Chapter 24: Counted

The letter from Tate came in January, in a plain envelope with a Duluth postmark.

It was waiting in my box at the Institute under a flyer for a ski sale.

I read it standing in the mailroom with my coat still on.

It was one page, in his big square handwriting, and it asked me for nothing.

He wrote that the draft was over, and that two teams had withdrawn before the first round.

He wrote that he had given the Captain's Cup back to the coach and the patch back to the equipment room.

He wrote that he was working for his father on the boat in the harbor, hauling line, and that his shoulder was healing slowly.

He wrote: I do not know how to say sorry to someone I told to take her time.

The last line said only: I'm not asking you to answer.

I folded the page along its creases.

I did not forgive him in the mailroom.

I did not tear the letter up either.

I took a card from the stack on the desk and wrote three lines in my own hand.

Received. I'm glad your fingers are all right. Please look after the people on your boat.

I signed it with my name and nothing else, and I put it in the outgoing tray.

That was all I owed him, and I paid it.

The next November, the head coach called me himself.

"Cahill," he said. "I'd like you at Harlan State on the fifteenth. The whole squad asked. Bring that Norwegian if he'll come."

"Is this a trap?"

"It's a bus," he said. "And a protocol with your name on the cover."

We flew in on Thursday.

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