"Okay, that's it. I should have been born white."

After a detour through Adam's neighborhood, the bunch was now back on the campus of their old alma mater, standing outside Christianson Arena as birds chirped overhead.

Twenty years, and nothing had changed.

The buildings were as stately as ever. Concrete paths still wound through thick grasses and lush foliage, a lane of brick pavers still bearing the names of all of the WASP-y graduates who had come before. The air on campus still seemed crisper than it did anywhere else; Eden Hall still a world unto itself.

.

Eden Hall would always be Eden Hall.

Edina would always be Edina.

Time had marched on, transforming other parts of Minneapolis, but here, amongst the circular driveways and tree-lined cul de sacs; amongst the women who wore Hermes scarves, and the men who worked in office towers, it was still the same world it had been twenty years earlier. The same people still won every time; Varsity could still play any way they wanted without the refs calling it. Some things in life weren't limited to hockey.

"Why?"

"Really? Russ asked, looking over at Adam with his scuffed Gucci loafers and tousled hair.

This too had never changed; not really.

"What? You guys have like, rap and huge dongs. We have skin cancer and polka."

"Dude. That...so ought to be offensive somehow."

"Nah. What it's offensive to are us white guys. We're the ones who're disappointing at basketball. And...other things."

"You would be very disappointing at basketball." Russ agreed, smirking when he noticed that Adam's cane matched his belt.

To be fair, that one's winning the white person Olympics.

"So disappointing. Like, John Stockton gave me hope as kid, but nope. That one would not be in the cards."

"I think you might be even whiter."

"I don't think that's possible."

"You're coordinating your cane with your needlepoint shit. If that's not a special level of white, I don't know what is."

"Heh, I did get in a fight with Laura over whether some french fries were too spicy..."

"Damn man..." Russ shook his head. "We really do need some kind of intervention to save you from yourself."

"So many of those, yet usually not within this context..."

"It's a safety issue. This level of whiteness is what causes people to die in hot air balloon accidents, or get attacked by poltergeists."

"I think those things can happen to anyone."

"You ever hear about some dude named 'Jamal' dying in a hot air balloon crash?"

"Good point."

"During this intervention, would it be possible to work on his basketball skills?" Ken joked, referring to a time sophomore year when Adam managed to trip over the bleachers in gym class, bringing his pants down with him—an incident that seemed impossible to imagine happening to anyone else. "Because I know we're working with some extra disadvantages now, but that was really sad."

Adam's cheeks flushed pink.

"Nope. Not playing any sport where it's that easy to end up pantsless."

"Literally nobody else ever lost their pants in basketball. That was some awkwardness that only you were capable of."

"Okay, yeah, I blame my dad. That much overtraining at hockey didn't leave much room for anything else."

"True."

Julie shook her head.

Her eyes went to his right arm, and she felt that familiar pang of sympathy; that same desire to march right down to hell and give Phil a piece of her mind.

Asshole.

"He really did have a way of making Marv Marinovich look reasonable." She agreed, diverting her gaze to a nearby squirrel when Adam caught her staring at his wrist.

"No kidding. Todd had no idea how lucky he was."

"On the upside, you've definitely aged better than Todd Marinovich."

"It's hockey. Less sun damage."

"I guess that is an upside, isn't it?"

"It kind of is."

"You also have better hair."

"That really is the one area where I've lucked out..."

"You really did."

As Julie reached over to ruffle Adam's hair, Russ found himself distracted.

He looked out into the horizon, thinking of those houses that lie just beyond the stone walls of Eden Hall. Of Adam's house-8,000 square feet in a neighborhood where everybody's ancestors came over on the Mayflower.

He could still see the guys who used to roam the school's courtyards-the bustling packs of khakis and pastel polos. He could still see Thad Coker running from the prefects after getting caught with cigarettes for the 100th time.

...

Back then, he always used to think that guys like Thad would be sorry. That they'd come to regret wasting a good education, and that nobody would particularly want to hire a guy who'd spent the entirety of his high school career cutting class to smoke behind the bleachers.

He didn't hold Charlie's animosity—Thad himself was actually a pretty fun guy—but he figured the universe would reward people accordingly. That he would be glad he'd more or less done as his teachers wanted him to, and that the Thads would come to wish they'd paid more attention in class, and spent less time opening beer cans with their teeth.

And, for awhile, it seemed like he was right.

His acceptances to U of Michigan, Northwestern, and Pepperdine were all coming in just as the actual Thad got waitlisted at Minnesota State.

