The Man Who Can't Be Moved

“Tu es un trou du cul!” Flower bellows, as he waddles towards the dressing room door, clad only in his bulky leg pads, skates and a backwards Pens cap as Staalsy and I enter the scarcely populated room.

It’s a small crowd; normally the profanity and the insults and the perverted, smart ass banters drowns out the music that blares from the iPod docking station that sits on top of a row of lockers. Today you can clearly make out Marilyn Manson’s freaky ass bullshit; the screeching and shrieking about ‘the beautiful people’ booming through the speakers as several bodies linger at their respective stalls. From the looks of things, the guys in attendance have all either missed the memo that practice had been cancelled due to the weather, or we were the only ones stupid enough to make the trip. I can’t help but steal a glance towards the left side of the room, eyes zeroing in on the second last stall as I silently plead for there to be some sign that God actually does exist; that miracles do happen and I’ve been blessed to avoid confrontation for at least one more day.

But my hopes fade fast when I notice Sid’s belongings; North Face parka hung on the hook at the back of his locker, personal effects neatly arranged on the top shelf, a pair of winter boots placed in front of his bench. Fucking Armageddon outside and he still feels the need to be the first at the rink. I can understand his love and devotion for the game; he’s phenomenally talented and he’s been groomed for greatness from the time he was a toddler. What I don’t understand is how it can be the only thing that he truly loves; that even after all the heartache with Em he can’t seem get it through his thick fucking skull that there’s more to life than hockey. There has to be more to life; there has to be something else that gets his pulse racing and his juices flowing. Something that even he would consider slowing himself down a bit for. Apparently he hasn’t found it; it doesn’t exist in the adorable, bubbly, sugary sweet and impossibly vibrant Penn State student he’d hooked up with a month ago and is apparently -if you listen to Vero’s gossip- holding out hope that she’s the future Mrs. Crosby.

Good fucking luck.

“Why am I an asshole?” I inquire, as my best friend greets me with a one armed hugged around the neck and a noisy, sloppy kiss on the cheek.

“You were supposed to come over last night! You were supposed to stop by with Emma-Leigh! Imbecile! How could you forget? How could you let that slip your mind? Do you have any idea how upset Vero is? What I’ve had to put up with?! Tu es un grand merdeux!”

“Je suis desolee,” I apologize, as he curls his arm even tighter around my neck and yanks me in the direction of our side by side stalls. “It honestly slipped my mind; I didn’t remember. Em had had long flight and she wasn’t feeling well and by the time we stopped to get something to eat and then headed home, we were ready for bed.”

“I bet you were,” he chuckles, and tousles my hair and finally relinquishes his hold on me. “I bet you never got out of bed until the very last second today. Not that I blame you. If I had to go two months without having sex…”

“You’re going to go a lot longer than that once the doctor tells Vero it’s not safe to have it anymore,” Dupers comments, as he wanders out of the equipment room, teetering on his skates as he does up the strings on his hockey pants. “It’s going to happen, Flower. Whether you like it or not. She’s going to get too big to be knocking boots; she’s going to be way too uncomfortable. I give it another month and then the OB will be giving you guys the red light.”

“But she’ll only be seven months!” our goalie protests. “That’s way too soon!”

“But she looks like she’s nine months and then some,” Dupers points out. “Come on; cut the girl some goddamn slack. She’s suffering, you know? Her back is killing her, her ankles are swollen, she can’t see her feet and she’s got wicked heartburn twenty four seven. All to give you a kid. Isn’t that enough? You can’t go without sex for a few months?”

“A few months?!” Flower cries, as he drops onto the bench in front of his bench. “Merde alors! Why the hell so long?”

“Because there’s like almost like eight weeks or something like that after the baby comes where you have to wait,” I reply, as I toe off my snow covered boots and unzip my jacket; my shoulder rebelling the second I attempt to slip out of my coat, a horrific, burning pain erupting in the nape of my neck and spreading all the way down to the tips of my fingers. I have to bite down on my bottom lip to prevent a string of profanities from erupting from my mouth, the agony subsiding only for my entire arm to go completely numb. Not fucking good at all. I’m just glad that both Dupers and Flower have their minds on pulling on the rest of their equipment; that they can’t see the distress etched on my face.

“See that?” Dupers jerks his head in my direction. “Even Superstar knows at least a little bit about kids. Don’t you think you should be learning something, Flower? Why don’t you go and buy yourself some kind of book about pregnancy. So you know that the fuck is going on and you won’t be a useless twit in the delivery room.”

“I am not going in there,” he declares. “I have already told Vero that she’s on her own. I don’t care who goes in my place. Her mother, her sister, a fucking stranger off the street. I am not doing it. I don’t want to see it, d’accord? I don’t want to be in the room when it all goes down. Reminds me of that scene in Alien when the monster came out of the guy’s stomach,” he shudders at the mere thought.

