Page 15 of The Grumpy Defenseman
Sandra intercepted me as I was breaking down the rig. “You saved us today. Seriously.” She held up her phone, my tether feed mirrored to her device, one of theMcKinney frames already flagged. “This is the cover of the campaign. This is the one that lands the summer push.”
She spoke to me the way one working professional spoke to another: pressure second, praise specific, rooted in the actual image instead of the relief of having survived the day. I liked her better for it.
“I know,” I said, because false modesty was a waste of everyone’s time.
She laughed. “Cocky.”
“Efficient,” I corrected.
Silas appeared as Sandra left, timing his approach with the precision of a man who had been waiting in the wings. He leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed.
“Sandra tells me the work is excellent,” he said. “She’s rarely this effusive. Good.”
I waited for the but.
“Just keep it clean,” he said. “The campaign’s entering a critical window. Contract talks are starting. Sponsors are paying attention. The images need to stay focusedon the team.”
He said it lightly. Like a suggestion. Like a passing thought. But his eyes did not match his tone, and I had been reading faces long enough to know when someone was wrapping a warning in gift paper.
“Always,” I said.
He nodded once and left.
I stood alone in the media room, strobes cooling, reflector panels leaning against the wall. The building hummed around me with the post-event quiet of a space that had been filled with energy and was now digesting it.
I made it three steps before I pulled out my phone and texted Bella.
Me: Media day is over. I need legal counsel.
Bella: Did you commit a crime?
Me: Define crime.
Bella: Samantha.
Me: I photographed a man too well.
Bella: That is not a crime. That is your job.
Me: It felt illegal.
Bella: Was this the hockey man?
I stared at the screen.
Hockey man. As if that narrowed it down on a roster full of men whose job description was professionally large on ice.
Me: You are going to need to be more specific.
Bella: The emotionally constipated one.
Rude. Accurate, but rude.
Me: I refuse to answer on the grounds that you are enjoying this too much.
Bella: Confirmed. What happened?
I shouldered my camera bag and stepped outside into the San Antonio evening. The sky had gone pink at the edges, the air warm and smelling like mesquite smoke and summer.
