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“I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this pissed,” I said to Reyes.
“Dude. You know you fucked up, right?” Reyes hoisted his shoulder pads over his head.
“Yeah, man. I tripped him. It was an accident.”
He raised his eyebrows. “You left your brand-new wife alone at your parents’ house for dinner.”
“What do you mean? Her friends showed up. She’s used to being there without me.”
Reyes gave me side-eye so bad it looked like he might have an aneurism.
“You weren’t married then. And your mom was there.”
“So?”
“Yeah… don’t do that.” Reyes looked shell-shocked. Then he cringed like a ghost walked over his grave. “Don’t ever leave her alone with your mom. You deal with your family; she deals with hers. I don’t give out marital advice very often. That’s the freebie. Saved Tiff and me a lot of unnecessary squabbles over the years. And it saves Dec from that common trap of doing all the mental heavy lifting for both of you in a marriage. Don’t be that guy. Don’t pawn your family of origin off on your wife.”
“He made a commitment to the team, too,” Waylon said. “He supposed to leave us without a wing so he can babysit his wife? She’s a big girl. Decca can take care of herself.”
“We might as well have played without a wing,” Cameron said. “I don’t know where Gus’s head was at tonight.”
“You’re one to talk, the way you keep hanging out in our zone. You gave Forty-Three a clear shot at the goal.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Waylon’s eyes narrowed as he shoved his pads into his bag. He stopped zipping and looked up, pointing to me. “We’ll recap your game at the bar, Padre.”
George raised his eyebrows as we threw our sticks and bags in the back of the truck.
“You really sucked out there, man,” he said after we’d been on the road for several minutes.
“I should go back to skating clinic. Stick and shoots,” I said to the window.
“No, like, you always suck, but you extra-sucked tonight. What’s going on? Are you and Dec—”
“Yeah, yeah. Everything’s good. It’s an adjustment, being married.”
“Well, yeah. That’s true for everyone. And in your case, the adjustment’s colossal. But it’s more than that. Don’t bullshit me. You don’t seem very happy.”
“You’re one to talk.”
“I am happy. It took a lot of work. It takes continuous work. I don’t have the natural inclination towards it. You do. And it’s lacking right now. I know how you feel about Decca. This should be the best time of your life. Before all the petty annoyances kick in, and you need the break of hockey because you can’t stand that your wife keeps forgetting to wring out the sponge and she just drops it, sopping wet, in the bottom of the sink and walks away.”
“Did Bethany forget to wring out the sponge?”
“Hypothetical.” He gritted his teeth. His hands gripped the steering wheel tighter and twisting the black plastic. “It’s like a germ bomb waiting to explode all over your plates. Clean plates you’re supposed to be able to eat off of. And there’s nothing you can do once the germs start breeding. It’s like an abdominal cavity in a corpse. The cell walls break down and bacteria feast and feast, creating more and more gasses until…” he made an explosion gesture with his hands. “And you can’t microwave it or throw it inthe dishwasher. That only kills the good bacteria. All you can do is throw the sponge away.”
“Luckily…” I looked at my brother. “It’s a sponge. It costs what? A dollar fifty?
“It’s the principle.”
“Right. It’s a conundrum,” I said, pretending I didn’t understand the metaphor.
“But you don’t have that excuse. You don’t have a sponge non-wringer-outer causing bacterial plague in your house. So, what were you thinking about out there on the ice?”
I sighed. “It stays between me and you, right? I’d rather not rehash this in front of the team.”
“That goes without saying.”
