Picks and Sticks

by Michèle Muzzi

  The pond ice was beginning to get a skim of snow on top. She hoped someone would bring a shovel and — unfortunately — wipe away the beauty.

  On the road, a player approached. Jane’s eyes adjusted from her concentrated study of snowflakes and pierced the veil of snow to reveal Susan. The first thing that gave Susan away was her walk. She led with her big thighs, and almost rolled from side to side. She was encumbered by her equipment, but her posture was undeniable — stooped. She was the kind of girl who hunched to hide the growth of her breasts and the height of her body. Her thighs were the alive part of her, revealing her true self: bold, generous, big-­hearted.

  Behind Susan, thirty feet away, were Katherine and Karen. They did everything together, these girls from the Ding-­Wing — such a cruel nickname for a place that housed the less fortunate students. It wasn’t their fault they were in the technical part of the school. Life had denied these young women something: parents to read to them at night, parents who paid attention, parents who stayed. Their troubles echoed in the quiet of their unguarded moments, reverberating before snippy hardness could cover the sound. Katherine was especially exposed to Jane. She wasn’t stupid about life — she was street-smart, mouthy, understood social situations perfectly, knew the order of things — her edge revealed in the little verbal jabs she took at Karen who couldn’t protect herself, wasn’t as quick-­witted, and was simply slow.

  But then Katherine would do something incredibly kind; she would untie Karen’s knotted laces with her long, hard nails and Karen wouldn’t even have to ask. Jane imagined what it would be like to be Karen as the pair stepped onto the far end of the pond, Katherine urging her larger friend on and managing to trip her up at the same time. Not much fazed Karen; she was eternally happy, smiling, sweet, as lumbering in her muscular one hundred and eighty pounds as Katherine was quick in her tight one hundred. Katherine was a whirling dervish of speed; Karen was just there. Just like Susan, Jane sensed these girls would have her back in an instant, no questions asked. They hardly said anything to Jane, but would look to her for a reaction, desperate for leadership, or maybe just a sense of belonging. Well, Jane wanted to belong to them, too.

  Karen slipped on the fluffy surface, and Katherine gruffly picked her up and brushed her off. Jane could now see that Karen carried a shovel. Katherine grabbed it from her, clearing a path straight to Jane for her unsteady friend, then racing back and forth to scrape the entire surface.

  “Not going to be able to keep up!” she called to Susan and Jane, indicating the amount of snow falling from the sky.

  “Get crackin’!” Susan called back. “This’ll pass!”

  “Hey, Jane,” Susan said as she plunked down beside her. “It’s been far too long.”

  “Tell me about it,” Jane said, her voice muted by the snowflakes. No wind had come up to rustle things about. Before the shovelling had started, Jane could actually hear the snow nestling into the blankets already there, going to sleep.

  “Wish you’d been here the last couple of weeks,” Susan said as she shivered free of her parka and sweater and threw her shoulder pads on over a T-­shirt. “I’ve basically been running things myself.”

  “What? When?” Jane asked, shocked.

  “At dusk. No one’s around then.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Susan looked up from brushing the snow off her shoulders. “I’m not going to be responsible for another injury of yours. I’m just not. You had to decide for yourself if you were ready.” Susan quickly put on her jersey, and Jane tugged it down at the back. “Well,” Jane said, “if you’d told me you were playing, I could have made that decision!”

  “You’ll see a big improvement. In everybody,” Susan said, grinning. “Just wait.”

  Jane went silent. Here she’d been practising all by herself. Communication was the key. She cursed the bubble her teammates placed around her. But maybe it was her fault. Maybe I continue to seem unapproachable.

  The quiet was disturbed by the drone of snowmobiles. Soon Tina, Rose, Lily, Leslie, and Laura emerged at the top of the hill, dismounted from their machines, and walked down, their brown, round faces distinct against the whiteness of the storm. Tina was always leading the pack. The others always deferred to her, although Jane knew Lily was a math whiz, Laura an amazing artist, and Leslie a reader who immersed herself in other worlds and wrote of her own. But Tina just had that quiet leadership, that ability to say so much with few words.

  “Gonna have to stop riding across the Sound,” she said after she had her equipment on. “Gonna end up in it instead of on it. You hear about my brother Cam? Fell through.”

  “How’d he get out?”

  “Lucky it was shallow. He could stand. Had to break through the ice to our place, crack through the ice in front of him, bit by bit, with his chest. Left his snowmobile drowned there. Sat by the fire ’til he could stop shiverin’. Nearly died.”

  It was the most Tina had ever said to Jane. Traumatized into talking.

  “Why did you come across?” Jane said, astonished.

  “He weighs more’n me.” Tina laughed heartily. “No, seriously,” she said in reaction to Jane’s staring, “the roads take too long. Practice would be over.”

  The five of them were laced up and on the ice in no time, passing easily and stopping shots despite the stickiness of the conditions.

