Ten

He gave me this look of complete sadness, like he was trying to say you-sad-sack, why-am-I-even-here? Fucking-charity-cases, but he got up and wandered into my shower. I rolled onto my side and threw the blanket back over my head before trying to sleep again.

Yes, I definitely had bruises all over my ass and thighs. I uncovered my head and used the weak light from the sun straining in through the shades to look at the rest of myself. Painful-looking blue bruises, a completely misplaced one on my calf (but that might have been from the game, so it’s OK), and something that resembled a hickey on my shoulder.

Groggily, I turned back over and covered my head again to sleep for an hour. Or three.

I woke again and look at the clock. Nine-thirty-eight. The bed is still empty, evidently Miro doesn’t have the ability to shower, come back to bed, and sleep some more. I struggled out from under the comforter and stretched.

Yes, those were definitely bruises, and they definitely hurt.

Rubbed my eyes and went downstairs, looked around before I found Miro in my living room, seated like he owns the place, on my couch with my newspaper.

“You have a nice house,” he said cheerfully. “Kind of too many plants, but you have a nice house. I like it. I’d live here.”

“Bastard. My mom gave me all those plants. You want me to throw out the plants my mom gave me?” I teased. “You’re horrible.”

He blushed. “Sorry. You do have a lot of plants, though. I was kind of bored, so I took a little walk around your house.”

“Tell me about it. They’re hell to water. I’ve killed like, ten, just from long road trips.” I was in an extraordinarily better mood. The few hours of sleep had helped.

The phone rang, and Miro reached over to pick it up. “Hello?” in English. “Yeah, he’s here, just a second,” in Slovakian.

Fuck, I thought. Who IS it?

“Hello?”

“Hey, darling brother. What’s up?”

I sighed with utter relief. “Just you. What do you want, Marcel?” I made a mental note to hurt my brother the next time I saw him for calling me so early and giving me a heart attack.

“I wanted to congratulate on your win last night.”

“Do you not believe in calling me the night of, or what? Why so early?”

“I wanted to give you time to deal with the adoring throngs, so I decided I’d wait till now.” I rolled my eyes.

“Oh, you are so amusing, I can’t get over it.”

“I’m auditioning for my comedy career next Tuesday, maybe you can come. But anyway, who was that who answered your phone?”

I turned white. I know I did. There are no mirrors in my living room, but I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that I turned slate-white when Marcel asked that. Why? Why?

“Erm…today?” I asked blankly. Even though my brain had shut down operations for the day and hung out the little “Come Back Later” sign, I tried to stall for time.

“No, last month, idiot. Yes, today.” He sounded perturbed.

“Uh.” Fucker. I opened and closed my mouth a few times. “Nobody.”

“Nobody who? It didn’t sound like Zdeno.” Well, dumbass, it wasn’t. Zdeno Chara was probably at home, still asleep. Like a normal person. Goddammit, what was I supposed to say?

“It’s not. It’s nobody important.”

Marcel knew well enough when to leave me alone (a skill finely honed after years of yelling and screaming at him, slamming doors in his face, and beating him up after I caught his skinny ass going through my stuff) and he shut up. He mentioned a few other things about some of his friends, something he’d heard about Dukla Trencin, and that our parents were thinking of painting the kitchen yellow instead of blue. I sort of quit paying attention to either what was going on in my own living room or on the telephone.

“Okay? Marian? Marian?”

“Yeah, what?”

“I’ll call you back later, okay? I love you, talk to you later.”

“Yeah, I love you too Marcel bye see you later.” I slammed the phone down and stood up quickly. The dynamic of my living room had changed, gone from cheerful teasing to awkward silence.

“Your brother’s nice,” Miro said coldly.

“Uh, yeah, he is good. We used to fight all the time though, we’ve gotten a lot better. When I left to play for Dukla Trencin it got a lot better,” I babbled. He looked absently at me; he looked then through me. “What?”

“Nothing.” He stood up after a half a second. “I better be going, people will miss me.”

“You have a little while yet, right?” I asked. I must have sounded too eager, because he looked upset and made for the door.

“No, I really better leave.”

“What is it? What’d I do?” I asked sharply. “Either fucking tell me or leave.” He said nothing, just walked towards the door. “Fine! Don’t tell me! Just don’t come back, then.” He gestured ‘okay’ and looked for his coat. “Fuck you!” I should have realized by this point that if you’re upset and screaming and the other person won’t say anything, getting more upset and screaming louder will not make them speak. Sadly, I continued to shout like a hyena on amphetamines. “Leave! See if I care!” My dialogue had reduced itself to the level of a fourteen-year-old and his equally young ‘n’ stupid girlfriend, but I didn’t care. Hey, I was mad!

Miro stepped outside into the garage purposefully for a minute, then stopped short and looked confused. He seemed to be recalling the events of the previous night.

And then I started laughing at him.

I felt like a horrible person, but I really couldn’t stop laughing. I’d driven him to my fucking house! I slumped myself against the doorjamb into the garage, still chilly even though it was going into spring, and I laughed.