But now, Thad—the actual, literal Thad—was a regional sales director for Maui Boats. He had a big cabin on the lake, and he went to Palm Springs twice a year, and as far as Russ could tell, he mostly got paid to drink beer and hang out with other guys who also never went to class when they were younger. His world now was one of Thads-the metaphorical kind-and as he laughed along with all of their jokes, and replied to all of their emails, they kept getting promoted, and their houses kept getting larger, and he couldn't shake the feeling that this was a game they'd always win.

...

"I'd take a turn at being your kind of white...maybe not with your dad, but other than that."

"Heh, it's overrated."

"Says the guy whose house is larger than my whole apartment complex."

"Wasn't worth it."

Russ nodded, pretty sure that he knew what Adam was talking about.

The timing of the new house made it pretty clear that it probably hadn't been a reward for moving up the corporate ladder.

"I...don't think doing anything to get a house like that is an option for brothas."

"Probably a good thing."

"I don't know...I think I'd bleach myself to look like Michael Jackson if it meant getting a house like that. Do all the weird shit, too. Us black folks get out of jail, and we're goin' to live with our mamas when we get out..."

"My mom would be pretty awkward to live with."

Russ laughed for a moment. Then he remembered.

"Shit."

April 2, 2002

"So did you ever free your apartment of drunk girls?"

Julie sat back at her desk, trying to make herself get dressed as the light shone through her curtains.

She needed to go for a jog.

She needed to go to the library.

She needed to make a trip to the grocery store for Gatorade and mascara.

Her morning malaise, on the other hand, had different plans. No matter how many things she needed to do, the TV beckoned; a day of watching Real World and eating cereal in bed far preferable to any of the alternatives. She leaned back in her chair, stretching as her sneakers taunted her for wasting the morning.

"I did. I mean, other than Laura, but she's kind of supposed to be there."

"And no Awkward Plea?"

"No Awkward Plea." Adam assured her, his phone on speaker as he drove to yet another physical therapy appointment. "She even came back with cupcakes the next day to thank me."

"Aww, somebody didn't seem like a creeper."

"I know, right? And that's despite me telling her how I can make good bird sounds as I drove her home."

"Wait, what?"

"Yeah. The good news is, she knows I'm not a rapist or kidnapper. The bad news is, she also now knows that I'm awkward as shit."

Julie laughed, glancing at the old red and blue picture frame on her desk, featuring the group after their win over Iceland.

Even under all those pounds of pads, it was hard to disguise the inherent dorkiness of junior high; Adam apparently unsure of what to do with his hands or face. He looked deeply lost, puberty a mystery that he hadn't quite figured out, his limbs longer than he remembered, and his nose a hair larger than he wanted it to be.

Heh, the more things change...

"Like, how did that even come up?"

"Because I was specifically trying to think of not weird things to say. If I would have tried to be awkward, we might have been okay. But nope. Had to try to be normal. By making pigeon sounds."

"That really does take skill."

"It totally does. It takes a special person to pull off this level of awkwardness."

"It was kind of one of your best qualities." She reminded him. "I mean, you're a hot guy with a Porsche. The fact that you say really weird things just adds suspense, like 'Is he going to tell a normal story about what it's like to be rich and popular, or are we going to get bird sounds?'. And when it's bird sounds, nobody is ever disappointed."

"Correction: I'm pretty sure my parents are very disappointed."

"That doesn't count. I'll take bird sounds over your mom any day."

"Yeah, but what about my dad? I guarantee his ghost is just like, watching all of this, super embarrassed, apologizing to his ghost friends for what a weirdo I am."

"They're ghosts. What better things do they have to talk about?"

"I don't know. Knowing him, his ghost buddies all have kids in the NHL. Their sons are like, bringing home Stanley Cups, and here I am, spilling soup on myself and pretending to be a pigeon to show girls how normal I can be."

Julie looked back at that picture frame, remembering the folded piece of paper underneath—ten digits written on a Holiday Inn notepad, the ink smeared from him trying to write with his left hand.

He was so awkward, even by 13 year old boy standards.

But he also gave her his number. And they talked. Every week for the rest of the summer. And he was still awkward on those calls, but he also understood about older brothers stealing the last slice of pizza, and getting left out of friends' plans. Even though she could gather that he was probably actually one of the more popular kids back home, he didn't seem like it; his dorkiness a reminder that expensive clothes and being a hockey phenom can't solve everything.

He was also a lot tougher than he let on, never mentioning the surgery to repair his wrist, or the way that his dad would yell behind closed doors. He never mentioned that his problems were bigger than hers, or discounted what it was like to worry about having the wrong outfit on the first day of school.

He was a lot more than a good wrist shot and bird sounds.

