies. That’s what people did. He didn’t have any. Maybe he should find some.