“Have a seat,” Dominik urges, nodding toward one of the guest chairs. He mimics my actions and lowers himself into his seat, leaning back and crossing one leg over the other.
“Thanks for seeing me on such short notice,” I say.
“I’ll always make time for my players. What can I do for you?”
I hold up the multipage document—the Pittsburgh Titans employment contract—and wave it. “Had an interesting conversation with Brienne Norcross after the memorial service yesterday.”
Dominik nods knowingly. “I wasn’t sure they were going to make the offer, but she had reached out to ask me about you.”
“Yeah, she told me she talked to you.”
Dominik’s expression is sympathetic. “She sure has found herself in the deep end of the pool without even a life vest to clutch on to. She’s struggling to figure out what to do, so I’m trying to help her as much as I can.”
This doesn’t surprise me. Brienne is now the sole owner of the Pittsburgh Titans, a rival to the Arizona Vengeance. While the entire league has been mourning the loss of the team, I doubt many are going to step up to help Brienne. Not because they’re selfish or they don’t want to, but because they’re all busy running their own organizations.
“They want me to be the goalie coach,” I say, my tone indicating that I’m still as disbelieving of the offer as I was yesterday.
Dominik stares at me pointedly. “And?”
“I’m not a coach.”
Dominik continues his stoic regard of my face.
“I’m a hockey player. I’m a goalie. I don’t coach.”
Dominik leans forward and clasps his hands on his desk. “I get that you’re trying to figure out whether you have the skills to coach at the professional level. It’s unheard of for a team to bring on someone without experience, so I think it says something that Brienne offered it to you.”
I hate to make this point and risk sounding like a dick at the same time, but it must be said. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing. She’s had absolutely no experience with running that team since she and her brother inherited it. He’s done everything. How do I know she’s not making the biggest mistake of the team’s life by offering me this position?”
Dominik shrugs. “You don’t know if it’s a stupid offer. All you really know is whether you’ve got the guts to try it. But that’s not why you’re really here.”
And there it is… out on the table. Dominik is forcing me to confront the real issue that we haven’t talked about since the day I was injured seven months ago.
Whether I could potentially still play hockey at a professional level.
Dominik is not a doctor. He is not a coach. He is a businessman who owns this team and truly doesn’t get involved in player decisions. But he has stayed very involved in my medical treatment. I gave full releases to my doctors to discuss my medical condition with Dominik and any member of the coaching staff as they saw fit. Dominik knows every single thing my doctors have talked to me about. The Vengeance team doctors also have my medical files from my orthopedist, my neurosurgeon, and my therapists so they can advise me and keep Dominik in the loop.
He knows as well as I do what my chances are of returning to this league.
I just need him to validate what I already suspect.
I need him to say it.
He doesn’t make it easy for me though. “There’s a chance you could get back on the ice.”
“Not a good chance,” I mutter.
I’m sure he’s seen my most recent evaluation. I’m able to walk now without pain. I am mostly stable on my feet, hand crutches providing stability if I think I need them.
I don’t. Not really.
I am doing workouts on my lower body now. I can do squats, dead lifts and leg presses, all with much lighter weights than I used to but I’m steadily improving. I’m even doing some smaller box jumps.
I can run on the treadmill, although admittedly, I use the side rails as a confidence booster.
Sure, my stamina is shot. My legs have atrophied and need to be rebuilt to match the rest of me, but I am a walking fucking miracle.
I’m also a hard worker who will do whatever it takes to reach max potential.
The only question is… what does max potential look like for me?
“A long shot, for sure,” he says in a low voice. “There’s no way you’ll be ready for next season. You’ve got another good year of hard rehab to build yourself back up again. But I’m willing to keep you on this team and let you take that shot if you want it.”
That does not help me at all. If anything, he’s shining a spotlight on the tiniest glimmer of hope that I could return to competitive play. It’s going to take more hard work, much more than I’ve even put into myself up to this point. Grueling hours in therapy and the gym. Building up muscle and then reforming it to regain flexibility, which is crucial for a goalie. Doing drills over and over and over to regain muscle memory. And then I have to prove myself against other goalies who have perfect bodies, who are younger and hungry for the position.
“So to recap,” I drawl, “it’s going to be near to impossible that I would be able to return to competitive play as a goalie for this team. And if I do, it’s not going to happen anytime soon. I don’t know how to coach, but I do know quite a bit about being a goalie, and I’ve paid attention to the people who’ve coached me from the time I first put on skates until now. I might end up being the worst goalie coach in the league, but I could help rebuild a decimated team.”
“You didn’t even need to come in and talk to me.” Dominik laughs. “You seem to have it all figured out.”
But I don’t. Not really.
Because neither choice is easy. I could take the coaching position and turn my back on the potential for a return to competitive play. I would be putting to bed my career as a player.
I could become the goalie coach for the Pittsburgh Titans, and there’s a very good chance I might suck at it. My second career could be a miserable failure.
On the flip side, I could pour my heart and soul into getting my body back in good enough shape to attempt to get my job back on this team. I could work months and months and still not be strong or steady enough. And by then, the opportunity to enter the coaching world would be gone. I’ll be a dried-up, early retired-hockey player with only a few years of investments to carry me on through life. I’ll have to go through the league’s program to find a new career, and at this point, I have no clue what even appeals to me. All I know is that I want to be around hockey in some form or fashion.
Looking Dominik squarely in the eye, I demand to know. “What should I do?”
He shakes his head, his expression somber. “I can’t answer that for you. It’s too personal a decision.”
“Well,” I drawl, trying to hide my irritation that he won’t just tell me what to do. “If you were in my shoes, what would you do?”
“I’m not in your shoes, Baden.” His voice is low, sorrowful. “I can’t even begin to imagine the physical and emotional toll you’ve endured, and in a million years, I could never weed through the pros and cons of these choices. These options can only be examined through the lenses you wear, colored by your experiences. I can only tell you that you must go with your gut.”