"His ghost buddies are jealous." She assured him, a part of her longing to be right there beside him. "Anyone can win a Stanley Cup. You're way cooler."

"I'm pretty sure I'd be cooler if I were in the NHL right now."

"Meh, you're good at accidentally kidnapping people and pretending to be a pigeon. That's pretty much peak-cool right there."

"Don't forget about spilling soup on myself." He reminded her, now on his second shirt of the day for that very reason. "I'm really good at that one, too."

"The ultimate Renaissance Man..."

"Exactly!"

Russ just stared down at the ground for a moment, trying to think of the right thing to say.

Of course, there wasn't anything to say.

There hadn't been six years ago, and there wasn't now.

.

Six years earlier, Bunny Banks had blown her head off in the front yard of her Edina mansion; neighbors out jogging and kids playing hockey in their driveways as the sound a gunshot rang through the neighborhood.

Nobody had had the words. The Banks' were already a family unravelling at that point; Scott in prison on drug charges, and rumors swirling that Adam was going to be indicted for insider trading and securities fraud. And so, nobody said anything at all.

Flowers and cards were sent to Adam's house, marked 'Our Condolences', and that was that. The world went on, everybody including Adam trying not to think too much about what had happened.

.

"Yeah." Adam mused. "Like, if she would have hung herself or overdosed or something, that one would be one thing. You could do a whole Weekend at Bernie's thing, and it might even be kind of fun. But as it is, she would not be a good corpse to have to live with."

"As opposed to all of the corpses you normally hang out with?"

"You don't know my life."

"They do make quiet houseguests..." Julie agreed.

"See? Plus, that way, if you ever skip a shower, nobody will notice. They'll be too busy smelling your dinner companion."

Her fingers accidentally brushed against his thigh as they walked through the doors of Christianson Arena, the smell of the rink filling her with nostalgia. She could just see him the way he was, sixteen and twirling her in his arms after a game.

"You're kind of warped." She reminded him, glancing up at those lovely blue eyes.

But also still as cute as ever.

"My social options are limited. Living people really prefer to hang out with people who aren't me. But dead? Short of a zombie outbreak, they don't have much choice in the matter. And even then, I bet I could outsmart them enough to keep them around. I'll just set up a treadmill at each doorway or whatever."

"That is definitely one upside to dead people." She conceded, still close enough to smell that familiar scent of his soap and cologne; close enough to notice the slight spillover under his shirt where his brace ended, and there was no longer anything to hold everything in place. The bulge was more obvious now that she realized what lie underneath; the sheer physics amazing her as she pondered how his reality had been so tidily shaped into something more socially acceptable.

"Exactly. A friend who doesn't have any better place to be, doesn't care if you've showered, and probably won't eat your brain? What more could you want?"

"Dork."

"You're just jealous. Your fancy 'living, breathing' houseguests are always judging you based on whether or not you've showered."

"Yup. Nailed it."

"I'm a smart guy that way."

"A smart, smelly guy?"

"Maybe."

Julie laughed, scrunching her nose as she leaned over and pretended to sniff him. While she was at it, she took hold of his hand, giving it a squeeze as they walked through the atrium and past the trophy case that once celebrated his legacy.

"Oh man, very. You've gotten spoiled to hanging out with those corpses."

"When you find something that works..."

May 4, 2002

"So what are your summer plans looking like?" Adam asked, looking over at the stack of boxes towering in the corner.

.

It was real now. The khakis and oxfords had been sorted; the suits and ties carefully folded. Picture frames and Mr. Fluffy had been packed away, each box neatly labeled.

Goldman Sachs was waiting, the thousand debates over whether a person could or could not live without Persian rugs for nine weeks finally over.

.

"Heh, nothing too exciting here. Are you excited about New York?"

"I...think so?" He shrugged, his closet still half-full of pastel shirts. "They do still have like, normal stuff there, right?"

"Normal stuff?"

"Yeah. Like, I'm not going to have to start speaking French and eating sushi, am I?"

A thousand miles away, Julie rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, I think they speak English there."

"And sushi?"

"As long as you don't go to a sushi restaurant, you should be safe."

"You promise that I won't be attacked by a raw fish?"

"I mean, this is you we're talking about. If there's anyone who could find a way to be attacked by a salmon in midtown, it would be you. But it's not like, a thing."

"I think you're just saying that."

"Yup, you've got me. Goldman Sachs is actually nothing but a bunch of guys speaking French as they fight off sashimi rolls. And once they defeat the last of the raw fish, they all have to break out in song and dance, like a Broadway play."

"I knew it."

