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Hayden lays on the floor in his tiny living room and soaks in the utter silence of his apartment. Laying in the middle of the living room is not a new hobby of his. He’s spent a lot of afternoons doing homework sprawled out next to the couch when Mom and Rachel were using the kitchen counter for dinner and flat surfaces were at a premium. He’s spent a lot of evenings wedged in any free space on the carpet making alliances with John, Kimball, and Chase to get the TV on hockey instead of a drama.
The silence is new. Hayden takes a deep breath and thinks there was never this much oxygen in the air before. He takes in the bare walls and generic furniture of the small one bedroom he’d paid the deposit for last week. It’s nothing special but it’s clean, furnished, close to the rink, and—most importantly—not a single person knows it’s his address. Inevitably, his eyes are drawn to the last cardboard box he has left to unpack. It sits by the front door with “Hayden” written in soft, feminine handwriting. Kaitlin even drew a little sprouting seedling, which makes his heart hurt.
Kaitlyn isn’t his oldest sister, but she’d the oldest he remembers growing up with. She’d been seven when he was born. She’d sat next to him in the church pew each Sunday while Mom led the hymns, handing him toys and shushing him during the prayer. She’d been the one he ran to when he and Dad fought about hockey or Hayden’s friends or his plans for the future. The one he’d waited for on a manicured lawn outside a beautiful building he was to young to see her get married in.
She’d let him stay at her and her husband’s house for a few days before he drove here to his new apartment in Montreal. Everything had boiled over a bit too soon with his parents and he’d stormed out to his already packed car and not once looked back. Sitting on her couch bouncing little Emma on his lap while he heard her hushed tones from the kitchen had almost broken his resolve. But then she’d wrangled her two older kids to bed and come sat with him on the couch and she looked so tired for 25. Her motherly tone balanced between sympathetic and placating while she tried to find him some middle ground between himself and the family and he knew he couldn’t do it. If he told any of them, even Kaitlin, where to find him he’d never really be able to leave.
Hayden opens the box. Kaitlin’s husband had taped it shut and helped him jam it into his trunk at her direction. She’d said it had some things he might need for his new place but hadn’t thought of because he’s an 18 year old boy. On the very top is a picture of the whole family, before all the spouses and nieces and nephews, smiling picture perfect for the camera. He turns it face down on the floor and riffles through the rest of the box. There are normal apartment things. A set of kitchen knives, dishtowels, dryer sheets. Things he hadn’t thought of. At the bottom sits Kaitlin’s leather-bound scripture set she’s carefully studied and annotated since she got it as a gift on her eighth birthday. There’s a folded piece of paper tucked under the front cover. Hayden makes a shopping list of the practical things in the box, tapes it back shut, and leaves it by the door. He almost steps on the picture when he stands up again. He throws away the shopping list.
After their first practice the next day, he asks Hollander, the other rookie, what stuff he’s getting for his new apartment. Hollander texts his mom and both buy everything she suggests. The other players catch wind of this and make increasingly questionable suggestions of things brand new professional hockey players will want in their apartment. Hayden finds comfort in the fact that Hollander looks about as nauseous as he feels.
Kaitlin’s box goes to the nearest thrift store as is—scriptures and all. The picture goes to the very bottom of a fireproof lockbox he now owns where all his important documents live.
Hayden goes on to live a new life.
The twins look like Jackie. Jackie says the twins look like hacky-sacks, but Hayden thinks that’s lingering resentment for the past 18 hours they’ve put her through. Sure their little faces are a bit scrunched up and swollen and red-purple-ish, but who wouldn’t be after a workout like that? Sure their eyes are closed most of the time and Ruby is a little dough ball and Jade is a spindly old lady, but they’re real and perfect in a way that he can only describe as Jackie.
He sits beside Jackie’s bed and holds Ruby while Jade rests on Jackie’s chest. He spends a long time staring at tiny fingers curled into a fist barely larger than the curve of Jackie’s collarbone where it rests. Ruby makes an adorable yet concerning noise. Everything the babies (and Jackie) do is adorable and concerning right now. He runs through a mental checklist of what might be wrong, but it seems like she’s fine. Just making noise because she can. He watches her face move as she simply exists in the world.
For a second Hayden remembers the understanding his parents and older siblings described whenever they talked about their kid’s births. The sense of a soul entrusted to them, looking at a baby and seeing a pure innocent spirit, realizing that bringing people into the world like this is their divine calling. He waits to see if he feels it. If he sees that in Ruby.
He sees a baby. A tiny, fragile human with minuscule hands and quick little breaths who’s relying on him to take care of her. He feels the million ways he could fail her. He looks at Jade in Jackie’s arms and sees the same. Even Jackie is so precariously human right now, despite the playful sparkle in her eyes. He wishes he could hold both the twins forever and also Jackie. She laughs at him as he rearranges the three of them and does his best to do just that.
