Page 85 of Hard Check
“Two,” Ethan said to the woman behind the glass. “Lower bowl, close as you’ve got behind the home bench.”
She typed something. “I’ve got row six, seats three and four.”
“That works.” Ethan handed Dawson his ticket. “You’re paying me back.”
“Yeah.”
“And buying me a beer.”
They pushed through the concourse doors and the noise hit—music, crowd, the hum of ten thousand people settling in. Ethan looked at the sign, looked at Dawson, and the shit-giving drained out of his face. What was left was quieter.
“I gotta say,” Ethan said, “you’ve got bigger balls than me. No chance in hell I’d walk into an arena full of strangers and make an ass of myself for the person I love.”
“I don’t—” Dawson started. Stopped. His ears were hot. “It’s not— I haven’t?—”
“Yeah, you do.” Ethan’s voice was matter-of-fact, like he was reading a parts invoice. “You’ll figure that out eventually.”
Dawson’s throat tightened. He’d realized how much Leo meat to him within minutes of him leaving, but he wasn’t going to admit that to Ethan until he had a chance to tell Leo.
“Go find our seats,” Ethan said. He clapped him on the shoulder, once, firm. “I’ll grab beers.”
He found the section entrance and started down the steps and the arena opened up around him—the ice white and empty under the lights, the seats filling in blues and silvers, the distant thump of music from the PA system. Warm-ups hadn’t started yet. He had a few minutes.
Row six was right behind the home bench. He found their seats and sat down, and the arena stretched out around him, massive and loud and full of people who belonged here. His shirt was damp under the hoodie. His heart raced with anticipation.
He set the sign on the floor between his feet and breathed—in through the nose, out through the mouth, trying to chill.
The seats around him filled. Families, couples, groups of guys in jerseys. Down by the glass, a cluster of kids was already pressed against the boards, faces bright, homemade signs held overhead.WE LOVE YOU, CALLY. A little girl with a poster that just saidHIin wobbly letters. Next to them, a college-age woman in a Stags crop top held upJONESY, MARRY MEin pink glitter, and her friend was filming the whole thing.
Dawson looked at his own sign. Block letters, black Sharpie, no glitter or cute doodles. He was going to stand down there with the children and the college girl with her phone camera.
Ethan dropped into the seat beside him and handed over a beer. Dawson took it. Drank. Didn’t taste it.
The music shifted. The lights changed. A buzzer sounded, low and long. The tunnel doors opened, the Stags came out, and Dawson’s hand tightened on the cup.
“You know you can’t hold that sign from up here and expect him to see it, right?” Ethan said. “Get your ass down there and get your man.”
“I’m working up to it.”
“Seriously, man. You’re overthinking this. They’re going to come out for warm-ups soon, and if you aren’t there when they start I doubt he’ll see you once he’s in the zone.” Ethan took the beer out of his grip and set it in the holder. “Commit.”
Dawson looked at the glass. Looked at the ice. Looked at the sign between his feet.
Dawson stood. Picked up the sign. Walked down the steps past rows five and four and three and two, past the couple on the aisle, past a dad hoisting a toddler onto his shoulders, until he was standing at the glass between a kid in a Stags jersey holding a sign that said#7 IS MY HEROand a girl who couldn’t have been older than eight waving a foam finger that was bigger than her head.
The players poured onto the ice in a loose stream, sticks down, gliding into their warm-up patterns. Dawson held the sign against his chest, words still hidden, and watched. Ford went straight to the net and started digging his skate into the ice. Leo was near the end of the line, and Dawson’s stomach fluttered at the sight of him.
He was really going to do this.
Leo came out of the tunnel, sprinting to the other side of the ice before taking a couple laps around their half. He looked good. He looked like he belonged out there, like the ice was the one place where everything he carried got lighter. Dawson watched him take a lap and fire a wrist shot into the far corner, and the sound of the puck hitting the back bar was a clean, hard crack that vibrated through the boards.
His fingers trembled. He turned the sign around and held it up, the four words facing the ice, and braced his free hand against the glass to keep himself steady.
He didn’t wave. Didn’t shout. Just stood with the words against the boards, his hand on cold glass, and waited.
Jonesy saw it first.
He was taking a lazy loop near the boards, spraying ice with one skate, and his head snapped sideways—caught by something in the periphery that didn’t fit. He slowed. Squinted. Read the sign. Looked at Dawson’s face, then back at the board, then across the ice to where Leo was stretching near the blue line.
