So This Is Rock Bottom

The city has lost its spark. It's fire, its passion. Hockey is....or was, huge in the steel city of Pittsburgh. It started when they lost the cup in the final five seconds. Nobody really could figure it out, but it set off a domino effect, things crashing down around the team. Some would say it was a long time coming, a long period of tension finally snapping. Some believed they could pull it together again, others, not so much. The team hadn't even come close to the Stanley Cup this year, not by a long shot. Their season ended early and many went home after that final game, wondering if there would even be a next season.

Hannah worked for the LA Kings for nearly three years. She made them look good, marketed the team to sponsors and the general public. She had watched the decline of one of the greatest teams in the league. The Kings had just won the cup when she decided to quit. She didn't know what she was doing. She was young, twenty four, and ready to take on the challenges of a different world. That's what Pittsburgh felt like when she stepped off the plane, a different world. It was raining, not the harsh, pounding, thunderous rain storms of the summer. No, it was a drizzling, misty haze of fall. It was June.

She had saved up to rent, a small place just inside the city. It was far from her LA apartment, the large windows looking over the hills, replaced with a grimey pane. A work in progress. She barely took time to unpack before she took off with her resume and went straight to the Consol Energy Center. It was like a ghost town near the home of the Penguins. The parking lot, mostly deserted. She half expected some tumbleweeds to roll past her as she went inside. It was so quiet, her steps echoing through the building. She went up to the offices. She had spoken to someone the week before and now she was handing in a resume. They had her sit down with the office manager. She interviewed and then sat and waited. They were going to get the coaches and GM. This was a big hiring decision. They sat all around a large, round table, their faces tired and worn out. They told her they couldn't match the salary she had made in LA. She told them to pay her less. They didn't believe she was serious. She told me they could pay her minimum wage if they needed to. She was hired.

She was sitting in the rink, high up in the stands, looking down at the ice. She had just been hired on a little more than minimum wage. She was crazy, that's what she had been told. She wouldn't have the job for long, that's what they chirped. She closed her eyes, smiling to herself. She could almost hear it, the ghostly echos of fans, the goal horn, the sound of blades cutting through the ice. She was going to her life for this team. It was about time that the Pittsburgh Penguins had their comeback.