“Your wife’s pregnant? Didn’t you guys have twins like three seconds ago? How do you even deal with that many babies” Comeau snorts.
Hayden grimaces at the tone. He’s gotten the sentiment a lot, from old ladies cooing over Jackie’s belly at the store to sidelong glances at their rambunctious two year-olds climbing all over them in the obstetrician waiting room. He should have been more prepared for locker room chirps, honestly. Someone else chimes in
“Yeah man, she must be tired. Didn’t you have sex-ed in high school? Condoms dude.”
“Unless you went to fucking, catholic school or something.” JJ ribs good-naturedly “Or, what is it. Fuck who are the ones that have a million kids? Mormon? No! Amish. Dude if you secretly grew up Amish you have to tell us.”
“I don’t think Amish people believe in playing professional hockey” Shane’s no-nonsense practice tone cuts the claustrophobic air threatening to choke him, “and they still probably drill passes more than you all.” he chirps, “On the ice in five.”
Seven minutes later Hayden is pushing himself hard enough that no one will be able to tell he’s sweating and shaky from anything other than a tough practice.
Hayden drifts back awake on the couch. Theoretically he’s keeping an eye on the girls like he insisted on doing. In practice whatever the doctor gave him for his double flu infection—or possibly the last dregs of the flu itself—has him slipping in and out of focus. Jackie probably already knows that. She was somewhere nearby recently, or maybe hours ago, who knows? She wouldn’t put him in charge of actually watching the kids when he’s not capable. She’s probably keeping an eye on the girls and him and feeding Arthur lunch.
He’s home for a week and a half in the middle of the season and mostly he’s been useless since day three. Jackie’s been a trooper about it. But it was supposed to be time for to relax and him to pull his weight.
The next time Hayden wakes up the TV is on and late afternoon sunlight filters through the blinds. He’s still groggy, but lucid now. He recognizes the movies as that cheerleading one from like 20 years ago. It’s one of Jackie’s favorites for the nostalgia factor and Shane likes the competitive plot, so it’s a go-to for easy movie nights when everyone is home. In fact, he realizes he’s not alone on the couch. His head is resting in Jackie’s lap and his feet in Shane’s. As he finally, actually wakes up he notices Jackie’s fingers running through his sweaty hair and Shane’s knuckles gently drumming against his shin.
“Dad!!!” Oh, Arthur is here too. Crayons and paper litter the rug. He scrambles to his feet and toddles to Hayden with a half crumples paper clutched too tight in his fist. “I colored this!” Arthur shoves the paper in his face until he takes it.
He has the composition skills of a caveman with CTE, but that’s what the experts call “developmentally appropriate” for a three year old and Hayden has years of experience deciphering heartfelt scribbles.
“Wow! Great job baby! Did you draw us?” Six circles with shaky stick arms sit smiling in a rough row surrounded by colorful scribbles. Arthur launches into a toddler babble explanation of his masterpiece, wandering into tangents about his day. Uncle Shane is included in the drawing, which makes sense seeing as he’s been doing Hayden’s job for the past four days. Herding Arthur through his bedtime routine, breaking up arguments between the twins, even getting booed out of the kitchen for serving oven-baked sweet potato sticks as french fries. All classic dad stuff Hayden was meant to be doing.
Through the blur of drowsy medication and fever sleep, Hayden even remembers his best friend making him to sit up and drink some water and taking his temperature, sweetly chirping him the whole time.
Something beeps in the kitchen. Shane wriggles out from under Hayden’s legs and hands Arthur a Metros blue crayon on his way out. Arthur takes the paper back, only to pin it haphazardly to Hayden’s stomach so he can attack it with his newfound color. The whole time he chatters about anything and everything he has the words for. His big brown Jackie eyes sparkle and his familiar not-Jackie smile never wavers. He holds up his picture for Hayden to see. It’s lost any coherence it once had, an explosion of blue around and over his original work. Hayden should take some more meds because his nose is running like crazy and his eyes are watering up.
“Perfect baby, I’m so proud”
In hindsight, signing Jade up for martial arts lessons might have been a mistake. There had been a thought process. Getting her energy out, learning self-control, structure. A little dose of ‘sure you can punch and kick to your hearts’ content but only when your coach says’ to let her get her fix of chaos. She really wanted to be a black belt someday and plenty of kids take martial arts. It would be fine they told themselves.
