Line Change (14 page)

I bit my lip. “I don’t even know, Mum. Of course I love Dad, but he’s kind of tearing the team apart.”

“Then what he’s trying to do isn’t really coming across. Have you talked to him about it?”

“I can’t,” I shrugged.

“Why not?”

“Because I can tell he likes coaching and —”

“You don’t want to hurt his feelings,” she said, with a nod.

“No, I don’t.”

“Do you want me to talk to him?”

Part of me wanted her to, but I didn’t think that would
solve anything either. “No.”

“Well, can you talk to the guys?”

“I’ve tried, but like I said, they hate the drills and the running and they think he’s favouring me and —”

“Is he?”

I shrugged again, thinking about keeping my position. “Kind of.”

Mum shook her head. “I don’t know what to tell you, kiddo. You don’t want to talk to him, you don’t want
me
to talk to him, you don’t want to talk to the guys —”

“I know,” I sighed.

“I’d love to help, but you’ve turned down every suggestion I’ve made.” Mum shrugged. “It looks like you’re on your own on this one.”

Great.

*   *   *

“Dad?” I said, sitting down next to him on the couch after dinner. “Can I talk to you?”

“Sure,” he said, folding up his newspaper and putting it on the coffee table. “What’s up?”

“I think we might have lost Kenny, Colin and maybe Bosko.”

He nodded. “It’s kind of looking that way.”

“Uh-huh.” I nodded too. “And that doesn’t leave us with a ton of guys.”

He smiled. “I don’t think we’ve lost them for good, Nugget.”

“But if they don’t come back —”

“Of course they’ll come back. And even if they didn’t, we’d still have a full roster. We can get some bodies up off the bench.”

Great. Tim and Curtis.
That
would really help.

“But when the guys see we’re down all these players —”

“What are you getting at here, Nugget?”

I took a deep breath. “We need to scrimmage.”

“Look, changing things up can mean a tough adjustment, but —”

“Dad, we seriously
need
to get back to normal before everybody quits the team.”

He looked surprised. “Who’s quitting the team?”

I sighed. “I don’t know.”

“I’m not following you.”

“I just don’t know why you have to be so stubborn about doing things your way.”

Dad shook his head. “Nugget, this is the first time I’ve been out on the ice in years. This is my chance to make a difference, to use all the skills that have been buried for all this time.”

“You can still do that without making everyone mad.”

He rubbed his forehead. “I wish the players, the parents and even Coach O’Neal would let me do this my way. It’s for the good of the team. I’m not trying to sabotage the season, for crying out loud.”

“The guys don’t know that,” I told him. “Look, Dad. They think hockey is supposed to be fun all the time. They aren’t like me and Bosko.”

“You and Bosko?”

“Yeah. The other guys don’t get that it takes a lot more work to make it to the NHL than to make it on the island.”

“Ah, the NHL,” Dad nodded. “Maybe they don’t.”

“They just want to get out there and play the game. Like, now.”

“Yes, but —”

“Dad, if you don’t start doing stuff like Coach O’Neal
does, they aren’t going to want to come at all.”

Dad leaned back against the cushions. “I’m just trying to prepare them for a great season.”

“And they just want to
play
. Please Dad.”

He stroked his chin. “Let me think about it, okay?”

“Sure,” I said.

But I wasn’t sure at all.

*   *   *

Luckily, I was wrong about Bosko skipping Wednesday’s practice, and when I saw him in the locker room, I couldn’t help smiling with relief.

“I didn’t think you’d be here,” I said, as I dropped my bag on the bench.

We were both early, so none of the other guys were there yet, which was cool.

“Why not?” he asked, pulling an old Flames jersey over his head.

“I don’t know. Your dad seemed pretty mad yesterday and —”

Bosko shrugged. “He has a pretty short fuse. Like me lately, I guess.”

“He seems pretty —”

“Loud? Angry? Unreasonable?”

“Well, yeah.”

“That’s just the way he is. He gets mad about stuff, then it blows over when he finds something else to get mad about.”

“I thought he was going to say something to my dad about you playing centre.”

Bosko shook his head. “I doubt it. But I might.”

Great. Another argument, coming up.

