High Stick

by Alicia Hunter Pace

  “I don’t owe you an apology for doing it. I didn’t know you. It’s my body to do with as I see fit. My body, my business. If I owe anyone an apology, it’s me, and that’s between me and me.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.

  “I almost told you the morning after we slept together. I was all set to, and then I just couldn’t.”

  “Almost isn’t good enough.”

  “Really? Almost is all you’re ever going to have. It’s all anyone is ever going to have, because perfect doesn’t exist.”

  “I thought it did. I thought it was you.” He still looked more angry than sad. “You should have told me right away.”

  “Jarrett, be reasonable. That’s not something you tell someone you’ve known for the length of time I’ve known you.”

  “But you could tell me you love me and have sex with me after that length of time? Is that what I’m hearing?” And just like that anger set in. He was upset with good reason—one of the best—and she’d given him a pass more than once since he’d come in the door today. But this she could not let this go by.

  “Don’t you dare!” She wanted to stand up and loom over him, but maybe she should save that in case this got worse. “Don’t you dare condemn me for the very things you did yourself.”

  “I was innocent! I meant everything I said to you. I fell in love with you.”

  “And you think what I did negates my ability to love? Do you not think I could have fallen in love with you, too?”

  “Maybe.” His eyes were hard. “But if you did, you fell in love with the real me. I fell in love with who you were pretending to be. I am a fool. You told me that you came to my bed barely touched, the next thing to a virgin.”

  “And it’s true!”

  “You are going to sit there and tell me that someone who would pose for a picture like that wouldn’t—”

  She cut him off because it would kill her if he said it. She’d say it herself.

  “Screw every guy in her path? Yeah. That’s what I’m going to sit here and tell you. I own what I did, but I made a decision about celibacy and I stuck to it. Casual sex was not for me. That doesn’t make me a better person. It makes me a person who is master of her own body. And if that includes stripping every stitch of my clothing off and lying spread eagle on a bearskin rug in Times Square, it’s my business and not yours.”

  There were equal parts of hurt and condemnation in his eyes. The hurt might have been her undoing if the condemnation hadn’t been there.

  “I thought what we had was private and special,” he said. “I can’t tell you what it does to me to know that other men saw you. I know you had sex with that one guy in college. You told me about that and I can overlook it. But this, for money? And not even for money for a good reason.”

  Her hot anger went to ice. She was never going to win so she might as well have her say.

  “Overlook it? Who are you to overlook anything? Did you come to me pure as the driven snow?”

  “I told you that wasn’t an issue. It’s the naked picture—there for the world to see.”

  “Tell me something, Jarrett.” She could see from his face that he felt the cold in her voice. “Have you ever looked at porn? On the Internet? Or bought a girlie magazine? Or even looked at one that belonged to your buddy? Ever done that? Ah, I see the answer. Market demand, buddy. At least you have the decency to look ashamed.”

  “I haven’t done it lately,” he said. “And I am ashamed because I am decent. Can you say the same?”

  Now was the time. She jumped to her feet and loomed over him. “I will not be treated like a fallen angel. I never claimed to be perfect. That was your own invention. Get the hell out of my house.”

  He didn’t waste any time complying.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Jarrett was late for morning skate, something that never happened to him. He was too careful. He always left with time to spare. Not this morning. He hadn’t meant to be late, but he had intended to arrive just in time because he hadn’t wanted to see the guys tiptoe around him or talk to Packi. But his timing had been off, like everything else.

  There was still plenty of tiptoeing going on, even on skates. All Coach had said when he took the ice was, “You’re late, MacPherson. Unacceptable.” But there wasn’t any sting in the words, though Jarrett wouldn’t have given a damn if there had been. That was who he was today.

  Packi handed him his usual orange and blue Gatorade when he was back in the locker room but had said little—which suited Jarrett fine because he was in no mood for fortune cookie talk.

  But it was too good to be true. Packi was waiting for him outside the locker room.

  “Walk with me,” he said.

  And there was nothing else to do. Packi led him into his small office, which was a study in hockey equipment controlled chaos. Packi went to sit behind the desk and pointed to the guest chair. Jarrett had to move a box of stick tape before he could sit down.

  “Just put it on the floor,” Packi said.

  “Why don’t you let me go ahead and put it where it belongs?”

  “Because it belongs in that chair.”

  “So every time someone comes in here to talk to you, that tape has to be moved?”

  “I don’t allow people who come in here to sit down unless I invite them. And I never invite anyone.”

  “What about Coach or Pickens Davenport?”

  “I go to them. You don’t know a thing about pecking order do you?”

  “Of course I do. I live by it. I just thought it didn’t apply to you.”

  “It applies to everybody.” He reached behind him, plucked a box off the shelf, and set it in front of Jarrett. “That’s the skates you had me order for Merry. She wears a size seven.”

  Was there no place in this universe that wasn’t a torture chamber right now?

  “I have no use for those anymore, nor the information. I will not be purchasing footwear for Merry”—he fumbled for her middle name and realized he didn’t know it—“Sweet in the future.” Jarrett scooted the skates away from him. “Though it seems I should have asked you to get her a shirt. That might have been useful.”

