That night, as Julie settled into bed alone, she felt acutely aware of the space beside her.
In a house filled with three brothers, it was hard to say that the house felt too quiet, but still, it all seemed empty in a way that it hadn't before. The smell of Adam's cologne lingered on her pillow, and as the hum of the air conditioner drowned out an argument between Jeff and Shawn over who could have the last slice of pizza, she couldn't help but reconsider her choice.
.
Dartmouth was a good idea, certainly, but why did she have to close the door on everything?
.
Adam would have gone to Harvard.
All she had to do was say the word, and they would have only been a couple of hours apart. They would have still been able to spend the weekends together. They would have had another year to put off the harder decisions.
"It had to be done sooner or later." She reminded herself, snuggling up with the North Face pullover he'd 'accidentally' left behind.
Still, that didn't make it any easier.
And it didn't change the fact that her bed still felt too big.
That the things she loved felt too far away.
"You okay, dude?"
Charlie limped over and sat down on the living room sofa, a bag of frozen peas wrapped around his hand. Eyeing him was Adam, already sprawled across the other end with an icepack and a splitting headache.
"Yeah. You?"
"Yeah."
"Sorry about that." Charlie apologized, his back still reeling from the ill-advised tackle that had sent them both to the ground.
I don't remember this stuff hurting so much when I was fifteen.
"Heh, no worries. Pretty sure my kids hit harder than you."
"I've seen the scouting reports on those two." Charlie agreed, sinking into the velour. "Tucker could kick either of our asses."
"No shit." Adam chuckled. "So many daddy-issues going on there. Kid can't skate worth a damn, but Iceland wouldn't have stood a chance."
Charlie just shook his head.
"Why do I feel like that explains a lot about the Banks Dynasty?"
"Of course it does. I couldn't very well go around and mess up decades of tradition by good parent, now could I?"
As Adam reached over for the TV remote, Charlie noticed the way that he had to reach across with his good hand, and the slight wobble when he leaned over too far. Details that he hadn't paid attention to before.
Shit.
Opening a bottle of water, Charlie suddenly felt very conscious of the way that his own body worked; of the way that he could hold the bottle of Aquafina in one hand, and unscrew the lid with the other. Of the way that he could reach for things without losing his balance, and walk up the steps of his porch, and sit in chairs without anything to lean against.
"Are you really alright?"
"Of course. In case you can't tell, I've survived worse."
"Good point."
"I'm sorry about what I said, man." Adam added, glancing over at the framed jerseys on the wall; a collection that spanned from the Ducks to the city's Special Needs team, nary a mention of U of M in sight. "I didn't mean it. You're doing good work. Work a lot more important than my spot in the trophy case."
"Nah, I should have done more. I just…I don't know."
"It's cool. You have plenty of other shit to worry about."
"It's more than just that." Charlie paused, looking down to pick at a hangnail. The silence hung in the air a moment, filling the corners of the room and sinking into the geometric rug below. "It's just…I don't know. Life wasn't supposed to turn out this way. For either of us."
Adam shook his head, the bloody tissue still stuck to his lip.
"No shit." He agreed. "This is definitely not what I was dreaming of all those nights skating on the pond."
"You didn't dream that I'd be kicking your ass in twenty years?"
"I think you kicked your own ass." He chuckled, re-arranging his ice pack as he tried to get comfortable. "I guarantee, you're going to be feeling that longer than I am."
"Yeah, you're probably right about that.
Charlie sat back, propping his feet up on the coffee table. Eyeing his childhood idol, he chewed at the side of his cheek for a moment, thinking about the things that had been said out by the fire.
Thinking about all Adam had given to his favorite sport, and the way that it had repaid him. Thinking about the rumors and headlines that had swirled in the years since; Minnesota's golden boy having fallen from grace.
He also thought about the fact that he was training the next generation of Scotts and Adams; praying the whole time that he wasn't sending these kids to slaughter like so many of the ones who had come before them.
.
"So double hip replacement, huh?"
"Yeah."
"Shit."
"It's cool, man."
"I'm sorry. I know things didn't really turn out how you'd hoped."
As his words hung in the air, Charlie thought about clarifying his statement.
He thought about saying that he hadn't meant it when he'd said that the Hall of Fame was for people who had done something with their lives; that Adam had accomplished plenty in the years since high school. That any place should be proud of the legacy he'd left behind, blemishes be damned.
As much as he wanted to say it, though, he just couldn't.
It would be too big of a lie.
"It's cool."
"I just-you were always the greatest, you know. You were everything I wanted to be. It...it wasn't supposed to turn out like this..."
