Reality Check in Detroit (12 page)

He pulled the Detroit Motors jersey over his head.

And he secretly kissed the inside as he tugged it down.

The division of sticks had produced two great mixes of players. Travis and Sarah were now both Motors, so they could stay together on a line. But because Dmitri remained an Owl, Travis and Sarah were assigned a new right-winger by Mr. D, who took over the coaching for the Motors until a young assistant Motors’ coach, the only one still in the arena – and apparently the only one not in on the lies – stepped up and offered to take on the role. Once the fake coaches of the Motors had figured out that Inez and Brian wouldn’t be paying them, they’d all left.

The new winger on Travis and Sarah’s line was Cody.

While the promo was playing on the scoreboard, Sarah had accidentally caught Cody’s eye. The tall, blond Australian – it seemed Nish was right – had spread his hands apologetically. Sarah reasoned that Cody had also been manipulated by the producers, but all she’d been able to offer him was a tiny smile.

“Ditch the ‘Hollywood’ bit, okay?” Cody told Travis and Sarah, in his true Australian accent, as they tapped fists to welcome him to their line. “I already told you guys. It wasn’t my idea. None of this was.”

“But you’re
Australian
,” said Sarah with some bitterness. “You’re not even from Detroit. That whole story about your parents and the mall … even your accent was made up.”

Cody reached a glove forward as if he was going to touch Sarah’s arm, but then thought better of it.

“I don’t have any money – that part wasn’t a lie,” he offered. “When those producers found me, I was busking on a boardwalk in California – doing in-line skating tricks for money with my older brother. My mom and brother and I came here from Australia so I could try and work as an actor, but I wasn’t getting any roles. We were going to have to go home.”

Travis flashed Cody a small, sympathetic smile. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to react.

“The producers told me my footwork – from in-line skating and soccer – would bring something unique to the show – and that if this series took off, I’d be sure to get some acting offers in Hollywood.

“I’m sorry I lied to you. I feel terrible about it.”

Travis could tell from the way Sarah swallowed that she was still a little hurt by the lies, but there was something in what Cody said that she appreciated, something mostly forgotten in this whole experience with reality
TV
: sincerity. The romance plot between them had been embarrassing and awkward, but Sarah clearly accepted what Cody was trying to tell them. He, too, had been tricked.

Besides, Sarah, Travis, and Cody were now all on the same team.

Travis looked around and giggled. It seemed so odd to see his lifelong hockey pals – Jesse, Fahd, Jeremy, Sarah, Wilson – all in Detroit Motors jerseys. Nish was still an Owl, but Alex had switched from the Motors to the Owls and was now Nish’s defense partner. And there were a bunch of other new faces with the Owls, including Smitty.

Smitty was wearing Owls jersey number 7. Travis’s jersey. With the
C
.

He better not have kissed it, Travis thought.

Muck had asked the on-ice officials to stay on – they’d known nothing about the scheming of Brian and Inez – and they were happy to stay and referee the game.

Travis felt his heart skip as the ref signaled both goalies and then prepared to drop the puck. He knew what Sarah would do – try and pluck the puck out of midair and send it across to Travis on the left wing. He was ready – and it worked.

Travis felt the puck on his stick. He curled back with it, his hands feeling more comfortable in his old gloves than they had in the expensive new ones, and he quickly passed off to Fahd, who was on right defense.

Fahd must have thought Dmitri was still out there – Travis and Sarah were, after all – and he tried the high hoist play that Dmitri loved. He lifted the puck as high as he could down the rink, where Dmitri would try and beat the defense and be instantly on a breakaway. But Cody didn’t read the play at all and had curled back, too, thinking Travis might want to dish the puck off to him.

When they got to the bench, Sarah and Travis explained the play. “Just head down ice like you’re shot out of a gun,” Sarah said.

“Got it,” Cody said, nodding.

Nish was acting as if he’d been given his ridiculous “Hollywood” nickname back, now that Cody had dropped it. Nish was playing to the crowd, diving in front of shots, lugging the puck up the ice, blasting shots from the blue line, and pinching every chance he got. Travis swore that, at one point, he’d even seen the lights from Nish’s bow tie flashing underneath his neck guard.

