The Hanging Tree

by Bryan Gruley

  Soft goals are death to a hockey team. Almost nothing—a stupid penalty, a missed empty net—is more demoralizing. A team can totally dominate a game, outskating their opponents, beating them to every loose puck, blasting shot after shot at the opposing net, but if their own goalie then lets in a shot that everyone in the rink knows a blind man could have stopped, the game can change as suddenly and unforgivingly as if the teams had traded jerseys. A goaltender never wants to give up any kind of goal. But when I played in the net, there were nights when I would rather have faced the other squad’s best skater on a breakaway than a tumbling puck sliding toward me from a hundred feet away.

  Nobody in Starvation Lake was saying it out loud, because the softies surrendered so far by Taylor Haskell had come late in games, with the Rats enjoying comfortable leads. But there were whispers nonetheless. About the high one against Muskegon that he seemed to lose in the lights. The weak backhander that dribbled between his skates against Panorama Engineering. The one from behind his net that bounced in off of his butt against Compuware. The titters and the whispers became nervous little jokes that Taylor was so impenetrable that he had to actually let other teams score once in a while.

  The night Compuware scored off of his rear end, Channel Eight was waiting in the arena lobby when Taylor emerged from the dressing room. Usually his parents whisked him out a side door to their idling SUV, but tonight Laird and Felicia had gotten intercepted by Elvis Bontrager, and they weren’t about to cut off the chairman of the town council. By the time they reached Taylor, he was standing in a ring of teammates and their moms and dads, bathed in camera light and speaking haltingly into a microphone held by Tawny Jane Reese. I happened to be there, standing behind a gaggle of girls getting up on their toes for a glimpse of number 19.

  Tawny Jane asked him about the game—the Rats had won, 4–1—and he grinned and said it was a lot easier to be a goalie when the puck was in the other end most of the time. Good answer, I thought. She asked what he thought of the new rink going up and he said he hoped it would be ready for next season. Oops, wrong answer, I was thinking when I felt someone push past me: Laird Haskell. Felicia had him by a sleeve but he pulled away and pushed through the throng. Tawny Jane was asking the boy what had happened on that butt-bounce goal.

  Taylor didn’t seem to mind. “I guess I wasn’t paying attention,” he said. He shrugged. “I was kind of bored.”

  “Miss Reese,” Haskell said. “Please.”

  Tawny Jane looked up. Taylor turned around, eyes wide with apprehension, looking like he had in the pro shop when I’d seen him shopping for regular sticks. I turned and saw Felicia standing with her hands clapped over her mouth, looking mortified.

  “Please turn that off,” Laird Haskell said as he emerged into the camera light. “Miss Reese, I really wish you would have asked me about interviewing my son.”

  Tawny Jane looked over her shoulder at her cameraman. The light stayed on. “Mr. Haskell,” she said, shoving the mike in his face. “Taylor tells us he hopes the new rink is ready for next season.” She smiled her widest fake smile. “Does he know something the rest of us don’t?”

  Haskell shook his head no as he took Taylor by the shoulders and moved the boy behind him. “He’s fourteen years old, Miss Reese.” Beads of sweat had broken out on Haskell’s forehead, but he pasted on his own phony smile. “I worry about the rink, he worries about keeping pucks out of the net.”

  “Yeah,” one of the mothers said. “Stick to hockey, lady.” Others chimed in. Tawny Jane glanced around, saw me. I was grinning, as much in sympathy as amusement. She lowered her mike. The light went off.

  “Could we talk later, Mr. Haskell?” she said.

  “Of course,” he said. “Call my attorney.”

  I watched Felicia grab the boy, wrap an arm around his shoulders, and hurry him away, Laird Haskell trailing behind. “Bored?” Haskell snapped. “What do you mean, bored?” Over her shoulder his wife shot him a look of searing disdain as she ushered the boy through the lobby doors.

  Whoa, I thought. Bet they’ll be having a chat tonight.