You weren't supposed to grow up to be a junkie.
"No shit." Adam agreed, able to sense the words that were still hanging in the air.
"We good?"
"Yeah."
"And...you? Are you good? Like really."
Adam just smiled, giving a thoughtful nod after a second.
"Of course I am."
August 22, 2000
"Shawn Allen Gaffney. You stop that right now."
"What?"
"You know what!"
"He can't help that he always smells like farts!"
"Talkin' about yourself again?"
"Shut up, shithead."
"Would you two just stop being retards?" Julie finally barked from behind, her patience exhausted with the bickering that had gone on between Shawn and Tim all morning.
.
The plan had been simple.
Mr. and Mrs. Gaffney would load up the family minivan, and drive Julie down to New Hampshire themselves. Alone. Without any of their other children.
Unfortunately, fate had other plans.
Between Shawn's buddy Mike convincing him that Dartmouth was just crawling with hot, easy chicks, and Tim picking the week before to land himself in juvie for smoking pot at the skate park, the Gaffneys ended up with one son who refused to be left behind, and another who couldn't be left unsupervised. As such, that hot, sticky August morning, they found themselves trapped in a Dodge Caravan with three of their four children, plus half a dozen Rubbermaid bins filled with bedding and clothes.
Not even out of Penobscot County yet, patience was wearing thin as Shawn and Jeff decided that the enclosed car would be the perfect place for a farting contest, and Mr. Gaffney found himself faced with the realization that four-year tuition would never be a concern for half of his brood.
.
"What? Are you on your puberty?"
"What the hell?"
"Her puberty. Where chicks get all pissy."
"That's her period, numbnuts."
"Nah, it's called puberty, dipshit. Look it up."
"Puberty is what you're still waiting to go through, dumbass."
"Dudes don't get puberty. That's a chick thing."
"You are such a tard."
"Screw you."
"Your brother's right." Mr. Gaffney finally pointed out, staring out at the highway ahead. "Puberty is what everyone goes through when they become a teenager."
"Hah, see?"
"Whatever."
"I said you were a tard."
"You're both a couple of tards!"
Four and a half more hours...
Guy walked into the living room, looking back and forth between Adam and Charlie, at a loss for how to seemingly reasonable people could be counted on to regress into worse versions of their 15-year old selves at every opportunity.
"So you two are cool now?"
"Yeah."
"Which of you won?" He asked, commandeering the TV remote. Sitting down, he propped his feet up on the coffee table and flipped through the channels as Adam and Charlie continued to ice their wounds.
Then again, pretty sure those two had a few more brain cells back then...
Charlie just shook his head.
"It turns out that after a certain age, there is no such thing as winning a fight."
"So...the quadriplegic won?"
"Yup."
"Good going."
Settling on a rerun of Parks and Rec, the three settled in for the evening, the other Duck factions all slowly making their way into the living room. As the others found places on the floor or loveseat, Julie noticed that Adam's lap was sitting empty.
.
For a moment, she really did try to stop herself.
However, as she looked around, the loveseat was already packed. The floor too was rather crowded. She'd already killed off a bottle of wine. And perhaps most importantly, Adam had a very nice lap.
"I'm just being considerate." She assured herself, noting that Dwayne and Kenny were still in the kitchen, and that there weren't many good spots left on the rug.
It would be mean to make one of them sit on the laminate. And besides, it's not weird if the sofa's already full.
"Mind if I steal a spot on your lap?" She asked, her cheeks flush as she tried not to think about the naughtier implications of what she was doing.
"Well of course. Just think of me as your own personal Ikea sofa."
"Does that mean that I have to assemble you, and that you'll fall apart within a month?" She giggled, smoothing the back of her dress before she sat down on top of his thighs; making herself comfortable against his body.
Damn it.
He really is pretty good to cuddle with.
"Don't worry. I'm pre-owned IKEA. The assembly has already been done for you, as has the inevitable failure of all the important parts."
"Good to know."
Repositioning herself so that she could get a decent look at him, she held his chin in her hand for a moment, cocking her head to the side as she examined his lip.
Is every day with him this much of a mess?
Though his bottom lip was pretty swollen, and he had a bit of a cut along the edge of the swelling, she finally determined that he'd probably be as good as new within a day or two, lack of common sense notwithstanding.
"Is there ever going to be any convincing this IKEA sofa not to do stupid things?"
"Nah." He chuckled, his eyes crinkling up as he held her close enough that she could smell his cologne and the cigarette smoke in his hair. "That's only available on the LESBIATORP model. This is the male version, where bad ideas are a key structural component."
Julie just shook her head.
