Her Family's Defender

The woman’s face flushed. She had picked up on her daughter’s matchmaker vibe. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. “Come on, Tommy,” she said. She pulled the boy to her doorway with some speed.

Troy was glad that this time he wasn’t the one feeling awkward.

He wasn’t the one feeling awkward the next morning, either, when there was a knock at his door.

* * *

MICHELLE HAD HAD no intention of knocking on her neighbor’s door—ever. But she had also never imagined she’d have any reason to.

Being a single mom wasn’t easy. Michelle had known moving to Toronto was going to make it more difficult, in some ways. In Winnipeg, she and the kids had a support group: grandparents, the military, friends. The problem was that everyone knew their story. They couldn’t escape the pitying glances, the overwhelming sympathy and in some cases, the distance some of their friends had tried to put between her family and theirs, as if they carried a virus that could spread if there was too much contact.

The kids’ paternal grandparents were still grappling with their son’s death and found it easiest to blame Michelle.

Michelle’s family wanted to be supportive, but since they were in the military, they were scattered across the globe. Once Mitch’s funeral was over, they’d had to return to their own commitments. They kept in touch by Skype, and they could do that as well from Toronto as Winnipeg.

So here Michelle and the kids were, in a new city, making a new start.

It was the first day of school for all three of them. Last night Michelle had planned carefully so that the morning would go smoothly. Lunches had been made, clothes had been laid out. She had timed what they’d need to do and left a buffer for accidents.

Except she hadn’t accounted for the stupid Ontario milk bags. What was wrong with the cartons and jugs they had in Manitoba? In Ontario, the cartons only came in small sizes, and her family went through a lot of milk. She’d picked up one of the pitchers they were supposed to put the bags of milk into, but she hadn’t put the bag far enough into the jug, and it had tipped out, pouring milk all over Michelle’s shirt and the counter and floor.

And it had been the last bag of milk, of course. So no cereal for the kids. She’d made sandwiches with the last of the bread last night. No toast, no time to make anything like pancakes and she didn’t have milk or eggs anyway. The seconds had ticked by. She’d wanted to hit something out of sheer frustration.

She was considering picking up something for the kids’ breakfast on the way to school when she heard the faint ping of the elevator and footsteps going down the hallway, followed by the sound of a door opening and closing.

Before she could think it through, she told the kids to mop up the milk and went to ask her new neighbor for some milk.

She knocked at his door and stepped back. Should she apologize again? Grovel?

The door opened. Her neighbor stood there, but she couldn’t form the words.

She understood now that he was a hockey player, and he must have just come in from a run. The weather was still warm and much more humid here than in the Prairies. That would explain why he was wearing only shorts and shoes, and his incredible body was glistening with sweat. She might be a widow with kids, but she could appreciate that.

She stared for a moment, and then suddenly her mind flashed into the past. Back to when she’d first met Mitch, in basic training. They were both young and fit. Mitch had been a runner, and she’d seen him so many times just like this—shirtless, sweaty, looking so good...

But after his last mission, Mitch had come back a changed man. He’d let himself go, along with a lot of other things. So it had been a while since she’d been around a half-naked man looking as good as Troy did right then.

If only it could have been Mitch, still with them in every way. Coming in hot and sweaty from a run and pulling her into his embrace while she squealed, and he pretended not to understand what she was squealing about...

Troy raised his eyebrows. “Hello?”

Michelle forced herself to glance up, and she saw amusement in his eyes. He thought she was tongue-tied from staring at his naked chest. As if. Yes, she was staring at him, but she could handle an attractive body. It was remembering the past that would bring her down.

“Did something happen?” he asked.

Michelle followed his gaze to her shirt and realized the wet milk was making her shirt mostly see-through. Drops were dripping from her hem onto her feet. She could only imagine how the rest of her appeared.

She took a breath. She was army, for goodness’ sake. Discharged now, but she was tough. She straightened and looked him in the eyes.

“We’re out of milk. Could I borrow some?” She should probably at least say please, if not actually grovel, but she just couldn’t while he had that smug expression on his face.

