The street stretched out before me; far off I saw a church steeple and lights twinkling in store windows. Every time I banged my head against the wall, memories of Tommy and me on the Côte-Nord tumbled down from the stars like a meteor shower. Riding on our skidoos in winter, lost on trails we had never been on before. Me on my quad trying to keep up with him as he drove his dirt bike at full speed along the dunes overlooking the sea. And above all, that unforgettable moment last winter in the school cafeteria when he came over and sat down beside me after I’d run my skidoo into the river at twenty below. He didn’t say a word. We just laughed, cracking jokes. Guys don’t talk about these things, ever. Yet everything was okay; there was nothing to worry about.
Larry was in bed by the time I got home. I couldn’t be bothered to take a shower and plopped into bed. It was hot in my little room, but I closed the window anyway. It was like I didn’t want to hear anything, or maybe like I was afraid of something. When I closed the blinds, I saw eyes gleaming orange in the dark among the tomato plants and the beanstalks in Nathalie’s garden. Watching me. Waiting for me.
Tommy came in an hour later. I was still awake. Scrunched down under the covers, listening, I tracked his heavy footsteps in the kitchen, which was right next to my bedroom. He went to the bathroom to pee. Then to the fridge for a glass of milk. Through the opening at the bottom of my bedroom door, I saw the light go out. Everything fell still. Then, slowly, he came up to my door; then stopped in front of it.
What was he doing? Did he want to talk? I thought he was about to knock, but he didn’t, completely silent and motionless. I could almost hear him breathing on the other side. After a wait that seemed interminable, I began to sit up in bed, slowly, careful not to make a sound. A long bead of sweat trickled down my chest. I don’t know how much time passed while he stood outside my door, but it was crazy long. Sitting on the edge of my bed, my feet on the linoleum floor, I was ready to defend myself. But I was afraid. Afraid that he had talked with Vincent and his joint-smoking sidekick. And that they told him to settle accounts with me. Or that they were even actually out there, in the back yard, lurking in the shadows, hiding among the tomatoes, waiting for just the right moment to pounce on me.
Finally he moved. I was all set to jump to my feet to take away the advantage of surprise. But to my relief, he went back to his room. He closed the door gently, and then I heard him fooling around for a while before hitting the sack. I jammed a chair under the doorknob to bar the door. Was it possible that he just wanted to clear the air? Should I take the initiative and go to him? But what was there to say? There was no denying what had passed between us when our eyes met. The surprise and shame in his. The surprise and distress in mine.
I knew I’d never be able to fall asleep. After tossing and turning over a dozen times in the space of five minutes, I rose and grabbed my laptop. The screen was blinding and splashed its bright white light all over my body. My abs were sharply defined under the glowing light. I had changed. It was two o’clock in the morning. I wrote a short message to Chloé, saying I missed her and was thinking of her. It was only then that I fell asleep.
In the morning I awoke with a start, drenched in sweat. My window was closed and the heat was already overwhelming. Larry knocked on my door saying it was time. I dressed in a hurry and looked for my backpack. My heart sank when I realized I had left it at the gym the day before.
Not a word was spoken around the breakfast table. Tommy and I were avoiding eye contact. I expected Larry to say something about the hangdog look on our faces. But he seemed caught up in his own concerns, and said nothing.
“You’re not having anything to eat?” I finally asked, breaking the uneasy silence that prevailed in the small apartment.
“No,” he replied, leaning on the counter, a cup of coffee in one hand. “I’m not really hungry.”
It was hot. Through the window screen, I could hear Nathalie out in the garden yelling at her kids, who were already quarreling at half past seven in the morning. I imagined the neighbours who had to put up with those little loudmouths 365 days a year, shaking their heads and sighing in resignation. The linoleum in the apartment was disgusting: whole pieces had been torn out, showing the greasy particle board underneath. The refrigerator was leaking, forming a puddle on the floor that a grungy mop was waiting to swab up.
I could only think of one thing: find another place to live. There was no way it was going to work out for me here. I needed to concentrate on my game. That was all that mattered. I had to put Tommy and his cheating ways out of my mind. It turned my stomach to think that he was making himself sick, really sick, just to boost his performance. I needed to try to talk to him, I couldn’t just ignore it. Later on, we found ourselves alone in the locker room at the Colisée. The other guys were already on the ice. Without mentioning or planning anything, as if we both knew it was the right time, each of us lagged behind. Me by suddenly discovering that I needed to change my laces while Tommy had to retape the blade of his hockey stick.
There were just the two of us, plus a janitor who was cleaning the showers on the other side. Tommy still hadn’t looked at me. I could see he wasn’t going to make the first move. So I did. I went over to him. Concentrating on his hockey stick, looking for the best angle to apply the tape, he avoided looking at me. But he was listening. I felt nervous. Sweat was pouring off him. As usual, his face, covered with aggressive and purulent acne, was as red as ever. He was big, strong and more powerful than ever. But never had he seemed so fragile.
“Listen, Tom …”
“What?” he interjected, without giving me the chance to finish my sentence.
“… it’s just that, I’m worried about you.”