Hearing her teacher explain she landed a punch so hard it knocked a kid two grades older on his ass makes Hayden realize what a pipe dream that was. Hearing she threw the punch after her hard shoulder check didn’t stop him from yanking on her friends braids makes him a little proud. They’re certainly due for a conversation about “time and place” and the difference between Dad’s job and playground vigilantism.
“Dad hits people so they don’t hurt his friends” She defends herself. Luckily, her teacher knows about his employment enough to not get other authorities involved. Unluckily, she still looks unimpressed that he lets it influence his kids. Was he not supposed to let them watch his games? Hayden never questioned it before.
There’s a long conversation about consequences and apologies on both sides and it only takes one look between him and Jackie for her to nod in silent understanding and take over speaking to Jade. The teacher and the school councilor both frown. This probably doesn’t help their estimation of him, his line of work, or his involvement in parenting.
But Jade looks so much like Rachel right now. Like the little girl hardly much older than him who wrestled and argued on equal footing with her brothers but always got reprimanded more for less. Who’s angry expression came to include pursed lips as she bit down on her tongue. Who’s fiery, impassioned opinions simmered into quiet frustration over the years. Jade’s face burns with the same certainty of purpose. Six years old and completely unburdened of the politics of her behavior beyond seeing a bully and stopping a bully. More than once in the conversation things are said that make Hayden and Jackie lock eyes in solidarity, knowing they’ll have to carefully thread between explaining to Jade they don’t agree and not telling her the school councilor is full of shit.
They don’t pull her out of martial arts class, but they do tell her teacher about the incident and she gets temporarily banned from sparring as part of the gym’s philosophical principle of responsibility. The next time it’s Hayden’s turn to take her to class, he watches her do little conditioning drills with all her six-year-old endurance and a look of grim determination. She does every circuit she’s assigned and then loops back to do one more, this time flashing him a proud, wild grin. He wonders how many fights she'd have to win before he'll consider making her stop.
+1
“Congrats man, number 4. With you and Jackie that’s a full line. Maybe this one will be a goalie”
Shane finds him on the back patio, probably by accident while looking for his usual mid-party anti-social time. Since it’s Shane, Hayden appreciates the company.
“Thanks, man. You know what’s crazy?”
“It scares the hell out of you every time? I know Hayd, you say it constantly whenever Jackie’s pregnant.”
He must really say it a lot for in-season Shane Hollander to remember. Silence sits between them for a minute. Hayden takes a sip of his champagne glass full of sparkling cider. It tastes like childhood holidays. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Shane do the same and wince a little at the sweetness. They stare off in the middle distance with the dignity of two grown-ass men drinking apple juice on a patio.
“You alright Hayd?”
“Just working on my comebacks for all the chirps I’m about to get when I go back in. You know, a brochure about vasectomies. Have I considered converting to..catholisicm? Let Jackie breathe man. All that”
Shane snorts, “I don’t get how people think you’re the one choosing to have kids” he snarks “Jackie is the one making the plays.” He looks a little embarrassed and pats Hayden’s shoulder, “You’re top scorer on the assists, though.”
Hayden has to laugh. Shane’s sharp honesty cuts to the heart of things as always
“I think about it sometimes. More when we were 22 and had no business getting pregnant with me on the road all the time. I thought I was gonna die when that first pregnancy test came up positive. But she was so fucking excited. I never want it to stop being exciting for her like everyone seems to think it already is. But she says she wants to keep going so we keep having awesome kids.”
“I think it’s really brave, and, I don’t know, sweet?” Shane says, “Jumping into it whenever she’s ready even though you’re not sure. You make her happy.” He shakes his head in mild disbelief, “I don’t get it. Being pregnant sounds like a fucking nightmare, but she loves it and doing the whole hectic family thing with you. Its like her hockey I guess. You’re her team.”
“Only you would have a hockey metaphor lined up for that” Hayden chirps to lighten the mood, “Since when can you tell what women feel about being pregnant?”
“She literally told me jackass” Shane bumps his shoulder. Hayden bumps him back. “And I know she’d told you too, because you guys are that annoying stable happy married couple that makes everyone else feel like middle schoolers.”
Hayden didn’t know Jackie and Shane talk about stuff like that. Hayden and Shane don’t really, most of the time. Considering the past few years they’ve been more open about certain things, but there is a quiet comfort in having someone who will let you not talk about the elephant they know only you can see in the room. Today is a strange exception because they just announced their impending fourth baby.
Loud laughter echos out from the living room, led by two very familiar voices. He glances inside and sees Jackie, glowing and electric in the middle of a circle of friends. Hayden feels his own expression go soft as he watches Shane’s do the same. For old times sake, he makes a face at Shane full of suggestion. Just like old times Shane scoffs awkwardly in return.
“Whatever, go celebrate your giant, awesome family, weirdo.”