"I feel like that was a poor design choice."
"No kidding!
Using his good arm, he pulled her into a more comfortable position until her body was rested against his; his arm around her waist as she sank into this softer, rounder version of her first love.
"Believe me, the 'bad idea' component has not worked out well for this sofa."
...
As Kenny brought over a kitchen chair for his wife, and Dwayne scooched in next to Russ on the floor, the crowd became complete: The entire flock back in the same room together after nineteen years.
"Did it ever dawn on anybody to host this at say, Banksie's house, or even Goldberg's or something?" Russ finally pointed out, noting the cramped conditions.
"Saying my house is small?" Charlie joked, curling and uncurling his fingers under the bag of frozen peas to try to figure out if anything was broken.
I think his face was sturdier than my hand.
"What I'm saying is my ass is too fat for the floor, and I'm pretty sure ol' Cakeeater's kids are off playing hockey in their living room as we speak."
Adam just laughed, the fact not escaping him that Julie was in his fucking lap.
"Nah. Foyer's the better place for that...puck slides better on the marble."
"And that, my friend, is why everybody hates Edina."
"Hatin' us cuz' you ain't'n us.."
"Damn right. I'm still wantin' some of that cake."
"So anything good on?" Averman asked, glancing up at the framed photos on the entertainment center.
Right next to the TV, Charlie still had his trophy from peewees, sandwiched between a picture of the team after they beat the Hawks, and another picture of him and his son Josh at a hockey game.
In the latter, both were beaming after the Wild scored against the Redwings, Charlie and Josh in their matching hunter green jerseys; both with the same eyes and the same wavy brown hair.
As Averman looked closer, he couldn't help but notice that the picture was at least seven or eight years old. In it, Charlie's hair was still thick at the top; Josh still a pudgy little kid with round cheeks and a big, gapped smile.
.
He thought back to that version of Josh, and then of the argument he'd seen on Instagram a few months before, of Josh talking about how his dad was a 'washed-up, life ruining loser'.
He'd clicked over to Josh's profile out of curiosity.
Josh wore a lot of black now.
He didn't exactly look like the kind of kid who liked hockey. Or his dad. Or much of anything.
And based on the four divorces and two bankruptcies, Averman couldn't really blame the kid.
August 22, 2000
"So how's Dartmouth?"
Julie sat in her room, alone. Out in the hallway, she could hear the chatter of new friends making dinner plans, and the excited squeals of girls comparing their 'going out' outfits for the night. Parents had only driven away four hours earlier, yet already, the hum of Dartmouth's social scene could be heard throughout the dorm as the smell of AquaNet and Victoria's Secret Love Spell filled the air.
Looking over, she could see the pewter frames on her roommate's desk, filled with pictures from her family's trip to Spain, and a prep school commencement that looked quite a bit more picturesque than Eden Hall's.
.
As the Gaffney family had first arrived on campus, Julie felt more at home than she ever had back in Minnesota: The glamazons were fewer. The girls getting out of the Jeeps and Volvos had on sensible outfits, and all seemed to eschew the Abercrombie miniskirts and teetering heels that girls like Erica Tate insisted on wearing everywhere. Though Adam's own fears of inadequacy had played in her mind a few times, as she looked around at the sea of L.L. Bean totes and non-descript polos, she breathed a sigh of relief, realizing that she was finally at home.
And then the introductions began.
Deerfield. Middlesex. Choate.
Greenwich. Darien. Westport.
Martha's Vineyard. Belize. Monte Carlo.
These were not people with cow themed bathrooms at home.
"It's good. Very...fancy. How about Minnesota?"
"Pretty much exactly how it always has been." Adam chuckled, his voice at the other end of the line a welcome bit of familiarity in this very unfamiliar place.
"So they haven't like, suddenly moved it to Florida?"
"Nah, no flamingos in sight. Just the same boring shithole it's always been."
Julie laughed, glancing back over at the cork board above her desk. Over or not, she still had their prom picture pinned up there, right alongside a photo taken their sophomore year from when they snuck up onto his parents' roof to gaze out at the stars; a plaid blanket draped over them both.
That really had been a lovely night.
As a shooting star passed through the darkness, she'd closed her eyes and squeezed his hand, wishing that they could be together like that for forever.
"You know, I'm pretty sure if this whole hockey thing doesn't work out, you've got a job waiting for you with the state tourism board."
"Yeah, I'm already working with them. We're thinking of changing the state motto from 'Land of 1,000 Lakes' to 'At least we aren't Iowa'."
"It's a good motto." She agreed. "Very accurate."
"Thanks. I do what I can."