  While Jane talked to Tina, Jenny and Patti had come up the road with Wendy and Barb. As they put on their skates, Jane observed their easy camaraderie. Before the team was formed, Wendy would not have given those first two the time of day. She could be quite stuck-­up if you let her get away with it. Her father was one of the only doctors in town, a man who spent money to make his daughter happy and get her skilled at something. If anyone had the potential to be an ice princess, it was Wendy, but she wasn’t a good enough figure skater to go there. She was just that little bit lazy, and she lacked flexibility. Playing on the hockey team was a form of rebellion against her demanding father, Jane knew, and Jane silently cheered Wendy’s revolt: it echoed her own. Wendy was way more motivated out here than in the arena stroking around in one of her Toronto store-­bought skating dresses.

  Barb was just along for the ride, happy to be included, chatting away to Jenny and Patti who were both going to be hairdressers, their elaborate creations squished down by their helmets. They had been best friends since childhood, were slender reeds who, despite being buffeted by the larger players, were steel underneath. Knocked down, they got right back up again, in life and on the ice. Jenny had burn scars on her hand from a childhood accident she refused to talk about; she would work as a hairdresser anyway and damn those who couldn’t bear to look; Patti had been born with a purple birthmark on her jaw-­line and neck and damn those who couldn’t bear to look.

  We’re a pack of fighters, Jane thought. Now if only Irina would get here.

  Jane wondered if the weather had put the Russians off. It was well past meeting time, and Susan was taking a turn with the shovel now, the snow falling faster than she could keep up. It seemed the flakes had grown in size; their descent practically made dents in the wet ice surface.

  They would have to start playing. Jane called the team to her. Brilliant white smiles greeted her through the flakes. The whole world was white. Jane felt so happy.

  “So,” she said, grinning back at her girls. “Here we are again.”

  “Yup,” said Susan.

  “I’ve missed you,” Jane said.

  “You, too,” said Lily.

  “Yeah, yeah, let’s get on with it,” said Tina. She skated to her net, and Jane barked out a Russian drill. Soon they were swirling around the ice as the snowstorm whirled around them.

  After about fifteen minutes of skating drills, Jane made out three figures coming up the road: Ivan, Irina, and George. The girls stopped and watched them approach, a solemn mood sett
ling over the crazy, snow-­drenched proceedings. Ivan and Irina put on their gear and were on the ice quickly. George only put on his skates and joined them. The team surrounded the newcomers expectantly.

  “Well,” Ivan said.

  “Well,” Jane said.

  “You look well. All of you. Jane. You look well.”

  “I’m going to get well-­er,” Jane quipped. “And I want you to look more well.” Ivan still had that haggard look she had noticed at the cottage. It had not gone away in the great outdoors.

  “Let’s get some blood in our cheeks,” Ivan said and threw down some pucks. He immediately took over the practice while George went to coach Tina.

  Jane’s world was complete.

  Busy with sticky pucks and blinded by the fast-­falling snow, Jane did not see the next people approach until they were upon her. Deb and Mike stood at the side of the pond and said nothing until everyone around Jane stopped playing and Jane looked up. Deb’s arms were crossed and Mike was his stone-­self. Unlike watching her teammates come to the pond as through a long camera lens, the details of their faces slowly coming clearer, these two faces zoomed forward until they were in close-­up, their disapproval boldly etched. Here we go again, Jane thought.

  She skated away from her teammates and over to her family. But despite her attempt to separate herself, the girls drifted over and stood behind and around her, a semi-­circle of support that included Ivan and George.

  “Jane,” Deb said steadily, disappointment in her voice, “I just can’t believe it.”

  Jane couldn’t let her get the upper hand right away. She tried a new tack with her mother: friendly. “Remember, when you used to come watch us play here once in a while, Mom? When Dad was alive? Remember, Mike?”

  He was watching Irina, his longing naked. “Yeah,” he said.

  Deb said bitterly, looking around, “I remember the day Bud found this pond. We were in the woods, looking for a Christmas tree. We forgot about getting the Christmas tree. He had to go home and get his skates. Now there’s actually a road built right to it, announcing it.”

  “I thought the road was always there,” Mike said. “It’s an old logging road.”

  Deb shrugged him off. “Jane,” she said, “you have to come home.”

  “Not gonna do that.”

  Deb sighed. “I don’t want to have another big argument with you in front of all these people. Please. Can’t you just be reasonable? We need to talk about this at home.”

  “This is my home.”

  Deb shook her head and looked down. “Jane. Your father can’t replace me with his whispers. I’m flesh and blood. I’m looking after you, not a damn ghost.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I know why you come here. This whole thing is about him. The hockey team … everything.”

  “Even if that’s true, is it so bad?” Jane asked.

  “It’s only bad because it hurts you so much. Please. Can we just talk at the house?”

  “I want these people around me.” As if in response to Jane’s need, the team pressed a little closer. Deb changed tactics. She started to talk to Ivan.

  “You certainly seem to have a hold on my daughter,” she said. “You are not her father. You can’t just barge into our lives and think you can take over.”

  “I do not think this.”

  “Can you not see reason either? She is going to reinjure herself, ruin herself for everything, not just figure skating.”

  “Well,” he said, “this is always possible in any sport. A heavy fall in figure skating could hurt her just as well.”

