Page 2

Harrison

I t’s pointless trying to take a nap when I’m distracted by the knockout in the seat next to me.

The second I sit down, she stands up and moves into the wide hallway.

I tip my hat up to get a good look at her as she walks away.

She's tall and wearing a soft black dress that hugs her body but looks comfortable enough to fly in.

Her hair is slightly wavy but is styled and completely put together, hanging pinned just above her shoulders.

I’ve never been the kind of man to discriminate when it comes to the shape of a woman—I’m a fan of them all.

But there’s something about the way she moves, the slight pop of her hip when she looks up at the flight board, the finger that twirls through her hair while she talks to whomever is on the other end of the phone.

She looks like something I could take a bite out of.

And she also looks like someone who would take a considerable bite out of me.

When she walks, it’s with purpose. The tilt of her head seems to be at a precise angle.

Her sharp, exacting stare, the tone of her voice—she sounds like a mix between a CEO and an angry librarian.

Her voice is also a little low. Automatically sultry.

It’s been a minute since I’ve had this kind of reaction to a woman at first sight. There were plenty of beautiful women in Nice looking for a good time—even with an older guy—but none of them caught my eye like this.

Something rises inside me I haven’t felt in a while about another person—curiosity. A hunger to know more about her—who is she, why is she in Maine, and what is she doing when she gets to Baltimore?

Covertly, I watch her as she moves to the center of the aisle, her chin tipped up.

She’s speaking quietly, almost into her palm.

It’s like she wants to hide what she’s saying over the line—maybe to a boyfriend?

—as she gazes up at the flight board, dropping her hand from her mouth and agitating a ring on her finger.

Maybe she was re-routed through here, too.

Nothing like capping off a week-long trip in France with hours stuck in a nowhere airport. At least the airline upgraded me to first class for the trouble. And now, sitting next to her, there’s something more than shitty, dry food here to distract me while I wait to get back to Baltimore.

My phone buzzes against my hip and draws my attention away from the knockout, who’s turned away from me now. Shifting my weight, I pull the phone from my pocket, intending to do a quick glance and put it away again.

Then I see who the email is from, and tap it open.

SUBJECT: Clark Initiative Proposal

Hey Coach,

Thank you so much for submitting this proposal for this program.

While the administration loves the idea, we would like to wait for more feedback before taking any further steps.

As you know, the franchise has recently invested in an optimization and modernization consultant who will start this week.

We feel it would be erroneous to approve this proposal until we have the input of this new valuable member of our team.

If it receives approval in that regard, we’d look forward to providing you with the resources and funding necessary to make this initiative a reality, as we believe it would be a great benefit to the community and an excellent representation of the Baltimore Blue Crabs’ principles.

Sincerely,

Ki Park

General Manager, Baltimore Blue Crabs

P.S. Excited to have you back!

Letting out a puff of annoyed air, I click the phone screen off and slide the thing into my pocket. I’m no old geezer by any means, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss the days when I could go on a fucking vacation without bad news arriving straight into the palm of my hand.

Of course, they probably wanted to send me that email before I got back, so they wouldn’t have to tell me to my face. Waiting for approval from someone who doesn’t know the city or the team—probably some yuppie from New York—is basically killing it outright.

Settling back into the chair, I take a deep breath and throw the hat over my face again. The entire point of the vacation was to relax. That’s what Ki and Colt said—that I needed to relax. That it was impressive enough that the team made it to the Stanley Cup at all.

That put a sour taste in my mouth. Like I’m supposed to just be okay with a consolation prize, settle for good enough after orchestrating my entire fucking life around this singular goal: to lift that cup over my head, just one more time.

Instead, we got all the way to the game only for the team to blow it.

“…puck bounces past the right post, and into the air on a blast to the goal—but it’s into the glove of Roman Petroff! A great save by this Atlanta Fire’s goalie…”

As if God himself wants to shove the loss down my throat, I start to hear the faint, staticky sound of announcing from that game. The tenor of that grating voice on my ears instantly evaporates any calm that I’ve conjured from this vacation.

If I managed any at all.

At first, I think that it’s all in my head—that I’m torturing myself—but when it pauses, rewinds, and starts again, I pull my hat off, sitting up and glancing to the side.

The knockout is back, head bowed over the final game in the Stanley Cup from last year. Atlanta Fire vs. Blue Crabs. Fumbled in the last period when the Blue Crabs started to lose cohesion and let up pressure.

When the coach could not, for some reason, get his players to perform the way he knew they were capable of.

I speak up almost without meaning to.“If he’d hustled his ass up there and back checked, we could have avoided that shot altogether.”

Knockout, as I’ve started to think of her, startles, her eyes flicking over to me, a single brow raising. For a second, I think she might tell me to mind my own business, but she surprises me by tilting her head and asking, “Are you a hockey fan?”

