ONCE WE’RE DRESSED, we head down to the lobby to wait. After last night, I made sure Penny bundled up in thick socks, boots, jeans, an undershirt, a sweater, and then her coat, gloves, and her McKee knit cap. She looks like a puffball in her coat, and she’s glaring at me like she’s deeply annoyed, but I don’t care. She’s never risking the cold again, not after the stunt she pulled last night.
I feel like I’m waiting for a root canal. I’ve never had one, but this is what I imagine it’s like: staring at the clock, willing it to go slow yet fast, a pit of dread in your stomach the size of the Grand Canyon. I’d prefer dental work to talking to my father. At least the dentist would be less awkward, and maybe even less painful. You get Novocain at the dentist, not for heart-to-hearts.
If this ends up being that. I can’t imagine he has anything good to say. After he realized I gave over the money? The look of disappointment in his eyes was enough to make me want to crawl into the sewer and become one with the subway rats.
“Thank God he agreed,” I hear my mother say. I whip my head around; she’s walking arm-in-arm with Dad out of the elevator. When she sees us, she smiles tiredly. “There they are, Richard.”
Penny jumps up and kisses me on the cheek. “Have fun. I’m going to brunch with Izzy and your mom.”
“I need a mimosa,” Mom says. “And a bagel.”
“Can we get bagels?” I ask Dad.
He looks like a wreck, dark circles underneath his eyes, a shadow of a beard on his face. When he buttons his coat, I see bruises on his knuckles. Huh. Not that I thought Penny was lying about the fight, but it just sounded so improbable that I didn’t believe it. Yet here’s the evidence, right in front of me.
He gives Mom a peck on the lips before gesturing to the door. “We can get whatever you want, son. But I need some fresh air.”
I linger in the lobby for a moment so Mom can hug me. She kisses the side of my face, squeezing me tightly. “Listen to him, okay?” She leans back, cupping my chin with her gloved hand. “I love you both so much. I need you to be okay.”
“I love you too,” I say. My voice breaks, but it’s still easier to say to her than to Dad.
She pats my cheek before turning to Penny. “Izzy said she was awake,” she says, frowning down at her phone. “Time isn’t her strong suit.”
“It’s not Cooper’s either, if it’s not hockey,” I hear Penny say, a dry note in her tone. I almost turn around to stick my tongue out at her, but Dad is calling my name.
We stroll shoulder-to-shoulder down the sidewalk. At first, I think we’re just wandering around, but then he says, “Maps said the bagel shop should be up ahead,” and I realize he searched for the nearest one while I was saying bye to Mom. That makes my heart feel squishy. Then a beat passes and I feel silly. I asked if we could get bagels, so he found a shop. We’re in New fucking York. There’s one around every corner here.
Still, we each get a toasted everything bagel with cream cheese, plus little paper cups of coffee.
“Penny and I went ice skating last night,” I say. “At Wollman’s. Remember last year?”
“I remember I almost broke my wrist,” Dad says dryly. “That girl is a firecracker.”
“Be mad at me if you want, but don’t be mad at her.”
“Mad?” He leads the way to a bench just inside the park. “I’m not mad at her or you, son. I’m mad at myself.”
I nearly drop my bagel onto the sidewalk. “Dad? You feeling okay?”
He just stares out at the trees. “Blake is transferring the money back to you. What’s left of it, anyway. I agreed to replace the rest, so he leaves that much sooner.”
I swallow down a too-large bite of bagel. “Thanks.”
Despite knowing it’s for the best, my heart still aches. Maybe it’s like Mom said, and he really is best loved from a distance, but I liked having him around. If it wasn’t for him, I might never have discovered hockey, and then maybe I’d be a shitty wide receiver or something. It was nice to have an uncle, even if he fed right into the most fragile, insecure parts of myself.
Dad sighs, still looking around the park. A group of women fast-walk past us, and a dog walker comes from the opposite direction. No one looks at us twice, which I’m grateful for. James has said that he has trouble going out in public with Dad; someone always recognizes one or both.
James. I need to apologize to him, and to Sebastian. They were just trying to help, and I was shitty to them. I know that Dad and Uncle Blake’s relationship is complicated for a lot of reasons, but I never want to be at odds with my brothers the way they are.
Dad carefully sets his coffee on the bench beside him and turns to me, his hands clasped together over his knees. I’m drawn again to his left hand; the swollen, bruised knuckles make my heart do a somersault.
“I can’t believe you punched Uncle Blake,” I blurt.
He closes his eyes briefly. “Not my finest moment, perhaps.”
“Aren’t you the one always telling me not to lose my temper?”