It was one bad pinch that led to the Motors’ first goal. Cody had the puck along the boards and momentarily lost it in his feet. Nish lunged in from the blue line, sure he could take the puck away, but Cody, who had obviously played a lot of soccer back in Australia, deftly kicked the puck ahead so it passed Nish, clicked off the boards, and went right onto the tape of Sarah’s stick.

Travis and Sarah were on a two-on-one break, with only Alex back. Alex was skating backward fast, but no peewee could skate faster backward than Sarah Cuthbertson in full flight.

Sarah roared down the ice, looking over her shoulder for Travis.

Travis knew exactly what to do: head for the slot and be ready for the back pass.

Sarah angled off to the side, drawing Alex with her, and once she had Alex away from center ice, she dropped a perfect pass for Travis, who was coming in fast.

Travis picked up the puck, faked with his shoulder, drew poor Jenny right out of the net, and tucked the puck in neatly as he soared past the net.

Detroit Motors 1, Screech Owls 0.

Travis was heading back to tap gloves with his new teammates when, suddenly, he felt his skates go out from under him.

He went down hard, crashing into the boards.

All he could see was Nish skating away. His best friend had dumped him.

“What was that all about?” Cody asked when Travis’s line got to the bench.

“Nish doesn’t like being made a fool of,” Travis explained.

“He must be unhappy a lot, then,” Cody said.

Travis and Sarah started giggling. They were really starting to like the player they were supposed to hate.

The Owls tied the game at 1–1 when Lars and Dmitri combined on a gorgeous give-and-go, Dmitri sending a backhand so hard and high into the Motors net that the water bottle popped right off the netting.

The players all made mistakes as they adjusted to new line mates, but Travis was impressed at how quickly the game took form, and by the second period, it had become a genuine contest. Players modified their games, some line changes were made by both Muck and the Motors’ new coach, and it was astonishing how even the teams were, considering they’d been determined by Muck dividing up a pile of sticks at center ice.

Jesse scored a goal for the Motors when he tipped a Fahd shot home. Derek Dillinger canceled that out when he scored on a beautiful rush up the ice to split the Motors’ defense and put a shot in through the goalie’s five-hole.

The Owls got ahead 3–2 early in the third period when Smitty, who had played a strong, gritty game, took a shot, from the corner, that ticked off a defender’s skate and slipped in the short side past the Motors’ goaltender.

With time quickly running out late in the third period, Sarah once again won the face-off and ticked the puck over to Travis, who curled and passed back to Sam on defense.

Cody took off as if he’d been “shot out of a gun” – just as Sarah had told him to – and he flew past the Owls’ defense, Nish and Alex, just as Sam’s high hoist came slapping down on the ice near the opponents’ blue line.

Cody was onside and on a breakaway!

He came in fast, his stickhandling a bit awkward – Sarah had told him not to stickhandle so fast, so hard, just let the puck ride softly on the blade – but it was effective. He faked a shot, then deked left and put a nice backhand into the back of the net.

Cody had tied the game in the dying seconds!

Detroit Motors 3, Screech Owls 3.

Travis was heading for Cody to congratulate him, but Sarah was there first – to
hug
him. It caught Travis slightly off guard. Sarah always hugged him or Dmitri when they scored, but this seemed … 
different.
Cody, even through all the acting, seemed to genuinely
like
Sarah. And now, here was Sarah, laughing and hugging Cody for his gorgeous goal.

Travis looked back and saw Nish charging hard.

Nish’s face was beet red, and he was scowling.

Travis remembered how Nish had dumped him after the first goal, and he wondered for a moment if he should jump in between them and cut Nish off from Cody.

Nish had his glove out, fist closed – just like the giant fist that hung out in front of the Joe Louis Arena. Travis thought he should lunge, but now it was too late. There was nothing between Nish and Cody, and Nish was coming in fast.

Cody had a look of wonder on his face. And then, at the very last second, Nish opened his glove and … high-fived Cody!

As Cody and Nish, now apparently friends, skated away, Travis noticed that a small, folded piece of paper had fallen out of Nish’s glove and onto the ice. He skated over to pick it up. Guessing what it might be, he slowly unfolded it to take another look.