Something inside me lights up. A volley back my way. I can work with that. Shifting toward her, I say, “Something like that. What about you? Big Blue Crabs fan?”

“Not really. I’ll be honest with you—until a week ago, I’d never watched hockey a day in my life.”

“Never?”

“Never. Probably insulting to something like a hockey fan.”

“Not insulting. So why are you watching hockey now?”

She pauses, glances at me, tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. I follow the movement, but when I bring my gaze back to hers, she holds it, saying, “It’s for an assignment.”

“An assignment?” I sit back, eyeing her. I’d read her as being at least thirty. Maybe she just looks older, acts mature for her age. I’m not interested in flirting with a baby. “Are you in…college?”

“No—a work assignment,” she puffs out, “though maybe I should give you that whole line about being flattered.”

That makes me laugh—she’s straightforward and blunt. It’s refreshing.

“Why?” she goes on. “Are you?”

“Am I what?”

“In college.”

“Oh,” I lean back in again, eyes on hers. “I am flattered.”

I could ask her what she does, but the game is still paused on her screen, and I can’t stop my brain from zoning in on hockey. This close to her, the sharp, clean smell of her perfume is stronger. The sleeve of her black turtleneck is rubbing against my bare arm.

“So, what have you learned?” I ask instead, tipping my head toward the tablet.

“Hmm,” she taps, unpausing the game, and we watch together for a moment as the Blue Crabs skate back up the ice, that iconic sapphire hue less of a whir and more of a slow trickle.

The Fire are outplaying us with effort. “Well, the standard things I learned from another video. Three periods, five players—plus the goalie—and try to put the puck in the net.”

“Oh,” I lean back, shaking my head, “so there’s nothing else I can teach you.”

When she laughs, it feels like a reward. “So, you’re a very casual fan.”

“You know the basics—what else do you want to know?”

She pauses, then angles the screen toward me. I recognize the moment immediately—in the second period, our first line in. John Canton is fighting for the puck against the boards.

“Okay,” she says, her eyes flicking to mine. “Help me out with this, then. Why do you think the Blue Crabs lost the Stanley Cup?”

Fucking classic—I was hoping for a question about offsides. Icing. The penalty box. Of course this woman would go straight for the jugular. I stuff back my sarcastic laugh and tip my head toward her, “Wouldn’t you rather know why the Fire won the Stanley Cup?”

“Isn’t that the same question?”

“Nah.” I should keep this light, gentle flirting, but I can’t resist the urge to talk about hockey. My fatal fucking flaw. “The Blue Crabs did more than lose the game—they abandoned it.”

“Really?” When she laughs, it’s a short, sharp sound, and at first, it catches me by surprise, but I realize it matches her in a way that feels intimate to understand.

“Just look at the guys,” I say, gesturing for her to start the film again, and she does. “Watch them—you can see it in the way they skate. It’s like they’d resigned themselves to losing the game.”

“But they’re up a point here—why would they give up?”

I open my mouth, think about it, and close it again.

For years—pretty much since I retired and took over this position—the Blue Crabs have suffered under the specific and frustrating curse of playing to the level of their opponents, with the consequence of losing more games than we should.

Tight, aggressive offense coming in and battering at us right off the opening face-off? We rally and assemble to pressure them away from the goal. We fight for the puck and make good decisions. We’ve gone into so many games predicted to be the underdogs, only to put up an incredible fight.

The crowd loves those games, going wild.

But when we go up against teams we should beat with our sticks taped to our backs?

That fire is gone. For some reason, our players make the collective, unconscious decision to dial it down, loosen it up, so our defense is more open, allowing way more shots than we should, and our offense is sloppy, making poor decisions.

Rather than coming out every game and playing the way they do in practice, it’s like they measure the other team and match up. And I’ve been trying to knock it out of them for many seasons with no luck.

“Is there no answer to that one?” she asks, her eyes darting to the screen. It draws me out of my thinking. I’ve been wearing the same grooves in my head every day since the championship.

We’re closer now, our arms firmly pressed together, and when I turn my head to look at her, it’s with only an inch between our noses. I have the wild, sudden urge to lean forward and take her mouth with mine, and the reckless, stupid idea that she might let me.

Before I can do anything—answer her or make a move—we’re interrupted by a voice overhead. “Now boarding for first-class passengers. First-class passengers, please proceed to the gate.”

When I pull away from her and start to stand, surprise flashes over her face. Turning, I glance down at her, already smiling.

“I’d love to continue this conversation at the front of the plane,” I turn my boarding pass toward her. “Seat A1.”

With that, I turn and walk away, confident that once this plane is in the air, Knockout’s going to come and find me.