Page 49 of Slap Shot Surprise
After brooding about it for forty-eight hours, I’d finally broken down and messaged my brother Gianni Monday night.
Got a minute?
Sure, what’s up?
Can I call you?
Give me a few and I’ll call you. Getting the kids to bed.
My phone vibrated about fifteen minutes later, and I flopped back on the couch before taking the call.
“Hey.”
“Hey. Everything okay?”
“Yes. No.” I exhaled. “I need advice.”
“Quit trying to score fromthe blue line.”
“It’s not about hockey.”
He laughed. “There’s something else in your life besides hockey?”
“There is now.”
“Sounds kinda serious.”
“It is.” I leaned forward, one elbow on my knee, and pinched the bridge of my nose. “I got someone pregnant.”
Silence. “Courtney?”
“Not Courtney.”
“Who?”
“This girl named Mabel Buckley. It was a one-time thing the night of Footsie’s wedding.”
“So you did more than just take her out onto the balcony.”
“Yeah.”
My older brother exhaled. “Well, first I’m going to say what you said to me when I told you Ellie was pregnant.”
“What did I say?”
“You saiddude. That was it. A one-word text.”
“Yeah, well, the rest of the thought was, ‘Dude, how could you be so fucking stupid?’ But now I know.”
“Now you know. So what happened?”
“Condom broke.”
“Damn. So she got in touch with you?”
“Yeah. She drove down here over the weekend to tell me. She lives in Cherry Tree Harbor.”
“Is she related to Dashiel Buckley?”