He paused for a moment. “Sure,” he said and invited her in.

If Michelle had bothered to imagine what a single, successful hockey player would do with his place, she would have pictured this condo. The leather furniture was tan instead of black, and the place wasn’t as messy as she might have guessed, but she would wager he had someone come in to clean for him, and that it had been done recently. The big TV, gaming console and sound system, the modern furniture, it was all right out of Single Guy with Money designs.

She followed him into the kitchen, which was sleek and modern—and mostly unused, she suspected. While he opened the fridge, she pulled her shirt from her sticky torso. She’d have to take another quick shower. Reflexively, she pulled her necklace out from under her shirt as he turned to her with one of those ridiculous bags of milk in his large hands.

“Wedding ring?” Troy asked as he eyed her twisting the golden band that hung from her necklace.

Michelle followed his gaze and realized what she’d been doing. She tended to play with the ring when stressed. Before Mitch died, when she’d worn it on her finger, she’d twisted it around and around when she was upset. After he died, she’d moved it onto a necklace around her neck, but the instinct was still there.

It wasn’t hard to figure out why she was stressed at that moment. Three people were starting school today, and she was going to have to start her own preparations all over while trying to get them out the door on time. That would count as stress.

But Troy had paused, waiting for an answer. “Yes,” she said, taking a step closer to the milk and escape.

“Divorce?” he continued, passing the bag of milk toward her eager hands.

She shook her head. When he didn’t let the milk go, she sighed, frustrated. “I’m a widow.”

Surprised, he released his grip. She grabbed the needed bag and pivoted to leave.

“Cancer?” he asked. It was an interesting guess, but not unreasonable. Still, Michelle was not getting into their story with a man who was basically a stranger. They were trying to escape the past in Toronto, not drag it along with them.

She glanced over her shoulder as she headed for the door. “Sorry, long story, and I have to shower again and get the kids to school. Thank you for the milk.”

She left, aware she was in his debt. She’d have to deal with that. She didn’t accept charity. She stood on her own, and didn’t plan to let her neighbor think otherwise.

* * *

TROY WATCHED MICHELLE LEAVE. The milk-drenched T-shirt had given him a pretty vivid picture of her shape. He’d tried to remember she was someone’s mom, but he wasn’t blind. And she’d obviously taken a good look at him, so turn about was fair play.

But once she’d said she was a widow, those thoughts had fled.

A presumably young man could die from many causes. But he’d done the research on this during those dark days, and outside of accidents, suicide and murder, cancer was the top cause of death for young men.

He did his best to avoid dwelling on thoughts about cancer. He had a clean bill of health now. He’d beaten it. But every story the papers ran about him now mentioned the reason he’d missed last season. Every reporter wanted to know how he felt about it, if he was over it, if he could return to where and what he’d been.

Of course he said he’d beaten it. Of course he said he was the same player he’d always been; cancer hadn’t changed him. He wanted to believe it, so that was what he told everyone.

He couldn’t play his game if anyone thought he was soft or weak in any way. So he acted tough, and joked about beating everyone on the ice the way he’d beaten this disease. He never spoke about those black nights. When the doctors had first said the C word.

He hadn’t thought he was really sick. Just a minor urinary tract infection. The doctors would give him some antibiotics, and then he’d be fine. But it wasn’t an infection. It was prostate cancer. There was something in his body that wanted to kill him.

It took a while to get his mind around that. So he’d acquiesced to the advice of his doctors to wait and evaluate how things progressed. He’d tried chemo and radiation, before everyone had finally agreed that surgery was the answer. In hindsight, he’d have been smarter to just have the surgery at the very beginning. The various courses of treatment had meant that he’d missed a whole season before he had a clear bill of health.

During that year—a long, difficult year he did his best to forget—there had been too many nights when he’d woken up in a panic, unable to sleep while Death lay stretched out in the bed beside him.

