Break Away

by Sylvain Hotte

  Even with my nose in my book, I could sense some people walking towards me. Two passed in front of my table, then a third. A fourth person hesitantly stopped close by, swaying undecidedly. I held still, leaning over my book (which I wasn’t reading), pretending to be completely absorbed in it, waiting for my prey to react. He went for it, sitting down across from me, casting his shadow under the fluorescent lights.

  I wondered how long Stéphane Pinchault could have stayed there like that, motionless, without a word. After what seemed to me like an eternity, I raised my head and looked at him.

  It was the first time I had seen him up close. I had never approached him and I actually turned away each time we passed each other in the corridors. As I studied his face, I was surprised to see how, well, how ugly he was. What was beautiful about Jessie — her nose, her delicate mouth, her big almond eyes — seemed like defects on Stéphane Pinchault’s face. Not because he was scary or deformed. It was more the way he carried himself. The way he moved and his grimacing expressions seemed to be exaggerated expressions of what was going on in his head. It wasn’t revolting ; it was disturbing. But what was particularly unsettling was the way his eyes, with their large black pupils, flitting and evasive, could sometimes settle on your own. It was as if something was missing somewhere in his mind that would have made him a complete human being.

  “Hi,” I said.

  “ Hi,” he replied with his raspy voice. He was tall and gangly with pimples all over his big red nose and a sparse mustache of fat black whiskers.

  He stood there a long moment, silently looking at me, uncomfortable. I slid the book a little closer to him and I saw him checking it out, glancing at it nervously.

  “Go on,” I said, “Check it out.”

  “Can I sit down ?”

  “Sure,” I said, “have a seat, Stéphane. That would be cool.”

  Okay, maybe I was going a bit too far. A low blow. I saw him hesitate, and look from side to side to see if anybody was watching. I bet everybody was watching, and trying to figure out what the two of us could be talking about. Any way you looked at it, Stéphane Pinchault was the reject of all rejects. He occupied the bottom of the school pecking order. What did he have to lose ? He grimaced at me, which I interpreted as his way of smiling. He sat down in front of me and started thumbing through the encyclopedia.

  So, what they said about him was true : he was just wild about bugs. He seemed to forget I was even there as he feverishly flipped through the pages, devouring the text. I could see his eyes scanning at top speed from one line to the next. Every time he saw something familiar or pleasing, his face would twist into a grotesque expression and he would make bizarre gestures. He was more like an animal ; and I began to ease my chair backward, troubled.

  The bell rang ; time for class. I had to get going to make my French class in time. Stéphane’s a senior, same as me. He’s a little bit older, but he’s been held back twice. We don’t have any classes together. I get pretty good grades but he’s in a special education group.

  I told him he could borrow the book if he wanted to look through it. He could give it back to me at 3 :30, at the end of the day. He nodded vigorously and then melted into the crowd of students, the encyclopedia under his arm.

  How could you not feel pity and even sympathy for someone as troubled as him ? I don’t have an answer for that. I was happy to be able to do something that made him feel good and I told myself that it would be easy going from here on.

  It had been a long day at school and I couldn’t wait until it was over. I had a practice that night, and the next day I would be playing in my first game since the injury, against a team from the Saguenay with a couple of big tanks on defence. We were playing at home, and I was looking forward to my return in front of the home crowd. It would be fun — the other team’s porous defence meant there’d be a lot of ice. I’d be free to skate around, just waiting for Felix to find me with one of his pinpoint passes and thwack ! — the puck would be at the back of the net.

  Sitting on my quad at the end of the day, I waited for Stéphane Pinchault while the snow that had begun in the early afternoon kept falling. Tommy and Sam asked me what I was doing. They were going to the restaurant, but I told them I’d rather go home. They had just headed off when I saw Stéphane leave the school and head rapidly towards the bus. I stood up to be sure he could see me, but he just kept walking with a determined look on is face. I guessed he wasn’t going to notice me. So I jumped onto the sidewalk, ran up to him and stopped him in front of the bus door.