  Now, as the fluttering shot from Marquette’s number 6 reached Taylor Haskell, I could see that he was in trouble. Because his initial reaction had been late, he had overcompensated, trying to catch up. He was off balance, his stick had come up from the ice, and his body wasn’t square to the puck. He should have snagged it easily with his catching glove, but instead it smacked him just under his mask on the left side and bounced up and over his shoulder while he flailed with his glove. The crowd groaned. The puck bounced in the crease and rolled toward the goal line and a 1–1 score. Taylor toppled over backward, twisting his body around, stretching his glove out for the puck.

  He grabbed it just before it crossed the goal line. Players crashed into one another above him. Whistles blew. The stands exploded with a cheer of relief. I felt a sharp poke in the back of a shoulder and turned around.

  “Got a minute?” Jason Esper said.

  He threw the inside bolt on dressing room 3. I sat in the spot where I always sat for both the Rats and Soupy’s Chowder Heads, on a bench along the cinder-block wall. The tang of disinfectant stung the air. Johnny Ford must have just swabbed the shower mats.

  Jason grabbed a folding chair. He spun it around in front of me so that he sat facing me with his elbows propped on the chair back.

  “Not a bad little ’tender,” he said.

  “The Haskell kid? Yeah.”

  “But something ain’t right.”

  “Gives up a softie now and then.”

  “Got lucky on that last one. But it’s more than that. He doesn’t want to be out there.” Jason smirked at me. “Kind of like you, eh, Carp?”

  “He’s fourteen, Meat. I’m thirty-five.”

  “Fuck,” Jason said, and he guffawed. “He’s the fucking future of Starvation Lake. And you’re the past. God fucking help us all.”

  “What do you want, Jason?”

  “What do I want?”

  I waited.

  “What the fuck do you care what I want?” he said.

  I didn’t want to have this discussion. “How the hell did you end up here anyway?”

  Jason shrugged. “Ah, you know, this guy knew that guy. Hockey’s a pretty small world. You know.”

  He hitched the chair forward a foot. I caught a whiff of whatever goop shined in his tight blond curls.

  “Let me ask you something,” he said. “How the hell did Wilford fuck up his marriage? Wasn’t he married to that Brenda babe?”

  “Brenda Mack.”

  Why did Jason Esper care about Brad Wilford’s failed marriage?

  “The calendar thing finally do him in?”

  At the start of each season, Wilf dutifully noted all of his scheduled hockey games on a calendar hanging in his kitchen. He would add a fictitious game or two and, when those nights came, tell Brenda he didn’t really feel like playing, he’d rather just spend the time with her. This, he bragged to us, was the surest way to get laid without having to get his wife plastered.

  Of course, this being Starvation Lake, Brenda found out.

  “Among other things,” I said.

  Jason studied his right hand, turning it around as if he were examining it for the first time. The stringy scars crisscrossing his knuckles made the hand look like he’d stuck it in a lawnmower. “You know,” he said, “I wasn’t just a goon. I wasn’t even a goon. I could skate. I had size. I had hands.”

  “You played for the Pipefitters.”

  “Yeah. But I got better after that. I had a real shot, did you know that?”

  “At the pros?”

  “The Flyers. Twenty-one years old. Bus gets me to Philly the afternoon of the game and I figure no way they’re putting me on the ice tonight—shit, they’re playing the Habs—so I’m getting something to eat. I go in a bar, get a couple beers and a cheesesteak, maybe another couple beers. Love those cheesesteaks with mushrooms. I walk over to the rink just to check
out the locker room and I’ll be goddamned if my name isn’t on the lineup card. Dude, I’m penciled in on a line with fucking Zezel and Kerr.”

  “Really.”

  “I’m like, oh fuck, what do I do? I go out into the concourse because I don’t want anyone to see me in the locker room and I find a men’s room and lock myself in a stall and jam two fingers down my throat. Got a little out but the goddamn cheese just wouldn’t come up.”

  “Did you play?”

  “Yeah. Three shifts. Tripped a guy after he got by me because I was gassed. Stupid fucking penalty. Of course the Habs score on the power play. Coach moves me to the fourth line. I get one more shift. And that was it. One of the guys said I looked like Casper the Ghost.”