He was mostly over that now, but there were still nights when he’d wake up, sure he could feel the cancer in his body again, killing him from the inside. The doctors believed they’d caught it all, that it hadn’t metastasized and spread elsewhere. It was worth losing his prostate for that. But there were no guarantees. Michelle’s comment about her husband only reminded him of that.

After she left he pulled out his phone and called down to the concierge and asked for the name of his new neighbor. He gave it, and Troy typed “Michelle Robertson” into the search bar of his browser. He added “army” and “widow” to narrow the results down.

He wanted to know why her husband had died. He realized she might not be happy about it, but he was willing to push some boundaries when it came to the big C. He needed to know if it was cancer, and if it was the same kind that he’d had.

Prostate cancer was rare in young men, but Troy knew only too well that didn’t mean younger men couldn’t get it. He wanted the cause to be anything else, so that Troy’s own odds were better.

It took a bit of searching, but he found out the answer. And it was anything but what he’d expected.

CHAPTER TWO

“IT’LL BE GREAT,” Michelle said, ruffling Tommy’s hair. The look on his face told her that he didn’t believe her, but knew she had to say it anyway. She wanted to hug him, but he was too old now for such displays of affection in front of others. So she watched him file into the school with a pang.

Michelle and the kids hadn’t arrived at school with the additional time she’d hoped for, but they hadn’t been late. The kids were nervous. Angie got more talkative when she was unsure of herself, while Tommy grew even quieter. Michelle was nervous, too, mostly for her kids. Angie was outgoing, and likely to make friends. Tommy had always been shy, with a smaller circle of friends than his sister, but that was even more the case since his father’s death. He wouldn’t make the first steps to reach out to someone, and her heart ached to force the other boys to be kind to him.

She waved the kids off and then, once they’d disappeared into the school, she headed for the nearest subway entrance.

She hadn’t had a chance to familiarize herself with her route to class the way she’d have liked to do. Subways were new to her, since they only had buses back in the ’Peg. Fortunately, the Toronto Transit System was mostly one loop south and north, and one main line east and west. She had to listen carefully to the garbled transit announcements and watch the map closely, but she made her way to school without mishap.

She then followed the instructions she’d carefully printed out to get to her classes.

She’d enrolled in a one-year bookkeeping program. She didn’t have an avid interest in numbers, but math had been one of her better subjects, and her years in the Forces hadn’t provided her with many marketable skills outside the army. Bookkeeping seemed manageable for someone with only a high school diploma, and it also had good job prospects.

Once she found her classroom, she sat in the back and tried to be invisible as the teacher began the lesson. Since she was so new at this, and hadn’t been in class for a long time, she was planning to attend a lot of the lectures in person, even though it was possible to do most of the program online. Though that would be a nice option if she needed to take time with the kids.

The first class was overwhelming. She was scribbling notes madly, even when she didn’t understand what she was writing down. The matching principal almost made sense, but who decided on the boundaries for materiality? The students around her were all taking notes on their computers, while she was there with a binder and pen. She couldn’t keep up. She was definitely going to have to watch this lecture again at home.

She ate her lunch alone on a bench outside. She watched the other students walk by. They were mostly in groups, and they were all younger. The students were wearing new clothes that looked old, while she was wearing old things that she hoped looked new. She felt ancient and stupid. What had she gotten herself into?

She made her way back to the kids’ school for the end of the day in plenty of time and waited for them to come out. Some other parents began to gather. Michelle knew she should introduce herself but she couldn’t, not now. She was tired and discouraged. She wasn’t ready to answer the questions about what she did, where the children’s father was, what had happened and then the inevitable response, “oh how sad.”

The bell rang, and kids started spilling from the building.

Angie was the first to appear. She had another girl with her and she dragged her new friend over to her mother.

The other girl, Brittany, was a hockey player, and Michelle understood immediately how the two had bonded. Angie was hockey crazy. Her dad had started to watch games with her before his first tour. Michelle had enrolled her in skating lessons, but Angie had wanted to play hockey and it had been her passion ever since.

