Page 92 of Puck You Both

"They can just do it, you know." My thumb picks at the seam of the cushion. "Some guy with a checkmark types available at eleven in the morning, and by noon it's true, because he typed it. And the team can do it too. They sign you, they play you, they tell you you're a big part of what they're building, and you believe it, because you're a moron. And then one Tuesday two men in suits trade twenty minutes of phone calls and you're a future consideration." My voice is climbing again. There's nothing bright about it this time. "And everybody shakes your hand and calls it business. The rumor goblin gets his engagement, the team gets a pick, and I get shipped to a parking lot with palm trees, where nobody knows me, and I do the whole thing over, from scratch, and…"

It runs out. Just like that, mid-thought, nothing left. Like Margaux on the phone, except now there's no phone to hang up.

I brace, out of habit, to be saved from the quiet. Patrick would already be asking careful questions in his calm voice, and I'd grab the first exit those questions offered me.

Wall doesn't offer one. He sits next to me, solid, eyes on the screen, and lets the quiet come all the way into the room and settle between us. For a second I'm scared, because nobody has ever left me alone inside a silence and stayed. I keep waiting to fall through it.

I don't fall. It's just quiet, and he's just here. On the screen, Gaétan murmurs something almost forgiving about the subfloor.

Then, Wall’s eyes find mine and he says, "You're not a rental anywhere that matters."

I open my mouth, but nothing comes.

My hand finds his sleeve and holds on, and my head goes down on his shoulder, cheesehead and all. He turns back to the show like nothing happened, and we sit like that and watch a man repair a wall, my fingers still closed around his sleeve. He lets them stay.

At some point the episode changes on its own. Then it changes again. The light through the blinds goes from afternoon to something softer, and my eyes get heavy. The last thing I decide on purpose is that I'm not moving.

I’m not sure what time it is when the sound of a key turning in the lock wakes me.

I open one eye halfway.

The door clicks shut so carefully it barely counts as a sound. A gear bag comes down to the floor slow, by the strap, the quiet of a very large man trying to be a small one.

Patrick stops in the middle of my living room and looks at us. At Wall, head tipped back, mouth open, out cold, undignified, then at me, curled into his side, hand still fisted in his hoodie, cheesehead sliding half off my head.

He folds his arms over his chest, leans sideways against the wall, and smiles this warm smile he only allows himself to produce when he thinks nobody’s watching.

Saying goodbye to the Vipers will be tough, but I’ll manage. I always do.

I just don’t know how I’m going to survive losing this.

Chapter 18

WALL

I THINK TOO much, and that’s a problem.

It has never been a problem before, but then again, I’ve never been keeping a secret for this long in my life.

I’m on my fifth mental re-run of last night as I enter the locker room before morning skate, and the funny thing is, nothing happened last night. And it’s the nothingness that somehow weighs more that all the previous nights combined.

Patrick showed up at Theo’s as some point. I missed him walking in, but got woken up by a gentle tap on the shoulder, a hushed voice urging me to move to the bed. And then we just were, the two of us supporting the third, silently, because neither of us seemed to be able to find the right words. No touching, no shows, just being, and sleeping, existing in a shared space, a concept so confusing that I realize what’s going on in my surroundings way too late.

I’m already halfway to my stall before I notice the fuckery afoot.

The guys nearest the door go silent first, and the quiet rolls down the stalls ahead of me like a wave I'm generating, until by the time I reach my corner the only sound in the room is somebody's skate blade being stoned, slower and slower, and then that stops too.

The entire team, all suddenly busy. Snooze pretends to be asleep at an angle no spine allows. Groover and Ace are sharing one magazine between them, and the magazine is upside down. Petrov is reading his phone with his screen off.

The last time this room went quiet for my arrival, there was a fish in my glove. I set my bag down and check my glove.

Empty.

I check my helmet. Empty.

I run a hand along the top shelf of my stall and come away with nothing but dust.

Great. So it's worse than a fish.