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“Then what can we do? How much do we have for the season?”
Andrew stood quickly, his chair bouncing against the wall behind him, and rounded his desk. “How much gear do we have left?”
Leaving his office, Andrew grabbed the equipment room key from the little hook in my office and marched down the hall. He didn’t have far to go. Our workplace consisted of three offices—one of which was used as a fitting room—and a large, cold equipment room with a thermostat that practically screamed anytime it was turned on.
“Some helmets have expired, so we’d need to get new, but we have two junior gear kits and a senior.”
“Three completed kits?” Andrew balked, swinging around to face me. “That’s it?”
I shrugged. I knew he wasn’t mad at me, but his tone set me on edge. It all somehow felt like it was my fault, as if I was the reason that the Stags no longer wanted to work with us because they were so used to dealing with Stanley.
“That’s it,” I agreed. “We have a gear drive planned for the fifteenth of September.”
Andrew scoffed, and the sound made me frown. My boss mirrored the downturn of my mouth, and he stepped forward.
“Kiddo…we’ll make it work. We’ve got to.”
“I don’t want to see this program crash and burn.”
“It won’t,” he promised, but I was certain he didn’t believe himself.
Unlocking the door, Andrew flicked on the light and stared around at the empty shelves. When I first started, Andrew had told me that they used to have to turn away new and used equipment donations from the community due to not having enough space. That wasn’t the case anymore.
“Yikes,” Andrew whispered. “We’re going to have to get creative. I’m going to go make some calls, and you keep screening applications. Make me a list broken down into divisions, and I’ll see what I can do.”
“Okay,” I agreed with a nod, and left my boss to stare at the empty equipment room.
My phone was vibrating on my desk, and I accepted the call from my roommate as I sat down.
“Hey,” I called, wiggling my mouse to rouse my computer from sleep mode.
“Hey, sunshine,” Ali replied with a soft giggle. “Have you eaten your lunch yet?”
I glanced down at the time written across the bottom of my computer screen and blew out a slow breath that was enough of a response for Ali.
“No…” she prompted.
“No,” I agreed, and opened my email inbox. “Just had a meeting with Andrew.”
“Oh, yeah? And what did Mr. Hot Shot have to say?”
“That if we’re not creative, Power Play is dead.”
“Shit.”
“Shit is right. I’m screwed. I’m screwing everything up,” I hissed, hearing Andrew’s footsteps as he made his way back.
He leaned in, hung the key back onto the tiny hook, and winked at me in a way that reminded me of my dad.
“You are not. You’re doing the best you can. If that stupid assholeStanleyhadn’t justup and left you!” she yelled, and I had to pull the phone away from my ear. “So he could do…what? Carry around some sticks for a bunch of nobody hockey players? What stupid division, or whatever it’s called, is he doing that for again?”
“ECHL,” I offered. “He’s the equipment manager.”
“RIGHT, ECHL! He’s such an idiot. I hate him. I hate him so goddamn much. Equipment manager my ass… Did he get any training up there in Nowhere Land? Probably better than the two damn days he trained you!”
“Two and a half.”
Ali went silent, and I knew my input wasn’t helping.
