Page 170 of Full Contact

Mark

We were three wins from the Stanley Cup, and I couldn’t get through Trier’s front door without someone calling to change tomorrow’s schedule.

I stood on the sidewalk outside his building with a bag of takeout against my hip and my phone pressed to my ear.

“We need Pratt at eight fifteen,” the network producer said.

“You had him at eight forty.”

“We’ve moved things around. And at eight twenty-five, we’d like a player walking past the Cup banner. Just catching sight of it, taking it in. Something spontaneous.”

“Spontaneity at exactly eight twenty-five.”

“Yes.”

I shifted the bag to my other arm. “I’ll send you the revised interview schedule tonight. Any more changes go through me.”

Since we’d won Game One, everyone wanted a piece of the Final. On my way out of the arena, I’d passed two men selling shirts off a card table, the Ironhawks logo with an orange cat sitting on it and PEACHES KNOWS underneath.

I put my phone away, went upstairs, and unlocked Trier’s door.

He came down the hall as I stepped inside, limping a little after treatment. When he kissed me, I caught the sharp smell of the cream he used on his hip. He kept one hand against my jaw for a moment, then took the dinner bag.

“Stay tonight,” he said.

I followed him into the kitchen. “I still have to finish tomorrow’s interview schedule. Three crews are waiting for it, and they’ll all have questions. I need to be at the arena by seven, and my clean clothes are at home.”

He set the bag on the counter and took out the containers while I explained how early I’d have to leave to get home, change, and drive back to the arena. By the time I finished, he’d found the bread at the bottom of the bag.

“I still want you here,” he said. “What do you need?”

I looked toward his table. My laptop was in my shoulder bag. Nothing about the schedule required me to be in my own condo.

“Forty minutes to finish this. Without talking, even if I look like I’m only staring at the screen.”

“All right.”

“And…” I glanced down at my clothes. “There’s a clean shirt in my office. These trousers can go another day.”

Forty minutes and a shirt. That’s all I needed. I’d been halfway through explaining why the entire night was impossible over forty minutes and a shirt.

Trier took two plates from the cupboard. He put my dinner in the oven to keep warm and served his own while I set up at the window end of the table.

For the first few minutes, I kept checking each email as it arrived. Then I closed my inbox and opened the schedule. Behind me, Trier ate. His fork scraped his plate, and a chair creaked when he shifted his weight.

At seven, he opened the drawer where he kept Peaches’s medication.

“Come on,” he told her. “It’s the same as yesterday.”

I glanced over. Peaches sat on the counter with her ears flattened, looking past him toward the window. He stroked her head and waited until she relaxed enough for him to rub the gel inside her ear.

I almost said something. Then I remembered I was the one who’d asked for quiet and went back to checking interview times.

Thirty-eight minutes after I’d sat down, the schedule was ready. I opened my email to send it and found a new request: the league crew wanted to film Pratt walking from the locker room to his interview.

Devin was meeting them at seven. I forwarded the question to him, sent the schedule to all three crews, and shut my laptop.

Trier had moved to the couch. Peaches lay stretched along his thighs while he watched a recap of Game One with the sound off. He lifted his arm when I walked over with my plate, and I settled beside him.