It was no surprise that Angie had recognized Troy Green. Angie still loved the Winnipeg Whiteout, but as soon as the move to Toronto had been broached she’d been checking out the Toronto teams and players. The other Toronto club had been around longer, but the Blaze had won the Cup a couple of years ago, and Angie had picked them as her Toronto team.

Angie was overflowing with information she wanted to share with Michelle about Brittany’s hockey team. Angie had gotten all the details about when she herself could try out. She and her new friend had compared skills and were sure they would end up on the team together.

Michelle had been avoiding the H word. She knew Angie loved hockey, and was good at it, but her ambition of being the first woman skater in the top league had very little chance of coming to pass.

In fact, this year, playing at all might have little chance of coming to pass. Here in Toronto, without a car and with cash tight, Michelle couldn’t afford the fees, the gear and the transit to the games and practices. She had learned from experience that the practice hours were early and awkward, and away games were unlikely to be on the subway lines.

So she made noncommittal responses to Angie, greeted Brittany’s mother and kept one eye open for Tommy. She smiled as he finally emerged, walking slowly, head down and alone. Her smile faltered.

Michelle told Angie to say goodbye to her friend, gathered Tommy and headed home.

Michelle managed to avoid the upcoming storm with Angie about the hockey team by trying to draw Tommy out as they walked to the condo.

“So, how was school, Tommy?”

He didn’t look up. “Fine.”

“Do you like your teacher?”

Tommy shrugged.

“Tommy’s got the strictest teacher in school. My teacher is nicer, but she gives lots of homework,” Angie said.

“Were the other kids nice?” Michelle asked Tommy, voice tight with worry.

“They’re okay.”

Michelle told them a bit about her school, editing out all the worrisome parts, but their interest was perfunctory.

When they got to the condo building, she let the kids head up in the elevator first, while she stopped to ask at the desk about nearby grocery stores. There was a store not far away that would deliver, apparently.

She’d go get milk and bread from a convenience store tonight, and order some groceries online for tomorrow. She’d probably have to find a more economical solution going forward, but there was just too much to settle right now. They’d treat themselves to pizza tonight. She needed to get on top of things, not let things get out of hand like they had this morning.

When she got up to the top floor, Tommy was standing in the doorway of the condo, waiting, while Angie was chattering to their new neighbor, Troy Green. She was telling him all about the new hockey team she assumed she was joining, and asking him if it was a good step on her path to playing professionally.

Troy was being patient, but he was dressed to go out and Michelle was afraid Angie was holding him up. She sighed. Angie would be angry with her for breaking up her tête-à-tête. Then she’d have to finally tell her that she wasn’t playing hockey this year. She closed her eyes for a moment, and with a mental sigh, opened them and squared her shoulders.

* * *

“IT’S NOT FAIR!” Angie yelled at her mother, face red.

Michelle struggled to hold on to her temper.

“I know it’s not fair. But we just don’t have the money.”

“Dad would have let me.” Angie threw the words at her.

Michelle flinched. If Angie’s father was still alive, they wouldn’t be here, wouldn’t be having this conversation. “That’s irrelevant right now,” she answered.

“Is Tommy doing his Tae Kwon Do?”

“Yes. But—”

“That’s so unfair. It’s because he’s a boy, isn’t it? I hate you!” Angie spun around to run to her room.

“Angela Louise Robertson!”

Angie stopped. The full name was a sign of her mom losing it.

“I am doing nothing differently because Tommy is a boy. Tommy is wearing the same dobok as last year, so I don’t have to buy that. The dojang is two blocks away so we can walk and the lessons are reasonable. On the other hand, you grew out of all your hockey gear last year and it costs a he—a heck of a lot more than a dobak. The arenas are all miles away, and we don’t have a car. And hockey is very expensive.

“If you can come up with something cheaper to do, I’ll sign you up tonight. We could try swimming, or soccer...and when I can afford it, we’ll get you back into hockey, but I just can’t right now!”

Unfortunately, the cold hard facts didn’t help with Angie. She turned her nose up at Michelle’s offers and wouldn’t even let Michelle finish an invitation to join Tommy at Tae Kwon Do.

