Or if I’m just looking for a reason my instincts won’t shut up.
Either way, I force my focus back to the game, my jaw tightening as I dig my skates into the ice.
The Reapers start chirping halfway through the second, the way teams do when they realize skill alone isn’t going to win it for them. Little things at first: sticks tapping my skates after whistles, shoulders leaning in a fraction too hard along the boards. Their winger drifts close on a line change and mutters something about my stride, about how quiet I am.
He grins when I don’t react.
They always do.
I let it slide the way I always have. I sink inward, to the place I go when noise tries to get inside my head.
It’s automatic now. Muscle memory.
I picture my dad’s hands wrapped around a chipped ceramic mug, steam curling up between us on the back steps of our old place. Early mornings. Frost on the grass. He used to tell me that the ice doesn’t care how loud you are—only how steady.
Let them waste energy trying to move you,he’d said.You just stay where you are.
So, I do.
The Reapers winger keeps trying. He leans in after a whistle, breath hot through his cage.
“You ever smile, or you always look like that?”
Nothing.
“Guess that’s what happens when you’ve got nothing going on upstairs.”
Still nothing.
Marco takes an elbow along the boards not long after—an ugly one, tucked in close where the ref can pretend he didn’t see it. Marco stumbles, catches himself, then snarls. Gordo is already shedding gloves in the background like someone hit his fight button early, but Coach screams from the bench so hard I think the veins in his forehead are about to burst.
“NOT NOW!” he bellows. “SAVE IT FOR THE THIRD!”
It's barely contained chaos. We skate away, and the Reapers winger laughs like he’s won something.
By the time the third starts, it’s tied 2–2. The crowd is feral, noise rolling down from the stands in waves. Connor’s got a bruise blooming along his jaw from a cross-check nobody bothered to call, and my lungs burn, legs heavy, every shift carved out of grit instead of air.
We pull ahead with seven minutes left, when Gordo slips one through the five-hole after the goalie overcommits.
“You mean to do that?” I ask as he glides past me on the change.
“Obviously,” he says, chest heaving, eyes wild.
(He did not.)
The Reapers start pressing harder after that; bodies flying, sticks clashing, and the boards rattle like the whole rink might crack in half.
Their winger lines up beside me for the next faceoff, too close, blade nudging mine like it’s accidental when it isn’t. He doesn’t look at me as he speaks, staring straight ahead, though his voice is low and deliberate.
“Enjoy it while it lasts,” he says. “Your captain’s shoulder’s already hanging by a thread. Everyone can see it.”
I breathe out slowly through my nose.
Let it pass.
Let it slide.
He chuckles under his breath, sensing the lack of response, and finally turns his head.