  “Hey, Stéphane, what about my book ?”

  He turned, looking extremely nervous. I repeated what I had said, and asked him how he had liked the book.

  Without answering, he reached into his backpack and awkwardly thrust it toward me. Before I could grab it, it fell to the ground. I bent over to pick it up and thumbed through it quickly as I stood up. What I discovered really troubled me. I raised my eyes toward Stéphane ; he was looking green around the gills, as if he was about to vomit.

  My whole incredible insect encyclopedia, the one that had cost my aunt more than a hundred dollars, was filled with drawings, with meaningless words and lines of zeros and ones. I couldn’t believe it. He must have been at it all day without a break. You could even make out latitudes and longitudes like the ones on the maps we studied in my orientation classes.

  “They’re secret codes,” he stammered.

  My mouth hanging open, I couldn’t get a single word out. Finally, I handed him the book.

  “Well… here,” I said, “keep it. It’s a gift.”

  He snatched it out of my hands and climbed into the bus.

  I backed up a couple of steps while the driver closed the door and started the engine. The big yellow bus, which was headed for 3rd Side Road, passed in front of me. Through the dirty window, I could see Jessie looking at me, sitting in the last seat. The bus headed towards the road and Jessie turned around, still looking at me.

  I walked over to my quad with my hands in my pockets, cranked it and pulled my tuque down over my ears. It was snowing harder now ; you could see big snowflakes twirling under the streetlights that had just come on. I wondered if this might not be my last ride.

  Ready to take off, I glanced in the mirror and saw a metallic blue car coming towards me, Jonathan Sauvé’s Honda Civic. He had three guys from his gang with him. They sped right by me, windows down, music blasting. They didn’t even give me a look, never even turned their heads, but they brushed by so closely that I had to lift my leg to keep it from getting ripped right off.

  I was tempted to give their car a kick and yell insults at them. They’re older than me but they don’t scare me. I could have defended myself. But what kept running through my mind was Jessie, and the way she looked at me with her big mysterious eyes.

  Chapter Four

  Larry’s pre-game pep-talk electrified us. He was in top shape, bursting with enthusiasm. Up and down the locker room he marched, clapping his hands, exhorting us to outdo ourselves and score some goals. We had to hold our ground, not give an inch, wait for our openings and then surge through like the barbarian hordes of Genghis Khan. The guys were pumped ; fist bumping and nodding their heads in agreement whenever the coach boomed out the end of a sentence like a cannon shot.

  All his fervour might have seemed out of place. After all, we’d dropped six consecutive games, enough to sap any team’s morale. But there was a new ingredient in the mix. And even if Larry would never admit it, it had to do with the fact that I was sitting on the bench in front of locker number eight, dressed to play, back from the injury that had sidelined me. I was quiet and focused. I felt as hungry as a wolf who hadn’t eaten in three weeks. I wanted this victory and I was ready to chew up and spit out anybody who stood in my way.

  The bleachers were packed to the rafters ; the crowd was buzzing. When we took to the ice, some of the fans started yelling my name. A shiver run up my spine ; I felt a bit nervous to be carrying t
he responsibility everyone had put on my shoulders : Larry and his determination to win, my teammates’ enthusiasm, and now the fans who had anointed me the saviour who would single-handedly pull the team out of the doldrums. I gingerly tested my ankle, wondering if it could handle game pressure. But a couple of laps in that circus atmosphere convinced me that I was more than ready. The only thing I was still waiting for was the opening faceoff.

  I lined up to Félix’s right, shoulder to shoulder with the opposing winger, while the official checked that everyone was in position before dropping the puck.

  “How’s the foot ?” asked the guy from Saguenay in front of me.

  “You’ll find out,” I replied.

  Félix, quick as the devil, won the faceoff. The guy in front of me lowered his shoulder and threw me off balance for a second with a solid hit, but I was ready for it and with several quick cross steps to my left, hit my stride. I lifted my head just in time to take the pass from our defenceman Vigneault at centre ice.

