Crossing The Goal Line

Mike looked back at her shocked expression. “You don’t know the story? I thought the headlines were everywhere.”

Bridget shook her head.

“It was seven, almost eight years ago. March, just before the start of the playoffs, not long before I was called up.”

Bridget worked the math in her head. “We were on a tour in Australia that spring. I remember Toronto wasn’t in the playoffs, so I’d mostly ignored the hockey news. Besides, Quebec won, so...oh. That would have been your first Cup.”

Mike looked out the windows as the half ice, half rain pelted them, though Bridget doubted he really saw what was out there.

“The short version is that she was in a car accident. Bad weather, car went off the road. She was probably driving too fast and would have died on impact.”

“I’m sorry. That’s awful.”

Mike had his crutches, but was mostly balanced on his one good foot.

“She was pregnant.”

* * *

MIKE STARED OUT over where the lake would normally be. Back then there had been no spectacular view. He was a farm team goalie for the Rimouski Raiders, in Quebec. Their place was barely adequate, but Amber had worked hard to make the most of it. As she often complained, she didn’t have anything else to do.

He found himself talking, mostly to himself.

“We met in college. I’d been drafted by Quebec when I was eighteen, but my mom insisted I had to get a degree. She’d never cared much for hockey and wanted me to have a backup plan. So instead of going directly to the farm team, I went to college on a hockey scholarship, and met Amber in a freshman English class. She knew nothing about hockey but came to every game and started learning rules like offside and icing.” He smiled at the memory. “Her father was a professor there, and she’d grown up in that town. Lived in the same house her whole life. She’d had this storybook life that was so different than mine.

“We graduated the same year, and got married that summer. In the fall, I had to report to Rimouski.”

He remembered the excitement of finally, finally being able to start his hockey career. But there had also been trepidation. What if he wasn’t good enough? “Amber hated it. Most of the guys on the team were single, and she was positive they were taking me to strip clubs and that we were meeting women every time we were on the road. The married guys were older and had kids, so Amber didn’t really fit in with their wives.

“She wanted me to quit. She’d tell me that the chances were that I’d never make it to the big show, and if I loved her I’d want her to be happy. She told me I was selfish, putting my dream above her. I argued that I’d thought it was our dream. I was young, and sure I was going to make it, if she’d just stick it out a bit longer. I didn’t want to give it up.”

His grip tightened on the crutch handles. That had been a bad period. He’d never dreamed that they would spend that much time fighting as newlyweds.

“We made the playoffs that year in Rimouski. I was playing well. I tried to convince her that it meant I would make it, that we would make it. We had a big fight. It was the night the team was going out to celebrate. I left, slamming the door. When I came back, she was gone. She’d packed up to go back to her parents.

“Then the police came to tell me she was dead. And that she was pregnant when she died. I don’t even know if she knew that. She hadn’t told me, in any case.”

Mike still wondered if she’d known, and if she had, if she had deliberately left without telling him. That fear could still hurt.

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