Dropping Gloves (30 page)

For the rest of my time with Katie that day, the two of us got to know more about Koz. Even though it was very obvious that she still felt like hell, she was smiling when the guys and I left. A real smile, not one she’d pasted in place so we wouldn’t worry.

I wasn’t sure
if the signs the guys and I carried with us as we came and went from Katie’s house were helping, or if it was just the fact that she was staying out of the public eye. Whatever was behind it, the media was finally easing up on her and finding some other celebrities to feed their addiction.

That was one positive thing.

The way the team had been playing of late was another positive. Whether Koz was starting to feel more like he belonged or we were treating him more like he was one of us, there had been a huge change in the way he was playing. He was listening more and talking less, but when he did speak up, he usually had something constructive to say. He saw the ice differently than most of us, almost like he could see a play forming from up above. He realized not only where the guys on the ice were at the moment but could see where they were heading. Now, when he said something, the rest of us listened.

Our puck luck was starting to change for the better, and everyone was playing a lot looser. Well, almost everyone. I hadn’t been playing my best. I hadn’t scored a goal in nearly two weeks, and I’d hardly even gotten any assists. Those I had gotten had been due to luck more than any of my own efforts. My aim and timing were off, and I didn’t know what to do about it. I tried not to let it get to me, but it was. I felt as if I wasn’t holding up my end of the bargain, and that didn’t make me a very good captain.

In my weekly leadership meetings with Bergy and the rest of the coaches, we always discussed the things we could do to keep the team moving in this direction, keep the guys focused on the big picture and our overall goals. Bergy was a huge proponent of goals, big and small, short-term and long-term.

Even though I knew my game was suffering, it surprised me when, during our most recent meeting, Bergy wasn’t happy with the short-term goal I’d written down:
Spend a day on the road with Koz to get to know him better
.

“That’s not a good goal for you,” Bergy said.

“Why isn’t that a good goal?” I asked.

“Because you’ve already done what you needed to with Koz. Now you need to trust the rest of the guys to pick up where you left off. He’s being a team player now. He’s found his voice in the room and on the ice. He doesn’t need to be your focus anymore.”

I must have been giving him a confused expression because he scowled, crossing his arms. “You need to make goals about your own game. Not the team. You need to figure out what’s going on with your own shit instead of worrying about everyone else’s for a while.”

“It’s easier to worry about them than to deal with what’s wrong with me.”

“I think you know what’s wrong with you.” Bergy handed me another three-by-five index card. When I didn’t immediately start writing, he said, “Tell him what he needs to focus on, Danger, because he’s not getting it.”

“If your personal life isn’t in order, your game is going to suffer,” Danger said. “It’s a simple fact. Right now, your focus shouldn’t be on the team as much as it should be on your life away from the game.”

My life away from the game. Right now, that was just Katie. Nothing more and nothing less. And obviously, the ways I worried about her had probably been affecting my play.

“It’s only normal to worry about the people you love, Babs,” Burnzie said. “That’s what we do. You need to find ways to channel that when we’re off the ice so that during games, you can think about what’s happening there.”

I chewed on that for a while, and then I remembered what Koz had said about bringing his grandma flowers every day because it had made her smile. He had done it because it was something that lightened her load, even just for a moment, and that made living his own life slightly easier. He couldn’t cure his grandma’s cancer any more than I could cure Katie’s, but he could bring her flowers. He could make her smile, even if it was only a brief respite. I could do the same thing.

I wrote down a new goal:
Make Katie smile every day, no matter what it takes.

Bergy looked over my shoulder, and then he nodded and walked away. “I think that’s good enough for this week, boys. Let’s get ready for practice.”

“The tumor is
definitely shrinking,” Dr. Oliver said.

I grasped on to that like it was a life buoy. “Then no surgery.”

He glanced up over the top of my chart. “It’s shrunk, but not enough to rule out surgery. It’s not gone, and I doubt it will completely disappear until you have the thyroidectomy. You’re skipping over steps, Katie. Important steps.”

I sighed like a deflating balloon, and Jamie took my hand. We’d hardly had this much contact in a month, and I let his warmth cocoon around me.

For the last couple of weeks, he’d been bringing me flowers every day and having them delivered while he was out on the road. My house was starting to look like a spring garden. Daisies, tulips, roses, lilies, carnations…he’d given me every flower under the sun in every color imaginable. I kept running out of vases and having to send someone out to buy me more so I’d have room for them all. That wasn’t what had touched me the most, though. He’d given me a soft, stuffed cat, a toy like you’d give a five-year-old.
So you’ll have something to hold when you’re not allowed contact
, he’d said. I’d felt silly at first when I’d snuggled that cat close to me at night, but eventually the thought had faded and I’d been glad for something to hold.

But now, he was next to me. Holding my hand. Helping to settle me through the simple act of touching me. I doubted he understood just how healing his presence could be, but it was a balm to my soul at a time when I felt as alone as I’d ever been in my life.

“Radiation has definitely helped things along,” the doctor said. “It hasn’t helped enough, and I don’t think this is something we want to just keep throwing radiation at. I think we definitely need to move on to chemotherapy, as we discussed previously.”

I bit my tongue to keep from throwing a fit. Radiation had been awful, and chemo was worse, but at least chemo wouldn’t keep me in isolation nonstop. I would be allowed to touch people again. To touch Jamie, like we were doing now. To let him hold me. Maybe we could even make love sometimes, as long as I felt up to it and he wasn’t disgusted by my bald head and all the other fun things that came with the territory.