“You know, Dad’s not trying to —”

“I don’t mean today, Nugget. I listened to what you said and I’ll see how things go at the game on Saturday.” He paused for a second or two. “So, is he going to try
you
out in a new position?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

In fact, I had no idea what he was going to do about anything.

I checked the clock and had a weird feeling that the whole team was going to pull a no-show.

Maybe I’d waited too long to talk to Dad.

But at that moment Patrick Chen walked into the locker room. I was happy to see him, but he didn’t look happy to see me.

“How’s it going?” I asked.

“Fine,” he said, dumping his bag.

“Ready for Saturday’s game?”

“I guess so,” he said, unzipping it.

“What’s wrong?” I asked him.

“With you?”

“No, with you,” I said, confused.

“I don’t know, Nugget. I thought we were solid teammates, you know?”

“Yeah,” I said, feeling my stomach sink.

“So why was I the only one standing up for your dad last practice?”

“What?” Bosko asked, raising an eyebrow at me.

“Nothing,” I told him.

“He backed Colin and Jeff up when they were complaining about his dad.”

“Are you kidding?” Bosko asked.

“Look, I was just —”

“Then as soon as Colin and Kenny left, him and Jeff
acted like it never happened,” Patrick said, glaring at me. “We’re supposed to be a team, you know?”

“I know,” I sighed. “I’m sorry, okay? I made a bad choice.”

“No doubt,” he grunted, as he started digging in his bag.

“You think Colin and Kenny will show up today?” I asked.

“No idea,” Patrick shrugged.

“They’d better,” Bosko said.

“Better what?” Jeff asked, as he entered the locker room.

“Show up for practice,” I said. “Colin and Kenny.”

Patrick spoke up again. “I don’t think their dads should have acted all tough with your dad like that.”

“Me neither,” I sighed.

“He handled it, though,” Patrick said. “I liked what he said about how they should have volunteered to coach if they were going to complain about it.”

“If they don’t show up, it’s their loss,” Jeff said.

And probably ours on Saturday.

“What do the other guys think?” I asked. “Are they going to show?”

“Who cares?” Bosko asked me.

“I do. If they don’t come to practice, they don’t play on Saturday. And if we don’t have enough guys, we don’t play either.”

“Do you actually think those goofs will miss out on the season?” Bosko asked, with a snort.

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. Everyone had been so split on things lately, I couldn’t guess what they would do.

“No way,” Patrick said. “They won’t miss out.”

Bedhead McCafferty showed up with one of the benchwarmers and squinted at us, like he just woke up.
“Are we playing today?” he asked.

“It’s Wednesday,” I told him. “Practice.”

“I know,” he sighed. “I meant are we hitting the ice today?”

“I think so,” I told him.

Dad hadn’t said anything about leaving skates at home when we’d left that morning.

“Well, I’m getting my gear on,” Bedhead said, pulling his shoulder pads out of his bag.

I did the same, and as each of the guys came in, I waited for somebody to say something about the scene with Colin and Kenny’s dads, but no one did.

I couldn’t stop wishing that Dad’s coaching had turned out the way I’d expected it to, where he was the hero and the Cougars played better then ever before.

I knew it wasn’t totally his fault that things were all messed up, but why hadn’t he just stuck to the kind of practice we were used to? Why did he have to do his own thing?

Patrick finished lacing up his skates and looked around the room. “No Colin and no Kenny,” he said.

Great. We’d definitely be down two guys for Saturday’s game.

And everyone would blame Dad.

Just then, Kenny walked into the locker room and everybody just stared.

I watched out of the corner of my eye as he started unloading his bag.

“Ken,” Bosko said, nodding at him as he walked by on his way to the rink.

“Hey,” he said, quietly, but didn’t turn around.

I waited for a couple of minutes, before finally saying, “I
didn’t think you’d show up.”

The rest of the guys turned to look at Kenny.

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t supposed to,” he said.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

He shrugged. “My dad doesn’t know I’m here. I mean, my mum drove me, but he was still sleeping when we left.”

“Will he be mad?” I asked.

“Probably,” Kenny shrugged. “But I’m mad too.”

“At my dad?” I asked.

Kenny looked surprised. “No, at mine.”

