Whole School Behind Us
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2012 We hit the ice. We wear the equipment we wore in high school, pants that stop above the knee, shoulder pads that bear our beer bellied midriffs in secret beneath our jerseys. We shake the rust from our legs and facemasks and fire shots on our goalie, a former Western women's back up. As for me, I haven't played in an organized league since high school. My new team’s jerseys looks like the Montreal Canadians with the red and blue, but our jerseys have "Bad News Beers" written in italic. In the bottom of the font our team's mission statement is embroidered as a reminder to each opponent we face: 'fuck bitches, get money'. Since our goalie is the girlfriend of the team captain and he is creator of the name, I question this name choice. Our opponents are the "Don Cherry Poppers". I should learn to check the esoteric of my English degree at the dressing room door. Most of us played high school and travel; a couple of guys even spent time playing in isolated Junior B leagues in the extremes of Northern and Southern Ontario. The smells and the sounds send my thoughts wheeling back to a time when the stands were filled and there was energy beneath our feet. 2008 My high school team, the John F. Ross Royals, are in the 2008 OFSAA "AAAA" finals in my grade 12 year. We've practiced hard and drank to oblivion on the weekends. We've bleached our hair blond for the playoffs, instantly recognizable in our fourth period Math and English classes. Four guys are OHL prospects, and six will go on to play junior on some level. The Detroit Red Wings will draft one power forward, Stephen Johnston, in the sixth round, while another, Karri Oksanen, will play Collegiate Baseball for Arkansas Tech. I'm the sixth defensemen, raised on the relative mediocrity of the Guelph AA loop. For the Royals I'm filler, regulated to short mid period shifts and the odd penalty kill. After more than ten years of cheap hotels, screaming coaches and 6:AM practices, I feel like Paul Newman in Slapshot without the naked women. We're celebrities on Rogers Cable, the underdogs. Karri even gets an interview with Rogers on the ice before the game. "How's the team feeling?" says the overweight reporter. Karri leans on his stick, his voice bright like a kid on Christmas morning. "Well, all us guys are just so excited to be here today in Toronto for this. It's what we've been playing for all year. We have our whole school behind us. It just feels great to have that support." 2012 We line up. My hands feel like cement, so I skate around trying to hit anything that doesn't read 'fuck bitches, get money'. My eyesight has worsened since high school and I squint and spit and squint and spit. 2008 We win 2-1, and I play maybe five minutes. Karri scores a beautiful on a one-man rush, and Steve Johnston gets the winner at the beginning of the third with a snapshot from the hash mark. After both goals, everyone on the ice tackles the goal scorer and our bench goes nuts. Matt Samis, our goalie, faces 34 shots as the Majors came out like the team everyone expected. My contributions consist of knocking a guy off the puck in our corner, making the outlet pass, and later skating from our blue line to centre ice with the puck, dumping it in and changing. The local paper says we wanted it more. The stands are filled, 700 people watch us win—but it feels like way more. Order in dressing room after the game is lost. It's a chaotic swell of sweating bodies jumping on one another like puppies in a pen. The coaches, balding and stern in their bomber jackets, have tears in their eyes. I pose for a picture with my defence partner, Kevin, arms dug into our respective shoulder blades. We all touch the trophy with our hands. We scream our school name into the garbage can at the centre of the room. Our parents and our friends are everywhere so I duck into the empty stands. I find a balled up piece of clear tape and shoot it between two garbage cans. I score every time. 2012 "Ah, fuck boys, I think I'm gonna ralph." My new line mate is doubled over on our bench, and sucks wind. Each shift is torture, one line limps onto the ice after another. My lungs feel like they have moss growing around the lining. The water bottles have been empty since the first period. We'll end up losing 5-0. Katie, our goalie, is playing a solid game in net, but our defense can’t keep up with the crisp passes and aggressive rushes from the Poppers. I throw one big one hit in our end where the guy had his head down. The guy lines up with me for the last face-off. "Clean hit, man" he says. He seems pretty sincere. "I'm used to pick-up." I turn around and look at the stands, picturing the dark streets and the empty campus buildings on the other side, the whole school behind us. "Me too." I take the bus after the game. When I get to my girlfriend's house, who I met in a class called '20th Century Irish Literature', she says she doesn't want to come watch any more games because she doesn't like all the 'pushing'. She makes tea and I put my head on her lap. We watch Gilmore Girls and I fall into a deep sleep. 2008 Matt has a party at his parent's house I end up passed out on his lawn. At the start of summer, I walk out of high school and I never come back. 2012 Matt still lives in town and sells Hondas in Cambridge. He's engaged. Kevin played Junior 'C' with the Fergus Devils and now goes to the University of Guelph. He smokes weed every day and lives in a house with some of the guys from the old team. Stephen Johnston played for the Windsor Spitfires and won a Memorial Cup a couple years back. He made it all the way to a Red Wings training camp. According to Facebook, he's working at Wal Mart and last I heard he's playing in a men's league with some other ex-OHL guys. Karri was at Kevin's house for a party about a month ago, home for the summer. He got into an argument with some of the boys about a beer pong game and headed out in the night while Kevin slept on the couch. At 12:45 AM the Hasty Market clerk sold Karri a pack of Belmont's. He walked back to Kevin's as his previous anger subsided. A transport truck driver coming from Brantford didn't see Karri step from the gravel shoulder onto the asphalt to cross the highway. The boys rushed out to see when they heard sirens and by the time they got there he was being loaded on a stretcher. Karri was brain dead, on life support through the night. He was pronounced dead on a sunny Sunday morning in late August. *
At his visitation, most of the guys are there. Kevin's face is grey. My old gym teacher takes a long look at me as he tries to remember. When I line up to shake the family's hand, I think about what I'm going to say to Karri's dad.
**
He's a big man. The front of his blazer is wet with his own tears but also mixed with the tears of those who embraced him before my turn in line.
"I'm sorry," I say. "Thank you." He shakes my hand. "It's a horrible feeling. I don't understand, I don't understand. But it feels better knowing his team is still behind him." I look around the funeral home. "The whole school behind you." ***
On Monday night with the Bad News Beers I go out and skate as hard as I can, chasing ghosts.
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Alex Carey is graduating this year with an Honours Specialization in English Literature and a Minor in Creative Writing. He received an honorable mention in the 2013 Alfred R. Poynt Award in the Department of English and Writing and volunteers as a reader and social media editor for The Rusty Toque. He is from Guelph, Ontario and he usually works at a summer camp for July and August, but now that he is graduating, he is looking for more boring and adult ways to earn a paycheque.
