“Build a better club. Stay and make the sport better. For everyone.”
He promises. She goes to her room, comes back with two wrapped parcels. Puts them down on the table in front of her parents.
*
Then she goes around to see Ana. The girls each take a shotgun and head out so far into the snow that no one can hear them anymore. They fire at plastic bottles filled with water, watch the explosions when the shots hit them. They shoot for different reasons. One does it out of aggression. The other does it for practice.
*
Benji has always felt that he has different versions of himself for different people. He’s always known that there are different versions of Kevin too. The Kevin who exists on the ice, the Kevin in school, the Kevin when they’re on their own. Above all, there’s a Kevin out on the island, and that Kevin is Benji’s alone.
They’re both sitting on rocks now, looking out at it. Their island. Kevin clears his throat.
“We’re going to do all the things in Hed that we wanted to do in Beartown. The A-team, the national side, the NHL . . . we can still have it all! So this town can go to hell!” Kevin smiles with a self-confidence that only Benji’s presence can give him.
Benji puts his broken foot down in the snow, presses gently on it, gathers the pain.
“You mean you can have everything,” he corrects.
“What the fuck do you mean by that?” Kevin exclaims.
“You’ll get what you want. You always get what you want.”
Kevin’s eyes open wide, his lips narrow.
“What are you talking about?”
Benji turns around, until their faces are barely a yard apart. “You’ve never been able to lie to me. Don’t forget that.”
Kevin’s pupils drown as the rest of his eyes turn black. He raises his forefinger furiously at Benji.
“The cops dropped the investigation. They interviewed everyone, and they DROPPED it. So there was no fucking rape! So don’t even try, because you weren’t even there.”
Benji nods slowly.
“No. And I shouldn’t be here either.”
As he gets to his feet, the expression on Kevin’s face changes in the space of a breath, from hate to terror, from threat to plea.
“Come on, Benji, don’t go! I’m sorry, okay? SORRY! FUCKING SORRY! What do you want me to say? That I need you? I need you, okay? I NEED YOU!”
He stands up, arms outstretched. Benji puts more and more weight on his broken foot. Kevin takes a step forward, and he isn’t the Kevin everyone in Beartown knows, he’s Kevin from the island. Benji’s Kevin. His feet are soft in the snow as his fingertips gently touch Benji’s jaw.
“Sorry, okay? Sorry . . . It . . . it’s going to be all right.”
But Benji backs away. Closes his eyes. Feels his cheek grown cold. He whispers: “I hope you find him, Kev.”
Kevin frowns uncomprehendingly; the wind finds its way under his eyelids.
“Who?”
Benji has put his crutches down in the snow. Is hopping slowly over the rocks, up into the forest, away from his best friend on the planet. Away from their island.
“WHO? YOU HOPE I FIND WHO?” Kevin shouts after him.
Benji’s reply is so quiet that even the wind seems to turn and carry the words so that they reach all the way to the water.
“The Kevin you’re looking for.”
*
In a kitchen in a house sit two parents, each opening a present from their daughter. In Kira’s: a coffee cup with a wolf on it. In Peter’s: an espresso machine.
47
There are people who say that children don’t behave the way adults tell them to, but the way they see adults behave. Perhaps that’s true. But children live the way adults tell them to a fair bit as well.
*
The bass player is woken by a knock. He opens the door with his chest bare. Benji sniggers.
“You’ll need more clothes than that if we’re going skating.”
“I waited for you to come all yesterday evening. You could have called,” the bass player whispers, disappointed.
“Sorry,” Benji says.
And the bass player forgives him. Even if he tries not to. How can you help it with a boy who looks at you like that?
*
The Bearskin is its usual self, smelling like a mixture of damp animal and a plate of food someone’s hidden behind a radiator. There are men sitting at the tables, nothing but men. Kira knows they’ve all registered her arrival, but no one is looking at her. She’s always been proud of the fact that she doesn’t scare easily, but the unpredictability of this group is sending cold shivers down her spine. Seeing them in the rink at A-team matches is bad enough, when they yell horrible things at Peter at the end of an unsuccessful season. Seeing them here, in a cramped room when most of them have been drinking, makes her more nervous than she cares to admit.
Ramona’s hand reaches out to her across the bar. The old woman smiles through crooked teeth.
“Kia! What are you doing here? Have you finally had enough of Peter’s teetotal nonsense?”
Kira smiles almost imperceptibly.
“No. I just came to say thank you. I heard what you did at the meeting, what you said.”
“There’s no need,” Ramona mutters.
Kira stands at the bar, and insists:
“Yes there is. You stood up when no one else did, and I wanted to look you in the eye when I say it. Even if I know that you all get embarrassed about thanking each other in this town.”
Ramona laughs and coughs.
“You’ve never been much of a one for feeling embarrassed, lass.”
“No,” Kira smiles.
Ramona pats her cheek.
“This town doesn’t always know the difference between right and wrong, I’ll admit that. But we know the difference between good and evil.”
Kira’s nails dig into the wood of the bar. She isn’t just here to say thank you, she’s here because she needs to know the answer to a question. And she’s wary of asking it in here. But Kira has never been much good at being timid either.
“Why did you do it, Ramona? Why did the Pack vote to let Peter keep his job?”
Ramona stares at her. The whole bar falls silent.
“I don’t know what you . . . ,” Ramona begins, but Kira holds up two exhausted hands: “Please, spare me the bullshit. Don’t tell me there is no Pack. They exist, and they hate Peter.”
She doesn’t turn around, but she can feel the men staring at the back of her head. So her voice is trembling when she says: “I’m a pretty smart woman, Ramona, so I know how to count. There’s no way that Peter could have won that vote unless the Pack and anyone who has any influence over it voted for him.”
Ramona looks at her for a long time without blinking. None of the men stands up. No one so much as moves. In the end Ramona nods slowly.