Crazy Thing Called Love (28 page)

Billy shoved the whole table aside, and Fiona and the guys stared openmouthed as their lunches fell to the floor. Billy took one big threatening step toward Kevin, who jumped to his feet, his hands in fists.

Maddy had no idea she was going to do what she did until she was doing it.

But suddenly she was in between Billy and Kevin. “Get out of here, Kevin,” she said.

“Maddy …” Billy tried to push her behind him, but she wouldn’t be budged.

“You need a girl to fight for you?” Kevin laughed and other kids started to join in.

“No, he doesn’t,” she said, feeling anger churn through her. Anger for Billy, for herself, for the way they grew up, for the choices they had to make and the assholes like this guy, who wanted to make fun of them for
trying. “He could take you with one arm behind his back. But he’s too smart to do it.”

“I don’t think Billy has ever been called smart,” he sneered.

Oh that made her mad. “Yeah, well, neither have you. Now go, before you get us all in trouble.”

“No.” Kevin folded his arms over his chest. Suddenly, Maddy remembered her dad dealing with a drunk man at the arena one time. A belligerent dad who wouldn’t shut up and wouldn’t walk away—just like Kevin.

And so, just like her father had done, Maddy reached out and smacked him, openhanded, across the face. More insulting than painful.

The entire cafeteria gasped and Maddy’s hand stung and her heart stopped.

“Oh shit,” Billy muttered and finally pulled her behind him, just as the cafeteria erupted. Kevin charged Billy, trying to get at Maddy. Billy held him off with one hand, but another fight broke out behind them and someone caught her in the eye with their elbow.

She was stunned. Reeling. Holding on to the back of Billy’s shirt like her life depended on it.

Suddenly, there was a whistle and Coach Roames was standing on a table, bellowing.

“Who started this?”

Everyone slowly turned and pointed their finger at her.

“Oh shit,” Billy muttered again.

Ten minutes later Maddy was sitting outside the principal’s office with an ice pack pressed to her eye. She’d never been in trouble before and was pretty sure she was going to throw up all over herself.

The door to the main office opened and Billy slipped in, carrying her book bag. Her heart dropped into her
stomach and she didn’t know if she was happy or embarrassed. He sat beside her and she tried to pull her body, her skin, as far from him as she could.

“You all right?” he asked.

“My eye hurts.”

His fingers touched her chin, turning her face toward him, and she burned at the touch. From her hair to her toes, she burned.

“Let me see,” he whispered, and he lifted the cold pack. He whistled, long and low.

“It’s bad?” she asked.

“It’ll be a shiner.”

“My dad is going to kill me.”

She leaned back, staring up at the ceiling.

Billy shifted and cleared his throat.

“You don’t have to sit here,” she muttered.

“You think I would leave? After what you did?”

Oh God, she felt stupid and small.

“I’ll explain to Mr. Pursator,” he said. “And your dad.”

“You’ll explain that I slapped Kevin Dockrill?” Saying it sounded ridiculous, like it had to be someone else who’d slapped him. Someone else that dumb.

“I’ll explain that he was saying shitty things about you and you stood up for yourself and you … you know … you stood up for me.”

The silence pulsed around them. When he put it that way, she didn’t feel quite so bad. In fact, she felt kind of … right.

“You think that will work?”

“Yep.” He nodded, like the case was closed. No problem.

When she smiled it hurt her eye, but that didn’t stop her. “Thanks.”

His fingers touched hers, the knuckle, the palm of her
hand, where she could still feel that slap. “Thank you,” he whispered. “No one has ever done that for me.”

“Slapped a guy?”

“Stood up for me.”

She got lost for a second in his eyes. They were so pretty and she could see so much in them. “You’re not stupid,” she said.

“I know.” But he didn’t, she could see that in his eyes, too.

They sat there quietly, waiting for the principal to open the door. Listening to the buzz in the main office, the clock in the hall count off the seconds.

It was weird sitting there with a black eye and Billy Wilkins. But there was nowhere she’d rather be.

And when she looked into his chocolate eyes, she got the idea that he didn’t want to be anywhere else either.

After meatball subs
, Tara Jean suggested a trip to Target. Charlie jumped up and down, which Billy was beginning to realize was the kid’s normal state. He must have been truly scared, truly exhausted before, to have subdued all this ceaseless joy.

Surprisingly, despite her sullen stillness and silence, Becky lit right up, too. For the first time she actually looked like a thirteen-year-old girl.

The sight was sort of breathtaking.

“I need the money.” She held out her hand. “The hundred in the front hall drawer.”

“I think I can afford some stuff from Target,” he said, pushing himself to his feet.

“We can pay our way.”
We don’t need charity
, that’s what she was really saying. He knew that tone of voice. Remembered using it with all those rec league coaches who talked about fund-raising and scholarship programs for a kid who had to work so hard just to buy skates, much less pay his fees.

“Becky.” He felt every minute of his years, every ache in the bones of his body. “How many of your birthdays have I missed?”

“All of them.”

“Charlie’s?”

“All of them.”

“Right. Consider this payback.”

She didn’t even hesitate. Charity was one thing, overdue presents, quite another. “Fine.”

“I’ll drive.” He turned for the living room and the foyer with his shoes and keys, but Tara Jean stopped him.

“If you go, every person in the store will be snapping pictures of you on their cell phones.”

God, he was exhausted. He rubbed his face, his eyes, ran a hand through his hair, getting himself ready to practice his indifference. To summon his patience.

“I got this, Billy.”

Oh Lord, really? He couldn’t even pretend not to be totally grateful. Honestly, at this point, he would take a bullet for Tara Jean Sweet.

“You sure?”

TJ shrugged. “How hard can it be?”

Luc, still sitting at the round table, the daylight haloing his face, laughed.