“Yeah, well I’m worried about you. You better watch out where you’re sticking your big nose.”
It was a threat. I couldn’t believe my ears. It was me that did something wrong. It was me that stuck my nose into his business.
“What are you doing? You were always a good hockey player. You don’t need….”
“Need what?”
“Umm …”
“What? What are you talking about?”
I couldn’t say it. I just couldn’t find the words. All of a sudden, it all seemed unreal; as if nothing ever happened. As if the sordid scene in the basement of the gym had never happened. And since I wasn’t talking, it was Tommy’s turn. He tossed the roll of tape into his locker and pointed his stick at me. All he could get past his lips was a groan. His light-coloured eyes were damp with tears that never fell. And he growled like a bear as he left, slamming the locker room door behind him.
On the ice, the coach and the coaching staff explained what we were going to be doing that week. The cuts would be coming soon. Pay close attention to instructions, they told us; they wouldn’t be cutting us any slack. The bottom line was that there were really only three forward and one defenceman’s slots open. I figured I had a good shot at it.
I dominated in the power skating exercises, handling them better than anyone. Except near the end when Tommy, never short of breath, began to get the upper hand. A guy from Abitibi, one of the clowns at the team lunch the day before, was pretty hard to beat in the skills tests. But again, I came out all right. Leaning against the boards while I caught my breath, I watched Tommy going through his paces, looking clumsy. It was definitely not his strong point. During the one-on-ones he had to shove a couple of guys in order to get where he was going, which earned him a couple of comments from the coaches. He lost his temper and whacked the boards two or three times with his stick.
I handled the one-timers with flying colours. I had a wicked shot, and was able to put the puck on the target wherever they asked me, no problem. There were guys up in the stands taking notes and I knew I was getting high marks. In fact, everything was going easier than I had expected.
Things went a little downhill for me when we started team exercises. I found myself playing against Tommy— a fate that was to dog me all the wa
y to the end of training camp. Not only that, it turned out that he lined up right opposite me. At the faceoff, I felt his shoulder leaning heavily against mine. He was letting me know he wasn’t going to be holding back. I tried to push back, but he refused to budge. Okay, game on. Twice I went up the wing and turned up the jets just in time to avoid his check, and heard him hit the boards with a crash. On my third rush, I had to keep my eyes on the puck; it was bouncing and I had trouble controlling it. That’s when he got me. But good. Boom! I thought my head would pop. I could swear everybody in the stands watching the workout rose from their seats at the moment of impact. Stunned, I put one knee on the ice to get my bearings. I managed to pull myself together and finish the game with a couple of half-decent plays. But it was like I was running on empty. Plus I had a splitting headache.
In the locker room, I was seated on the bench. I could hardly move a muscle.
“McKenzie, keep your head up,” said one of the guys.
“You gave us a scare,” said Tommy, who was awkwardly trying to show some sympathy.
He was trying to show that it was just part of the game, that he was a decent guy. And even if he could get some people to swallow it, I wasn’t biting. I cut him a sideways glance and asked him how his right buttock was feeling. Nobody understood a word I was talking about. But Tom, his eyes darkening, knew exactly what I meant.
A trainer came to look me over. He sat next to me and asked if I was going to be okay. I told him I had a bit of a headache, but that was all. He said it would be better to go to the hospital and see a doctor. His name was François. He was a nurse studying physical fitness at Laval University. On the way to the hospital, he asked me if I’d known Tommy for long. I told him that we knew each other since we were six. We went to grade school and high school together, and we were always on the same hockey teams. Right into juniors.
“Quite an athlete, your friend.”
“Yeah …”
“A tough guy.”
I had never been so ready to tell someone the truth about what was going on. François looked like someone who might be able to help Tom out. I wanted to tell him that Tommy had always been cool, an easy-going kind of guy, the kind of guy who always came out on top, thanks to his love of the game and his desire to win. Now, what used to be pleasure or desire had morphed into a pure and senseless rage. He hadn’t been like this before. But, once again, I held my silence. I stood mutely beside the trainer, looking at my feet and the Saint-François Hospital waiting room floor.
The doctor examined my eyes and ears. He asked me some questions and sent me home. I didn’t have a concussion. I didn’t have any symptoms. But if, later in the day, I experienced dizziness, nausea or confusion, I was to come back and see him.
Larry was sitting on a lawn chair at the back of the yard reading the paper. After dropping my stuff off in my room, I glanced into Tommy’s. It was completely empty. His suitcase, his things, everything was gone. He’d even made the bed.
I pulled up a chair and sat down next to Larry. I took off my running shoes and socks and wriggled my feet in the fresh-cut grass. Laptop perched on my knees, I had to fight the glare in order to read the screen. There were a couple of emails in my Hotmail account, including one from Chloé. She was thinking of me too, she wrote. She added that she would try to make it to Quebec City in a couple of weeks, but she didn’t know exactly when. She might be able to take a couple of days off after school started. She signed off with a couple of xx’s, after asking me to say hi to Tommy for her.
“Where’d he go?” I asked.
“He left,” answered Larry.
“What do you mean, he left? Left for where?”