What?

“How come?”

He stared at me for a couple of seconds. “Because he totally embarrassed me, Nugget. Geez, coming down here to chew out my coach?”

My coach.

It was the first time I’d heard any of the guys call Dad that.

“I thought you didn’t like him,” I said.

“What? Of course I like him. I just don’t like running and all that. I like being on the ice.”

“I like him, too,” Patrick said. “Coach McDonald knows more about hockey than any of the other dads.”

I nodded, surprised. “It just seemed like everybody hated him.”

“No way,” Bedhead said. “He’s cool.”

“It definitely stunk when we lost to the Eagles,” Jeff said.

“But it rocked when we beat Nanaimo,” Patrick added.

“No doubt,” Kenny said. “That was our highest-scoring game ever.”

I was totally relieved that the team wasn’t falling apart. Could it be true that no one hated Dad?

Then I remembered something.

“What about Colin?” I asked.

“Like I said, he’s a no-show.” Patrick shook his head.

“Dumb,” Bedhead added. “That means he can’t play on Saturday. Coach O’Neal’s rules.”

“Coach’s rules,” Patrick agreed and the rest of the guys nodded.

“What if he quits the team?” I asked, quietly.

“He won’t, Nugget,” Bedhead said. “I know he gave Coach a hard time, but I don’t think he wanted to leave when his dad made him.”

I was still worried.

Colin was a really good player and, like the rest of the guys on the team, he was my friend. It would totally stink if he left the Cougars.

What if he ended up on a different team, and we had to play against him? How lame would that be?

“Are we practising, or what?” Jeff asked.

“Practising,” a few of us answered and headed out to the rink.

When we got there, I was relieved to see Dad setting cones out on the ice.

Just like Coach O’Neal.

Despite everything that was happening, it felt really good to get onto that perfectly smooth, shiny rink. It seemed like I hadn’t skated for weeks, but it had only been a couple of days.

I started to smile as I stepped onto the ice to warm up. My blades scraped the surface, carving it up as I headed for the far goal. I built up speed and the cold air filled up my lungs.

Kenny caught up with me, panting a little. “Hey,
Nugget.”

“Hey.”

“I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, I mean, not just for my dad being like that. I was kind of a jerk about your dad coaching, and I’m sorry.”

“Thanks, Kenny.”

“We’re cool?” he asked.

“Always,” I told him, as we reached the net. “Race you back,” I said, taking off fast.

I smiled as I skated, glad that some things were getting back to normal.

When he was ready to get started, Dad blew his whistle and called us to centre ice.

“Okay, guys. Today we’re going to do some of Coach O’Neal’s drills.”

“And scrimmage?” I asked, hopefully.

“And scrimmage,” Dad said, with a nod. “Look, guys. I realize I threw you into kind of a different style of practice, and I know it’s been tough to adapt.”

Awesome. That was the perfect thing to say.

He took a breath. “That said, the plyometrics and running are an important part of training.”

Uh-oh. Don’t let things go sideways.

“But so is ice time,” he said, glancing at me.

Whew!

“From now on, we’ll do a mixture of strength training drills and ice time on Mondays, then all ice on Wednesdays. How does that sound?”

“Cool,” Kenny said.

I was glad he was the first one to speak up, and even more glad when the rest of the guys followed suit.

“Great,” Dad said. “Now let’s get down to business.”

And he meant it.

The first thing we did was skate a few warm-up laps and, as usual, I worked to keep pace with Bosko. I don’t know what he had for breakfast, but the giant had a full tank going for him. As we lapped Kenny and Bedhead for the second time, I glanced over and saw that he hadn’t even broken a sweat.

I had, though. I could taste the salt on my lips and I was starting to get a cramp in my side.

In the middle of the laps, Mulligan showed up. He’d never been to any of our practices before, so it was kind of weird. Especially when he walked out to centre ice for a long, quiet talk with Dad. It was long enough that I wondered if Dad had forgotten we were all still skating, waiting for him to blow the whistle. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I could tell they weren’t arguing. That was a relief.

When Dad finally blew the whistle to stop, I was almost a full metre ahead of Bosko.

Nice!

“Let’s get some line drills going,” Dad said.