by Grey, S. R.
Every time I uttered those words, I was reminded I wasn’t simply Benjamin “Benny” Perry, premier left winger for the Las Vegas Wolves. I was also a twenty-nine-year-old former substance abuser.
That former part was important, and I worked on it every single day. Management and my teammates liked to think I’d changed completely, that I was long done with my partying ways of the past. I was, but only because I attended meetings like the one that had just wrapped up.
The fact was, every fucking day of staying clean and sober took as much effort, if not more so, as playing good hockey.
Some days were a breeze, and some days were…not.
Today was one of the latter. It started out rough, beginning with when I woke up at dawn in bed with a random puck bunny. No alcohol or drugs were involved. I was just a dog, battling the only vice I’d not yet conquered—easy sex. It was the one addiction I couldn’t quite beat. Well, the only one if you didn’t count my weakness for donuts. If you counted that, then there were two.
I could live with the donut problem. It wasn’t that bad. Besides, I wasn’t giving up donuts for anything. Our team-mandated player diet, which I’d soon be adhering to, would have to allow for some wiggle room this season.
That’s why I felt okay about stopping for a donut on the way to this meeting. It was an emergency, damn it. Or so I told myself. I was soon convinced I needed a big chocolate-frosted donut to soothe my puck bunny woes.
It helped, but what I’d really needed was this meeting. I felt better already having just talked things out. Not that I’d confessed any major details of my little indiscretion. I’d simply spoken of challenges in general. Still, I felt good now. I always did after sharing shit with people like me.
The people in this particular group were all like me. As in, everyone in attendance that morning in the basement of a Las Vegas church on the outskirts of town was either a former, or present-day, athlete who was battling an addiction.
I happened to fall into the “present-day” category. I was in the prime of my hockey career, having just won the motherfucking Stanley Cup. That was great, but winning it all didn’t make everything rosy. I’d learned long ago that life was not perfect, even when it seemed it should be.
Every man in the room that morning knew that.
That’s why we’d started our little group. This church really was our haven. And these meetings provided a place where we all understood one another on a level no one else ever really could.
That bond was essential for our success. We felt comfortable calling each other out and sifting through the BS. In other words, we could be ourselves.
The chair creaked beneath me as I yawned and stretched. In fact, a bunch of chairs murmured the same dissent as other guys did the same. The cheap-ass things were nothing but folding pieces of thin metal crap. They hadn’t been designed to hold men as big and muscular as the ones in the room.
Speaking of muscles, mine were screaming for a good massage. Good thing preseason had started. I could schedule one at any time. I’d gone really hard at practice this morning and I was feeling it now. The pain was worth it. After dealing with all my mixed-up feelings regarding the random sex with the stranger, I’d needed that release.
A bunch of guys stood then, including me, but we remained in the circle of chairs. There were twelve of us in all who met regularly, and we enjoyed sticking around afterward to bullshit about this or that.
Then there was the coffee and donuts in the back.
That right there kept me around.
I made a beeline for the sugar and caffeine, and after pouring a coffee so black it looked like tar, I added in some sweetener, and then grabbed a heavily chocolate-frosted donut from the tray.
As I savored the first gooey bite, a guy bigger than me—and I was six feet two, so that was really saying something—strode up and handed me a napkin.
“Here, Perry. No need to be a pig about things.”
Graham Tettersaw, the giant next to me, smirked as I shot him the finger.
Too late, I thought, you should have seen me last night. The things I did to that girl…
“I have to say,” he went on, nodding to the donut. “That’s some heavy-duty sugar consumption, even for you. I know it’s only training camp, but doesn’t the regular season start soon?”
“It does indeed, Graham,” I mumbled as I swallowed.
“Maybe you ought to be laying off the sweets, then?”
I chortled, “What are you, my goddamn mother?”
He laughed. “You clearly need some kind of guidance. So sure, I can stand in for good ’ole mom if needed.”
“You’re such a prick,” I shot back.
Our banter was all in good fun. Graham took a special joy in giving me a hard time. And I enjoyed giving it right the fuck back to him. He was an athlete, like me, an ex-football star. More importantly, Graham was my sponsor. I relied on him. I especially had in the early days of staying sober, those times when I couldn’t even attend events where alcohol was being served. I’d also discovered, over the past year, Graham Tettersaw was a true stand-up guy.
He used to play ball for the Phoenix Cardinals. Quarterback, till he blew out his knee. After he was cut from the team, he developed a nasty painkiller addiction.
That’s what landed him in rehab…and why he was here today.
But Graham was clean going on three years now. He strongly believed in paying it forward. That’s why he became a sponsor.
He was also looking to play ball again, as I’d recently learned.
“Maybe,” he said when I caught him running drills and asked if he was looking to get back in the game.
There were no maybe about it, far as I could see. He’d been working out for months and had as good a chance as anyone at making a comeback. Dude was strong as an ox and still had the right moves. It wouldn’t be easy, though. Graham had just turned thirty and had been away from playing pro ball since getting hurt.
If anyone could do it, my money was on him. He was a persistent bastard, if nothing else. As demonstrated when he started riding me when I picked up another donut.