“I can do it!” Tara Jean protested.

“I have no doubt that you can.” Luc grinned at his girlfriend, his faith in her palpable. “You can do anything.” Their happiness was bittersweet to watch and Billy looked down at his feet.

He’d begged Maddy to stay and she had left. Part of him understood that—hell, he’d leave if he could. But he’d been floored by how badly he’d wanted her here. It was one thing to love her, but the need kind of surprised him.

“Saddle up, kids,” Tara Jean said, herding them out the kitchen door. As they passed Billy, she held out her hand and he shoved all the money he had at her.

“A car seat,” he said. “And some kid crap. Movies and things.”

“Got it.”

Without looking at or counting the money, she just tucked it into her pocket. He knew if he was short, she
would fill in the gaps and never say a word. That was friendship.

After they left, the house was silent in a way it had never been before. There was silence and then there was the absence of noise. Of people.

Billy dropped into a dining room chair as if all his bones had broken at once.

“You all right?” Luc asked, sitting beside him.

“Thanks to you guys.” Billy was at a loss, it had been years since he’d been in such debt to another person. After the divorce, he’d developed a steady pattern of pushing people off to a comfortable distance.

Nothing like an emergency to shrink that comfortable distance down to nothing.

“Our pleasure, man. I wish we didn’t have to fly to Toronto tomorrow.”

“No, don’t worry. Honestly.” Billy had regretted asking them to stay the night nearly the second he’d done it. A knee-jerk desperate response to being all alone with two kids. To being so exhausted he couldn’t see straight.

It was almost better that Luc and TJ couldn’t stay; he was uncomfortable enough with all this help. All these well-meaning witnesses to his floundering at rock bottom. “I’ll be all right.”

Luc stretched his legs out in front of him. “What are you going to do?”

“About the kids? I feel like I can’t do anything until I talk to Janice.”

“What about Maddy?”

Billy dropped his head back, his laugh strangled. “I have no clue. No. Fucking. Clue.”

“Then let’s talk about hockey.”

Luc watched Billy as if he was waiting for him to say something. Billy finally shrugged, tired of feeling so damn clueless.

“If you have something you want to say, spit it out, Luc. I’m too damn tired to read your mind.”

“Hornsby was trying to save your hide, Billy. You’re the one who didn’t help. And this whole thing with Maddy and the kids, you know that’s not what he’s really upset about.”

“So now you’re an expert on my coach?”

Billy tried to make a joke to kill the tension that was coating the room like a thin layer of ice, but Luc just gave him that level cut-the-crap stare.

Billy got to his feet and walked toward the fridge even though he wasn’t hungry. Between the exhaustion and the emotional upheaval of the last few days he felt raw. As if every breeze was a hurricane force wind and he couldn’t keep himself on his feet.

“I’ve been playing professional hockey for sixteen years, Luc. I am the kind of player teams need, not to be a leader but to get shit done. To stir the pot.” He pulled a glass out and filled it with water he didn’t really plan on drinking. “I don’t make speeches, or score points. I get in the other team’s head. I take the hits, I make the hits—all so guys like you can do your jobs.”

The black edge of resentment in his voice surprised him. Shook the corners of the room. Shook his corners. But Luc just nodded, as if he’d known all along.

“You know, buddy, I’ve never said this before, and I’ll never say it again, but the day we started playing on the same team was the same day you stopped being the player you could have been.”

The glass hit the counter with a crack. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“You weren’t an enforcer until you and I were in Toronto.” Billy started to tell him that he was crazy, but Luc lifted his hand. “No, you weren’t a finesse player, and yes, you were rough and aggressive. You’ve played with a chip on your shoulder your whole damn career,
but you scored points back then. You led by example, you showed all of us what it meant to play hockey with nothing held back. But the more we were on the ice together, the more you let me shine and took the hits and handed out the retribution.”

Billy rolled his eyes.

“No, listen. For once, just listen without fighting. I started to hit my stride and you and I fell into a rhythm. And it was good for all of us. But I think you let go of the player you could have been.”

“I’m pretty damn happy with the player I am.”

“Really? Because they’re sending that player down to the minors.”

“That doesn’t have anything to do with the way I play!”

“That’s right. Because you didn’t play the last half of the season! Is this really the way you want to go out, Billy?”

They were standing. Yelling at each other. Billy had his hands wrapped around his glass like he was going to throw it at his best friend. His only friend.

“I’m sorry,” Luc said.

“Don’t be sorry.” Billy sighed. “You’re right.”

Luc blinked.

“And I won’t ever say that again, so we’re even.”

Luc laughed and the tension in the room vanished. Billy wasn’t a guy who had heart-to-hearts and Luc knew that, so he dropped the subject.

“You look like you could fall asleep,” Luc said. “Let’s go see if there’s anything good on TV.”

“I’m sure you’ve got other things to do besides hang out with me.”

“Nope,” Luc answered definitively and walked to the living room, talking about how he wanted to see Billy’s epic movie collection.

“Grab that candy Tara Jean brought,” he called and
Billy, on autopilot, pulled the licorice from the cupboard under the counter.

Somewhere in the parts of his brain that cataloged things like loss and grief, he realized Luc was right. Coming up in the league, he’d been a powerful defenseman, capable of scoring points, of quarterbacking the power play. But he’d been an angry player—ready to fight all the time.

And everyone had wanted a piece of that anger. Wanted to capitalize on his willingness to fight. Wanted to use him like a weapon, and he’d been all right with that. He’d had more than his share of hate for the world. But somehow, over the years he’d been sharpened so much, so effectively that there was nothing left but that black, black anger.

Was this how he wanted to go out?

No. What a stupid question. Who wants to go out in the minors, without playing most of his last year of NHL hockey? No one.