7
The office was too warm.
Mara stood behind her desk with the window cracked open and the evening air drifting in, carrying the faint salt tang of the ocean and the distant rumble of traffic on the coast road. Her coaching jacket hung on the back of the door. She'd unzipped it, peeled it off, draped it there twenty minutes ago, and the chill from the window should have been enough to cool her down. It was not enough. Her skin was flushed from her chest to her hairline and the collar of her polo felt like it was strangling her.
Goldie was curled under the desk, chin on her paws, watching Mara pace with patient golden eyes. The dog had that expression she got when Mara was agitated, calm and steady and faintly concerned, like she was waiting for the storm to pass.
The storm was not passing.
Every time Mara closed her eyes, she saw it. Lex against the shower tiles, water droplets glistening on brown skin and ink and muscle, catching light along the ridges of her shoulders, the curve of her breasts, the flat plane of her stomach, the carved lines of her thighs. The tattoos vivid and glistening under theoverhead lights. The absolute absence of shame. Lex had stood there, naked and dripping and unhurried, and looked at Mara like she was the one who owed an explanation.
Mara pressed her palms flat against the desk and breathed through her nose.
Twenty years of locker rooms. She had never reacted like this. The heat under her skin was not professional. The tightness low in her belly was not functional. The image burned into the back of her eyelids, Lex turning slowly under the water with that crooked half-smile, was the furthest thing from unremarkable she had ever experienced.
Get yourself together. You are forty-eight years old. You have a session with her in fifteen minutes.
The video strategy sessions had been productive since preseason. Mara would pull up game footage on the laptop, sit Lex on the other side of the desk, and walk her through defensive reads, positioning angles, coverage responsibilities. It was clinical. Analytical. Two professionals reviewing tape. Except now the desk between them felt like a joke. Now the office felt small and warm and private enough to make Mara's pulse knock against her throat.
She filled a glass of water from the jug on the shelf and drank half of it standing at the window. The parking lot below was nearly empty. A few cars remained, staff vehicles and Lex's battered black sedan parked crookedly near the side entrance. Lex was still in the building somewhere.
Mara drained the glass and set it down harder than she meant to. Goldie's ears twitched.
"Sorry, girl." She reached down and scratched behind Goldie's ear, and the dog's tail thumped once against the carpet.The warmth of Goldie's fur under her fingers was grounding, pulling her back from the edge of whatever precipice she'd been teetering on since she walked into that locker room.
You can cancel. Tell her you're busy. Reschedule for tomorrow when you've had time to?—
A knock on the door.
Mara straightened. Her hand went to her ponytail, tightening it, a reflex she couldn't seem to break when she was nervous. She smoothed the front of her polo, checked that her posture was correct, and opened the door.
Lex stood in the corridor in a clean black hoodie and gray joggers, hair still damp from whatever shower she'd taken after the photoshoot debacle. She'd washed off the makeup and her face was bare, scrubbed clean, sharper without makeup. The tattoos on her hands disappeared up into the hoodie sleeves and there was a thin silver chain around her neck catching the fluorescent light.
"Hey, Coach." Lex's voice was easy, unbothered, like an hour ago she hadn't been standing naked and defiant in a steam-filled shower while Mara tried to form a coherent sentence. "We still good for the session?"
"Come in." Mara stepped back to let her pass and caught the scent of clean soap as Lex moved by. Simple. Uncomplicated. It shouldn't have made her stomach clench.
Lex dropped into the chair across from the desk and immediately leaned down to greet Goldie, who had emerged from her hiding spot with her tail going. "Hey, beautiful." Lex rubbed Goldie's ears with both hands, scratching the spots that made the dog's back leg kick, and Goldie's entire body wiggled with delight. "You're the best girl. The absolute best."
Mara sat down and opened the laptop. The game footage was already queued up, timestamps highlighted, her notes organized in the margins. She clicked the first clip and angled the screen toward Lex.
"Before we start." Lex was still petting Goldie but her eyes had come up to Mara's face. Dark and direct and uncomfortably perceptive. "Do you want to talk about the photo thing? Clear the air?"
Mara's fingers stilled on the keyboard. "I'm not sure what there is to discuss."
"You seemed pretty sure earlier. When you came into the locker room like you were going to fire someone." Lex scratched behind Goldie's ears, her gaze steady on Mara.
"I was concerned about unauthorized use of team facilities for personal?—"
"For a fan photoshoot. Yeah, I heard the speech." Lex's mouth curved, not mocking exactly, but amused. She leaned back in the chair and stretched her legs out, crossing her ankles. Goldie settled against her shins and Lex's hand dropped to rest on the dog's back. "Look, I get it. You saw something you didn't expect and you reacted. But the photos aren't what you think they are."
Mara closed the laptop. The footage could wait. "Then tell me what they are."
Lex sat forward, elbows on her knees, and Mara saw it, the shift. The cockiness dropped away like a mask removed. What replaced it was quieter, more certain, grounded in conviction.
"There's a fan account. Women's hockey, women's sport in general. It's run by two women in Montreal who've been covering female athletes for years. They approached me because of what I represent. Not the controversy, not the gossip. The fact that I look the way I look and I don't apologize for it." Lex paused, choosing her words, and Mara was struck by theclarity. "I'm masc. I'm muscular. I have tattoos. I don't perform femininity for the cameras. And there's a whole generation of women and girls who need to see someone like me owning that. Being powerful and attractive and not shrinking myself to make anyone comfortable."
The office was quiet. Goldie's breathing. The hum of the ventilation.
