My fingers moved on instinct—fast, efficient, practiced in a way that had nothing to do with kids’ gear and everything to do with years of repetition. I stripped the old skate loose in one pull, laces sliding free, tugged it off clean, then grabbed the new one without looking.
I set his foot, adjusted the tongue without thinking, pulled the laces tight—firm, even pressure all the way up, locking the ankle the way it should’ve been locked in the first place.
He watched me the whole time.
Second skate—faster.
Cleaner.
My hands worked through it with the same controlled precision I used taping my own before a game, tightening, securing, finishing with a sharp tug that told me it would hold.
Done.
I leaned back slightly, giving it one last check out of habit—pressing at the ankle, testing the flex, making sure it would respond when he pushed.
“Go.” I tapped Bobby once on the pads.
“Don’t go anywhere,” he stammered, like the words got ahead of him, like he hadn’t meant to say them out loud but couldn’t take them back now that they were there.
He pushed off hard, the new blades catching differently—cleaner—his body overcorrecting for half a second before adjusting mid-stride. He nearly clipped another kid, shoulder twisting at the last second to avoid it, then recovered, cutting a tighter line as he dropped back into formation.
I watched him find it. That split-second recalibration. The moment his body realized it didn’t have to fight the equipment anymore.
I lunged back over the boards in one smooth motion, hands bracing, clearing the barrier easily before landing a few feet from Bea. The rubber mat absorbed the impact, dulling the sound.
My attention pulled—hard—toward her. That awareness crept in. That pull I didn’t have a name for.
I ignored it, or at least did my best. Forced my focus back to the ice, to the practice, to the kid that mattered a little more than I knew how to define.
I watched him adjust on instinct, testing the edges without overthinking it this time. His stride lengthened by half a fraction. His turns held instead of slipping out from under him. He pushed into a stop—too hard—snow spraying unevenly before he corrected, resetting his stance faster than he would have before.
He stumbled once—caught himself—kept going.
“Holy—” a voice cut in from behind the boards, low and disbelieving. “You trying to make me look bad, Müller?”
I didn’t turn right away. I knew the voice.
“Thought you retired,” I chuckled dryly, glancing over my shoulder.
Coach Harris leaned against the boards, arms crossed, a knit cap pulled low over his head, whistle hanging loose around his neck. He looked exactly the same as the day I met him years back, dropping Bobby off—tired in the way thatnever quite left, but sharp enough to keep a dozen kids moving in the same direction.
“Yeah, well,” he huffed, pushing off the boards and walking toward me.
Bea shifted slightly behind me.
Harris’s gaze flicked past me, clocking her in a single pass, then coming back without comment. He didn’t ask. Didn’t assume. That wasn’t his style.
His eyes dropped to the open boxes.
Then back to me.
“You didn’t have to do that,” he breathed. Not performative. Not for anyone else.
“I know.”
He exhaled through his nose, something like a laugh threatening at the edges of it. “You’re gonna ruin these kids,” he muttered. He stepped forward, crouching slightly to dig into one of the boxes, pulling out a pair and turning them over with a practiced eye. Checking the blade. The fit. The reality of it. “These’ll last them a while,” he added.
“That’s the idea.”