Page 1 of Made for Mayhem

1

Three Years Ago

Pain is temporary, glory is forever, or so the saying went. At thirty-four, I called bullshit.

I pulled on my black hoodie, rotating my shoulder a few times to loosen it back up after tonight’s hockey game. The joint protested, the pain sharp, stubborn, and far too familiar. Nothing seemed to touch it these days. Not the ice baths, not the therapy the team insisted on, not even a summer off.

Around me, the locker room thinned out in waves, guys packing slower than usual. This was the last time this group of guys would be together, and we all knew it.

“Ready for the off-season?” Matt O’Connell asked, grabbing his wallet and keys off the shelf above his stall. “Big plans?”

“Not sure yet,” I said. Fuck, I had no idea what came next. “You?”

“I promised the wifey a beach vacation. We’re leaving tomorrow—Turks and Caicos. Rented a bungalow for two weeks. Hoping I can forget how shitty this season was.”

I nodded, rolling my shoulder again even though I knew it wouldn’t help.

Some people might call the Chicago Storm’s season a growth year. Developmental. Transitional, even. A polite way of saying we’d spent months figuring out what didn’t work.

Really, we sucked.

“You headed to the bar?” Matt asked, slinging his duffel over his shoulder. “One last night with the boys?”

I dropped my gaze to my phone, pretending to scroll when I couldn’t look away from the group text that had come in sometime during the second period.

Mom

Good luck tonight, Ty! Sorry we couldn’t make it.

Emmy

WHAT? Why didn’t you tell me before now?! I would have flown in.

Mom

Something came up last minute with the store, and Dad couldn’t step away.

Emmy

Really? Even when you knew it might be his last game in the NHL?

We talked about this—you were going because Jace has a tournament this weekend, and I can’t go.

Mom

Sorry, honey. We’ll come to the next one.

Emmy

That’s the point, Mom. There is no NEXT ONE. He’s retiring. He’s done.

“You good?” Matt asked.

I lifted my head and nodded, the motion automatic. “Yeah, buddy.”

I slid my phone into my back pocket, ignoring the string of new messages from Emmy outside the group chat—probably already tearing into our parents or making plans to fix something that wasn’t hers to fix.

My parents’ absence shouldn’t have surprised me. It shouldn’t have hurt. Birthdays, milestones, games I’d circled on the calendar months in advance—there was always a reason, always something more important somewhere else.