Delete. Too . . . something I couldn’t . . . I wouldn’t . . . justtoo something.
In the end, I sent:
Me: Touchdown. Hotel’s nice. How’s my booth?
His response came almost immediately.
Jacks: Happy to report booth is secure, sir. No infiltrators attempted entry. Benji added more signs. You now have a “VIP Section” designation.
Me: I’m honored.
Jacks: You should be. Benji doesn’t bestow VIP status lightly.
Me: What are the perks of VIP status?
Jacks: Slightly faster service and Benji will only judge your drink orders a bit instead of a lot.
Me: Living the dream.
Jacks: Nightmares are dreams, too,ya know?
We texted back and forth for another hour. It flowed in the same easy banter we’d fallen into over the past few weeks. He told me about a customer who’d tried to order a “surprise me” cocktail and then complained about every option Benji suggested. I told him about Murph’s in-flight attempt to convince Erik that the plane was haunted.
It was comfortable.
It was fun.
It also made the distance feel a bit smaller, like he was right there instead of 2,800 miles away.
When I put my phone down to grab dinner with the team, I realized I’d been smiling for the better part of an hour.
The next few days blurred together in a haze of practices, games, and hotel rooms. We beat Seattle 4 to 2 on Thursday night, then flew to Vancouver for a Saturday matinee that we won in overtime. The team was clicking, the wins were piling up, and by all objective measures, the road trip was going great.
But I was still distracted. Erik hadn’t been wrong.
I managed to stay focused on the ice. I’d learned long ago to compartmentalize, to leave everythingelse at the boards and focus on the game. Off the ice, in the quiet hours between practices and puck drops, my mind kept wandering to places it had no business visiting.
Places like Barbacks.
Places like oak trees.
Places like the curve of Jacks’s smile when he was trying not to laugh, and the way his eyes twinkled in the awful lighting that hung above the service area of the bar.
The more we talked, the more I wanted to talk.
The more I learned about him, the more I wanted to know.
Every conversation left me hungry for the next one, counting hours until my phone would buzz with his name.
That wasn’t normal friendship.
I knew it wasn’t.
But I didn’t know what else to call it.
On Monday morning, the day before we flew to Calgary, Coach called a team meeting in the hotel conference room.
“Quick update before practice,” he said, standing at the front of the room while we sprawled in chairs around him. “Schedule change. The league moved our Calgary game to Tuesday night instead of Wednesday, which means we fly out tonightinstead of tomorrow morning.”
