Page 26 of The Rebound Play

“I already know,” he insists and proceeds to skate, holding his stick in front of him with one hand, about a foot above the ice.

Points for enthusiasm, but not so much for technique.

“How about I show you the proper grip? Both hands. Top hand controls, bottom hand guides.”

He grips it, his eyes wide with the novelty.

“Nice work, Benny. Now, why don’t you feel the puck with the stick?” I slide a puck from my pocket onto the ice in front of him.

He fumbles at first, his stick awkwardly chasing the puck like a cat after a laser pointer, barely making contact.

“The trick is to keep it close, like it’s attached to the end of your stick,” I advise him.

He nods, focused on the task. With a few more tries, he’s pushing the puck along, a little more confidently each time.

“Nice work! You’ll be deking out goalies in the NHL in no time,” I say.

“What’s deking?” he asks.

“It’s short for decoy and it means you trick an opposing player out of their position so you can get past them and score a goal.”

“I wanna do that,” he replies with a grin.

“Kid, we all wanna do that,” I tell him with a laugh. “Watch this.”

I drop another puck from my pocket onto the ice and push it around. I pull back to shoot for goal and as my stick makes contact with the puck, a jolt of hot, searing pain shoots up my left arm from my wrist.

“Ah!” I utter reflexively, dropping my stick to grip my wrist.

Benny looks at me in confusion. “I don’t think that’s how you do it,” he says, his brows pulled inward, making him look like a serious adult.

I can’t help but laugh despite the pain.

“Dan! Are you all right?” Keira calls from the sideline.

I turn to look at her and give her the thumbs up. “Just being dramatic.” I tell Benny to practice his moves and skate over to her.

“It’s your wrist, right? I heard you had an injury.”

“I was dumb. The PT told me not to overdo it, but I got carried away trying to show Benny how to shoot for a goal.”

“You’ve got to take care of yourself,” she says, and the concern in her voice fills my chest with a warm glow.

“I’ll try.”

We share a smile, and it feels as though I am one step closer to my goal of making her mine once more.

“Dan! Look at me!” Benny calls out, and I turn to see him nudging the puck into the goal from a five-foot distance.

“Awesome work, Benny,” I say.

His smile says it all—this could be the beginning of something great for him, and I’m happy to come along for the ride.

“I’ll give him another ten minutes or so,” I say to Keira.

“As long as your wrist is okay?” Her brow is furrowed with worry, and I can’t help but smile.

“It’s fine, but thanks for checking.” My wrist gives a contrary throb, but right now, basking in Keira’s smile, I could not care less.