He came up to me and put his hands on my shoulders, then shoved me back into the house. I cut myself off, still wheezing with laughter.

“What do you want me to do now?” he asked, still using that calm, cold, spiky-sharp voice. I wanted to hide from it, but how do you hide from a sound?

I pulled the keys off the rack and threw them at him. “Leave. I’ll get my car later,” I said pointedly, and Miro left. He didn’t look back. Not even once.

I threw myself around for a while, acting spoiled and self-important. And once I thought it was okay, I called up Bonkie.

“Hello?”

“Hey, you have to help me get my car back.”

“The fuck? Marian, please don’t tell me your car was stolen and you’re enlisting me to help find it. Call the police, not me, man. Unless you were aiming for 911 and you hit my number instead, I can’t help you,” he said, sounding exasperated.

“No, no, no. But it’s a long story. Can you come pick me up?” I asked. “Please?”

He sighed. “Fine. I guess. But only because I have nothing better to do. And because I think this will be interesting.”

He was right. He picked me up and we drove into town to the hotel where the Sabres were staying and drove around the (massive) parking lot for an hour. I swear.

“Look, maybe that’s it—no, nope. There, may—no, that’s not it either. Hey, over there, maybe—oh, no, never mind.”

“Radek, please shut up before I hit you.”

“Is that it—no, wait.”

I hit him. He shut up. Problem solved. Eventually my car appeared in the distance, and he dropped me off.

Locked. Naturally. Keys in full view on the seat, I made plans to kill Miro.

“All right? Have I helped enough? Can I go home now?” Radek leaned out of his window as I slumped against the wheel well of my shiny blue car.

“Yeah, leave. I’ll call a locksmith.”

I did just that, actually, waited for about an hour and a half while the locksmith tried to get to me in the brutal Ottawa traffic, all the while thinking “Next time I see him, I’m going to kill him, kill him, there won’t be anything left but a grease spot.”

“A ha ha ha!” chortled the locksmith, roaring up in his Mr. Lock truck. I wanted him to die. “Locked your keys in your car, eh?”

To spare him the long story of “well, no, not quite, see, I met this guy at the Olympics for real, but he’s psycho—REALLY psycho—but I think I love him, so I took him back to my house then we fought and he took my car back and probably did this to piss me off,” I answered “Yeah, pretty stupid.”

Five minutes and thirty-eight dollars lighter, I sent the man off. “Yeah! Thanks a lot! I’ll call you next time I’m stupid!” I yelled after his truck. Goddammit.

I walked back in and that damn answering machine light was flashing again. I wanted to kill it as I stabbed the “play” button angrily.

“Marian? Havlat. Dinner after practice, Bonkie, me, Zdeno, you in? Call.” Well, thanks, Martin, I thought. One of his typically concise messages, seeing as how he’s always talked like he’s being charged for it.

“Hoss, a bunch of us are going out to dinner later, just found out or I would have told you on our big car-finding adventure. [Hysterical laughter] You should come, it’ll be laughs a plenty.” Thanks Radek, got the message already.

“Marian? [long pause] It’s me. Um…I’m sorry. I guess I’ll try you later. Sorry.”

Oh God. Miro had called me back. All at once I wanted to scream at him but squeeze him tightly to my chest.

I promptly sat down on the couch and willed the phone to ring.

“Ring, damn you.”

Damn thing stayed silent for what seemed like an eternity. When it finally did ring, I almost jumped on it.

“Hello?” I panted.

“Yeah Hoss, are you coming?”

“What? Coming where?” To my brain, Havlat’s dinner invitation was as foreign as ancient Sumerian scrolls.

“To dinner with us tonight after practice, which begins in three hours, okay?” He spoke in an exaggeratedly slow manner. Fucker. I’d kill him.

“Yeah, sure, I guess.” I’d choke down some food. Probably wouldn’t help my mood at all, but it was better than sitting at home psychically commanding my phone to ring.

“Okay, see you later.” I was surprised the phone conversation had even lasted that long. Martin is convinced that somehow, the more he talks, the less time he’ll have to do important things like I don’t know, eat? I honestly don’t know.

I stared at the phone.

If it had eyes, it would have stared back at me.

It finally rang.

“Hello?” I answered before the first ring was done.

“Marian?” Miro. Thank God, I said silently. “We’re back in Buffalo, I’m at home. And, um, I’m sorry.”

I paused for a long time, not quite knowing what to say. “I accept your apology.”

“And, um, I thought about some things.” He sounded very quiet and still.

“Yeah?”

“I’m going to get help.” Even quieter than before, I heard his voice crack on the last word. I swear I wanted nothing more on earth than to hold him.

“I’m proud of you.” Some deep well in the old Responsible, Honest, Dependable, Reliable Marian had sprung up and I realized I sounded like I used to sound.

Before I met him.

“I love you.” He hung up. In the half-second before the dial tone hit my ears, I was unbelievably, shockingly happy. I wanted to jump up and down for joy, I wished I recorded my phone conversations.

“I love you too.”

I had the best practice I’d had in a long time. Total ecstasy must be good for skill, I guess.