Pride and Pucks and Prejudice - 7. Chapter 7

Noah

The video room smelled of burnt coffee and quiet dread. Every team in the league had one. Dim lights. Three rows of seats. A projector that somehow made everyone look guilty.

Coach Hayes stood beside the screen with a remote in one hand. Assistant Coach Daniels leaned against the back wall holding a coffee the size of a fire extinguisher.

Nobody talked much. Film sessions had a remarkable ability to make grown men regret decisions they'd forgotten making.

Hayes pressed play. The screen filled with last night's game. Second period. Neutral-zone regroup. Board battle.

I recognized the sequence immediately.

Oh no.

The room stayed silent as the play unfolded. I got pinned along the boards. Won the puck.

Without looking, I shoveled it into open ice.

The video froze.

Click.

Hayes rewound three seconds.

Played it again.

Pause.

Again.

Pause.

Nobody said anything.

Daniels pushed himself away from the wall. "Notice anything?"

I raised a hand. "He drifted too high."

Across the room Jackson answered at almost exactly the same moment. "Noah carried the puck too long."

Daniels looked at the ceiling. "...Right."

Hayes advanced the frame.

Click.

A yellow telestrator circle appeared around me.

"Look where Noah releases the puck."

Click.

Another circle appeared thirty feet away around Jackson.

"Look where Jackson already is."

Click.

The frame advanced again.

Now another circle surrounded me as I cut through the slot.

"Look where Noah arrives."

Three circles.

Three points.

Perfect spacing.

Hayes drew bright lines between them.

A triangle.

Even I had to admit it looked...

Professional.

Hayes folded his arms. "Neither of you looked." Silence. "You didn't communicate. "Silence. "You didn't call for the puck." Another pause. "You both already knew."

The room remained completely still. I looked at the screen again.

Jackson really had been there before I'd released it.

Not after.

Before.

And I'd gone exactly where he'd sent the return pass.

Without thinking.

I frowned. "...Huh."

Jackson frowned too. "...That's odd."

A muffled snort came from somewhere behind us.

Hayes let the silence stretch another few seconds.

Then he delivered the verdict. "So maybe..."

He looked first at Jackson. Then at me.

"...stop fighting your own linemate."

Nobody said a word. Even Eddie kept his mouth shut.

For almost three whole seconds.

Then, from the back row—

"So..." He raised one hand. "...does this mean I get assists for marriage counselling?"

The room exploded.

Ben laughed so hard coffee came out his nose.

Aleksander slapped the seat in front of him.

Even Daniels gave up trying to look professional.

Hayes pinched the bridge of his nose. "I walked into that one."

"You really did," Daniels agreed.

---

The meeting broke up a few minutes later. Players drifted toward the door in noisy little groups. Someone was already arguing about lunch.

Someone else wanted to know who had stolen their tape.

Life resumed.

I stuffed my notebook into my bag and headed for the exit.

"Lindholm."

I looked over my shoulder. Jackson caught up in three easy strides. He adjusted the strap of his equipment bag.

"Good game."

The words came out before I could stop them. "You got lucky."

He smiled. He wasn't smug. He was just warm. "Probably."

Then he walked away. Just like that. No comeback. No chirp. No "Also Ran." Nothing.

I watched him disappear down the corridor toward the dressing room.

Annoyingly, my brain decided that was the perfect moment to replay the goal. The board battle. The blind pass. The return feed exactly where I'd wanted it.

I stopped walking. That pass had been exactly where I wanted it. I frowned. Coincidence.

Obviously. It had to be.

After all, he'd only spent six years playing against me. There was no reason he should know exactly where I'd be. ...Except that apparently he did.

I scowled all the way to the locker room. The irritating part wasn't that Coach had been right. The irritating part was that I was beginning to suspect Jackson hadn't been surprised by the play at all.

He'd simply expected me to be there.

And, somehow, I'd expected exactly the same thing from him.