“Only thing about the scene in Alien is the fact that that monster is probably a hundred times better looking than what your kid is going to be,” Matt Cooke pipes up from across the room.

“Very fucking funny,” Flower tosses a roll of stick tape in his direction. “My kid is going to be phenomenally beautiful, alright?”

“Only if it looks like it’s mother,” I comment, and then chuckle and jump out of the way when he grabs his blocker and takes a swipe at me with it. “And maybe you shouldn’t be worrying so much about your upcoming lack of a sex life and whether or not you’re going to pass out in the delivery room and start worrying more about all the pucks you’re letting in behind you.”

“Fuck you, Max,” he grumbles. “You don’t have any idea what it’s like, okay? You have no idea what that woman is putting me through! Treating me like her goddamn servant all the time! Getting me to rub her feet and massage her back and tie her shoes! And the cravings! They’re off the fucking hook! Last night she made me go and get her Taco Bell!”

“What’s wrong with that?” I ask, as I slowly and carefully begin peeling off my clothes.

“At two thirty in the morning!” he cries. “At two thirty in the morning she wakes me up and tells me that she’s hungry! That she wants Taco Bell! So off I go, being a good little errand boy just so I won’t have to incur her wrath anymore than I have to! So I go and get her some goddamn Taco Bell and it takes me nearly an hour and a half ‘cause of how shit the roads were! And you know what she does? You know what happens when I get back? Does she even seem worried that I could have gotten into an accident? All she cares about is that I didn’t get her enough fucking hot sauce! Can you believe that? Do you realize what the weather was like last night? No, you wouldn’t realize ‘cause you were too busy fucking your wife!”

“Flower…” Dupers’ voice is low and rumbling and his eyes are riveted on Cookie; waiting to see if he reacts to the use of the ‘w’ word. Thankfully, he seems too immersed in tying his skates to really give a rat’s ass about our conversation. “Ferme ta guele, connard. Don’t you think that’s something that Max needs to tell people about?”

“What? What did I say?” our goalie asks. “I didn’t say anything wrong. I just said that…”

“You just said that Emma-Leigh is Max’s wife,” Cookie says. “I’m not deaf, you know. And I’m also not blind; I saw that ring on his finger the second he walked in here.”

Dupers sighs heavily and rakes both of his hands through his hair.

“I honestly don’t see what the big fucking deal is,” Cookie continues, as he yanks his practice jersey over his head and stands up. “Why the hell keep it a secret? We’re all adults around here, right? Why the need to hide it like there’s something you need to be ashamed about?”

“’Cause there’s a lot of…issues…that needed to be worked out,” I explain.

“Yeah…a lot of issues you and your legendary wandering dick have caused,” he retorts. “I mean, come on, Max. First you fuck his girl and now you run off and marry her? Where’s the fucking loyalty in that? The respect? Whatever happened to the whole ‘bros before hoes’ mentality? And what the hell is so special about this girl anyway that both you and Sid got so hooked on? The vag that good that neither of you can keep out of it?”

“Listen you little fuck…” I only manage two steps before Dupers is in front of me, laying his hands on my shoulders and aggressively shoving me backwards towards my stall.

“Truth hurts, huh?” Cookie gives a chuckle and shoves his helmet onto his head. “You know how I felt about this whole ‘fucking your buddy’s girl’ thing when it first happened. So don’t be expecting any wedding presents or congratulatory cards from me.”

“Whether or not you were okay with it or not wouldn’t make a difference anyway,” Tanger remarks, as he casually saunters in from the stick room in his underarmour, a Pens cap, a pair of athletic socks pulled up to his knees and bright yellow Crocs on his feet. “After all, you have to be able to spell your own name to sign the card.”

“That’s rich coming from you,” Cookie gives a derisive snort. “Considering you started this whole ‘fuck your buddy’s girl’ thing by poaching TK’s woman right out from under his nose.”

“I am not even going to dignify that with a response,” Tanger says, not even blinking an eyelash as he continues towards his stall.

“You’re all alike,” Cookie declares as he heads for the door. “I’ll leave you Frenchies alone to talk your pig latin and plot whose wife or girlfriend to steal next.”

“You just do that,” Flower gives a sugary sweet smile. “At least you know you won’t have to worry. Your marriage is safe. ‘Cause none of us would touch your old lady with someone else’s equipment.”

“Don’t be such a prick,” Cookie grumbles, then stands up and bangs his gloved hands together like a boxer getting ready to step into the ring.

