I Burned The Hockey Star Down novel · Chapter 31 of 32

Chapter 31: Duluth or Here

"Take it," I said.

I said it before I could think, because if I thought, I wouldn't.

Beau looked at me.

"Brecken."

"Head coach. Your own bench. Twenty minutes from your mom." I made myself keep smiling. "You pushed a kitchen chair across that lake. You should get to coach on it."

"It's a rink, not the lake."

"You know what I mean."

Behind me on the steps, twenty-six kids were taking turns having their picture taken with the PAID IN FULL page.

Peg was supervising.

"I have a rink," I said. "I have a book. I have a grandmother with a stent. I can't go to Duluth. But you can, and you should, and I'll fly out. People do that. They fly."

"You hate flying."

"I hate separate flights. I'd sit next to myself."

He laughed, and then he didn't.

"Greer."

"Don't Greer me on the courthouse steps. I'll cry in front of the bug."

He reached out and took both my hands.

His were warm. He'd ironed a shirt for my grandmother's tax bill.

"I told them no," he said.

I stared at him.

"Just now. On the phone. That's what you couldn't hear."

"Beau."

"The owner called me on Friday. The day after Powell's." He rubbed his thumb over my knuckles. "He apologized for the suspension. Then he offered me a new job. Skills coach. The whole organization, the pros and the kids' camps. He wants me to build it."

"Here."

"Here. Ten minutes from Lents." He shrugged. "I said yes on Friday. I didn't tell you, because you had a bank page to stare at."

"You turned down head coach."

"I turned down a place I'd be running to." He looked out at the river. "I spent seven years leaving rooms before anybody could see me limp. I want to stay in one. This one."

"A county building?"

"You, Brecken." He squeezed my hands. "Duluth's where I go at Christmas. With you, if you'll come. My mom wants to meet the girl who wrote chapter seven."

I didn't cry in front of the bug.

I cried in front of the bug, the twins, the ladder-rack dad, a man with a parking ticket and the Multnomah County courthouse.

The bug watched with deep interest.

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