one
Knox
I pull out my keycard and swipe it on the black magnetic strip, waiting for the garage door to open. Advancing just a touch when the door starts to slide up, I drive down the ramp and look over to see Clive, the valet guy, is waiting for us to arrive. He gets out of his chair and walks over to where we usually stop. Putting the SUV in park, I open the door. “Morning, Clive.” I smile over at him. “How’s it going?”
"Could be better,” he says, and I nod at him, knowing the feeling, “but there’s always next year.”
“Coming back better and stronger.” I slap him on the arm as he passes me to go to the driver’s seat, and I walk over to the black steel door and pull it open.
I step into the hallway and see a bustle of activity coming from the front offices, different coaching staff people walking in and out of the doorways. “Hey,” I say to a couple of them as I walk down to the locker room.
The hallway is bare now that the season is over, no sticks lined up outside the room. No equipment staff running in and out with skates in their hands to sharpen or fix. Stepping into the room, I see most of the guys are already here. “Hey,” I greet to the room, walking over to my spot on the bench right under my name.
“Hey,” Jaxon, my teammate and our team’s best defensemen says, looking over his shoulder at me, giving me a chin up. “How you doing?” he asks me as he reaches for something on his shelf and tosses it in his duffel bag on the bench.
“Sucks.” I shrug, trying not to feel the dread of another season that has come and gone with us not winning the Stanley Cup. “But it is what it is.”
“Getting knocked out while in the wild card spot is harder than not making the playoffs,” he says. “It isn’t something anyone wants to happen, especially when it went to the last game of the season.”
He’s not wrong about that. We were tied with the Edmonton team for the wild card spot, and we had the same number of points, but they had an extra game in hand. It was our last game of the season and felt like playoff hockey already. We were going on a five-game winning streak on top of that. All eyes were on us; everyone was ready for that first round of playoffs.
But the hockey gods had other plans for us. We needed one freaking point to be contenders but lost the last game of the season. I’m pretty sure it sucked as much as going to the final round in the playoffs and losing that chance to hoist the Cup. At least that is how it felt for me.
That was last week and now we were asked to all come in today to do final interviews with the press and pack up our lockers. You never know what can happen over the summer break, even if I have a contract with the team for the next two years. I’ve seen it time in and time out; trades happen in the summer. Here today, gone tomorrow. I’ve been at this game for the last twelve years, and I’ve been lucky to only be hit with a trade once. That trade brought me from Montreal to the LA Warriors, done in the summer months.
I want to say I didn’t know it was coming, but my contract was up, and they were trying to wring me to take less than I knew I was worth. My agent at the time was looking out for me and didn’t back down. He took a couple of calls from other general managers, and I gave him four teams I’d be okay with being traded to. LA was one of them and then, in the span of three hours, I was traded. I was in the middle of my honeymoon on a boat in Capri when it happened. Josephine was beside herself since she’s from Montreal. Her whole family was from there and now she had to move to the other side of the continent. It took her a full year of going back and forth for her to finally settle in LA, but it was only because she was pregnant at that point. Now that she’s here, she loves every single thing about the city.
“Morning,” Kirby, the other top defenseman says, coming into the room. His phone in his hand, he tucks it in the back pocket of his shorts. “This fucking sucks,” he mumbles as he walks past me, slapping me on my back.
“It just makes you want it more next year,” I reply as I stand in front of my locker. “What’s going to suck more is the exit interviews.”
“Ugh,” Jaxon groans and his head goes back, and I laugh at his displeasure. “Like, how many times can you say ‘this isn’t how we wanted the season to go’ before you say ‘you think you can do better? I’ll lace up your skates.’”
“I will pay you one thousand dollars,” I grab my duffel bag from under my bench, “if you say that to them.” I look over at him. “Fuck that, I’ll double it and donate it to this guy for his foundation,” I point at Kirby, who just started a new foundation to help domestic abuse survivors.
“I will triple that,” Kirby adds. “Fuck, I’ll give you twenty thousand dollars.” I snort-laugh when he pushes Jaxon’s arm. “Do it.”
Jaxon smirks and shakes his head. “We’ll see,” he says, and I start packing my bag, grabbing the handmade cards the kids made me during the season. Smiling, I see the last one my five-year-old daughter, Nora, made me when we were away for two weeks straight. It’s the two of us on the ice together, holding hands, with her name and “Dad” in her handwriting with arrows pointing to our respective stick people. The next thing I put in my bag is a picture of the five of us at the last family skate. Josephine is next to me, with my arm around her and Nora in front of her. Vincent, our eight-year-old, has his arm around Nora and Westley, our six-year-old, is in front of him. The five of us are smiling big for the camera. “Two hours and I’m officially on summer vacation.”
I look over my shoulder at him. “What do you have planned?” I ask him as I put some of my workout clothes in the bag.
“We have Ariella’s family vacation for two weeks,” he says, “then we are going to just spend the summer here.” I nod at him. “What about you guys? Going to Italy again for two months?”
I laugh at him. “Last time I did that, I came back twenty pounds heavier, and it took me a whole season to work it off,” I remind him of the trip we took last year for our summer break. We drove from the top of Italy to the bottom, stopping for weeks on end in small towns close to the beaches. It was a trip I would never forget. “We’re going to spend the summer in Montreal with Josie’s family,” I tell them. “We rented a cottage on the lake. I have a trainer coming in four times a week and it’s got a rink not too far from it, so I’ll be skating too.” They both laugh at me. “It was all fun and games until I couldn’t even play two minutes last year.”
A couple of guys come back into the room. “Kirby, Jaxon, and Knox, they are ready for you guys.”
“Great.” I grab the last of my things and toss them in the bag. “Let’s do this,” I say, looking at Jaxon and Kirby, who take a deep inhale.
I walk out of the locker room and head over to the media room. Stepping in, I see the table in the middle of the room on top of the stage, walk up the three steps and head to the last chair, pulling it out and sitting down. Our PR coordinator, Jill, comes out and puts my name in front of me and then proceeds to do that with the other two. As if the reporters who have been following us for the last year don’t know who we are.
“Okay,” Kirby starts, “let’s get this over with.” We all chuckle as we take questions. The interview lasts for a whole forty-five minutes. We reflect on the year and add in what we should work on as a team.
When the last question is asked, I get up and walk out with my teammates. “Boys,” Jaxon says, “it’s been a pleasure.” He smirks. “Even though I didn’t win the bet…” He turns, walking backward. “I’m going to do the honorable thing and donate to the foundation anyway.”
“Great.” I roll my eyes. “So if I don’t, I’m a cheap bastard. Fine, I’ll match it.”
I walk into the locker room. “We’re done earlier than we thought,” Kirby states and I look at my watch and see it’s only one, and I told Josephine I would be back at four. Now I’ll be home in time to go with her to grab the kids at school. “Want to hit up the golf course?”