  “Sarcasm does not become you.”

  “Not a problem, since I’m about as good with sarcasm as I am with judgment. That was a fluke.”

  “Neither does bitterness.”

  “I can’t do anything about that. That seems to be my flavor right now. But if you called me in here for me to tell you that you were right, consider it done. You tried to tell me she was a bad choice.”

  Packi’s frown lines deepened. “I never told you that. I told you that you needed to take to some time to know her instead of assigning characteristics to her that you found acceptable.”

  “What’s the difference? The end is the same.”

  “You’ve had quite a few ends and they’ve all been for the same reason.”

  “But I’ve never felt like this before.”

  Packi studied him for a long time. “Then I guess you’d better tell me all about it.”

  So he did. It wasn’t hard to reenact the entire ending scene between Merry and him. He’d gone over it in his head so many times since then, it was engraved on his brain. He didn’t try to spin it or hold anything back.

  During the telling, Packi looked pained but never interrupted.

  “So you see?” Jarrett said at the end.

  Pack nodded. “I do. I got it loud and clear, but I don’t know if you did.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “No. I don’t suppose you do. But like I told you before, you can’t pour a person into a mold.”

  “First, you say not to be with her. Now it sounds like you’re saying I should.”

  “I never said you shouldn’t be with her. I said you needed to rethink how you view life and love.”

  Jarrett put his face in his hands. “That’s the hell of it. I do love her.”

  “Then you need to find a w
ay around this.”

  “I don’t think I can find a way to forgive her.”

  Packi shook his head. “That’s not the key. You need to find a way to forgive yourself for not forgiving her. That’s what it comes down to.”

  More fortune cookie talk. Jarrett stood up. “I’ve got a game tonight.”

  “You don’t say. I didn’t know that. That was sarcasm in case you missed it.”

  “I need to go nap. I hardly slept last night.”

  • • •

  That night, the Sound lost to the Kings in a big ugly way. It was an even bigger and uglier night for Jarrett—bloody, too. He, who had never so much as taken a swing at a guy on the ice, threw his gloves off and tore into an LA defenseman who had done nothing more than deliver a fair and acceptable check from behind. He didn’t even care when the LA enforcer took it up and beat the hell out of him before Thor could get in the mix.

  “I guess I caused that,” Jarrett said to Thor as they headed to the locker room, having been thrown out of the game.

  “I guess you did,” Thor agreed.

  He hoped that Merry had seen it, hoped she knew he was bleeding.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The rest of January blurred into February and Merry waited for the pain to subside. She wasn’t having much luck with that, but she was able to land a job at Starbucks to replace the one she’d lost. She didn’t make as much there as she had as an ice suite attendant, but it was conveniently a few blocks down from Foolscap and Vellum. Most important, it wasn’t a place where Jarrett would have to see her or her him. After all, he didn’t like coffee and it was highly unlikely that he’d come in and order one anyway because she’d caught him looking at her.

  Though she did sometimes have the opportunity to look at him from a distance. Starbucks was across the street from The Big Skate, and she’d caught sight of him going in a few times after home games. Once she’d seen him with—she knew from the Christmas pictures he’d shown her—his mother, grandmother, and sister. He had been carrying his little niece, probably because of the late hour since she was old enough to walk. The sight of it melted her heart.

  Amy and Gabriella had been into Foolscap and Vellum a few times—Amy to satisfy her addiction to wrapping paper and Gabriella to begin looking at wedding invitations though she hadn’t yet set a date. They clearly felt sorry for her and had invited her to lunch a few times, but she’d begged off, saying she needed to study. Finally, they’d stopped asking and it was better that way. They were in his world and she couldn’t be in it.

  Oddly, the gossip about the calendar died down almost immediately. She read that Jarrett had resigned from Disney. There had been a few rude remarks, but she hadn’t felt the need to threaten to shoot anyone in the genitals again. It felt better to pretend she hadn’t heard and walk away. A few reporters had tried to get a comment from her, but they hadn’t tried very hard.

  She was surprised when the call came offering her a calendar all her own with a hockey theme. They wanted to call it Merry Ice Time. She’d hung up without comment.

  “I am so sick of this Valentine’s Day stuff!” Chelsea said afternoon of the fourteenth.

  “So am I!” Merry said. Red hearts, lace, pink cupids, all dedicated to love. She wanted to burn the entire lot of it until there was nothing left except ashes. “Let’s take down every bit of it and put out St. Patrick’s Day.”

  Surely, March would be better. In the South, it began to warm up in March, began to feel like spring. Merry needed a new season. She’d met Jarrett in the winter, made love with him cuddled under quilts, and they’d broken each other’s hearts when everything was cold and gray.

  Chelsea looked alarmed. “Merry, it’s still Valentine’s Day. We’ll make a lot of last minute sales.”

  “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

  “No. Don’t be sorry. It’s just gotten to be a joke with us. I complain that I’m tired of something and want to take it down prematurely and you are the voice of reason. I’m worried about you.”

  “Don’t be. I’m just tired.”

