The Second Line

The odor of a hockey arena is unique.  The combination of hockey sweat, Zamboni fumes, old ice and dust is unmistakable.   It’s a traditional stench that links hockey communities throughout Minnesota.

I made my way across the top of the bleachers, avoiding the group of parents positioned above the blue line below me.  My ex-wife could represent our family.  There were two men leaning against the railing a little further down and out of earshot of the rest of the parents.

“Hey, it’s about time,” Jonathon said moving to the right to give me a place to stand.  “I thought you had to work.”

“Ahhh… They’ll never notice I’m gone.” I nodded at the scoreboard.  “We’re already down?”

“We lost the faceoff and they cruised in for an easy score.  We could hear Blatt swearing from here.”  Jonathon was the provost at the state university and struggled with the profanity that ran through the hockey community.

Mitch, the man to my left, leaned across my shoulder, “Didn’t change the line though.”  He worked as a mechanic downtown.  His son JP played the left wing, Jonathon’s son Trevor played the right wing and my Billy, was the center for the Second Line of the Bantam B Team.  We’d fallen into the habit of lining up in the same order, standing on the bleachers as far from the rest of the parents as possible.  Our kids drug us into hockey as nine year olds and they were now completing their fourth season together.

Unlike most sports, hockey players have to come off the ice and rest every minute or two.  Our Bantam B team only had players for two lines.   Coach Blatt played the First Line forwards until they were ready to drop before letting our kids play.

Finally, the Second Line stormed on to the ice.

I drifted into the game. My ex-wife, my ridiculous job, hockey politics and everything else melted away as I focused on the puck and my son.

“Nice, nice.  Now work it around.”

“Pressure… Pressure on the puck.”

The almost mumbled words, flowed between Jonathon, Mitch and I. We’d developed a strange, quiet patter when our kids were on the ice.

“Don’t overskate… stay under control.”

“Body, Body…  Body up on him”

“That’s right… you own those corners… get on the boards.”

None of us had ever played hockey or even watched a game until our kids begged to take up the sport. We’d spent four years attending practices and every game together.  We mumbled to each other but avoided letting anyone else hear. When it was just the three of us, the provost, the mechanic and the accountant, we didn’t have to be politically correct or even accurate.  The words flowed between us like a group stream of consciousness.

We’d all attempted to give our sons pointers only to be informed that they knew far more about hockey than we ever would.  It was a standing joke, that providing a thirteen year old boy the opportunity to accurately tell his old man that he didn’t know diddly about a subject of mutual interest, was a wonderful gift from hockey.

The puck popped free and Billy brought it under control.  The ice opened up for a moment and my stomach churned.  As he crossed the middle of the ice, Coach Blatt’s voice boomed, “Dump it, Dump it!”

Billy pushed the puck softly into the corner and charged back to the bench.  The First Line stormed over the boards and into the game.

“Damn, I wish he’d taken it down for a shot,” Jonathon said in our quiet patter.

“Blatt wants them off the ice so his First Liners can get back on,”

“For all the good it does,” Mitch mumbled.

Most of the Bantam “Bs,” including Billy, JP and Trevor, were 13 except for a couple of 14 year olds suffering the indignity of being a “top of the age bracket B player.”  The line between “Bs” and “As” was distinct and the politics for those on the “bubble” included all of the drama, intrigue and passion of a brokered political convention. Billy, JP and Trevor would be on that bubble next year.  The decision was over six months away, but some parents had already been scouting the 12 year olds on the Pee Wee A team.  Since our Bantam “Bs” currently had three wins against twenty two losses I doubted it mattered. We played on.

But today, our Bantam “Bs” were hanging in there, only down a goal with two minutes left in the game.

As Billy leaned out over the face off dot, I felt the sweat beading on his forehead.  I felt his heart hammering,   I felt his adrenalin surge as the puck dropped and his stick slashed out.  He caught it on the curve of his stick and pulled it back.  It was a perfect face off draw and I let out a breath.

