“Who’s missing?” Coach asks our assistant coach. “I’m only counting twenty-six.”
“Morris is missing,” Sebastian says.
Reno sighs and pulls his phone out. With the call on speakerphone, we all hear it ring.
“I’m sorry,” Morris says as soon as he answers, the sound of sirens filtering in along with his voice. “There’s an accident three cars ahead of me. He crossed the line, and it looked like some shit out of a movie.”
“Is anyone hurt?” Assistant Coach Reno asks.
“I don’t know. I’m about to turn around before more of the road gets blocked. It just happened like four minutes ago, and I was debating whether it made me a bad human to drive away.”
“They’re not going to let you help anyway,” someone says. “They’re not even going to take a statement from you.”
“Wiley’s right,” Coach says.
We hear Morris’ heavy breath. “Okay. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Sorry. I didn’t mean to be late.”
“Drive safely,” Reno says.
Beethoven Morris is one of our new players this year, so I imagine he’s feeling very stressed right now because we’re waiting on him. Checking my watch, I see that he’s nottechnically late anyway. We weren’t scheduled to be here until nine this morning, and it’s still quarter to.
We mill about while we wait for Morris. I catch Coach’s eyes several times as they move through the team. I don’t even try to hide my smile, especially when I think I see a flush on his cheeks.
Finally, Morris arrives. He’s scrambling to join us, still apologizing.
“Not your fault,” Coach says.
“You’re not actually late,” Zenia Talmage says. “It’s 8:59. You’re still early.”
Coach inclines his head. “Zen is correct. Take a breath and relax. No need to begin the day stressed.”
Morris nods and takes a breath. “Thanks.”
“Alright,” Coach says. “First business. Everyone has water, correct?”
A chorus of yeses fill the air.
Coach nods. “Good. We’ll be hiking to the end of the trail. It’s not an aggressively steep incline, but the terrain can be challenging.” He holds up a beach ball. “You’re familiar with the practice of tossing a beach ball around during assemblies in high school, yeah?”
I nod along with my teammates.
“I thought that was just my backwoods hillbilly town,” someone mutters. Snickers fill the group.
“As we walk along the trail, you’ll be tossing this around. Your goal is to keep it in the air and with us the entire time, all whilenotbreaking an ankle. This will hone your skill of knowing where your teammates are when they’re behind you—where the puck is when you don’t see it. Be aware of your surroundings. You need to keep the ball in play until I tell you otherwise.Do notlet it go off the trail or hit the ground. This isn’t keep-away. It’s keep-in-play. Your job isn’t to aggressively hit it to the front of the line from the back. Use your teammates. Any questions?”
I shake my head as several teammates answer verbally.
“Good. Let’s get started.”
“We’ll be stopping halfway for a quick break and water refills for those who need it. You should all be hydrating. It’s not super hot, but I’m sure your packs are heavy, and you’re going to be strenuously hiking for several hours,” Mina says.
“I don’t think I’ve ever hiked,” Willits says. He steps beside me as we fall into line behind Ren and Felton. Ren’s besties, Zenia and Denny, are in front of them.
I glance behind us to see how far back our team goes. It’s important to know when that damn beach ball is heading in our direction. Seems we’re about in the middle of the pack. Not an awful place to be.
There’s a lot of chatter for the first hour or so before it dies off. The team has fun with the beach ball for about that time. That’s when it becomes clear that fit hockey players do not equate to endurance hikers.
“How long is this trail?” someone behind me asks.