“I called his mom to say I was worried about him. But all she did was throw insults at me, like how I was a complete idiot who was ruining her kid’s chances of success. I don’t have a clue what Tommy told her. She just yelled at me and refused to listen to a thing I had to say. He packed up after I hung up and went to stay with a friend of his cousin’s.”
I had no doubt that the friend was Vincent.
When Larry got up to go inside, a piece of paper slid from the chair and landed in the grass at my feet. I picked it up. It was a pretty good crayon sketch of Larry’s face. It wasn’t hard to recognize his red hair, his peaked forehead, his glasses perched precariously on his stub nose. At the bottom, to the right, “I love you, papa” was written.
Later that evening, I had to return an urgent call from my father. Tommy’s mother was stirring up the village, claiming that Larry had gone crazy and was taking it out on us. I tried to calm things down, pointing out that it wasn’t really working out for Tommy at training camp and that he had it in for everybody. He was convinced that his problems were due to Larry’s negative influence. When my father heard what I had to say, he seemed reassured. He made a few suggestions which I immediately forgot, and passed the phone to Sylvie. It made me a little sad to hear my aunt’s voice. Right at that moment, I would have given anything to be with her. Because with her, nothing was really complicated; she took it all with a grain of salt. Were things going good? For sure. Was everything okay? Yeah, yeah, okay. Are you happy? For sure, Sylvie, I’m really happy. I’m having a good camp. I’m confident I’ll make the team. Maybe that’s why Tommy was so angry at Larry. Maybe it’s because things weren’t going the way he wanted.
“Can’t you help him? Talk to him?”
“I’ve tried. But he’s pretty thick-headed. I can’t skate and score for him.”
“Just the same, Alex…”
I could stay with a girlfriend of hers in Charlesbourg, a suburb north of Quebec City. There was a room in the basement. I’d have all the privacy I needed. And it would certainly be quieter than being downtown, wouldn’t it?
That was exactly what I’d been wishing for the day before. But everything had changed. Tommy had split, and I really thought that Larry needed my help, and more than that, my presence. While my friend had gone over the line, having steroids injected in his bum by a handful of bikers, my coach was standing right on that line, spying on his own daughter at her school. I imagined Larry decked out in a grey raincoat, a fake beard and oversized sunglasses, being pulled over in his Jeep by the police. That’s the reason I turned down Sylvie’s offer. But I did promise her I’d think about it, and that maybe, once the season was over, I’d take her up on it. But not before. I didn’t have time for that right now. I had to concentrate on hockey.
After I hung up I noticed that Larry had made himself scarce. Maybe he was afraid he’d have to talk to my father and that’d he’d get another earful.
I spent the rest of the evening slouched on the sofa, watching television and surfing the Internet. I tried to find Chloé on Skype or MSN, but she wasn’t on-line on either one.
No, Larry hadn’t gone crazy. He was sure that something was out of synch with Tom. Especially after he paid a visit to the gym and got a look at the seedy guys who ran the place. He just tried to do the right thing. What’s more, finding out that people in the village were talking behind his back, and that Tommy’s mother was bad-mouthing him was unbearable. There already wasn’t much left of his reputation after his various run-ins with the law and his employers; if people were going to think he was a lousy coach and an unworthy mentor, there wouldn’t be anything left for him to do except go back into the army and disappear forever into the mountains of Afghanistan.
That’s why, that very evening, he headed over to the gym to have it out with Tommy. He wanted to confront him in front of the guys who were leading him down the road to ruin. And who, in doing so, were destroying him forever by turning him into a monster.
Monday was a busy night. Tuesday was even more so. The music was thumping, the atmosphere stifling, and people were lined up in front of the machines. Larry quickly spotted Tommy at the back of the room, in the corner where the weights and dumbbells were stacked. Vincent was beside him, egging him on as he power lifted.
Our coach wasn’t a big guy
. But he wasn’t afraid of anybody. He’d been to war, and no doped-up body builder was going to intimidate him. Without a glance at the jittery little guy at the reception desk, Larry marched with a determined stride to the back of the room.
Vincent immediately spotted the bizarre individual heading straight for him. Of course, Larry was decked out in his pale blue jogging suit. With his blue shades and his unkempt red hair sticking out in all directions, he was hard to miss. A man of action who was used to all sorts of nasty business, Vincent hurriedly helped Tommy lower the steel bar and its enormous cast iron plates. He knew exactly who he was dealing with.
“Tom,” said Larry, “I know what’s going on here. I want to talk to you.”
Tommy was about to reply, but Vincent abruptly cut him off.
“Hey, my friend, none of this concerns you. Butt out. Just a bit of friendly advice.”
“I’m not talking to you, fat ass. Which means … just shut your mouth!” During his stint in the Canadian armed forces, Larry had taken some judo courses. When Vincent, spitting nails, moved in to grab him, Larry flipped him over his hip with a lightning-fast move. The body builder with the bulging biceps went crashing to the mat. Cool as a cucumber, our coach turned to Tommy and pointed his finger at him, commanding him to get out of this dump. Immediately!
Power Forward Page 8