The other guys had descended on the table and the chocolate-frosted ones were going like hotcakes, so I’d acted fast.
“Aw, fuck you, man.” I laughed, pointing my new donut at Graham. “Do you ever stop?”
Apparently not, since, suppressing a grin, he volleyed back, “You’re gonna get fat, lose your speed. Then you’ll get demoted to the goon line and be whining like a baby.”
From around a mouthful of dough, I cursed him out.
After I swallowed, I informed him, “The season doesn’t start till October, dick. There’s plenty of time to indulge.”
“Hmm, I don’t know what calendar you’re looking at, but mine shows that’s only two weeks away.” Graham nodded to the donut—or rather to what was left of it. “I wonder what the team nutritionist will have to say about your massive donut habit.”
“She’ll say it’s fine if I indulge only once in a while.”
“She will, huh?”
“Yep, she will.”
I polished off the donut and licked my fingers clean. I guess I looked guilty about more than donuts since Graham raised a brow.
“You sure we’re only talking about donuts here?” he queried.
Since indulge-once-in-a-while was pretty much how I’d justified last night’s sexcapade, I almost came clean. But then I worried we’d get into the whys of what I’d done, and I just didn’t feel like addressing those yet.
Sheepishly, I simply replied, “Yeah, I’m sure.”
Clapping me on the back, Graham grabbed a donut for himself.
“Hey,” he said, “you know I’m just fucking with you, huh? I know you’ve been doing really well.”
Blowing shit off was sometimes Graham’s way of drilling down to the real issue. He obviously had noticed how antsy I was during the meeting.
“You may as well just lay it on the line,” I said, si
ghing. “I can tell something’s on your mind.”
“Well, now that you mention it…” He crossed his massive arms over his equally massive chest. Like I said, I was big, but this dude was hard and cut like a mountain. “I noticed something was off during the meeting, Benny.”
“Uh-oh, do I even want to know what you’re thinking?”
My sponsor was sometimes too observant. And I hadn’t yet decided if that was a blessing or a curse.
Pinning me with a don’t-try-and-bullshit-me roll of the eyes, he said, “When some of the other guys were talking about struggling with destructive behaviors, you looked uneasy as fuck.”
Shit. It was time to play dumb. “You think so? How do you mean?”
“You were sighing heavily and moving around in your seat, like you were dying to speak up.” Damn creaky chairs! “Is there something that didn’t get brought up that’s still weighing on you?”
I slipped into full busted, defensive mode, as evidenced when I snapped, “I haven’t fallen off the wagon, if that’s what you mean.”
“That’s great, but that’s not what I mean. There are other things that can be just as destructive, Benny.”
I calmed down an iota. He was only trying to help.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I conceded.
Aw, fuck, I know exactly what he means. And it has nothing to do with donuts.
“So…” He eyed me knowingly. “I’m assuming you’re back to calling up women from your little black book?”
I raised a brow. “You mean my famous puck bunny directory?”
He nodded, and I went straight to my best tried and true avoidance tactics. “First off, Tettersaw, it’s not a ‘little black book.’ It’s not even black, it’s red. And it’s more of a pamphlet.”
He rolled his eyes again. “Yeah, okay, whatever you say.”
“Actually,” I continued, still avoiding shit like a mofo, “it’s technically a notebook. But whatever it is, let me assure you that it’s not a ‘problem.’”
Graham snorted. “It’s a problem if you’re calling the women in it.”
“Okay, so what if I am?”
“How often are you doing that?” he asked somberly.
I thought about it and confessed, “Since I got back into town, maybe once or twice a week?”
“Once or twice a week!” Graham shook his head. “Man, you’re worse than I ever was. And I was pretty bad at the height of my career.”
I blew out a breath and just fucking leveled with him. “My puck bunny directory isn’t what’s messing with me, Graham. Not today.”
He grew über serious. “What do you mean?”
I ran a hand down my face. “Ah, fuck. So here’s the thing. I picked up some chick last night at a casino. She wasn’t even in my stupid directory.”
Graham saw where that could be a problem, and said quietly, “She wasn’t?”
“Nope. And we ended up at her house. Where, of course, one thing led to another. Once it all started, it was like a blur of crazy sex. I lost myself in it.”
“Benny…”
“I know, I know. It gets worse. When I woke up, I couldn’t even remember her fucking name. I just wanted out of there, dude. I don’t even know why I went home with her in the first place. I just guess there’s comfort in bad habits.”
Looking worried as hell, Graham said, “A blur of crazy sex, huh? You sure you were totally sober?”
“I’m sure. I told you alcohol wasn’t the issue.” I dragged my hand through my unruly hair, tugging at the wild ends.
“So what exactly about last night has you so worked up today?” Graham carefully asked.
Shit, I was about to try to explain something I didn’t even have a handle on. But I knew it was for my own damn good. That’s why Graham had asked.
“Fuck, dude,” I began. “Picking the girl up is the problem. Not the girl herself”—I waved a hand—“but how it all made me feel. Not knowing her in the slightest and her not being from the puck bunny directory… It was all one hell of an endorphin rush.”
