“And they’re sure it’s not a concussion?” Jax’s voice was husky and on edge.
“Oui.” The phone was pinched between Antony’s shoulder and ear as he reached for his wallet. The clerk in the duty free shop packed the bottle of Dior perfume for him. He thought Maxine might find it funny or at least charming in a clumsy kind of way. He usually felt a shade goofier around her, more relaxed.
“Because it could mean losing the rest of the season if you get hit like that again.”
Antony rolled his eyes. A wave of nausea hit him, making him regret the movement. “I know, Jax,” he said, trying to sound casual. “I’m fine…looked worse than it felt.”
“Good thing you got up right away,” she said. “I have a few more gray hairs now, you tough bastard.”
Antony took the package from the clerk and made his way through the airport to his gate. “I’m not one who got game misconduct,” he said.
“You should have heard the radio show after the game. Toronto is ready for blood the next time Philadelphia plays here. You’re their golden boy now, and no one wants to see Laurent illegally hit.”
Antony smiled despite the ache settling across his forehead. “How’s contract looking?” he asked. Visions of a more stable life in Toronto with Maxine had begun to take root in his imagination. He didn’t realize how much he needed her to anchor him. All this time he’d been flailing from one game to the next, nothing solid to hold on to, nothing to care about.
“Listen, nothing is final, but you’re going to be set—for a long time. Keep playing well and for Christ’s sake don’t get hit again.”
By the time Antony had settled into his seat and closed his eyes, ready to sleep off the dizziness, a clear plan had formed in his mind. He’d asked Sasha to check into journalism college programs for Marc, or some kind of community television courses, anything to get him motivated to leave the apartment to help him get a life…so Antony could have one too with Maxine. She was never far from his thoughts. He’d even begun to picture the store front for Beauty Full. Her dreams were now his.
The night before he left for Philadelphia he took a chance and surprised her at work. She resisted slightly, then she let him take her home where they spent the next few hours on her bed in each other’s arms.
“What’s the best thing about hockey?” she’d asked, rubbing her nose against his as they shared a pillow.
“Getting rebound,” he’d said. “Better than slapshot. Goalie can always see first shot, but second shot, the rebound…he’s not expecting.”
“So, you always score on a rebound?” Her voice had a flirtatious but secret quality.
“Non,” he’d said. “They use experience to stop puck. But that’s why rebound is so great. You are denied over and over. Then finally, you get rebound. And is amazing feeling because you never expect it.”
“Oui,” she said. “Rebounds are amazing.”
Then Antony wrote more French flashcards for her, rewarding her with kisses every time she got one right.
And then later, when they made love with the lights on, she straddled him, rocking her hips, her thick wavy hair cascaded past her shoulders, ending just above her breasts. He felt like he was with Venus from that Botticelli painting. He reached up, tracing her lower lip with his thumb.
She took it in her mouth and sucked before saying, “Je suis à vous.”
I am yours.
Antony came soon after that, repeating the phrase as he thrust his hips upward.
By the time he got back to his apartment that night, Marc was completely pissed that he’d stayed out late without texting him.
“You chase her around like starving dog,” Marc had said. His words were slurred. Antony could see a beer bottle on its side on the kitchen floor. “You need a life,” Antony replied, too tired to play this game. He started down the hallway to his bedroom.
“I had one,” Marc said, wheeling behind him. “But you took it away.”
Antony put his hand on the doorknob and counted to five. The urge to push his brother out of that goddamn wheelchair was so strong sometimes it scared him.
There was a sniff from Marc. “Je voudrais être morte.”
The fist around Antony’s heart tightened its grip. The fingertips digging in, puncturing over and over. “Don’t wish you were dead.” There was a pause of silence then Antony turned, his palms facing Marc in a
repentant gesture. “Early tomorrow, before I go, you tell me stats for Philadelphia. Who will score, who will hit, who I watch for…oui?”
Marc’s pout dissolved. He shrugged in his chair. “Oui. Et après chaque jeu trop?”
“Oui, after every game, too.”