Normally I don’t mind the guy; I even used to be the first one that would laugh over his smart ass comments and the often vulgar and degrading way he’d talk about his sex life with his wife. Now that I have a wife of my own, I’m ashamed at myself for ever finding his comments amusing. I can’t imagine ever talking about Em that way; turning the love of my life and my be all and end all into locker room chatter. Now I’m the one that’s steering clear of all of the sexual bullshit that gets discussed; a shock for the other guys considering they used to gather around my stall and listen intently while I gave them very detailed descriptions of whoever I happened to be banging. But Cookie’s a team player and I respect how he ‘brings it’ each and every night; he’s rough and tumble and while his play sometimes borders on shady and controversial, he’s a definite asset to the team.

That being said, I’m not above tearing him another asshole the next time he opens his big mouth about Em.

“And do us all a favour, would ya Flower?” Cookie asks from the dressing room door. “Quit grossing us all out and put a goddamn shirt on. I’ve got more hair on my balls than you do on your entire chest.”

Our goalie simply rolls his eyes and then glances sideways at me and shakes his head. As if to say, ‘Can you believe this guy?’

“What an asshole,” Dupers mutters, as Cookie finally leaves the room, and then turns to give me a reassuring smile and then taps his palm affectionately against my cheek. “We can’t all be universally loved, Superstar. We can’t make everyone happy. Don’t worry about that little shit.”

“Makes me sick,” Flower mutters. “Il est un grand baiseur. There’s certain rules, you know? About locker room talk. It’s okay to talk shit about random women, but you don’t do disrespect to a guy’s wife or girlfriend, bien?"

“Bien,” Dupers and I say in unison, as Tanger -attention focused solely on the tape job he’s performing on the freshly cut stick between his thighs- nods in agreement.

“Certain rules?” Staalsy laughs dryly as he smoothes down the Velcro straps that holds his shoulder pads in place. “I think every rule that ever existed in here has gone completely down the shitter, don’t you? Considering a couple of you guys already broke the mother of them all by poaching your buddies’ girls.”

“Do you want this stick shoved up your ass, Staalsy?” Tanger inquires, ever his cool, collected and soft spoken self. “’Cause I’m not above ramming this fucker as far up your hole as humanly possible.”

The kid from Thunder Bay just shakes his head in obvious disgust and dismay, grabs his remaining equipment and heads for the door. He knows he’s lost this battle; that leaving is the only possible way of holding onto whatever shred of dignity he still has left.

***********

A slow, shit eating grin spreads across Dupers face and he tosses one of his gloves in Tanger’s direction, catching the young defenseman off the top of his head. “Who pissed on your Corn Flakes?” he teases. “What’s eating you?”

“Or who isn’t eating you,” Flower chides.

“It’s nothing,” Tanger mumbles, and picks loose pieces of tape from the knob of his stick. “It’s just…I don’t know…it’s something yet it’s nothing all at the same time.”

“That was quite possibly the most fucking cryptic answer you’ve ever given,” Dupers says.

“What I mean is that it’s nothing with the possibility of turning into something,” he explains. “Or it’s something with the possibility of being nothing. Fuck…” he gives a strangled groan and runs the palms of his hands over his face. “I am so fucking confused!”

“Qu’est-ce qui na va pas?” I ask, as I slip on both skates and then slam the blades down onto the floor to force them fully onto my feet. “What’s going on? Everything okay? With you and Peyton?”

“Oui,” he gives an affirmative nod. “Ca va tres bien. Mais…” he sighs and chews nervously on his bottom lip.

“Spit it out, Tanger!” Dupers ordered. “We don’t have all goddamn day! What’s going on?”

“Peyton thinks she’s pregnant,” he mumbles.

“Merde sainte!” Flower exclaims. “You too? Like what the fuck is going on around here? First Vero, now Peyton…”

“We don’t know for sure,” Tanger quickly explains. “We don’t know if it’s a sure thing, you know? Just she’s a couple months late and it’s happened before ‘cause her cycle has been all screwed to shit since she was a teenager. But now she’s throwing up every morning and she’s complaining about headaches all the time…”

“I swear to God, your women have some fucking conspiracy going on,” I declare, as I lean over to lace my skates. “I’m still holding onto my belief that Vero got tired of waiting around for Flower to pop the question and all of that and decided to take matters into her own hands. She wasn’t going to wait forever to start a family so she figured she’d poke holes in all the condoms to get what she wanted.”

“Vero would never do that,” Flower argues. “Ever.”

“Yes, she would,” Dupers says. “You’ve been with her for more than half your life practically. She’s pissed off that it’s taking you so damn long to shit or get off the pot about marrying her so she decided to land you in another way. I honestly don’t see what the hold up is; why you haven’t just gotten hitched already. I mean, if Max can marry someone he’s only known for seven months…”

“Things are great the way they are!” our goalie cries. “Things are perfect! Once you sign those papers and the rings go on your finger, all hell breaks lose!” he glances at me, then at Tanger and adds, “No offence.”

