Rockets Versus Gravity Read Online Free PDF Page B

time that his cheeks puff out and turn purple.
    Keegan Thrush skates to centre ice for the opening faceoff, wearing a confident grin like one of those cowboy heroes in the 1950s serials that they play late at night on the public television channel (which is one of three stations we get on the tinfoil antennas on our ancient TV). There is a good reason for Keegan’s confident grin: the Gasberg Pipefitters’ previous game against the Brownton Buttermilkers.
    The Buttermilkers have got intimidating-looking black-and -gold jerseys, like the Boston Bruins. They’ve also got the most terrible name in the history of hockey. The Brownton Buttermilkers sounds like the title of one of those pastel-covered paperback novels that my mother likes to read: The Southern Saffron Soufflé Sisterhood or The Peterborough Puddin’ Pie Protectorate. Despite their less-than -threatening name, though, the Buttermilkers are a hell of a better hockey team than we are, the second-best in the league. And just last week, Keegan Thrush scored ten unassisted goals on them.
    Think about that for a minute. Ten goals. Unassisted. Ten goals, all by himself. Against an entire team of decent players.
    To put this feat in perspective, the highest number of points ever scored in a NHL game was ten, by the Toronto Maple Leafs’ Darryl Sittler, versus the Boston Bruins. Sittler scored six goals and contributed four assists. It has never happened again since, and probably never will.
    Darryl Sittler got six goals and four helpers. Keegan Thrush scored ten goals.
    Now, I understand that the Wheatfield Major Junior Hockey League is not exactly the NHL, and that the Brownton Buttermilkers are not the Boston Bruins. But still, against our pathetic team it’s possible that Keegan will score eleven goals tonight.
    This is what everyone is hoping to see. Everyone wants to see Keegan Thrush set yet another league record.
    Nobody is here to cheer for their pitiful home team. Everyone in town has crammed into the Faireville Memorial Arena to watch Keegan Thrush single-handedly destroy the Faireville Blue Flames.
    Everyone but my dad, that is. He may be the only person in Faireville who isn’t in love with Keegan Thrush.
    â€œYou should drop the gloves with that gawd-damned pretty-boy traitor,” Dad said through gritted teeth as we walked to the arena. “Are you wearing your lucky ring?”
    â€œYep. I’m wearing it.” The ring is too tight for me now, but I still wear it when I’m playing hockey. Dad takes it personally when I don’t, and, well, he’s not a lot of fun to be around when he takes things personally.
    â€œYou should put it right in that little prick’s eye!” Dad yelped. “Fuckin’ show ’im, that little panty-wearing rich boy. It’s the Code, Aaron. You always gotta live by the Code.”
    Keegan never drops the gloves, though. No matter what you say to him, no matter what you do, he always just smiles and skates away. One of his teammates usually charges in to do the fighting for him; they can’t have the guy who scores ninety percent of their goals getting injured in a brawl.
    In his own hockey-playing days, my dad was like Keegan Thrush in one way: he always skated away from the altercation with a smile on his face. But that was after leaving his opponent’s body, and some of his blood, and often a few of his teeth, splattered and scattered on the ice. When Dad played for the Blue Flames, he was known as Pauly “The Pummeller” Springthorpe. He still holds the all-time record for penalty minutes in the Wheatfield League.
    One of the managers at the Krispy Green Pickle factory was a fan of “Old Time Hockey,” and he had the entire library of Don Cherry’s Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Hockey videos at home to prove it; so when Dad hung up his skates after going undrafted in his final Junior year, he was invited to go to work on the jar-filling