“That a baby.”

Our defenseman sent the puck rocketing around the boards.  It bounced along to the other team’s defenseman holding the point.  The puck arrived simultaneously with JP.

“Body Body Body,” Mitch mumbled.

JP got his stick on the puck as he delivered a thunderous check into the body of the defenseman.  The puck popped free to center ice.

Billy controlled it in full stride.  Coach Blatt was screaming, “Dump it… Dump the puck.”

And that’s exactly what it looked like he was going to do, positioning his stick to push the puck softly into the corner.  At the last moment before entering our zone, he rocketed the puck almost horizontally across the ice to where Trever was streaking along the boards.

“Get it… get it,” Jonathon whispered.

Trevor got the pass just as he crossed the blue line near the left side, planted his skate and drove hard toward the left side of the net, drawing the defenseman and goalie with him.  At the top of the circle he backhanded a pass to a hard charging Billy coming from the right side.

It was every hockey parent’s dream and nightmare; a close game, the puck careening across the ice directly at your kid and an open look at the net.  As easy as it appears, controlling a puck skittering across rough ice while skating full speed is extremely difficult. Many an NHL player has whiffed on the opportunity.

But the Minnesota Hockey Deities smiled at the Bantam B Second Line on that day.  Billy reached out his stick and with a deft flick of his wrist, lifted the puck a foot off the ice, just over the extended pad of the goalie.

In that instant, the Bantam B Second Line stopped being three thirteen year old kids who didn’t quite fit in. Their Dads stopped being a university provost, a mechanic and a lousy accountant.  For that instant, that single instant, we were all part of the tradition and glory of Minnesota Hockey.  Nothing, not the ugly hockey politics, the exorbitant costs or the maniacal coaches, would ever take that away from us… any of us.

The team mobbed Billy, JP and Trevor.  On his way to the bench Billy raised the big gloved hand holding his stick and nodded at me… or perhaps I just imagined he did.

Of course, Coach Blatt put the First Line back in for the last forty five seconds, and of course they gave up a quick goal.  The overtime was sudden death and they gave up another goal before our kids ever got back on the ice… loss number twenty-three… check.

Trevor never played another hockey game.  By summer, Jonathon announced that he was going to be the President of a private college in Indiana.  We kept in touch on social media, but never spoke again.  They didn’t have hockey in Indiana and Trevor focused on music.  The last I heard, he’d been accepted as a percussionist at some prestigious music school I’ve never heard of.

JP never played hockey again, either.  He got into a fight with one of the First Liners after the last game. The Hockey Board suspended both of them for the first two weeks of the next season and JP told them to shove it. Mitch and I said hello when we ran into each other in town but we no longer had anything to talk about.  JP was off to the Army a week after high school graduation. The last time I spoke with Mitch was at the memorial service when they brought JP’s body back from Afghanistan.

Billy hung in there like he always did.  He didn’t make the Bantam As and we endured another year with the Bantam Bs although it was never the same.  He stayed with hockey all through High School, still a JV player even as a senior.  Hockey was one of the few fibers that held Billy and me together as we navigated the post-divorce world as a family. He’s getting adequate grades in Accounting in his junior year at St Cloud State now.

We’ve all moved on with our lives for better or worse.  But for that one instant, in that stinking old hockey arena, JP, Trevor and Billy, and the Second Line Dads became small part of Minnesota Hockey immortality, and that will remain with all of us forever.

About the author

name: Steve Linstrom

Steve Linstrom received his masters degree in Literature from Minnesota State Mankato and had two novels and several short stories published in 2013-14.  He taught writing at Southwest Minnesota State University for several years before retiring to St. Paul.  He’s active in the Westside St Paul Writers Group and has reestablished his writing efforts, recently publishing a new story in the Talking Stick Literary Journal and self-publishing a book of short stories and poetry. stevelinstromwriter.com