  “She isn’t figure skating yet, is she? She hasn’t got her doctor’s approval yet, has she? No. But, of course, she’s sneaking away out here, as usual, defying me and her coach.”

  Jane peered at her mother through the storm, aware of the blizzard of feeling between them. She took a deep, deep breath, struggling for clarity. “I’m … I’m not deliberately trying to defy you, Mom,” she said. “I … I just don’t know how to make you see …” They were all becoming covered in wet snow, weighed down by its heaviness. “It’s just … I can’t help myself anymore. It’s what connected me to skating in the first place … not just this place … but hockey … and to take it away now, now that I have rediscovered it … now that Ivan has helped me rediscover it … It’s in my bones, Mom. It’s deep, deep in there, like it’s in Mike. I can go to Worlds, I can figure skate for you … and myself … but unless I do this, too … I swear … nothing will happen in Moscow. I will not win. I will not care. I won’t have that … that thing … that feeling … that makes skating work for me, makes me want to do it. I won’t feel any passion … They’re linked now, Mom. More and more. I can’t separate them anymore.”

  “You’re telling me you don’t like figure skating?”

  “No! Listen to me. I’m saying for me to be good at figure skating, I’ve got to play hockey, too.”

  A resounding boom echoed through the hills behind them. Every person turned to look at the pond. The thick inches of snow were shifting. A crack spread across the ice, jagging itself toward the team. They scrambled onto the snowbanks and watched as the pond split in two.

  10

  Ultimatums

  JANE WAS BAKING under her covers. Angry voices filtered through the darkness. She threw off the sheets and listened. Deb and Leonard were fighting. Their distant argument seemed to seep through from another time.

  “What else am I supposed to do? I’m her mother, Leonard. It’s not like I can turn off my love and just see the athlete, just see the skating machine. That’s my little girl striving for something.” Deb paused and Jane strained to hear.

  “Preposterous.”

  “I’m not saying I support it exactly …”

  “I would stop coaching her, right now, if I could.”

  “What crap, Leonard. Your glory lies with her, and you know it.”

  “Careful, Deb.”

  “Of what? Trampling your precious ego? I’m so sick of your damned ego I could puke.” The front door was opened. “Leonard. Please. I apologize,” Deb said, her voice low, “but I’ve got to go to bed. Can you please leave?”

  “No. We’re not done.”

  A long pause. Barely audible to Jane, Deb said, “I think we are.” Jane sat up.

  “What do you mean? You’re dumping me?” Leonard bellowed. Deb shushed him.

  “We were never together, Leonard. Not really. You just liked to think so.”

  “I’ll stop coaching her, Deb, I swear.”

  “If you need ultimatums to direct the course of our relationship, Leonard, then it is definitely over. I’ll have her on the ice tomorrow morning, first thing.”

  Jane heard more protestations from Leonard, but the door closed on them. The doorbell rang a couple of times, and he pounded vigorously, yelling Deb’s name, but her mother ignored his dramatics. Jane heard Deb sigh, and begin to climb the stairs. Jane shut her eyes. She smoothed out her breathing, stilled her heart, and pretended she was asleep for the hovering figure in the doorway.

  Half an hour later, after Deb had gone to bed, Mike stole into Jane’s room. “Hear that?” he asked.

  “How could I not?”

  “Feel better now?”

  “No. Now I just feel sorry for Mom … But not really.” She grinned. “Let’s just hope she sticks with it.” Jane thought for a moment. “It almost sounded like she was going to support my hockey there … for about half a second.” Mike grunted and was quiet, but he seemed like he wanted to talk. He wasn’t leaving. He wasn’t exactly the chatty type, so Jane didn’t kick him out, sleepy though she was.

  “Irina …,” he began, “doesn’t seem to like me anymore. She avoids me whenever she can … it’s hopeless, Jane … I’m lying there in bed, coming up with ways to talk to her, but when I see her,
I can’t get up the courage to try … I’m too worried she’ll reject me.”

  “I don’t think it’s that she doesn’t like you,” Jane began carefully. “I think it’s more than that. When a person’s got something so huge as her mother’s disappearance on her mind, then … I don’t think she can think about anything else. And I really don’t think she can think about loving someone else until that huge thing is dealt with. It’s consuming her.”

  Mike nodded, like her ideas were wise. As he spoke, he twisted her bedspread around his fingers until it was a tangled mess of material; he pulled it right off her. “Whenever I see her on that pond,” he said, his voice cracking with emotion, “it’s like my heart is in my throat. It’s like … it’s gonna burst through my mouth and my head fills up so much with the beating I can’t even see anymore … I can’t hear anything. It’s like I’m tasting my heart. All I can do is taste.”

  Jane laughed. “Wow,” she said. “That’s so poetic. That’s so unlike you … Sorry,” she said quickly, when she saw his hurt face. “You’re better at English than I am. Give me back my bedspread, please.”

  “Sorry,” he said in return, covering her with it.

  Expecting he would leave, Jane was surprised when he lay down beside her instead, put his hands behind his head, crossed his legs, and stared at the ceiling. “I can wait,” he intoned. “I can wait as long as George can wait for you.”