It Never Happened

You survive the meeting by staring at a fixed point on the wall: a laminated poster about hydration.

Your father talks systems. Mason Dufresne sits in the center stall, elbows on his knees, the picture of a focused captain. He doesn't look at you once. That's somehow worse than if he had.

When it's over, the room explodes back into noise. You escape down the concrete stairs to the basement, where your new office waits behind a steel door with a hand-lettered sign taped to it: THE CAVE. ABANDON HOPE.

It's perfect. Three big monitors on a long desk. A whiteboard covered in old plays. A couch the color of a bruise that sags in the middle like it's given up on life. A vending machine humming in the corner with a note that says EXACT CHANGE ONLY, NO EXCEPTIONS, THIS MEANS YOU BRIS.

You drop into the chair, put your face in your hands, and breathe.

The door opens behind you.

"So," says a voice you heard last night whispering your name in an alley. "Mullane."

You spin around. Mason is leaning in the doorway in his practice gear, minus the skates, which means he's in socks, which should make him less intimidating and absolutely does not. He shuts the door behind him with his heel.

"You didn't tell me you were the captain," you hiss.

"You didn't tell me you were Coach's daughter."

"I told you I watch hockey for a living!" you say. "And my name is Ava, not Mullane."

"I told you same!" He drags a hand through his hair. "I thought you were a blogger. Or a fan with a spreadsheet. I didn't think you were going to be standing next to the man who controls my entire life while he described Winnipeg's weather."

You stare at each other. Then, horrifyingly, you both start to laugh.

It's the panicked kind. He covers his face. You put your forehead on the desk. Somewhere upstairs a whistle blows.

"Okay," he says finally, wiping his eyes. "Okay. Here's what we do. It never happened."

"It never happened."

"We're professionals."

"Extremely professional."

"I've never kissed you in an alley."

"I've never heard of an alley."

"Good." He points at you. "Great. Glad we talked." He opens the door, pauses, and looks back. For one second his eyes drop to your mouth, and his jaw does something complicated. Then he's gone.

You sit there with your heart doing laps.

By noon you've learned three things.

First: the players have decided you're Coach's spy. Two fourth-liners stop talking when you walk past the trainer's room. Somebody has taped a picture of a CCTV camera to the Cave door under ABANDON HOPE. Gaetan Brisebois, the starting goalie, a lanky Quebecer with a mustache he's clearly proud of, is the only one who says hello. He also tells you he talks to his goalposts and that the left one is "a little sensitive", so you're not sure he counts.

Second: Cassius Theriault, the director of analytics, is beautiful and knows it. He's maybe thirty, in a navy suit that fits like a promise, with cheekbones you could ski down. He shakes your hand in the hallway and says, "So you're the thesis."

"I'm the video coordinator."

"Mm. Ava Mullane. Your father showed me your thesis. Very... thorough. We'll see how it holds up when the sample sizes are real." He smiles. "My door's always open if the numbers get confusing."

You smile back with all your teeth. "Same."

Third: Maeve Leclair runs the team's social media, and she has red hair, a phone that never stops filming, and a way of looking at you like she's deciding which filter you need. She asks for a highlight cut of Mason's goals from last season "for a thirst trap, sorry, a content series." Then, while you're pulling clips, she leans over your shoulder and says, casually, "We dated, you know. Me and Mase. Two years ago. Four months."

"Okay," you say.

"He's very charming." She watches the screen, where Mason is scoring on a backhand and grinning at the crowd. "He's also very good at leaving. Just so you know."

"I'm not sure why I'd need to know that."

"Mm," Maeve says, exactly like Cassius did, and takes her clips.

At four, Uncle Duff finds you.

Duff Comeau is your godfather, your father's best friend for thirty years, and the associate coach who runs the defense and the penalty kill. He's fifty-four and still handsome in a silver-fox, sweater-vest way. When you were twelve and your mother died, he was the one who sat with you in the hospital cafeteria and let you eat four puddings in a row without saying a word.

"Kiddo." He wraps you in a bear hug that smells like peppermint gum. "Look at you. An employee."

"Don't make it weird."

"Too late. I've already cried in the parking lot." He presses a key into your palm, a brass one on a Gales lanyard. "Only two of these for the Cave. Mine and now yours. Your dad keeps losing his."

"Of course he does."

"He also keeps his computer password on a sticky note under his keyboard," Duff says, rolling his eyes. "Thirty years in hockey and the man thinks hackers won't look under things."

You laugh. "Seriously?"

"Go look. It's the name of your first dog." Then Duff drops his chin, squints, and in a perfect gravelly copy of your father's voice says: "Mullane! Who ate my yogurt? I want names!"

You snort so hard you have to grab the desk. It's uncanny. It's exactly him: the bark, the gravel, the little uptick on names. Duff has been doing that impression at Christmas parties since before you could walk, and it has never once stopped being funny.

"Okay, first real assignment." Duff taps the whiteboard. "Your dad wants every penalty kill from last season cut and tagged. Every one. We were the worst PK in the league after New Year's, and I'd like to know why before I get fired."

"You won't get fired."

"From your lips." He kisses the top of your head on his way out. "Proud of you, Ava."

You work until ten. Every penalty kill from October to April. You tag them, sort them, and start noticing a few things you don't like yet. You fall asleep on the bruise-colored couch for twenty minutes and wake with a crick in your neck.

On your way out you walk past your father's office. Through the glass you can see his desk, his reading glasses abandoned on a stack of depth charts, and the corner of a yellow sticky note poking out from under the keyboard.

You shake your head and go home.

At 11:47 p.m., in bed, your phone buzzes on the nightstand.

Unknown number.

Film room. 11:30 tomorrow. Bring the good snacks. Don't tell Coach.