But I preferred to call it exactly what it was: a waste of my goddamn time.
They’d smacked me with a game suspension and a fine. Not to mention my manager was launching a PR campaign as if I were a live grenade. The League came back with the crushing blow of forced group therapy if I had any hope of playing again this season.
So yeah, I showed up.
Didn’t mean I had to enjoy it.
Today was my second group session, and I figured it wouldn’t be any better than the first. The room reeked of lemon cleaner and shame. The cleaner stung my nose and my pride; the same institutional scent they flooded the locker room with.
In my mind, suddenly there were flashes of a tunnel, rubber under foot. Sticks tapped the kick plate in a rhythm that meant wake up.
I ignored everyone and made a beeline for the coffee pot. Head down, hood up. Do not engage with anyone. But he was already there, fully prepared to lead another meeting.
Blair.
The clipboard guy. Thin wrists, thick lashes. He sat in one of the chairs in a circle and flipped through a stack of forms. At first glance, his hands looked almost soft. His shirt was a little too perfectly crisp and his face a little too delicate.
Not the type of man I’d expect to run an anger management course for people who threw fists for a living.
He glanced up from his seat as if he hadn’t expected me to show up on time. His fingers slid too carefully through the pages as he tried not to show how close he was to trembling.
I immediately knew Blair had watched the video again, in spite of me calling him out on it after the previous group session.
And he hadn’t viewed it just once.
Blair didn’t break eye contact, and that told me everything I needed to know. He wasn’t just curious… he was measuring me.
Because under all his polite little nods and tidy shirts, he held the one thing I needed most: his signature.
He could decide if the League’s golden monster deserved another chance on the ice. One flick of Blair’s pen and I was either back in the game or benched for good.
From how he studied me, I wasn’t sure which way he was leaning. He held my career in his hands.
And that made me furious.
I wasn’t another client or participant to him. I was the fight. The Mercer Game. The one who didn’t stop at three punches. Or at six.
The last punch was what got me here. But what no one saw was that Mercer had speared me. His stick tip caught my ribs where neither the camera nor the referee could see.
I gritted my teeth. I wanted to look away, but something changed in his expression when I walked in. Not fear. Not exactly. More along the lines of… calculation. Studying, maybe to determine what type of beast had wandered into his circle of cheap folding chairs.
Blair nodded politely and said my name, neutral, detached. “Colt, thanks for being here.”
I grunted and sat down in the last remaining chair, which was thankfully also the farthest away from Blair. Arms crossed. Legs spread. A stance meant to say: don’t fucking talk to me.
Blair talked anyway.
“I want to thank everyone for showing up,” he said to the room.
Almost not looking at me, he added, “And for staying.”
I glanced around and took them all in. A couple of them barely registered for me. One dude with his head down fiddled with the sleeves of his shirt. Another guy, skinny as hell, and nervous, as if he might apologize for breathing.
Then there was Travis, in his chair with a scowl on his face. Big man. Arms covered in tattoos. Cheap class ring on his finger which he spun with his thumb. Green-glass stone, gold flaked away at the edges.
Travis seemed like the type of guy who peaked in high school. For some reason he always looked twitchy as hell. He shifted his weight in his seat as if his chair might bite him. When anyone else tried to speak, he sliced through with a short, mean laugh that didn’t come across as a joke.
Obviously, he didn’t want to be here anymore than I did, but for an entirely different reason.
