Page 6 of Face Off

The wheels struck the runway hard enough to drag my attention back to the plane. People around me reached for their phones before we finished slowing, filling the cabin with notification sounds and conversations nobody needed to have at full volume. The woman beside me turned off airplane mode, looked at the screen, and released a disappointed breath when whatever she expected failed to appear.

She’d recognized me before we left Milwaukee.

I knew because she asked whether I played hockey after staring at my face for ten minutes and then opened my social media page with the brightness turned high enough for both of us to see it.

I told her I sold insurance.

She didn’t believe me.

By the time we landed, she had moved from questions about hockey to mentioning that her boyfriend wouldn’t be picking her up. I’d learned the difference between casual conversation and an invitation sometime during my first month as a professional athlete, when women started slipping hotel room numbers into my hand after games and pretending they didn’t know my name.

Fifteen months gave me enough bodies to prove my dick still worked and none that made me want to stay until morning.

I fucked women who knew what I offered before we entered a room. I didn’t lie, date, promise, or pretend that sex might become something else if they impressed me enough. They wanted the player, the tattoos, the story, or the version of El Cuchillo that existed in highlight reels and sports articles.

I gave them what they wanted and then I went home alone.

The woman beside me closed the airline app and angled toward me. “Are you staying in Detroit?”

“No.”

“Business?”

“Wedding.”

Her smile sharpened. “Yours?”

“Do I look excited enough to be getting married?”

“You don’t look excited about anything.”

“That should answer the question.”

The flight attendant reminded everyone to remain seated. The woman laughed and touched my forearm as though my irritation were flirting.

Maybe it was. I’d stopped caring how people interpreted anything that didn’t matter.

“My friend and I are going downtown tonight,” she said. “If you’re around.”

“I won’t be.”

“You don’t know where we’re going.”

“I know where I’m not.”

Her fingers left my arm.

I collected my phone from the seat pocket and watched messages load across the screen. Tyler sent the updated offseason training schedule. Briggs had added twelve messages to the group chat, including three memes, a photograph of his airport breakfast, and a complaint about Lyric refusing to let him bring his goalie equipment to New York.

Rider responded that bringing professional hockey gear to a wedding was concerning behavior.

Easton wanted to know why anyone still encouraged Briggs by answering him.

Cade’s message waited beneath theirs.

Cade: I’m outside. North end of arrivals.

Ryan: Plane just landed.