The Cocky Hockey Captain

Chapter 33 ● The Hero The Town Needed

The next day I appeared on the Silver Grove Times, the main newspaper in town. The headline said, Local Girl Everybody Thought Was a Boy Saved Local High School Hockey Superstar From Bullet.

I thought it was too wordy, but it occupied so much space that the picture of me they put was small and blurry. Of course, everybody knew it was me, anyway.

Besides, it appeared under a much more important headline. That one read, Local High School Hockey Assistant Coach Tried To Murder Student.

To me that was the biggest story not just in town, but likely in all Canada. Gun crimes were not common here, and it figured that I had to be the one to encounter the one gun crime in the year in all the land.

Unbelievably enough, there was an even bigger headline on top of it. For the town of Silver Grove, there was another piece of news that was clearly more important than everything else. And it was this one:

Silver Grove Bears Defeat Eagles of East Pembroke 2-0 And Move To Province Finals.

My dad read me the news in the hospital the day after I went through the surgery. He didn't understand why I'd suddenly started laughing until I pointed out the obvious.

"All three headlines have one thing in common," I told him with a grin. "Hockey."

He sighed but made the effort of offering me a watery smile. "If I'd known I could have won this town over faster through hockey I'd have given them a brand new arena."

I patted his hand. "You're giving them something better. Jobs so they can earn money to pay for hockey tickets." As an afterthought I added, "And skates. And sticks. And pucks. You'd be surprised at how easy it is to lose pucks. What if you buy the school buckets of pucks? They might forgive us then."

Dad's look was skeptical at best.

A couple of days later, Coach Martel and the principal, Mr. Lapierre, came over for a visit. They caught me in the middle of eating the most insipid soup I'd ever tasted, and dad had to set his work laptop aside so he could greet them. They didn't catch us by surprise, exactly. The three of them had already spoken over the phone that this must be done.

And by that, they meant my expulsion.

"How are you doing, Bernal?" Coach Martel asked as he sat on a stool by the bed. He scratched the back of his head. "I heard your name is actually Carlota, should I call you that way?"

I gave him a smile. There was no animosity coming from him, no resentment. If anything he seemed confused, and even though I wouldn't be able to call him my coach anymore, he'd always be a genuinely fair and good guy in my mind.

"You can keep calling me Bernal if it makes you more comfortable, Mr. Martel."

He frowned. "Please, call me Coach. I feel like you're addressing my old man."

We chuckled. The conversation didn't require much hilarity, if any at all, but he and I had gone through some shit together. He'd kept his cool throughout and later I heard that he'd actually been the one to wrestle Gauthier to the ground and keep him there until the police and paramedics arrived. In my books, he was as much of a hero as Pace, who ran clear out of the school in his socks and all the way into the police station, because he didn't have a cellphone in him, or any shoes after removing his skates outside the locker room.

I'd been overly pleased when Dean reported that Pace had kept his feet and all toes, despite the cold.

Lapierre sighed. "I'm really glad you're doing well, kid. And I do want to stress the fact that we're just as perplexed as everyone else by Florian Gauthier's actions. We had no idea there was a monster in our midst, and I will deeply regret these events for the rest of my life."