Page 252 of On His Team

At the rink, nobody is acting like we won anything. Fuller makes sure of that. The first practice back is hard enough that Stanley stops talking twenty minutes in, which might be the best indication of how serious it is. Minnesota clips are already loaded in the video room. Special teams get reworked. Everybody’s schedule for the next week is printed and taped inside the locker-room door.

The Frozen Four is suddenly everywhere.

There are eleven days between the win over Boston College and the semifinal. Eleven days sounds like time until I start counting what has to fit inside them.

Class. Practice. Video. Media. Travel.

Then Minnesota.

Maybe Michigan after that.

Maybe nobody after that.

Gianna is in my room Thursday night with an open suitcase on the floor and clothes spread across the end of my bed like she is the one leaving tomorrow.

I’m supposed to be packing. She’s supposed to be helping. Neither of those things are happening.

“You own seven black shirts,” she says.

“They’re different.”

Her head comes up.

I’m sitting at my desk, and the look she gives me makes me smile before she says anything.

“Interesting.”

“What?”

“Nothing. I just remember somebody having opinions about my three Camden sweatshirts.”

“That’s different,” I argue.

“How?”

“You were going to Toledo for two nights.”

“And you are going to Vegas for four.”

“Yeah.”

She stares at me.

I know that did not help.

Gianna turns back to the suitcase and picks up two shirts that look almost identical even to me. “Which one?”

“Either.”

“No. You just said they’re different.”

“They are.”

“So which one?”

I point at the one in her left hand.

She looks at both, then at me again. “I’m pretty sure you chose randomly.”