“Okay. Chemo next, and then maybe the tumor will disappear.”

The doctor grimaced, and Jamie squeezed my hand, and I almost lost my shit.

“I know!” I said. “I shouldn’t get my hopes up about that, and I know that I’m probably going to end up having surgery. But I have to have hope that I can avoid it. Don’t take that one small thing away from me.” My damn tears were back, and it pissed me off. I batted them away with the back of my free hand. “Please. Just let me hope, even if you know that there is absolutely zero chance in hell that it’ll go the way I want, at least have the decency to leave me with some hope.” I took a shuddering breath, bracing myself for him to tell me the same shit he’d been telling me all along and squash my plea and my spirit in a single blow.

Dr. Oliver set the chart aside and fixed me with his professional stare. “There is always hope,” he said.

I took those words in and held them tight to my heart.

We spent some time hashing out all the details for my upcoming chemotherapy regimen. I would go in to have a port implanted in a few days, and I’d start the first round of chemo in a week. Dr. Oliver said I could start getting back to being around people like normal, as long as I was up to it. I needed to still limit the time I spent touching kids, pregnant women, and animals for another week or two, but I could have sex again—thank God—and have fairly normal contact with Jamie other than spending a full night together. The doctor said that should wait a week, as well, but we could gradually build ourselves up to the type of physical relationship that we wanted.

Once all of that was arranged, Jamie drove me home. It wasn’t a game night, and he’d already finished everything he was required to do for the team for the day, so he was mine until I had to go back to my place and sleep.

As soon as he opened the door from his garage, Blackbeard made a running leap for him.

“He’s so big!” I said. In a month, that kitten had to have doubled in size.

Jamie grinned. “Over two pounds now. He’s still underweight for his age, but he’s catching up as fast as he can.”

He headed into the living room, Blackbeard going along for the ride, and I followed. The fishing pole feather toy was on a table, up out of the kitten’s reach, so I took it down and gave it a swish. That was all the enticement Blackbeard needed to turn into a rabid feather hunter. He leaped and twirled, doing backflips, twisting in midair, and generally contorting his body in ways that left me and Jamie in stitches. I had to stop because I was laughing so hard it hurt, but Blackbeard acted as though he could have kept going forever.

I collapsed on the floor, flopping on my back until I could catch my breath. Four tiny paws ended up on my chest, and two wild, gigantic kitten eyes stared right at me.

“Oh, you haven’t had enough, have you?”

“Never,” Jamie said.

I flushed with heat from the promise in his voice. “I didn’t mean you.”

“I know.” He lay down on the floor beside me, stretching his body out so that we were touching at so many different points.

Then I couldn’t catch my breath, but for an entirely different reason.

He propped his head up on an elbow and looked down at me, tracing the lines of my face with his other hand. “Do you have any plans for New Year’s Eve?” he asked.

“Beyond coming to the game? After this last month, I’m ready for some human contact, at least where I can get it.”

“I mean after the game.”

I shook my head. “Are you not doing the Light the Lamp event this year?” I would do it, too, if not for the fact that I was bound to be bald alien-girl again by then, and I wasn’t really keen on having that plastered all over the entertainment news. Besides, chemo zapped the energy right out of me. Staying up for much beyond the Storm’s game was probably more than I could commit to doing.

“Jessica hasn’t told you?” he asked.

I shook my head, confused.

“It’s going to be different this year. She got together with Brie and managed to get The End of All Things on board.”

“What?” I was so excited by that news that I would have sat upright on the floor if not for his fingers tracing lazy patterns on my skin. Maybe I
could
convince my body to play along for that one night, if it meant a chance to hang out with my favorite band in the history of ever. “Aren’t they still supposed to be on tour then? Oh my God, they’re going to be celebrity drivers for the night? Do you think I could talk Jessica into letting me just be a guest for the night? I would make a huge donation if I could get Emery to drive—”

“Slow down.” Jamie laughed and placed a fingertip on my lips to silence me, and I kissed it. “Like I said, it’s going to be different this year. It’s going to be at the Moda Center after the game, and the band is going to put on a concert. The tickets they sell will raise money for Light the Lamp. I think she might still be doing the celebrity drivers afterward, too. Not sure on that part. So do you want to come with me? We don’t have to take part in anything official. I just know you love their music—”

“Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.” And a thousand more yesses where that came from.

“Okay. I’ll make it happen. I can probably even convince Brie to figure out a way for you to get backstage and meet them. Maybe you could even watch the show from back there if you didn’t feel up to being out with the crowd.” His fingertips were still touching my lips, dancing lightly over them. “It’s been forever since I’ve kissed you.”

“Yes,” I said again. My voice was a harsh whisper against his touch. The excitement of his revelation combined with my longing for him made my heart feel like it was breaking through my ribs, it was pounding so hard.

He didn’t kiss me right away. At least not in a way where I could kiss him back. He pressed his lips to my temple first, holding them there for an impossible length of time before kissing the bridge of my nose. I held my breath, anxious to discover where his kisses would lead him next. He took his time, ramping up his efforts at such a gradual pace I thought I would go insane. I was so deprived of his touch that every ounce of contact left me feeling drugged, but in the best possible way.