Chapter 9: The Silver Lining

12 January 1987 – Hardwick Road, Enfield, Massachusetts

Jeff put his lunch down across from Allison Newbury at their normal table. They’d been eating together every day since September. Kathy and Jack joined them for lunch most days but today they were off on their own. Jeff appreciated how his best friends had tried to keep his spirits up during the difficult first few weeks after Pauline’s departure. Today something clicked for Jeff while he listened to Allison. He smiled at her as she kept talking.

“What?” she asked when she noticed him smiling at her. “Do I have something in my teeth?”

Jeff reached over and put his hand on top of hers. “Thank you.”

“For what? What did I do?”

“You, Kathy, Jack, and our other friends have helped me keep my head up this year. Thank you.” Allison blushed. Jeff stroked his thumb over the back of her hand, causing Allison to shiver. “You’ve been waiting, haven’t you?”

“Waiting?”

“For me to notice what an incredible person you are,” he replied. “For me to notice, really notice, how brilliant you are? How beautiful? How generous?”

“Yes.” Tears of happiness filled her eyes. “You think I’m pretty?”

“I said you were beautiful, Allison,” he corrected her. “But even that pales in comparison to how brilliant you are. I’m no dummy, but you could think circles around me with one hemisphere tied behind your back.” She giggled at that. “Would you like to do something together Friday night?”

Allison gasped as a smile spread across her face. “Yes!” As beautiful as Allison was, her smile was glorious. Jeff realized he wanted to see it as often as possible.

Jeff held his hand to the small of Allison’s back days later as the hostess led them to their table in the upscale restaurant. He kept a neutral expression on his face as the rest of the patrons watched the young couple cross the dining room. Reaching the table, Jeff held Allison’s chair for her while she sat. He sat across the table. Their waitress took their non-alcoholic, pre-dinner drink orders. Allison leaned forward and whispered a question to Jeff when the sever left.

“What was everyone looking at when we came in?”

Jeff’s water glass paused halfway to his lips. He set it back down on the table.

“You’re kidding me, right?”

“No, why?”

“Allison, everyone here is wondering what some high school kid is doing escorting an absolutely beautiful college-age woman into a well-regarded restaurant.”

Jeff saw the uncertain look on her face. Allison emerged from her cocoon over the summer with Kathy Stein’s help, but her self-confidence was taking longer to emerge. Gone were the unflattering outfits and posture and, in their place, was the stunning young lady across the table from him.

Jeff pressed ahead. “Allison, my pulse has been racing since you opened your door tonight, and not just because this is our first date. I know I’ve told you that you’re beautiful at school but, with that dress and the way your hair is done tonight? My GOD!” She blushed again. “You, Allison, are a stunning young woman. Boys are intimidated by you, aren’t they?”

“Yes. Usually, it’s the whole likely-valedictorian thing that throws them, though.” She cocked her head, regarding him closer. “But you aren’t intimidated by me at all, are you?”

“You remember what I said earlier this week, right? I like being able to have an intelligent conversation with someone. There’s a reason I choose to surround myself with people who don’t pepper their speech with ’um’ and ’like.’ People who care about others, people who don’t just think about themselves.”

“My reasons for hanging around you weren’t exactly altruistic,” she pointed out.

“Maybe not. Funny how I don’t care.”

The Black Bears’ hockey comeback faltered after the Christmas break. They lost their first game after school restarted, though they won the next two. They won half of their games through the end of February. Another five-game winning streak allowed them to make it back into the state tournament.

Pittsfield High School exploited the team’s lack of depth in the first game. The number one seed found seams in Thompkins’ other defensive lines and led three-to-zero. Chris and Jeff skated off the ice after their latest shift with less than seven minutes remaining in the second period; they would have a minute or two at most to rest. They watched while Pittsfield’s offense sped up again and peppered their goalie with shot after shot.

“We’re stopping them when we’re out there, but they’re cutting the other lines apart,” Chris said to Jeff.

“I’ve been trying to tell these guys all game, but they aren’t listening. We’ll do what we can. We stand them up at the blue line. Make ‘em play dump-and-chase. Make ‘em pay for every puck they win.”

The pair retook the ice with 4:37 left in the period. Chris and Jeff did evertything they could to keep Thompkins in the game. For their next three shifts, they became snipers and enforcers. They fired shot after shot from the point, and they crushed opposing players trying to get past them into the boards.

Chris scored just before the second intermission on a turnover Jeff forced. Jeff blindly flipped the puck out of Thompkins’ zone and across the ice to a streaking Chris. Chris flew unopposed into the Pittsfield end of the ice and faked their goalie into sprawling on the ice. He put the puck into the wide-open net with a casual forehand wrist shot. The period ended with Thompkins trailing four-to-one.

“Coach, give me a second in there without the coaching staff, okay?”

John Kessler raised an eyebrow. “You’re the captain.”

