“So you want the kinds of jobs where you’d have to spend most of your time away from home?” he grumbled.
I studied him for a moment, trying to register the force behind his response.
“You already know that, Niklas,” I whispered. “I don’t have the job yet, but I want to try for it.”
He paused, frowning.
“I get it, Caroline,” he finally said. “If we had somehow met in Sweden just before I joined the Red Wings, I couldn’t have let go of that opportunity. I would have tried like hell to make both things work. But you leaving for a month at a time doesn’t work for me. What happens after that? Back for a few weeks and then another month away?”
Niklas leaned back in his chair and looked away. When he met my gaze again, his eyes were dark, and he sounded almost angry. “I can’t help but wonder where on the list of priorities the two of us will fall when it comes to making career choices.”
I struggled to understand what was happening. Of course he was frustrated. He had just followed me around the world for the summer, but I balked at doing the same. But something else was going on, too, and I didn’t know what. I looked down at my hands, clasped tightly in my lap.
“I’m sorry, Niklas.”
A long sigh came from across the table. I looked up at him.
“I told myself I wasn’t going to push you,” he said, rubbing his forehead with his hand. “If you feel like you’re giving up your career, that doesn’t work either. But you have to be ready to choose us. And spending more time away than with me doesn’t work.”
The candles blew in the warm, gentle breeze. Niklas’s face shone in the flickering light. Was falling in love enough to build a relationship? Would everything else just work itself out? Sitting across the table from Niklas right now, I wanted to believe it.
“I want to choose us and my career,” I finally said. “I just haven’t figured out how to do that yet. What do you want, Niklas? Would you really be happy in Detroit?”
The hint of a smile faded from Niklas’s face. “I don’t know. I’ll keep practicing for the next couple days and see. It’s a great team this year.”
“What about Bauer? And the…”
The wordabusesat on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn’t say it. I didn’t have to. Niklas’s face shuttered closed before I said more.
“The Red Wings haven’t offered me a contract at this point, but I’ll probably know by next week whether or not playing here is even an option.”
He wasn’t answering my question. He was considering playing for the Red Wings for me, not for him. After spending the afternoon at Joe Lewis Arena, immersed in his world, I wondered what kind of bargain that would turn out to be in the end.
I took a sip of wine, fortifying myself for the next subject. “Bauer was pretty awful. I didn’t expect him to be that direct.”
Niklas shook his head slowly. “Honestly, I didn’t either. Last spring, he wasn’t like that. I told you before, he… he thanked me for not defending myself when the articles hinted that I had hit that woman. As if the problem was the publicity, as if he didn’t understand he had crossed the line into something really serious.”
Niklas looked away, his face darkening.
“Today was different,” Niklas said, his voice harder. “Makes me wonder what happened this summer. I think something gave him a little more awareness.”
I had to wonder who would choose to get involved in the life I had taken a step into. Why did women pursue hockey players or anyone in professional sports, for that matter? Hockey seemed to reward physical aggression and the single-minded drive to win, with no room for compromise or tenderness.
“I don’t want us mixed up in those darker parts of what playing an aggressive sport can do to a person,” Niklas added, as if he were following my thoughts.
“Are any of the guys on your team married?”
“Yes, some of them,” he said.
“How do we make it work?” I asked. “I didn’t see any other women watching the scrimmage today. I just can’t see how women would fit in.”
Niklas frowned as he considered my question. Or was he frowning at my mention of marriage? Even the word felt raw in my mouth. We sat in silence, the night noises surrounding them, until Niklas finally spoke.
“Honestly, I’ve never thought too much about the other guys’ wives,” he said with a little smirk. “I think some guys marry women who like money and publicity. I’m sure there are other parts to the relationship, but that part seems to feed it.”
He took another drink of his wine and looked out into the dark night.
“But some of the guys keep that part of our lives separate,” he continued. “There’s one guy I’ve played with for a few years. Swedish, too, so I know him pretty well. But I’ve only met his wife once. Still, the idea of leading two separate lives…”