  “And you never played in the bigs again.”

  Jason didn’t like the way I said that.

  “Always figured I would,” he said. “But that was it. One chance and I blew it. Bounced around in the minors. Started to fight, thinking I might get the call-up as a goon. Got my ass kicked a bunch but finally learned how to go and got a pretty good reputation as a hammer.” He looked at his hand again.

  “Did you like fighting?”

  “I don’t know. You like typing?”

  “Depends what I’m typing.”

  “Exactly,” he said. “Which brings us to what I’m about to tell you.”

  In one quick motion he had my left wrist in his hand, squeezing the bones between his thumb and forefinger. It hurt. I tried to pull away but my arm stayed where it was. Jason leveled his eyes on mine.

  “I’m done fucking up my life,” he said. “And you are done fucking my wife.”

  A shiver rippled down the backs of my arms. Not because I was afraid; Jason Esper, coach-to-be of the River Rats, wasn’t about to kick my ass in a dressing room in the middle of a game with half the town in the arena. But the certainty with which he said what he said made me wonder: Had he told Darlene the same when they spoke in the parking lot behind the sheriff’s department? Had she told him to go to hell? Or had she said something that made him think he could succeed in scaring me away? Or winning her back?

  “She’s only your wife,” I said, “on a piece of paper.”

  Jason let go of my wrist. He stood. He picked up his chair in one hand and set it back against the wall near the shower. Then he came back and stood over me. “Maybe I should’ve got a prenup like the one old Laird stuck his old lady with, eh? Now that’s one happy fucking household. If she wants out—and believe you me, she wants out—she gets her panties back dirty, that’s about it.”

  “Serves her right for negotiating with a scumbag lawyer.”

  Jason leaned back and considered me.

  “You know,” he said, “I had the hots for Darl way back when we were in high school. But I wasn’t one of the hotshots on the River Rats.”

  He stepped forward and angled his face in close to mine.

  “Now I’m the coach, motherfucker.”

  “Good for you. Beat the Pipefitters, will you?”

  “Uh-huh. And that piece of paper? It says we’re married. If she wanted to get divorced, she could’ve gotten divorced. I wasn’t stopping her. Now I am.”

  “Sorry, Jason, but—”

  “Listen,” he said. “Listen fucking good. Whatever you did with her up to this minute, count yourself lucky, because I ain’t holding it against you. But from now on, she’s my wife, and I’m going to make amends, and you goddamn better well respect that.” He showed me his cleverest smile. “Man, I’m the new coach of the new River Rats. For the sake of the team, for the sake of the town, I can’t have my wife running around with some shithead reporter who doesn’t even want a new rink built around here.”

  “The rink has nothing to do with your fucked-up marriage.”

  “It does now. You heard me. I ain’t fucking this up anymore. If I hear—”

  It sounded like a firecracker. A huge firecracker, out in the arena. There was one booming pop, then nothing, then the screams, the women loudest and shrillest, Oh my baby my baby . . . “What the fuck?” Jason and I said in unison. He threw the bolt on the door and we scrambled out.

  My nostrils filled with the smell of gasoline cut with something bitter that I did not recognize. I saw a cloud of black smoke turning to gray obscuring the bay where the Zamboni was stored. On both benches, coaches were yelling, “Down, get down!” and pushing their players to the floor. Parents were rushing out of the bleachers and around the boards to get at their boys. Some of the kids in the sweatshirts followed them into the lobby while others hung in the stands, hugging one another, staring across at the Zam shed.

  Oh Jesus, Darlene was down there, I thought. I couldn’t see her for the smoke and the chaos of people running back and forth, so I pushed past Jason and ran down the aisle behind the benches, clambering over the young skaters cowering on the floor. Jason followed me. “Darlene,” I heard him yell and then I yelled myself, “Darlene, where are you?” I glanced up at the scoreboard. The game clock read 1:14 left in the first period; above the scoreboard, a real clock showed the time was 8:01. I slammed into Poppy Popovich, the outgoing Rats coach. “What the hell’s going on around here?” he said as Jason grabbed me by the back of my coat, tossed me aside, and hurried past.