“I’ll get a job.”

“A twelve-year-old can’t make enough to cover hockey costs. There’s not much you can do right now anyway. You’ll need to take the babysitting course to make money that way, and we don’t know anyone in Toronto to babysit.”

Angie’s lip quivered. “I’ll ask everyone who sends me money for Christmas to send it now instead.”

Michelle explained that wouldn’t be enough. It wasn’t just the fees; it was equipment and transportation. Their family members weren’t rich.

Michelle couldn’t ask for any more favors from her family and friends. She wanted more than anything else to give her daughter what she wanted, what she dreamed of, but she simply did not have enough money. If she gave up school and got a job, maybe they could cover hockey this year. But next year, when they were no longer house-sitting and had to pay rent? Michelle had to finish these courses so she could make enough money to support them. Angie, though, could only see her dream slipping from her fingers.

Michelle finally went out for pizza, reminding the crying girl that she was in charge of her brother while her mother was gone. While she was out, she picked up milk and bread for breakfast and lunch tomorrow. The pizza she carried was no longer the big celebration she’d hoped for. It seemed as if everyone had had a crappy day.

Everyone but her neighbor. Troy Green was already inside when she walked into the elevator with her food at the lobby floor. He’d obviously driven into the garage and gotten on the elevator at one of the parking levels. He looked relaxed, carefree and rich, a shopping bag from a name-brand store in his hand.

“I ordered some milk, so I’ll be able to return the bag you loaned us tomorrow,” she said tersely. She only had a small carton with her now, but she felt obligated to indicate she didn’t intend to freeload.

“Don’t worry about it. I have more than enough.”

He glanced at the flat red and green box she had balanced over her grocery bag. “Pizza, eh? Kids must be happy about that.” Considering how poorly she’d treated him, he was being nice. Michelle realized she should respond in kind, but it had been a difficult day, and it was far from over yet.

She smiled perfunctorily. “That was the plan.”

“Your daughter is pretty excited about playing hockey—want me to check out this league she’s talking about?”

“Angie isn’t playing this year,” she said flatly, watching the floor numbers going by.

“Does she know that?”

“She does now. Excuse any sounds of wailing you might hear from our condo.”

“Is it because of me?”

Michelle rolled her eyes. Of course, it had to be about Mr. Hockey Superstar.

“We don’t have the money to buy her equipment. We don’t have a vehicle to get to games and practices. Unlike some, we can’t afford it.”

Michelle was relieved when the elevator doors opened. She refused to defend herself to this spoiled man who could buy anything he wanted, while she couldn’t give her daughter the one thing she dreamed about. It must be nice to have everything go right for you, she thought sourly.

When she knocked on the door, Tommy opened it, and she took a deep breath, preparing to deal with her world: the one where things always seemed to go wrong.

* * *

TROY WONDERED WHY his new neighbor disliked him so much. He was trying to be nice, considering what she’d gone through. He’d been making polite conversation and, wham, out came the guilt.

He wondered if Michelle didn’t want her daughter playing hockey. But one look at the woman’s eyes and he could see that it was ripping her up to not be able to give this to her child.

He didn’t like that look. He’d seen too much of that the past year. People who were desperate to help but helpless. He didn’t want the reminder of the bad time. Besides, it wasn’t fair.

He remembered when he’d played as a kid. His dad had sacrificed a lot so he could play. He’d worn second- or third-hand hockey equipment most of the time. It had been just his dad and him, and money had been tight. Troy had shown talent from his first league games, though, and his dad had dreamed of success through his son’s hockey career, so it had taken priority over anything else.

It had consumed his father. He’d take Troy to any ice they could find and drill him, working him hard to make him better. It was too bad he’d died before Troy had lifted the Cup. His dad might finally have been happy with what Troy had accomplished. Sure, he’d been happy when Troy was drafted, but he’d complained that he hadn’t gone top ten, and that the Blaze was a crap team. Well, that crap team had won the Cup, and Troy had his ring.