“No.” I haven’t logged into social media in years. I would rather take a puck to the face than look at that shit.
“Well, the guy’s a douche. Prep school brat, Harvard hockey. Raised in the Hamptons and never goes anywhere without his designer Swiss watch.”
“I don’t know what being raised in the Hamptons means,” I say. I’ve heard of the Hamptons, but they don’t mean anything to me.
“It’s like America’s Monaco.”
“America doesn’t have a Monaco.” My family took a road trip to Monaco once, when I was young, before my father passed. I remember we camped because we couldn’t afford the hotels.
“You’re so annoying. You get what I’m saying. The dude’s a cocky prick and I’m jonesing to get a hit on him. I don’t like his face.”
“He’s just a kid.”
“A kid with a twenty-million-dollar contract.” Poirier lands a particularly hard punch on the sandbag.
“It sounds like you’re worried he’ll make a better defenseman,” I needle him.
Poirier drops his hands and stares at me. “I’m not worried about that pretty-boy shrimp. The only person making me feel threatened right now is that dickhead suit of a new owner. Dude’s never even been to a game. He doesn’t give a shit about what happens to us.”
My mood darkens. It’s not official yet, but it’s looking increasingly likely that Hugh Hearst will take over the team. I don’t feel good about it. Poirier’s right, he doesn’t care about hockey and the whole franchise knows it. Unless we pull off the greatest comeback in the history of the team, there’s a ninety-nine percent chance Iamgoing to end up in Utah, or St. Louis, or some other shithole this time next year, though my odds of winning the Cup can’t get much worse than they are now. Either way, dating is the least of my concerns. I keep a strict schedule, and it doesn’t have room for any of that.
“Stay focused, Poirier,” I say, toweling off my face. “We just have to show him what we’re worth.”
“Whatever you say, Captain.”
I shoot him a glare and head for the showers.
Chapter 6
Freddie
I leave the post office in a foul mood. My mind keeps replaying the interaction with that guy in line, wondering if I really did something wrong. I glance around the parking lot, having half a mind to confront him, but he’s gone. Was there some European culture difference I missed, or did he just find me that offensive? At least I think he was European. There was a foreign lilt to his words, stretching and widening his vowels. Not too prominent, but noticeable. I guess there’s a chance he’s one of those suspiciously German Argentinians. I almost laugh at the fact that he was wearing a Monarchs hat—if only he knew—but the way he spoke to me leaves me second-guessing myself, like he couldn’t stand to breathe the same air as me.
Then it hits me. Maybe hedidknow. Maybe he recognized me, and that’s why he treated me like dirt. Because he’s a Monarchs fan, and he knows who my family are. Is this what I have to look forward to?
I feel like bashing my head against the steering wheel, but I don’t have any more time to think about it. I pull into the parking lot of the Monarchs’ training rink twenty minutes late. My father acts like he’s been infected with the Rage Virus when he’s kept waiting, but there was no way around it—I’d already dated andpackaged up all the paperwork for my submission to the Agnelli Agency with the intention of sending it today.
By now I’ve submitted my request for representation to most of the director’s agencies in town, and all I’ve heard is crickets. Like what happened in the post office, I can’t help wondering if my name has something to do with it. A lot of Hollywood types don’t like my father, but the Agnelli Agency is my last shot. They only take submissions by post, probably to deter people who aren’t seriously interested. Sending my submission off for judgment put my teeth on edge, and I must have watched my director’s reel twenty times last night for peace of mind. Is it the best reel on planet Earth? No. Is it good enough to get an agent? I guess I’ll find out.
The sports center parking lot is half-empty, littered with a few parents walking alongside children dragging hockey bags. My parents tried to enroll me in skate lessons when I was little, but that lasted about two seconds. All it took was one bruise on my butt for me to tear off my brand-new skates and declare that I quit. Plus I hated those itchy leotards. Sports were never my thing anyway. I have no interest in watching grown men knock each other’s teeth out.
The only hockey player I like is Jason Voorhees.
I park in the corner, beside an old yellow Volvo with a pine-shaped air freshener hanging from the rearview. I haven’t seen one of those things since prep school, when my friends would crack open five at once to try to hide the evidence we’d been joyriding around smoking blunts. Surely nobody likes the way they smell, and if they do, that’s serial killer behavior as far as I’m concerned.
I stare at the rink entrance, trying to muster the willpower to get out of my car. I haven’t been here since before I started undergrad, before I dropped out of business school and invoked my father’s ire. It’s never a good sign when he wants to speak to me alone, not that my motherhas ever been much of a shield against him. If anything, she’s the one who usesmeas a shield. She’s happy to make me into a scapegoat that she can blame for my father’s misery, so long as it means her lifestyle won’t change. She wasn’t raised with money, but now that she has it she’d give up anything else to keep it.
It doesn’t help that I slept like shit last night. My mother insisted I stay over—something about personal safety and keeping the situation confined—and I wasn’t quick enough to come up with an excuse to leave. Being back in my childhood room always revives bad memories. Unlike other teens, I wasn’t allowed to hang posters on the walls or decorate with colorful bedding. My father always said it made the place look tacky, that our rooms and walls were tooniceto be ruined with knick-knacks, but all that ever did was make the place feel more like a hospital than a bedroom.
I glance at my phone, stalling by scrolling through my messages. No new texts or emails. Nothing from Miles about budget changes, or any meeting requests from any of the agencies I’ve submitted to. Nothing to show for myself when my father inevitably drills into what I’ve been up to lately. I shouldn’t get my hopes up.
Sometimes I wonder if I’m Jack Torrance fromThe Shining, deluding myself into thinking my artistry is going somewhere, when really, I’m just making my downward spiral everyone else’s problem.
“Welcome back, Frederica,” says the security guard at the desk, who I’m positive I’ve never spoken to in my life.
Sufficiently creepy, and not in the way I enjoy. A whistle blows somewhere in the facility, followed by the sound of children laughing, which makes the dreadful task of finding my father’s office feel more like descending into Pennywise’s sewer than entering a sports complex. My stomach twists, wondering what he wants.
“Freddie,” he says when he sees me in the doorway. “You’re late.”