  The next day when Merry came in at noon, there wasn’t a heart in sight. Chelsea hadn’t even marked it down and put it in the back.

  “Want to set up the shamrocks?” Chelsea asked.

  “Absolutely.”

  And she did find that the cheerful green and the lucky little leprechauns made her smile.

  • • •

  There was a cold, driving rain coming down, but it could be worse. It could still be Valentine’s Day.

  Thank God that was in the books. For days, it seemed like everyone around him had been buying jewelry and flowers and making dinner reservations. He understood it. It was the first February 14th in three years that the Sound hadn’t either been on the road or playing in town. There was some big-time making up to do to some long-suffering women.

  But he’d been weary of it, weary of thinking about that emerald ring that was living in his sock drawer.

  As he walked down the street, Jarrett willed himself not to look in the window of Foolscap and Vellum, because if he saw her, he’d go in, and that wasn’t going to do anyone any good.

  He was feeling a little better these days. At least he didn’t wake up anymore feeling like he’d been gutted. But if he saw her, he wouldn’t feel better anymore. For two weeks, he’d tried to catch sight of her in an ice suite on game days, but he’d finally asked and been told she wasn’t there anymore. She’d probably been fired and there was nothing fair about that, like it wasn’t fair that it was always the ice girls and never the players who got in trouble for breaking the fraternizing rule.

  But maybe she’d quit. Maybe she didn’t want to see him any more than he wanted to see her.

  Out of desperation, he’d started dating again. First, there had been the third grade teacher he’d met in line at the grocery store. She was nice, but all she’d wanted to talk about was her job and a guy could only listen to so many antics about eight-year-olds. Then there had been the travel agent he’d used when he’d flown his family in a few weeks ago, but they just hadn’t been able to get a conversation going.

  The real problem was that they weren’t Merry.

  And now he was on his way to meet another Not Merry. He had serious reservations about this. He still wasn’t sure why he’d let Robbie talk him into calling this woman, though Robbie swore she wasn’t a puck bunny or an ice girl. If he found out otherwise, he was going to kill him. She was an investment banker who handled Robbie’s finances, who, according to him, was “hot but way too quiet.”

  She must be wary, too, since it was she who suggested they meet for coffee in the middle of the afternoon.

  Probably due to the weather and the odd hour, there were only a handful of people in the Starbucks, and only one who was likely to be her. Not bad looking. Her blond hair was twisted up on the back of her head like Merry’s had been at the wedding. She was dressed in an off-white suit with big gold buttons on the jacket. She already had her coffee and her nose was buried in her phone.

  She hasn’t seen you. It’s not too late to leave.

  He wouldn’t, of course. He’d said he’d be here and he was. It was now or never and it couldn’t be never.

  “Carla?” When he approached the table, she stood and offered her hand like it was a business meeting. “Jarrett MacPherson.”

  “I hope you were able to park close in this rain,” she said.

  He hadn’t been. “It was no problem.”

  Now they were at the silent part.

  “Well,” he said. “I see you already have a drink. I’ll just get something and join you. Can I get you anything else?”

  “No. I’m good.” She settled back into her chair and sipped her coffee.

  And then he turned around and found himself looking right into Merry’s eyes. Her mouth was in a straight line and her face a study in heartbreak. The counter was no more than eight feet away from where he stood, so she’d seen and heard the whole thing.
He couldn’t bring himself to close the space between them to place his order. She wiped her hands on her green apron and folded them together as if she was steeling herself for battle.

  Just then the door opened, and two women who clearly knew what they wanted flew up to the counter.

  He had to get out of here. He couldn’t make Merry witness a date that wasn’t going to work out anyway. Plus, he might jump over the counter and throw his arms around her.

  What to do, what to do? He couldn’t just run and leave Carla sitting here. She hadn’t done anything to deserve that.

  “Looks like you weren’t fast enough,” Carla said.

  “What?”

  She inclined her head to the counter. “They got ahead of you.”

  “Oh.” He bent down so he could speak quietly to her. “Listen, I know you said coffee, but I’m hungry. Would you mind if we stepped across the street to The Big Skate? I think the rain has slacked.”

  The rain had not slacked.

  Carla hesitated for a moment but then smiled. “Sure.” She reached into her bag and brought out one of those little umbrellas that popped out to full size when you pushed a button. This was a woman who was prepared for everything.

  There was a time when that would have mattered to him.

  After he’d eaten a hamburger he didn’t want and made a lot of inane small talk, Carla said she needed to get back to work.

  “Sure, let me get the check and I’ll walk you back.”

  “No!” That woman meant that no. “I mean, I really have to go now. I have a meeting. It’s right across the street. Thank you. It was a pleasure.” And she hurried away.

  He wasn’t sure which one of them was more relieved. He should go, except he had nowhere he had to be. If he turned his head slightly, he could see the Starbucks.

  “Is it too much to hope that you are staring at the woman who was with you?” The voice had a French accent. “The woman who is hurrying across the street now?”

  Yeah. Carla was crossing the street.

  “Because”—Emile slid into the seat where Carla had sat—“that would mean you are feeling better. On the mend.”