  I spun around and deked the smartass winger out of his shorts. Then, with a quick glance, I saw Félix hit the blue line on my left. He took my pass in full flight. One of the huge defencemen from the other team came up to check him, but missed and went heavy into the boards.

  I streaked up the ice into enemy territory. Félix spotted me from deep in the zone. He zipped me a perfect pass and I one-timed it, giving it all my weight : a wicked bullet that just cleared the goalie’s blocker.

  Score ! Top shelf ! The crowd went nuts. They screamed as if we had just won the finals. I looked up at the scoreboard clock : twenty seconds. Wow ! I skated the length of my bench to high five the guys who were pounding the boards with their sticks.

  Larry shook his head from left to right as though he couldn’t believe it. And I was happy to have stuck one in his craw.

  The rest of the game was a little more ordinary.

  We came from behind to win it at the very end after trailing 3-1 for two periods, with third-period goals by Tommy and Félix, and the winner by me with less than two minutes left on the clock. Anthony fired one from the point and I deflected the puck without ever really seeing it. I admit, it was luck. But we won, 4 to 3.

  The crowd, afraid we were about to drop another one, erupted with joy, practically raising the roof off of the arena. The guys all rushed over to me, winners for the first time in seven games. Happy, I searched for my father and Sylvie in the crowd. That’s when I saw, towering over everyone by at least a foot, Stéphane Pinchault. But the best part — Jessie was standing next to him cheering like crazy. Our eyes met, I’m sure of it. And for one moment, I swear that time stood still. The game, the crowd, the ice, the losing side — all had disappeared. There was nothing but that moment, and the most intense feeling I had ever known.

  They were partying so hard in the locker room you couldn’t hear a word.

  The team was in great spirits ; victory had been a long time coming. They went crazy, whip snapping each other with towels and splashing Gatorade all over each other.

  But when the coach came in, everything quieted down. No question that despite the win, it hadn’t been pretty. They all knew it. Most of all, they all knew Larry wouldn’t hesitate to drive it home. But surprisingly he kept it short, contrary to his usual practice of never being satisfied, no matter the outcome. He congratulated us for the “great game,” more like a recreation director at an old folks’ home. Then, along the same lines, he added that he was happy we hadn’t quit and that we had shown enough character to get back into the game and go on to win.

  He finished up by saying, “McKenzie, stop by my office before you leave.”

  After showering and dressing, I went up to Félix to thank him for his wicked assist to start off the game. He told me someone had to be there on the other side of his passes, and that he was happy I was back. We shook hands promising to bust a few heads over the rest of the season, and I headed for Larry’s office.

  He opened the door and waved me in, dressed as always in his pale blue phys ed director’s warm-up suit. I observed him for a moment with his balding head and his blue tinted shades. I never thought the guy was what you’d call ‘with it.’ But looking at him now, he seemed even more ridiculous. I mean, who do you know that wants to come off like that ? Nobody.

  When did anyone ever wake up saying : “I think I’ll dress like that, I feel like being laughed at.” Never. Anyway, one thing’s for sure, I can spot him a mile away in the grocery store, so whenever I see him coming with his shopping cart I duck into another aisle. That’s Larry. Not a bad coach, people say in town.

  We both sat down. It was a tiny office ; a little hole in the wall built out of beige cement bricks. Not much to inspire you in this particular coach’s office, unless you count a faded old poster of Chris Nilan to let you know who Larry looked up to when he was my age. Supposedly, in his third year in the AHL, Larry took on all comers in trying to make his mark as an enforcer, one strategy for getting to the NHL. But he wasn’t the biggest guy and he took more than his share of sucker punches. “Crazy Larry” was the moniker that stuck.

  His desk was a mess of paper filled with statistics and hockey magazines in French and English. Perched atop the pile was a gold-framed picture of a young girl, maybe seven or eight.

  “That’s my daughter,” said Larry, who noticed me checking out the photo.

