My voice catches, and I pause, drop my head; the bleachers stay silent.Someone coughs.A child squeals in irritation.
"Every last penny of the proceeds from this game will go toward the much-needed renovations of the Tomlin Falls Regional Hospital cancer center, which I am told, when it reopens, will be named in honor of my wife—so today, with your generosity, you all are planting the seeds that will become the Taylor Austin Memorial Cancer Center."
The applause, then, is so deafening that the whole building rattles.I wait until it subsides a bit, and then I lift my stick and helmet for quiet; silence descends once more.
"There's already been chatter about making this a yearly event, and while I can’t speak for these guys," I gesture at the benches, “I can say that I'll be ready to play next year, and every year after that, until I'm finally too dang old to lace up my own skates.The proceeds, like today, will go to the center.My hope is that in time we'll be able to create a fund big enough to help cut down the bills for folks who go through those doors, because let’s face it, cancer is a hell of an expensive thing, and trust me when I say I'm well aware that not everyone is lucky enough to have a son like mine."I point at Noel, who glowers at me for calling attention to him like that."Can we get a round of applause for Noel?We'd have beaten the cops without him, but he sure did help the cause!"
This is greeted with laughter, cheers, and good-natured boos.Noel, still glaring at me furiously, steps out of the box and onto the ice, does a single 360 while waving, and then steps back into the box and behind the bench, burly arms crossed.I'll be getting a scolding later, I'm sure.
I raise my hands."That's it, I guess.The ice is now open for the kiddos.Some of the guys will stick around, so lace up those skates and have fun!Concessions will stay open for a while longer, too.Have fun, be safe, do good, and be well.See ya'll next year!"
I drift off the ice and hang back in the tunnel leading to the locker rooms, watching kids take to the ice with glee—toddlers with double-bladed skates and skate helpers, lightning-fast, T-shirted, teenaged hockey players showing off their dekes and hockey stops, and figure skaters doing spins and leaps.
A girl, maybe fourteen or fifteen, wearing figure skates, leggings, and a hoodie, out-skates pretty much everyone else on the ice.She’s an incredible skater, with impeccable edgework, remarkable blade control, and stunning speed.I watch, impressed, as she dodges a stumbling gaggle of little ones, ducks under the outstretched arm of a gesturing teenage boy, cuts a hard right behind the net, and then makes a blazing break for center ice.There's a clearing in the scrum of skaters in the neutral zone, and she deftly pivots to skate backward at full speed, coasts a moment, and then launches into a textbook double lutz.As she nears the goal, she finds herself surrounded by a gaggle of boys about her age, passing pucks and taking slap shots at the empty net.Passing a pair of roughhousing boys, the girl—hair a long, loose black ribbon streaming behind her—scoops up a dropped stick, snags a puck, and weaves through the chaos in front of the net, deking, juking, and dribbling the puck in a phenomenal display of stick handling before sending the puck rocketing into the top shelf of the net with a wicked slapshot from the outside of the righthand faceoff circle.
Damn.
From a double lutz to a killer slapshot, all from a skinny little filly of a girl.
She tosses the stick to one of the open-mouthed boys, giving him a saucy smirk and wink, and coasts back toward the less chaotic side of the rink, where the kids and supervising adults are.
She's stopped by a stunningly beautiful woman who has to be her mother—she's similarly built, being tall and slender with loose, ink-black hair.The mother seems unhappy for some reason, gesturing at the net where the boys are now trying, with varying degrees of success, to replicate the girl's series of moves.
Huh.The mom seems pissed at the girl for showing off her hockey skills.Wonder what that's about.
I put them both out of my mind as Noel spots me and beelines toward me, still glowering furiously at my public call-out.
No sooner does he reach me, mouth open to start yelling, than Doug approaches at a jog, his radio squawking at his shoulder, held in place by a bright green nylon strap across his chest and around his waist.
"We've got an overturned semi causing a pileup with injuries just north of town, Cap," he says to me."We need you."
"On it.Lemme get these skates off."I glance at Noel."You can yell at me later, bud.Gotta go.Good coaching, though!"
I sprint—as fast as one can sprint down the hallway while wearing skates—for the locker room and change into my station wear in record speed.
Soon, all thoughts of hockey and fundraisers are out of sight and out of mind as I speed in my red Ram 2500 toward the scene, ready to do the job I was born for.