Antony stayed good on his promise and had talked with Marc after every game, listening and taking notes, but mostly looking at the clock waiting for the hour to be over so he could call Maxine.
The only time Marc hadn’t contacted him right away was after the last game when he’d suffered the hit from behind.
After the medical staff cleared him, he’d called Marc right away knowing that he would have been watching the game on TV. But his brother didn’t sound concerned, there was only a mild irritation in his voice.
“Who skates with head down in neutral zone?” he’d asked. “Even Bantam know better.” Insinuating that Antony’s sloppy defense had contributed to the hit. When he called Maxine, she was breathless on the other line. “I screamed in a bar full of people. I thought you were dead! And they kept showing it over and over—even in slow motion.” She took a few breaths. “I don’t think I can watch a live game again. Are you all right? They said you were okay, but I need to hear you
tell me.”
“I’m fine.” He’d smiled. “Head like wood. No damage.”
“I’ll feel better when I see you tomorrow. When I can hug you and kiss you.”
Now, on the plane, headed back to Maxine’s waiting arms, Antony closed his eyes and slept the entire flight back to Toronto.
****
Yawning through the deluge of a bizarre dream he couldn’t quite retain, Antony made his way to the taxis already waiting for him and the other players. The sky was darkening with a few snow flurries swirling outside the window. “Big storm comin’,” the cabbie said.
Antony nodded off several times, jerking awake when downtown traffic horns blared around him. Using an image of Maxine to push his tired self to his own apartment, Antony opened the door and dropped everything in the hallway.
Marc was there, smiling widely. He motioned to the kitchen where he’d taken out food to reheat for supper. “Hard head, they’re calling you,” Marc said. “I saved all papers. Fighting as good as goals. Remember I tell you?”
“Oui,” Antony put a hand on the wall to steady himself. “But hit is no fight.” His gaze went to the kitchen where two sets of dishes were laid out.
Marc frowned up at him. “Long flight?”
Pulling out his phone, Antony checked for a text from Maxine, but the screen was blank.
“I taped games,” Marc said. “Supper is ready.
Sasha set everything up before she left.”
Antony put the phone on the hall table. The easy thing would be to appease Marc’s request; stay at the apartment, eat with him, watch a game or two and listen, but Antony was tired of listening to Marc tell him how everything he was doing was wrong. He didn’t have the strength tonight to go over every game he’d just played on the road.
He picked up his car keys from the hook on the wall above the hall table. “Non,” he said. That one word seemed to hang in the air between the brothers.
“You’re leaving.” There was no hint of a query to his tone. “To see her.”
“Oui.”
Marc’s hands gripped the armrests. “Going to fuck your good fuck charm?”
“Don’t call her that,” Antony’s voice was low, challenging.
“Does she know?” Marc licked his lips and then a sneer slipped into place. “How you use her?”
“Ce n’est pas comme ca—”
“It’s not like that?” he mimicked. “Did you tell her truth about how you became hockey hero of our family?”
“I won’t fight you.” Antony turned and made his way toward the door to their apartment.
“You put me in this chair! Don’t walk away from me!”
Antony put his hand on the doorknob and counted to five.
He heard Marc breathing heavily behind him. There was a sniff, but this time Antony didn’t turn around and apologize. He was tired of apologizing for the same mistake over and over.
“I’m done,” he said then left the apartment and took the elevator down to the parking garage.
The cool air helped clear away some of the dark guilt that had wrapped itself around him. Antony slid into the front seat, grateful for the size of the sport utility vehicle. He needed to get to Maxine. Once he was in her arms, everything would be all right. Antony reached inside his jacket pocket but it was empty. He groaned remembering he’d left his phone on the hall table. A heaviness seemed to pull him further into the seat, like gravity was twice the force.
His head was throbbing now. Antony rubbed his temple, too many images from his past were racing to the surface; his hands covered in blood, the car flipped over, the police lights, and Marc begging him through his tears.
Everything turned hazy and then Antony went limp, falling forward into nothing.