“Thanks. One of us will come out when we’re done.” Jeff handed his stick, helmet, and gloves to one of the assistant coaches.

The coaches looked at each other in amusement while they stood in the hall; they knew what was about to happen. Jeff entered the visitor’s locker room and stood among his teammates. He turned slowly to look at all of them.

“Well, it was a great year, guys. Go ahead and put your uniforms in the hamper so they can be cleaned.” His teammates looked confused.

“Uh, Jeff? There’s still another period to play,” Shawn Leighton, a sophomore forward commented.

“Really? There is? That’s weird. ‘Cause you sure as shit aren’t playing like it!”

His abrupt change in demeanor stunned his teammates.

“Are you guys happy to be here? Are you happy about the opportunity to play in the state tournament? Don’t be. Start playing like you want to win it! I don’t know about you, but I’m playing to win a state championship. The school won one back in ‘85, remember? Do you guys even notice the banner on the back wall of the field house anymore?”

“I look at it every damn day, every time I take the ice in that building. Some of us were part of that team. We weren’t supposed to win that. Hell, we weren’t even supposed to be in the same building as the teams we played during that whole tournament! But we fought. We were the lower seed in every game and we fought. We took the number one seed in the whole state to overtime in the final and we won. We won because we didn’t give up. We played to the whistle. On every play! Keep your heads up! Keep your sticks down! Finish your checks! Don’t! Give! Up!”

“Coach Kessler and the rest of his staff have given us everything they could give over the season. They’ve given us every bit of knowledge and encouragement they have. They’ve shown us what to do, what to expect, and how to adjust to any situation. They gave us the tools but we have to play the game. I’ve been trying to tell you guys that all year.”

“We have twenty minutes left in this game. For the seniors on the team, for me, this may be the last twenty minutes of competitive hockey we’ll ever play. I’m going out there and put it all on the line. You’ll have to carry me on and off the bus, and I’ll probably sleep through it. Are you guys gonna do the same thing? If you’re not gonna give me everything you have left, I’ll go get the guys from the middle school team and skate with them instead.”

Jeff walked out of the locker room and collapsed into a chair by the door.

“Nice speech, Coach,” John Kessler joked to his captain. Jeff looked up. “I’m not going to even try and follow that up. You said everything I wanted to say.”

“We’ll see how it works out, Coach.”

Jeff sat in the hall until the team filed out for the third period. He collected his equipment from the coaches and headed out to the ice with his teammates. There was a noticeable increase in the speed of Thompkins’ warm-up skate. The players wore more determined looks on their faces than before.

Pittsfield didn’t know what hit them at first. Thompkins scored two goals within the first five minutes of the final period. The forwards harassed Pittsfield in their own end. The defense kept the pressure on in the neutral zone and by the Thompkins net. Pittsfield couldn’t keep possession long enough to get a shot off. They didn’t have a shot on net until nine minutes left in the third.

Pittsfield got a lucky bounce with less than five minutes left in the game. Their center redirected a shot into the Thompkins net to go up five-to-three. Coach Kessler called his players over to the bench while Pittsfield celebrated.

“This is it, gentlemen! 4:22 left in the game! Dig deep! Give it everything that you have!” The whistle blew, calling the players back onto the ice.

Pittsfield was mistaken if they expected Thompkins to fold after the goal. The eighth-seeded team charged at them as if the game had just started. Their defensive lines kept the puck out of the Thompkins end and pinned Pittsfield in theirs. Shot after shot peppered the Pittsfield goalie and forced him to perform. Thompkins pulled their goalie with a minute and a half remaining, adding an extra forward to the attack.

There was to be no miracle for this hockey team, however. Pittsfield regained possession of the puck in their end with thirty seconds left in the game. Their player turned and flipped the puck as far down the ice as he could. Jeff dug as hard as he could for the puck. He dove, sliding across the ice on his stomach in an attempt to knock the puck off-line.

He missed.

The puck slid into Thompkins’ empty net to put Pittsfield up six-to-three with twenty-two seconds left. Jeff punched the ice in frustration. Pittsfield won the ensuing face-off. They were content to skate the puck back into their end and run out the clock. The Thompkins players skated out to their goal and shared one last moment on the ice.

“I’m proud of you guys,” Coach Kessler said. “You didn’t quit. You took the fight to them that last period, but it just wasn’t our day. Forget about how the season went, forget about how the first two-thirds of this game went. Remember how you played for those last twenty minutes and be proud of that effort. Let’s line up.”

The bus ride back to Enfield was almost silent. A few players talked but the majority of them were exhausted and napped; Jeff was one of the latter. Chris woke him up when they pulled back into the parking lot at Thompkins. Jeff carried a bag of team equipment into the field house after putting his bag in his car.

Jeff wandered out to the unlit rink once he dropped the equipment bag in the locker room. He looked out across the frozen surface and at the empty seats while he stood by the benches. He looked into the rafters, catching sight of the state championship banner hanging by the far wall.