It was Nish’s secret fortune, written in dark red ink.

Travis still had no idea what it meant –
could it really be about hockey?
– but knew that it was important to Nish and his ridiculous spin-o-rama dream. He quickly folded it back up and slipped it into his own glove for safekeeping before moving back into position.

There was another face-off at center ice. Then, a moment later, the horn blew.

As the players returned to their benches, Data banged on the glass a little farther down, calling Travis over. He was pressing his smartphone up against the protective glass.

Travis had to squint to read it.

VintageEngine had written to them again. “I’m proud of you” was all the message said.

“Ha! Great,” Travis replied, smiling and gently rapping on the glass, ready to skate away.

But Data wasn’t done.

He put his smartphone back up to the glass and then nodded in the direction of Daniel, the sound guy, who was still sitting behind the Owls’ bench, still wearing the well-worn Detroit Motors jersey Travis had noticed earlier. Daniel was now standing, clapping for both teams.

Excited, Data pointed at his phone, at Daniel, and then back again.

VintageEngine, an old player for the Motors? Travis wondered. Could it be?

When the other players had finished filing back to their benches, Mr. D and the Motors’ coach looked over at Muck. Mr. D raised his thumb to give the “okay” sign as the Motors’ coach shouted over.

“Let’s settle this with a shootout!”

“I
told you, it doesn’t mean that at all!”

Travis was talking, but Nish still wasn’t listening. Travis shook his head and scanned the rink to see if any other players would back him up.

Nish had taken to the players’ bench and loosened the laces on his skates, and now he was pulling them so tight it seemed his face would burst from the exertion.

Nish’s fortune had read: “Pull your strings closer to you now.” Travis knew how those sayings worked. They were a bit vague but always implied a deeper meaning. This one was about relying on friends and family, surely, like he’d said. And now that the Owls and the Motors had come together to take back their game, he thought he had his proof.

“In life, we are all attached by invisible strings…,” Travis tried again. “Maybe it’s about how we’re all in the same boat. All of the Owls are linked together. And now the Motors are, too. We won. We worked together, and we won.
That’s
what your fortune was trying to tell you.”

But Nish had decided it was a message that he should tie his skates tighter. “Says right there,” he said, taking back the piece of paper from Travis. “ ‘Pull your strings closer to you now.’ I finally get it.
Strings
meaning
laces.
It
was
about hockey. See?”

Sometimes there was just no use arguing with Nish. He could be like a brick wall when it came to common sense. The brick wall was up, and Travis wasn’t going to get through it.

Muck and Mr. D were organizing the shootout. All the players would shoot. Everyone would have a chance. If you scored, you were to kneel on one knee on the ice closest to your teammates. At the end of the shootout, the team with the most players kneeling would be declared the winner – though Muck made it clear they were all winners now. The team that had lost had a beard and wore high heels on the ice.

Mr. D made a lineup. Sarah and Travis would be shooting last for the Motors, which pleased Travis; he liked to be the one the team depended on, and he also liked the idea that he and Sarah would be counted on together.

Last on the Owls’ side were Smitty and Nish. Nish was just coming out of the box, gingerly lifting one skate after the other as he felt how tight – maybe
too
tight – his laces now were.

The players were bunched together according to their teams. Travis and Sarah took up positions along the boards where they could watch the moves and see who had the best dekes among all the players.

“
Yak-u-shev, Owls
!” announced Mr. D, pointing in Dmitri’s direction and swinging his arm to indicate Dmitri was to shoot first.

Dmitri roared in, faked backhand, faked forehand, then lifted a backhand high into the roof of the net, sending the water bottle flying. He skated back without so much as a fist pump and kneeled down on one knee to watch the others.

After that, they alternated, Motors then Owls. Jesse scored on a nice deke. Alex scored by going five-hole on Jeremy. Determined little Wi-Fi just went straight for the goal – his helmet cam running the whole time – and without even a deke slipped the puck in the corner of the net. Andy scored on a slap shot. Simon failed to score on Jenny, as did Fahd. And Cody, whose stickhandling might have been weak but whose skating was awesome, roared in just like Dmitri, imitating his perfect execution, only to lose the puck on the backhand.