“Let me get this straight.” Graham peered over at me thoughtfully. “You’re telling me you got more of a rush from picking up a stranger than from simply calling some girl in your directory?”
“Yeah,” I sighed. “I did.”
My directory—and I wasn’t proud of this—was a compilation of puck bunnies and, for lack of a better word, hockey whores. They were the women I kept on speed dial. It was bad enough I couldn’t bring myself to destroy the damn thing, as I knew it wasn’t good for me, but I sure as hell didn’t care to start up a whole new problem. Picking up strange women fell into that “whole new problem” category.
With that in mind, I conceded a little.
“I know what I did wasn’t good for me. Shit like that is an escalation and could easily lead me back to the kinds of behaviors that almost destroyed my career.”
“And nearly destroyed you, Benny,” Graham reminded me.
“Yeah, right,” I replied. Hey, at least I could admit it.
Graham poured himself a cup of coffee, and as he stirred in that shitty powder creamer crap, he said, “You need to ask yourself why you keep doing this sort of stuff. Why do you have problems dealing with women in healthy ways?”
I gave him a look and, feeling boxed-in, snapped, “Do I really need to explain the obvious, dude?”
“Look, okay, I know. The chase, the pursuit, those things are exciting for men. Hell, I’ve been there myself. But hooking up with random women, from your directory or otherwise, speaks of something deeper, some unmet need.”
He was going all “sponsor” on me, and I half expected him to say my unmet need was that I didn’t feel loved. Fuck that. Maybe it was true, but I’d never admit it. Hell, I was okay. I had a family that loved me back up in Canada. And I even had pets!
Okay, sure, my “pets” were fish in an aquarium. But they loved me in their own fishy kind of way.
I knew what Graham was really driving at, that I needed the love of a good woman to straighten my ass out. But before I‘d admit that to him, I’d die.
In my most snarky tone, I stated, “Yeah, I’m pretty sure my unmet need is to blow my fucking load.”
He shot me the finger.
I was being a dick. Graham was only trying to help. But my defenses were way the hell up. Fucking random women was not exactly stable behavior, I knew that. It’d never lead to anything meaningful. Plus, it was the kind of shit that had led to my other addictions, the ones that landed me in rehab in the first place.
I didn’t want to go back to that place in my life, but… “Damn it, Graham, I have to have something.”
He wasn’t buying it and made me pledge to cut down on the ladies.
“Maybe give a girl you really like a chance?” he said.
“If only I could find one,” I muttered.
“Put away the directory, Benny. And for the love of God, stay away from random pick-ups. Maybe then you might.”
I wasn’t sure about all that, but I promised to try.
I would, too.
At least I still had donuts.
Back in the Game of Life
I expected the first months of adjusting to life with my parents, and being a parent myself, to be a challenge. But I actually took to it quite easily. Ava kept me busy, busy, busy, as did classes at UNLV once they started up.
I fell into a routine the minute the fall semester got underway. My life was going to school and taking care of baby, going to school and taking care of baby, going to school and taking care of baby…
You get the picture.
Who needed a life as a single young woman, anyway? Not me. I kind of liked hiding away.
Or did I…?
One warm September day—ha, like there are any other kind in Las Vegas—my mom pulled me aside. She was excited as could be that she just happened to have a spare ticket for a Wolves preseason game that night.
“It’s for you,” she said when I stared
blankly at the piece of paper in her outstretched hand.
That’s right, Eliza, there’s still a whole world out there. Remember that crush you have on Benny Perry? Maybe it’s time to work on making it happen, maybe move Benny from fantasyland to reality.
“You still like hockey, right?” my mom asked worriedly.
She needn’t have been concerned. The old me was coming back. She’d been stymied, not destroyed. Since the day we left DC, I’d been rising to the surface, ready to return to a full life.
Here was my chance to start, to quit hiding. And more importantly—to see Benjamin freaking Perry in action!
“Of course I still like hockey,” I replied. “I love hockey, Mom.” And I lust for a certain hot player, I silently added.
“Good,” she sighed. “I was so afraid that guy”—she waved the ticket around like she might be imagining smacking that guy with it—“had ruined hockey for you.”
It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out, even if she didn’t know his identity, she hadn’t forgotten Ava’s father was a hockey player.
I rolled my eyes. I’d never let him win.
“Mom, that asshole could never make me hate hockey.” I snatched the ticket from her hand. “In fact, I’d love to go to the game tonight.”
She smiled brightly, giving me her best way-to-go-Eliza grin. “Good,” she said.
It was decided. But then I panicked, remembering my new responsibilities.
“Wait, what am I thinking?” I shook my head and tried to hand the ticket back. “I can’t go.”
“Why not, Eliza?”
“What about Ava? There’s only one ticket.”
Would a baby even need one to get in? I could hold her, right?
I rethought that craziness quickly. Taking an infant to a rowdy arena where a stray puck could fly up into the crowd—gasp!—suddenly didn’t sound like such a great idea.
That was it, I couldn’t go.
Or could I?
Mom, apparently thinking on the same lines, offered to watch Ava.
I wavered, though. “I don’t know.”
“She’ll be fine, Eliza,” she assured me. “I babysit her all the time while you’re at school.”
