Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 81281 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 325(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81281 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 325(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
“Good game Wednesday,” he says without looking up from his food.
“We needed the two points.”
“You needed the two points. Your line has been the difference-maker the last three games. You and Rome, and we’re going to need that tomorrow night against Quebec.”
“You’ll get it,” I say with confidence.
“I’m not blowing smoke.” He glances up. “I don’t do that.”
“I know you don’t.”
He sets his utensils beside his plate. “Penalty minutes are down too.”
“I’m aware,” I say, wiping my mouth with my napkin.
“So, what’s the difference?” he asks.
I look out the window. The performance center’s east wing courtyard is visible from here. The December sky is flat gray and a couple of groundskeeping staff are moving equipment across the far end.
Just an ordinary afternoon in the life of a professional hockey player.
“I guess a different environment,” I say, surprised at my words.
Van looks at me questioningly. “Different how?”
“I don’t know.” I don’t want to say the difference isn’t really this place so much as one person within this place. “Let’s just say it’s been easier to keep the lid on lately. And I’m guessing it’s this new environment.”
A half-truth. Well, maybe quarter-truth. It’s mostly Livia.
Van is quiet while he pokes his straw up and down in his iced water. His eyes come to mine. “I know all about keeping a lid on anger.”
I know what he’s talking about… his own anger issues because of his dad. He’s never brought it up to me before.
“It might seem to you like no one can understand, but you have to know I do. And I’m telling you… that anger I kept bottled almost cost me everything. Not just my career, but my marriage too.”
This advice is surprisingly similar to what Livia told me. That even though I’m currently coping, the problem is still down deep. I didn’t want to hear from Livia, but admittedly, my curiosity is piqued about Van. “What happened?”
He’s quiet for a moment. Not reluctant but more like he’s deciding where to start. “Same thing that always happens when people can’t regulate emotion. The anger runs quiet for a long time and you get good at managing it until something breaks through, and then it comes out sideways.” He exhales through his nose. “I took it out on Simone.” His expression becomes pained and he shakes his head. “I was ugly to her. I pulled away, lashed out over small things, made her feel like the problem when the problem was nowhere near her.”
“But she’s still with you,” I point out.
“She didn’t leave,” he says with a wry smile. “Which she had every right to do.” He picks up his water and takes a sip. “She kept showing up, hounding me to confront my past. Drove me batshit crazy actually, because it would’ve been easier if she’d given up on me. I could’ve used that as evidence.”
“Evidence of what?”
“That I wasn’t worth the effort.” He says it like it’s a fact about himself he sorted out a long time ago. “When she didn’t give up—when she kept being there—I ran out of excuses to not get my head out of my ass.”
I look out the window again, but I’m not thinking about Van’s wife.
I’m thinking about a woman who sat across a desk from me and poked into my life. I’m thinking about two sessions of genuine access that I handed over against every instinct I have and the fact that none of it felt like an extraction. I’m thinking about our last session scheduled for Monday and I have no clue where we’ll go from there.
Van watches me, reading the expression on my face. I realize I’ve been looking at the courtyard long enough that the silence has a piece of the conversation.
“There’s a woman,” I say, turning to look at him. It just pops out against my better judgment to remain closed off.
A smile forms on Van’s face. “Can’t say I’m sad about that. It was a woman who made the difference for me.”
“It’s new and there are—” I almost say land mines, but that’s not quite right. “Complications. Things that make it not simple.”
“Relationships are never simple.”
“This one has specific reasons to be complicated, and I’ve never been particularly interested in putting in the work with a woman before but…”
“But this one’s different?”
I don’t answer directly. “I’ve had other long-term situations. Women I saw for a while but nobody I actually liked as a person.”
“I get the distinction,” Van says.
“Yeah.” I exhale with a chuckle. “I genuinely like her, and maybe that’s the different environment I was talking about earlier.”
Van nods as if he understands me completely. “The complicated parts… are they actual problems or are they things you’re using as problems?”
I feel my chin pull inward… a flash of surprise running through me.
“Because there’s a difference,” he explains, reading the expression on my face. “Men like you and me…” He gestures between us. “We’re very good at finding reasons to avoid things. We can build a case against anything if we’re motivated enough.”