“Things are going to get fucked up right quick if she is pregnant,” Tanger laments. “I mean, it’s all okay by me. I’m happy about it, you know? But it’s my goddamn family! My mom and my step dad are huge Catholics and we’re only getting married in Notre Dame to make them happy! ‘Cause that’s what they wanted for us! Big old Catholic wedding! They’re going to have a stroke if Peyton walks down the aisle as big as a fucking house!”

“More like mommy Letang will find out that her baby boy’s not as pure and innocent as he makes himself out to be,” Dupers teases. “Do you people have something against birth control or something? First Flower and Vero, now you and Peyton…”

“Things come in threes, right?” Flower asks, as he lays a hand on my shoulder in order to push himself up onto his feet and then begins gathering up his remaining equipment. “Isn’t that how the saying goes? That things come in threes?”

“Something like that,” Duper replies. “But don’t look at me. I’m not planning on planting any more seeds any time soon.”

“Max is next,” Flower declares, and taps me on the top of the head with his blocker. “He’s next on the daddy-hood list.”

“Not for another couple of years,” I say, and shrug into my jersey. “Emmy-Lou and I already agreed that we weren’t going to have kids for a bit. That we’re going to enjoy married life as much as we can before we start bringing rug rats into the world. And we’re definitely not in any rush after what happened to her back in September.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s going to happen again,” Dupers points out. “Just because it happened once doesn’t mean she’ll lose another baby.”

“True…” I agree, and attach the fighting strap on my pants to the inside of my jersey.

The guys don’t know about Em’s internal issues and how conceiving is almost next to impossible and that it’s practically a guarantee that if she does manage to get pregnant, she wouldn’t carry past the first term. Frankly, I don’t want to be selfishly rushing into parenthood if something like that is going to happen; I don’t want my own desire to be a father to cause her irreversible emotional pain and suffering. I’d seen how devastated she’d been when she’d lost her and Sid’s baby; how it had affected her long term. And I don’t want her to have to go through such a traumatic event again. Because this time I’m not sure if she’d ever fully recover.

“But we’re just not ready right now,” I add. “I mean, she’s only nineteen right? That’s still young. She’s practically a baby herself. We’ve got lots of time to be thinking about kids. Besides, I want her to go back to school. She had a good thing going on before…well before everything happened. She’s crazy smart. Seems like a shame to waste it all.”

“It’s not about what you want in a case like that,” Dupers says. “It’s about what she wants. Don’t pull a Sid and start telling her what she can and can’t do.”

“I just want her to do something that makes her happy,” I reason. “That’s all I want. I just want her to be happy. And trust me; Em is not the type of woman that’s going to be happy sitting at home day in and day out. That’s just not her. She’s not a typical WAG; she doesn’t want to spend all of her time shopping and getting her nails done and all that shit.”

“Knock her up then,” Dupers chides. “If you knock her up, she won’t have time to be bored at home. Come on, Superstar. You can’t tell me that you’re not jonesin’ to start a family; that you wouldn’t love to have a little Maxime Junior to call your own.”

“Of course I would. But…”

“This is all about ensuring our blood lines live on,” Dupers interjects. “It’s about having someone to carry on your name if something happens to you. ‘Cause let’s face it, the way shit is going in the league these days? We are all one fucking head shot or check from behind into the boards from being wiped out. From permanent lights out.”

“You are one fatalistic bastard,” Tanger declares.

“Realistic,” he corrects, and grabs the rest of his gear. “Think about it, Max…” he smacks me lightly upside the head. “You really want something happening to you out on the ice and not having anyone left behind to carry on the Talbot name? And I’m not talking about cousins and all that shit. I’m talking about offspring. Lives you helped make. You really wanna take that chance? You really want to…”

“Gentleman,” Mario’s voice, rich and authoritative, filters into the room. “Isn’t there a practice you should all be getting to?” he inquires, as his eyes flicker between the four of us. “By the sounds of it, your teammates are already out there. Is there a reason why you’re all congregated in here instead of out there breaking a sweat?”

“Time got away from us,” Dupers offers up a simple explanation. “Won’t happen again.”

“You’re right,” Mario gives a tight lipped smile. “It won’t.”

Tanger clears his throat noisily and then gives our ‘boss’ an apologetic smile before he hurries from the room. The rest of us follow suit; slipping our helmets and gloves on and grabbing our sticks before heading for the door.

“Not you,” Mario plants himself in the doorway before I get the chance to follow Dupers and Flower out into the hallway. “We need to have a little chat,” he adds.

“Is this where you’re going to tell me I need to head to Barnes and Noble and buy a travel guide on British Columbia?” I ask, hoping to lighten the mood.

“This is where you start being honest,” he replies. “I think I deserve that, don‘t you? I think you owe the man who pays your bills the truth.”

I swallow noisily and nod.

The shit is about to hit the fucking fan.