"Oh yeah.Not, like, millions or anything, but a steady income."She leans in and stage-whispers."He’s even thinking of finally getting his own place."
"Shocker," I deadpan.
She and her husband have been trying to gently encourage Luke to move out for at least a year and a half, to no avail.
Her husband appears with plastic cups of beer for all three of us, just in time for the second period to start.
The gameplay is tighter than ever, with more shots on goal for both teams.It's a goalie's game, so far, with the big showstopping plays all coming from the net.Duchesne, in particular, is on fire; one play in particular had even the FD supporters losing their minds as he flopped and scrambled and thrashed like a madman, stopping a series of increasingly desperate shots from every angle before finally managing to cover the puck with his glove to draw the whistle.
Noah, ever the sportsman, gives Duchesne a friendly side-hugging helmet-slap—and, I assume, a word of praise for the wild sequence of saves—before skating to the dot for the faceoff.
Noah has been solid all game, leading his team in shots on goal.His dedication to improving his skills and fitness has paid off—Stan Hibbard, who got away from Noah on a breakaway last year, tries it again, only for Noah to catch up and foil the breakaway before Stan could get past the blue line.Noah gets called for hooking on the play, though, which is rank bullshit and draws boos from his bench and half the crowd.
Shorthanded with Noah in the penalty box, the FD team struggles to contain the cops' powerplay offense.Tag tangles with a pair of forwards as they bombard the firefighters' zone, loses the puck, and trips.Before he can get up, the offensive players bat the puck behind the net, instigating a rough scrum.Hibbard gets the puck free, passes it across the zone to Lankford, a PD defenseman, who dribbles and dodges to give his team time to set up for a play.Noah's penalty ends, but he retakes the ice too little too late—a pass zips from Lankford to Hibbard and back, a well-timed check takes out Tag to the right of the net, and then Hibbard drains it in the bottom left corner, just over Delgado's leg—Dorian Delgado is the FD goalie, father of Dominic Delgado, also a goalie for Noah's 14U team, and husband to Delia, who owns Delgado's on Main.
Dorian sags to his knees, head hanging, and then rallies, scooping the puck free and passing it to the ref.His teammates surround him as the cops celebrate their go-ahead goal.
Noel calls for a line change, then, and the players return to the bench, outgoing players taking seats and accepting water bottles from the 14U boys as the fresh ones take the ice.
The rest of the second period is a slug-fest, with the firefighters attacking the net with renewed aggression while the cops defend their lead and try to increase it—and still, the game is decided by the goalies, with Delgado making several spectacular saves, including a bobble off his stick that he bats away with his mitt an instant before it crosses the line—right as the horn blows to end the second period.
Alaina's husband is a beer-bringing machine, which means I’m tipsy by the start of the third period.Alaina and I have been giggling like schoolgirls for most of the game, and have inadvertently started a game where every time Noah gets the puck, we cheer like crazy women.At first, it was just us doing it.And then some folks around us joined in, and now, three or four minutes into the third period, half the stadium erupts into noisy chaos every time the puck touches Noah’s stick.The fire department players think it’s freaking hysterical, and the guys on the bench quickly become the loudest voices of all, much to Noah's amusement.
A few people supporting the cops try to emulate it with Stan Hibbard, but it doesn't quite catch on and quickly dies out.
Midway through the third period, it's still 1-0, with the firefighters mounting a hell of a comeback, aggressively pushing the puck back into enemy territory and battling to keep it there, cracking shot after shot on net, and scrumming for the puck behind the net.
Finally, with four minutes left in regulation, Tag, Carter, and Suarez form a triangle left and right of the net with Suarez in the middle at the blue line, passing the puck back and forth in a well-rehearsed pattern, keeping the defenders jogging this way and that, Duchesne pivoting and trying to keep the puck in view.Behind the net, Mackenzie and Noah are tangled up with defenders from the cop team, struggling to break loose to join the play in front of the net.
Which is when all hell breaks loose.
There's a loud shout from behind the net; an enraged Mackenzie—a behemoth of a man who moonlights in strongman competitions in the summer—throws his gloves aside and launches himself at one of the other players, his nose sluicing blood.Noah gets in the middle of the fight, and then it's a free-for-all with all the players digging in and pulling each other away, ignoring the refs' whistles as they try to get to the center of the action.
After a minute of chaos, the players drift apart, pushed and pulled by teammates and refs.When the knot of players disperses, Mackenzie's face is a sheet of blood, and Noah has a swollen right eye and a bloody nose himself.
And he'spissed.
It takes both Sampson and Mackenzie to pull him away, and although I can't make out what he's saying, it's apparent that he's apoplectic about something.
It takes several minutes of stoppage to get everything sorted out, the ice cleaned up, bloodied players patched, and decorum restored.Two players from both teams—including Mackenzie and Noah from the FD—receive penalties for fighting, leaving both teams with three players on the ice.
The next couple of minutes are brutal.It's clear tensions are high and tempers are flaring following the fight, and although no more fists are thrown, checks are delivered with bone-crunching ugliness, and puck battles are knock-down-drag-out affairs.
When the penalties expire, Noah and Mackenzie hit the ice with renewed ferocity.
After a brief scrum behind the FD net, Noah streaks like lightning into the PD zone, chasing a loose puck, trailed by much slower defenders.He catches up to the puck, dribbles it as he carves toward the net at an oblique angle, jetting to an abrupt halt in front of the net, juking the other way and sending the puck into the top corner with a flick of his stick.
The horn blares to announce the tying goal, and the crowd is on its feet—with me cheering the loudest.
The last ninety seconds of the game last a lifetime, it feels like.Stan Hibbard answers Noah's goal with a breakaway of his own, gets Delgado flopping one way while he shoots the other.The PD supporters are wild with anticipatory celebration before the puck leaves Stan's stick…
A premature celebration, it turns out.Delgado, in a fit of desperation, kicks a skate upward—wildly, almost haphazardly.But it works.The Puck ricochets off the ankle of his skate, hits the ice in front of him, spinning and wobbling, and Delgado rolls to cover it with an instant to spare as Stan topples toward him, batting at the loose puck in one last attempt to drive it in.
Sixty seconds remaining—1-1.
The stoppage puts the faceoff into the FD circle, won by Noah.Delgado smacks the puck out of our zone and down-ice, chased by everyone else, Stan and Noah in the lead.They reach the puck at the same time, in the neutral zone nearest the PD's blue line.They crash into the boards together, sticks tangled up and ice shavings spraying the glass.Noah kicks it loose and takes off after it, Stan hard on his heels; Stan stabs his stick between Noah's legs from behind, poking the puck loose—and tangling Noah's legs up at the same time.
Trying to stay on his feet, he pivots on one skate, off balance, coasting backward on one leg, Noah manages to bat the puck in a wobbly pass to Carter—and the very next instant, Noah goes down hard.The back of his head hits the ice with acrackthat can be heard throughout the arena, over the noise of the game and the din of the crowd; in the same instant as he goes down, Carter swats the puck into the net for the go-ahead goal.
No one is celebrating the goal, though, because Noah doesn't get up.
I don't remember leaving my seat, don’t remember hurdling the half-wall or slipping and sliding in my sneakers across the ice.I get to him before some of his teammates, somehow.
When I get to him, he's unconscious, unmoving, his breathing shallow.
"Noah?"My voice breaks.
Fucking hockey.Stupid, dangerous fucking sport.
His eyes flutter, and his dark blue eyes fix on mine, blearily, unfocused."Wha' happened?"