"You'll be great." Julie assured him, her voice soft as she recalled how he stumbled over his words those first times that he spoke to her, but also how he did it, anyway; his nerves never stopping him from pursuing the things that he cared about most.

"I hope so."

"You will be."

"And you'll come to visit?"

"Only if you promise to eat sushi and speak French."

"Will Chinese buffet and watching Madeline be close enough?"

"For you? Yeah, I'd settle for that." She smiled. "But you might have to throw in some French fries for a little extra culture."

"Heh, that's a deal."

Julie paused for a moment, recalling those discussions about Harvard; they hadn't been about hockey or a love for his home—they had been about that great fear of the unknown. His not-quite-kidding suspicion that the world dropped off somewhere past Cleveland. That he wasn't anything outside of his reputation in Minnesota.

"I can't wait to see you." She reminded him, looking back at that old picture on her desk.

"Thanks."

"And uh, I'm proud of you. Like, really proud of you."

"Well thank you. You're pretty amazing, Cat Lady."

...

Back in Minnesota, Adam looked around his Edina apartment; at the tower of boxes, and the Ethan Allen furniture. At the overstuffed club chairs, and chinoiserie lamps. The Blue Willow and Lennox plates still sat stacked in the kitchen, Tiffany wineglasses filling the shelves. It was the perfect suburban space for somebody who was never going to go anywhere; an apartment literally weighted down by prosaic dreams.

For the past year, it had been Laura's gift to him-a monument to the idea that if things just looked nice enough, they could both quit hurting.

But it didn't work.

The trips to Dayton's and Von Mauer never made anything better. Instead, it just blunted the pain, turning the world a thousand shades of beige. For all of his reluctance to spend nine weeks without Persian rugs and Suge Knight, it was also liberating.

He could see the color returning to the universe; an opportunity to be Adam Banks again.

An opportunity to build a life, instead of just coasting by on trust funds as they tried not to think about what had happened to their lives. To the people they used to be.

"You okay?"

Guy sat down next to Adam on the bench as the rest of the Ducks skated around the rink.

Adam looked out at the scene; his old friends all laughing. He watched as Portman took hold of Julie's hand; as they went gliding across the ice together.

.

He knew it didn't mean anything.

That it wasn't his place to care if it did mean anything-that he was married with three kids. A fourth on the way.

But still, he longed for all of it. To be holding Julie's hand. To be laughing. To be able to move across the ice freely...to be able to move anywhere freely.

.

"Yeah." He nodded.

For a few moments, the two just sat as the world skated by in front of them.

"Should have enjoyed being 17 more when I had the chance..."

"Same."

"I never appreciated how fast it would all be over..."

Adam chuckled.

"You're preaching to the choir on that one."

"Heh, I guess I am, aren't I?"

Adam shook his head.

"I mean, I knew I wasn't going to be 17 for forever, but I figured I'd at least have another ten years or so. And that like, I'd be able to have a life after that. Like, a normal one. Not this.

He thought about how it'd been nearly 20 years since he'd laced up his skates; since he'd been able to tie his own shoes. It didn't get easier. Not really. He'd now spent virtually half of his life having to make sure that people were around who could help him if he fell; who could button buttons and tie ties and take care of the thousand other things regular adults take for granted, and it was still hard. No amount of reassurance from Laura could change the feeling that he wasn't really a man anymore.

"I really shouldn't have taken my hands for granted. And I should have had way more sex."

"You and me both." Guy chuckled. "You don't appreciate how hot 18 year old bodies are until you aren't 18. Like, you think you do, but you don't."

"Oh man, I'd have sex with me. That was...heh, all the times Julie would complain about tan lines, or I'd be worried that my abs weren't defined enough. Really wishing that was my biggest concern now."

"Your abs are not well-defined anymore."

"No? Really?" Adam laughed. "You're going to make me feel so self-conscious..."

"Dumbass."

Guy sighed, the rink cold for two people who weren't moving around.

He knew the universe had been far kinder to him than to his old roommate, but still. He knew the feeling. He knew it all too well.

.

The time wasn't supposed to pass so quickly.

Things weren't supposed to be over so fast.

There was supposed to be time to figure out what to do after hockey; middle-age wasn't supposed to just take you down from behind before you had a plan.

.

"What am I supposed to do?" He finally asked, the question heavy on his mind.

"With life?"

"Yeah."

"You're probably asking the wrong guy." Adam pointed out, staring down at a watch that insisted it was 6:02, and a bracelet made of yarn and wooden beads, from back when Tucker still thought he was a good dad.

"You're doing better than either of our dads did."

"Maybe. Depends on which day you ask."

"Same."