Page 5 of Two for Charging

Howie kicked the back of the passenger seat hard, and Chris spent the rest of the car ride trying to keep the peace between them.

Handily, it distracted him from how fast everything was changing.

As soon as they got to the barbecue, the distractions ended, and everything resumed, changing faster than Chris could prepare for. Coach Morris—real name Ben Sinclair—was there. Coaches usually didn’t come to casual team events, but he’d stopped being their coach. Now, he was just Phil’s husband, loitering around the grill in his glasses and a shirt with a funny slogan on it. It made Chris itch to watch. No one asked what Ben was doing there and why Phil kept touching him—little everyday, casual glances of his fingertips across the back of Ben’s neck or the curve of his hip. Everyone seemed to accept his continued presence, and no one looked at them askance. No one except Chris.

When their new coach, a woman named Susannah Lindbury (“but call me Lindy”), introduced herself, the party went downhill. Not because of Lindy, she seemed great. Luca and Howie immediately attached themselves to her. Howie asked questions about her Olympic career because he had encyclopedic knowledge of international women’s hockey teams for the last two decades, and Luca asked about her plans for the team. Chris wanted to know about those things, too, but he was more concerned about Hayes and Vanderbilt sharing unsubtle, mocking jokes in the far corner of Phil’s garden, and the Russian contingent going grim and silent.

He’d been afraid of this.

Last season, they’d had a choice: keep Ben on as their coach, knowing he was secretly a reporter investigating the team owner and defensive coach using insider information to bet against the Sea Lions, or retire Ben and get a new, valid coach.

The team had already splintered by then, with Hayes and Vanderbilt on one side and Tom, Jax, and Phil on the other. Chris had done his best to bridge the gap by suggesting working with a charity, a youth shelter, as a form of team bonding. He’d done brunches and dinners with the D-core and sucked it up through a hundred brutal practices with a defensive coach who wanted to see them fail. It’d paid off in those last magical weeks of the season when the team banded together and made it to the Western Conference Final.

But now, with Lindy being hired, what more could he do? Some guys in sports took pride in how closely they resembled Neanderthals. Hayes and Vanderbilt only occasionally respected Breezy, so he couldn’t convince them to take a female coach seriously no matter how many times she’d been in the Olympics.

Worst of all, Phil still hadn’t said what his new role would be.

“Are you moving?” Chris asked him. “Did you sign somewhere else? Are you coaching Juniors?”

Ben’s nephew Charlie snorted as he set out more snacks on the buffet table by the grill. Whatever. Chris had helped out at the shelter often enough to get used to all the teenagers mocking him relentlessly. And Charlie had spent so much time with the kids that he must have learned from them.

“Breezy, my man.” Phil turned away from the grill to face Chris. “Chill. I’m not going anywhere. I applied to be the new defensive coach, and I got it.”

A wave of relief crashed over Chris. Phil was staying. With him in a guiding role and still functioning as the beating heart of the team, they would manage to stick together. He wrapped Phil in a big hug, trying not to cry with gratitude. “Oh, thank God. The team wouldn’t be the same without you.”

Phil patted him on the back, bemused. “It won’t be the same with me coaching either. Get ready for the A on your chest, kid. It’s coming.”

The wave buoying Chris up receded with the tide, dragging him down, down, down, and under. He mumbled something, panic making his words slur together, and then he left as fast as he could, making a fool of himself and bumping into half the tables while he did it.

Oh, well.

Being an embarrassment was nothing new.

He couldn’t leave the party. He’d driven Luca and Howie, so they needed a ride home. Instead, Chris sat in the front seat of his car and called Matty.

“Hey, big bro. What’s up? Aren’t you busy being a super-important NHL player with no time for your family?”

“Ha, ha,” Chris said, though the accusation stung. “The season hasn’t started yet.”

“Yeah, the Sea Lions still have an unbroken winning record.”

“Oh, hey, I never thought of it that way.” He liked the idea—as if they were starting from the top.

Matty made a disbelieving noise. “Only you, man. So why are you calling?”

“You in a hurry? Big date tonight?” Chris had a duty as the elder brother to ask these things. No matter that Matty would start college in a month and was five times smarter than Chris ever would be.

“Jealous?” Matty asked.

Chris was, a little, which he could never admit. Matty had dated the same girl for all of high school. He’d met Tabitha, a feisty brunette, in his after-school debate club. They talked about things like whether Napoleon could have stayed in power if he hadn’t gotten greedy about Russia, or when the US government would lift the embargo on Cuba. Chris hadn’t known the word “embargo” or that the US had put one on Cuba until he heard them discussing it, curled up on the overstuffed couch in the Calabrese family living room while a documentary played.

He’d also never been comfortable enough with a girlfriend to hang out in sweatpants watching documentaries.

“Pff, as if,” he said instead of admitting his jealousy.

“It’s our last date anyway. Gotta get it in one last time before college.”

“Gross,” Chris said automatically, and then, “Wait, what? You’re breaking up?”