  He rotated it towards me so I could get a good look. She had a big smile and red hair like her dad, even if nowadays Larry’s hair looks more like faded rust. No doubt it was red when he was younger.

  “Mélissa,” he said. “I haven’t seen her for eight years.”

  “Where does she live ?”

  “Last I knew, she lived with her mom in Montreal. I’ve had to be patient over the last few years ; I’m trying to get a court order to be able to see her.”

  “Why can’t you see her ?”

  “It’s complicated,” he said, turning the photo so that it faced him again. “It’s not easy, a soldier’s life, McKenzie.”

  He looked at her for another moment and then put the frame away in one of the desk drawers. Leaning his elbows on his desk, he looked at me in silence.

  “Nice game,” he said, lowering his sunglasses to reveal his small grey piercing eyes.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “Two goals, one assist. Nice comeback after a serious injury. I’m happy for you.”

  “Yeah, not bad,” I said, a sarcastic smile frozen on my face.

  “You know that we’re not going far if we play like we did tonight.”

  “I guess.”

  “They’re nice, the magic tricks, McKenzie, the fancy plays, the razzle-dazzle, but if you give the puck away and we’re always forced to play in our own end, if you don’t get back and defend, if you…”

  “But we pulled it out, Larry.”

  “I don’t give a damn if we won ! That’s not what I’m here to talk about. It’s about you, your game.”

  Normally, his lectures made me fidgety and I’d stare at the floor waiting for him to finish. But this time, I held my head up, grinning from ear to ear. My mind was a million light years away from Larry’s office. I didn’t care about the game. Didn’t care about his advice or anything else. There was one indelible image planted in my brain : Jessie jumping up and down and cheering her heart out after I had scored the winning goal. Unreal.

  “Look, Alex,” said Larry, with an increasing tone of confidence, “the team won 4 to 3. You were a factor in three of the goals and your plus/minus is zero. Which means that each time they scored, you were on the ice.”

  “I know how to read a plus/minus.”

  “First off, that just looks awful. You can’t seriously think you’re going to make it to the NHL…”

  “Larry, I could care less about the NHL.”

  I don’t know why I said that. Really, I have no idea. I don’t think it’s even true.

  But I said it anyway. And Larry, in front of me, completely froze. H
e dropped his arms and sank into his chair.

  “Okay, if that’s the way it is, piss off. There’s no point in saying anything more.”

  I got up and went out.

  Slinging my duffel bag over my shoulder, I saw my father and my aunt waiting near the arena exit. I went up to them.

  “Bravo,” said Sylvie, hugging me and giving me a peck on the cheek. “I’m really proud of you.”

  “What did the coach want ?” asked my father.

  “He wanted to congratulate me for a great game.”

  We drove Sylvie home ; she had to turn in early in order to be ready for a day of work at Betty Brite. Some hunters had stopped in the day before and left her a pile of clothes to mend. As usual, my father wanted to eat at Chez Lisette. Sometimes, he seems to get hungry more often than me, even though I’m the one skating.

  “I don’t want to go to Chez Lisette,” I said.

  “No ? Where do you want to go ?”

  I knew that Tommy’d be there with a bunch of girls, and I didn’t want to run into them. In fact, I didn’t want to see anybody. If I could have tossed my father out of the pick-up and ditched him, I’d have done it. I’d have headed for 3rd Side Road. And all the Pinchaults would have welcomed me with open arms.

  We would have talked about the game, and then Stéphane and his father would have gone to bed and Jessie and I would have been left alone on the couch to watch television…

  “How about a hot dog down at the dock,” I said to my father.

  “At this time of night ?” he said, surprised. “In October ?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s kind of windy down there. And cold.”

  You can’t be serious ! If I’d have invited him to eat a salad, he wouldn’t have said a thing, and we would have been at Chez Lisette in no time. But, seeing as he was a big fan of hot dogs with mustard and sauerkraut, he said okay, and we headed over to the 24-hour Casse-Croûte.