  “Halt.” Deputy Skip Catledge stopped Jason and me with both hands held high. We were about thirty feet from the Zam shed. Smoke billowed out both sides of the Zamboni’s flat snout. I saw Darlene on one knee near the back wall of the rink, her hat off, holding her head in one hand. A man I recognized as Doc Joe knelt down beside her.

  “One more step and you’re going to jail,” Catledge told Jason and me.

  “Is she all right?” I said, the stink burning my sinuses.

  Darlene heard me, lifted her head.

  “A little shaken up. She should be OK.”

  “What happened? Did the Zam explode?”

  Jason took another step forward, then another, until he was almost touching Catledge. “That’s my wife.”

  Catledge placed a hand on Jason’s coach jacket. “Stand back, sir.”

  “I’m the new coach. That’s my goddamn wife. Let me through.”

  Catledge looked around at Darlene. He looked at me. “Quickly,” he said, letting Jason pass. Jason gave me a glance over his shoulder as he trotted to Darlene. I started to follow him but Catledge stopped me.

  “No.”

  “Come on, Skip.” What was I supposed to say? I’m sleeping with her?

  “Sorry.”

  “Darlene,” I shouted, but now her face was obscured behind Jason’s wide back as he moved toward her. “Darlene!”

  Now she half stood. Her cheeks were streaked black with soot or motor oil. Jason put his arms around her. I didn’t see her arms wrap around him but neither did she push him away. Then she caught my eye. She shook her head no, glanced up at Jason, turned around, and disappeared into the smoke.

  My mother answered on the fourth ring. I pictured her sitting in her chair in the living room. I hoped she wasn’t still grieving to Robert Goulet.

  I was sitting in my idling truck in the road in front of the rink. Police tape ringed the parking lot, filled now with flashing police cruisers, fire trucks, and ambulances. Locals huddled in small groups up and down the road, trying to comprehend the possibility that someone had set off a bomb in their quiet little town with its sole traffic light at Main and Estelle, its willow-lined streets, its cozy family diner, the clear blue lake where they had learned to swim and fish and drive a speedboat. I’d jotted everything I could recall in a notebook, even though we wouldn’t have another Pilot for five days. I didn’t even know if I’d still have a job then.

  My mother listened while I told her what had happened: the Zamboni had exploded. It wasn’t yet clear what had caused it. No one had been seriously hurt, including Darlene, who’d been closest to the blast. Even the Zam itself hadn’t sustained serious damage.

  “Gracie’s killers did this,” Mom said.
r />   “Well, they were a little late then.”

  “Maybe this was the real plan.”

  I supposed it was possible that a bomb—if it was a bomb and not just something that had gone wrong inside the Zamboni—could have been set days before and that whoever set it wouldn’t have been foolish enough to risk going back to unset it after Gracie was found dead. Luckily, no one was near enough the explosion to get seriously hurt. It just scared the hell out of everyone.

  “Maybe,” I said. “Tell me, Mom, do you have any idea what exactly Gracie did all those years she was downstate? How did she make a living? Did she actually live in Detroit or one of the ’burbs?”

  “I know she waitressed.”

  I pictured the Gracie I had glimpsed at the Red Wings game. She didn’t look like a waitress.

  “Anything else?”

  “Let me think.” I couldn’t tell if Mom was struggling with her failing memory or just deciding whether to tell me something. I wished she would just go to the damn doctor. My impatience got the best of me.

  “Did she ever say anything to you about an abortion?” I said.

  “Why … an abortion? No. I don’t—I think I would remember that.”

  “Would she even have told you?”

  “Yes. Yes, I think she would have.”

  I wasn’t so sure of that. I put my truck in gear. I had to steer around Tawny Jane Reese and her cameraman doing a stand-up in the middle of the road. I resisted the urge to honk my horn as I slid past her. As Kerasopoulos had told me, we were all a team now under the valiant Media North banner.

  “All right,” I told Mom. “I’m heading down there.”