Page 9 of Heartbreak Hockey

“Then we tie Dad’s balls in rubber at dawn.”

He laughed, but I was serious. Then he got serious. “We’re gonna need money, Merc. Cody and I are tapped out. Bea and Trish would like to have a baby of their own sometime …” he trailed off very fucking dramatically if you asked me and I knew what that meant.

I would have to come up with the money.

I did the whole run hands through my hair thing, while I gave a perfunctory glance to the living room—it didn’t sound like anyone was killing anyone else—and did yet more numbers in my head. This time money numbers. I spared a small moment—but only a small one—for how un-fucking-fair this was. What’s fair doesn’t count in real life. I’ve learned to move on quickly from unfairness or I’d be a wallowing mess.

“None of us can afford that baby, Ari, especially Dad.” I wasn’t saying anything he didn’t already know, but there he was still hoping he could squeeze blood from a stone.

At that moment, Theo chose to streak naked across my kitchen holding the neighbor’s cat who looked to be doing its own version of praying. God dammit. That fucking cat door I keep meaning to get rid of. It’s been there since the previous owners. That cat door is a metaphor for my life—all creatures welcome, I’ve got no time to evict you.

“Uh, call you back,” I said.

But I didn’t get the chance until much later that day. Theo was also muddy—no idea how he got that way since I wasn’t paying the best attention I could have been—so I had to bathe him. We had an argument about keeping the cat and then about, “Well if I can’t have that kitten, Merc, can we get one of our own?”

To which my response was, “No fucking pets.”

“That’s a bad word.”

“Grown-ups can say bad words, just like we can drink beer, smoke cigarettes, drive and take out bank loans. Your day will come, little man.” I don’t give a fuck if he swears, but Bea and Ari do.

Anyway, he wasn’t getting a cat.

We left that disaster and moved to the next: Lorelei gluing flowers made of construction paper to my living room walls.

“Bethany, didn’t you see her doing that?” She was right there the whole time.

“Yeah.”

“Why didn’t you stop her?”

She laughed. “I wanted to see your face. Was totally worth the wait.”

I couldn’t even blame her. Classic Meyer move. And I am still her older brother at the end of the day even if I’m caretaker the other half of the time. It’s not always perfect, but I do my best to balance between the two roles, and well, walls can be fixed even if it’s a pain in the ass. I’d just make Ari do it so I could seehisface.

By the time I got them out the door and to Bea’s, the universe decided it was time for the second call. It was the man of the hour. Resident Meyer babymaker.

Dad.

I was on my way to the grocery store because kidseat, especially teenagers and more especially teenagers who play hockey. All three of our Meyer teens play at the moment. Sometimes Theo shows interest and other times he’s chasing butterflies, claiming he wants to grow up to be a professional butterfly catcher. The girls—the youngest ones—have already informed me they’re going to design things. One as an engineer, though she calls herself an inventor, and the other in the form of clothes and purses.

But they all eat more than I ever imagined little people could eat so I’m constantly at the damn grocery store. I answered my phone as I pushed my ever-filling cart down the aisles.

“You’re calling to tell me it’s a false alarm,” is how I greeted him. It was a dick thing to say. The new baby will be my little brother or sister one day, but I wasn’t feeling generous, and I wanted him to know that his actions have consequences. My wrath just one of them.

“I knew you wouldn’t be happy.”

“Then why did you do it?”

“I really didn’t plan for it this time around. I love the makin’ babies part and then it happened. You kids turned out so well.”

“Have we, though?”

I am a failed hockey coach. I was one of the youngest coaches to ever grace NHL ice, only to crash and burn because as it turns out, you can’t properly raise six humans and be away half the year. And uh, you probably shouldn’t drink your face off and fuck your way through half the league either. Now, I fix cars, which is reasonably lucrative, but not NHL-coach lucrative. It’s also not a career that comfortably supports all the people I have to support. At least I was able to get into the housing market during that one profitable NHL year, but once that money dwindled, we’ve operated on a shoestring budget.

Ari paints houses, which is just as lucrative as being an auto mechanic when he’s busy, but money doesn’t fill everyone’s soul. He wishes he was a big-time artist or hell, even a small-time one, but he has no time or energy for it with how much he has to work to help me support our brothers and sisters.

Bea is a physiotherapist. She loves her job. She loves her wife Trish. Guess she mostly turned out, but she’s an anxious wreck, usually always worried about all of us and I know she’d say she doesn’t feel like she “turned out”.