“True,” he says wryly. “But when it comes to my children, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do.” He sighs again. “Cooper, I haven’t been a very good father to you. When I saw how you looked last night—my heart broke. I’m sorry that I fucked up things so badly. And I needed to hear it. I hope you’re planning on keeping that girl around, because you could use her in your corner.”
I duck my head, a small smile on my face. “She’s the best.”
“And you deserve the best. You deserve a father who doesn’t make you question his love.”
I look up; Dad’s voice is breaking. There are tears in his eyes, and when he blinks, a few of them run down his face. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen my father cry before. When James got drafted by the Eagles, maybe? At Granddad’s funeral? I shake my head, barely comprehending what he’s saying. “I mean, I know… I know you love me.”
“I do love you. I’ve loved you since the moment your mother and I found out we were going to be lucky enough to have another son.”
I bite my lip. Across the path, two squirrels chase each other. A woman walks by with a little kid in her arms. So many ordinary things are happening around us, and yet my heart is beating like I’m sprinting down the ice with a breakaway.
“Cooper, look at me.”
It’s hard, but I make myself. He wipes at his eyes carefully with a tissue before folding it back into a square and tucking it into his pocket.
“I’ve always been proud of you, even when I haven’t shown it. I’m especially proud of the man you’re becoming. And I’m sorry you doubted that. I’m sorry you felt like nothing you ever did was enough.”
My vision blurs with tears of my own. I blink them back impatiently. “Why’d you never… just say that? Like when I made captain, why’d you act like you didn’t care?”
“I did care. I was so fucking proud of you I could barely talk.” He laughs bitterly. “But I’d just heard about your uncle from James. I was trying to protect you, and of course, all I did was drive you right to him.”
“Dad?”
“Yes, son?”
“Do you…” I trail off. Fuck, this is hard, but I need to know the answer once and for all. If he’s serious about honesty, then this is the chance to ask. “I mean, do you wish I played football instead? Did I disappoint you, choosing hockey?”
He surprises me yet again by carefully setting my coffee cup aside and pulling me into a hug. I’m frozen for a moment, my brain scrambling as I try to input what’s happening; a hug from my handshake-yes-sir sort of father, but then I relax into it. It’s like when I went to Coach, but better, because it’s my dad giving it to me, not my girlfriend’s. “Never. Not even a little bit.”
“Are you sure? Because James…”
He rubs my back in long, comforting strokes. “Is James. You’re you. I’ve never wanted you to be anyone but yourself, and it’s on me if that got lost in translation. My father—your granddad—he tried his best, you know? But he was the stoic type. There was always a next step. Somewhere else to go. And mostly, that worked as motivation for me. But I see now that your needs are different, and I’m sorry I’ve failed you for so long.”
He takes in a deep, shuddering breath. “I’ll tell you it as often as you need. I won’t let my love go unsaid or unfelt. Not anymore. You’re precious to me, son.”
I’m pretty sure my brain short-circuits. I try to reply, but my voice is all strangled. Eventually, I manage a quiet, “Thanks.”
He presses a kiss to the top of my head. I bite the inside of my cheek. He hasn’t done that since I was very small. A kid in a hockey-themed bedroom, waiting for his quarterback father to come home from a game in time to kiss him goodnight. I’d stay up way later than I should have, just so I could get a couple extra seconds with him.
“I was coming to see you anyway, you know,” he says. “The day after you got into that fight.”
“Not to tell me off about Uncle Blake?”
“No. And I regret what I said.” He pulls away as he clears his throat. “I wanted to surprise you with lunch to celebrate you winning Hockey East. But Sebastian called me on the way, and I let my worry and fear get the best of me. We should have been celebrating your accomplishment, and instead I cocked it all up. Again.”
Hearing what he intended to do—even if it didn’t happen—eases the pain in my soul. “We could do it now,” I offer. “Make it dinner later, with Penny and her dad. I want you to really talk to Coach, and to get to know Pen better.”
He nods. “Your mother will want to be there too, I’m sure. After all, we’ll be traveling with her to see Regionals. The Frozen Four, too, when you get there.”
Warmth spreads through my insides. “If we get there.”
“You will.” He nods, like it’s an indisputable fact. “I’ve seen the tape, son. You’ll get there, and you’ll win.”
I run my hand through my hair. It’s absurd, after the conversation we just had, but I’m still a little nervous about asking him for things. I’ve spent so long worrying about his rejection—yet if this relationship is really going to be different moving forward, I need to put myself out there just as much as him. “So, do you want me to set it up? Or are you too busy?”
“Never for you.” He gathers up his coffee and the rest of his bagel, then claps me on the shoulder. “Let’s go watch the skating for a while. And tell me more about this girl you’re going to marry one day.”
