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FIFTY

Clay

JUNE

The practice rink outside Raleigh is already loud, but when Murph blows an ear-splitting whistle, I actually wince.

“Let’s go!” he cries, skating over to the face-off circle to start the scrimmage. “We’ve only got a half hour!”

“Coach,” Liana says from my right side. “You have a call with the venue in twenty minutes.”

“Thank you.”

“Coach?” the head trainer says from my left side. “I need fifteen minutes after practice.”

“All right, Kevin. Schedule it with Liana.”

And so on. My life is happening in a higher gear than I even thought possible.

Last night we lost game one at one a.m. during the third overtime. My guys fought like warriors. Hale only gave up three goals in a five-hour game, and the last one was only the result of a really unlucky bounce.

We’re already exhausted. I let everybody sleep in until noon, and then we all bussed out to a practice rink for a strategy session and a practice.

Murph drops the puck again, and I focus on the scrimmage. Per my instructions, we’re running a few new defensive plays. But the point of this practice is to shake out our nerves.

I could feel it in the video room earlier—a thrum of staticky energy. Players hunching forward in their chairs to get closer to the screen. Sharp eyes. Tapping feet. They’re all a little spooked by leveling up to the finals. And so am I, if I’m honest.

There’s exactly one man in the organization who isn’t jittery, though. And that man is Jethro Hale. He’s like a rock in the middle of a roaring river, calmly making notes on his pad during meetings and fending off attacks during practice.

Even now, as his teammates skitter around him in hyperdrive, he’s hunkered down in the net and stopping everything that flies his way.

“Hale looks really solid,” Demski says from the bench.

“Agreed,” I say tightly.

“Gotta say he’s been great with Walcott, too.”

“Really?” I can’t imagine that Jethro has much patience for the twenty-something blowhard.

“Totally. Hale is like the alpha dog who sets the mood for the pack. He isn’t panicking, so nobody around him feels the need to panic, either.”

“I wish that would rub off on me,” I mutter. But then I want to kick myself, because rubbing off is something Jethro and I do with some frequency.

Like last night. We’re both on the club floor of the Raleigh hotel. Our rooms don’t adjoin, but they’re across the hall from each other. And it’s pretty easy to walk three paces into one room instead of another.

So Jethro walked into mine, and we spent fifteen minutes making each other come before we fell into a dead sleep for nine hours. Then we ate room service naked and started our prep for game two.

It’s stupid. It’s risky. But I don’t want to stop seeing him.

“Walcott is a changed man,” Demski says. “He put away his ego. Now he’s trying to make his contribution on the ice and not Snapchat.”

“That’s good to hear. Even if we don’t need to lean on him.”

Demski’s eyes are trained on Jethro, who’s casually manning his station, calling out defensive moves and keeping a lock on his end of the ice. “God willing we’re going to make magic, Coach. I got a good feeling.”

The next twenty-four hours roll over me like a Zamboni, and suddenly it’s time for game two. At ninety minutes before gametime, I’ve already answered four dozen questions, eaten six Tums, and sweated through two shirts.

We need this win so bad. We can’t give up two games’ worth of momentum.

The tension in the room is electric. Stoney’s vision board has been dragged to North Carolina, where it’s covering the opposing team’s logo in the middle of the rug. Nobody is laughing at that thing anymore. They’re too busy taping their sticks and stretching their hamstrings and saying their prayers.

Suddenly, Stoney bursts into the room in a panic. “Where’s the doc! Need him in the bathroom. Something’s wrong with Pierre!”

My heart takes an express elevator down to my guts.

The next ten minutes are the lowest point of my coaching career. We find Pierre huddled on the floor in front of a toilet, sweating and ranting in French. His pupils are blown, and his face is the color of a tomato.

I call 911, while Doc Whitesmith checks his vital signs. “What did you take?” he asks repeatedly.

“ Qu’est-ce que t’as pris ?” demands Boudreau, our other French-Canadian player.

But Pierre is not making sense.

Minutes later, the paramedics arrive, start an IV, and check his heart. Murph and I have a hurried argument about who’s going to the hospital with him.

“It can’t be you,” Murph growls. “I’ll go.”

Helplessly, I watch them leave. Then I walk directly into the equipment room and put my face against the cool tiles of the wall.

This is my fault. When the trainer tipped us off, I should have acted more forcefully.

“Coach?” Jethro sticks his head into the little room. “It’s chaos out here. You okay?”

“ No ,” I shout.

Jethro’s eyes widen. He steps into the room and closes the door. “Take a breath.”

I pick up a skate and hurl it at the metal storage shelves. The sound blasts through the confined space loud as a freight-train crash.

“Clay.” He backs me up against a rack of hockey sticks and puts his hands on my shoulders. “ Settle .”

But my breaths are coming in gasps. “He told Kapski he’d stopped.”

“Yeah, he lied. Addicts do that.”

“ Fuck! ” The urge to smash something overtakes me again. But Jethro’s a step ahead of me and he grabs my hands.

“Get a grip,” he whispers. “And do it now. That guy is going to be okay.”

“You don’t know that.”

“He got immediate care. And the body can take a lot of punishment. Ask my sister.”

I suck in air. He’s got a point. And I don’t have time to throw a tantrum. “Okay, okay. Fuck.”

“Stay here another minute,” he says soothingly. Then he actually kisses my forehead, like I’m a kindergartener who’s upset over the last cookie. “Breathe.”

“Okay, okay,” I pant.

He steps back from me at the exact second the doorknob turns. Loud voices filter through the gap as Kapski sticks his head inside. “Uh, Coach?”

“He needs a minute,” Jethro says firmly, ushering Kapski out and then following him. “But I got something to say.” Jethro gives a piercing whistle. “Hey, hey. Can I have a minute of your time?”

The room quiets down immediately.

“I don’t speak up much around here,” Jethro says. “Because you kids seem to know what you’re doing, and also my record kinda sucked when I got here.”

I move to the doorway to check my players’ faces. I see a mix of confusion and worry.

“Today, though, I’ve got the kind of experience that matters. My sister is an addict. She overdosed on my bathroom floor once. But she’s still around, putting gray hairs on my head.”

There’s a stunned silence. Then Stoney says, “We shoulda seen it, though. Before he ended up shaking on the floor by the toilets.”

“Maybe,” Jethro says. “But I’ve been down that road, too. I’m a champion at blame as well as hockey. I’ve seen guys more fucked up than Pierre go to rehab and win a ring the next season. When he wakes up tomorrow morning in a hospital bed, with his family looking terrified, what do you think he wants to hear? That we blew the game worrying about him?”

Nobody says anything. But they’re listening.

“Panicking won’t help,” Jethro continues. “We’ve got an hour to remember how to be great. It’s the finals, guys. Our teammate messed up bad. He’s going to have a lot of regrets about tonight. You’re probably angry at him. Maybe you’re mad at yourself for not paying enough attention. But if you blow up your focus, it’s not helping him at all. Don’t make it worse for him tonight, okay? Let’s just get this done.”

From the doorway, someone starts clapping. It’s Doc Baker, the team psychologist. Then Coach Demski joins in. And Kapski.

Then the whole room.

Okay. Well. Jethro is better at this coaching thing than I am tonight. He just did my fucking job for me.

I look at my watch and step into the center of the room. “Warmups in nine minutes.”

“Suit up!” Kapski shouts.

Slowly, my guys pick up their rattled selves and go back to game prep.