“Pussy.”
“No news there, pal.”
“Which guy?”
“I don’t remember his name, but his nickname was something like, I don’t know, Knobs or Knobby or Knobbo?”
“Oh, fuck. That guy.” Wally twisted the cap off the fresh Blue and snapped it at the plastic wastebasket behind me, missing. “Fucking Knobbo, man.”
“Jarek Vend.”
“I’ve seen him in the paper. He’s mixed up in all sorts of shit now. Ever been to one of his strip joints?”
“No. Didn’t know the guy.”
“I dropped like seven hundred in one of them once. That was some high-end foo foo, boy. Thank God I’m married. It’s cheaper.”
“He played goalie for the Wonders?”
“Yeah.” Wally shut his eyes, thinking. “Ninety-one. You in the league then?”
“No. I was still playing in St. Clair Shores.”
“East side homos. Anyway, we made the finals and lost to Paxton Van Lines, best of three. We win five to one the first night, Blummer gets a hat trick. Next game we shit the bed, blow a two-goal lead, lose four to three in OT. Paxton comes out in the rubber with this ringer, played at ND, guy named Schneider-his brother played for the gold medal team in eighty-and just fucking swamps us, four-zip.”
He had a memory like that. I was sure he could have told me the starting lineups on each team and where each guy played his kid hockey.
“And Knobbo was in the net? Why do they call him Knobbo?”
Wally cracked a big smile. “If you don’t know, I ain’t telling you.”
“Fuck you then.”
“Hey, maybe the knob on his goalie stick, eh? Anyway, he could play, too. And he was like, I don’t know, forty. Played for the Junior Wings way back when Gordie Howe’s kids were still playing.” Wally stood and waved his arms around like a goalie stopping shots, beer slopping out of his bottle and onto his carpet. “Total flopper. But, man, what a weirdo. Always with the blow in the dressing room.”
“Cocaine?”
“Yeah. One line before the first period, two before the second, three before the third. A little superstitious, are we? Some nights he’d be the life of the damn party; other nights, not a word. You definitely didn’t want to fuck with him, though. I know all you goalies are crazy, but this guy took the cake.”
“Really.”
“Oh, man.” His face burst into a smile. “You heard about Antonoff.”
“No.”
Wally told me. Antonoff played for a team called the Gray Hawks sponsored by a mortgage company in Southgate. Everybody mistook him for a Russian because of his name and because he talked funny, but he was just some East Coast guy in for a year to consult with Chrysler on some manufacturing stuff. It took him only a few games to establish himself as a major asshole on the ice, always chopping guys, kicking legs out, running goalies. Always after the whistle.
One night, late in a game, the Wonders were blowing out the Gray Hawks when Vend-Knobbo-made a save and smothered the puck with his stick-hand glove. Antonoff came flying in after the refs had blown the play dead, sprayed Knobbo’s head with ice, then slapped the side of Knobbo’s mask with his stick blade. Knobbo jumped up, said something to Antonoff in a language other than English. Antonoff told him, Go back to your worthless fucking country.
As Antonoff skated away, laughing, Knobbo pulled his mask back on his head and said something else and looked up into the stands where he had two buddies with three young women dolled up in furs and silk scarves, smoking, drinking something that probably wasn’t 7Up from giant 7Up cups. Knobbo gave them a furious nod and waggled his big flat goalie stick in the direction of Antonoff. Both guys nodded back. The chicks giggled.
“Late that night, man,” Wally said, “they fucked him up.”
“Antonoff?”
“Yeah. He was always the last guy out of Nasty’s. Those jag-offs were waiting.”
“Knobbo?”
“No. The guys from the stands, talking in Polish or Ukrainian or whatever the hell it was. They beat the shit out of him, messed up his face so bad he had to have reconstructive surgery. Left him in a Dumpster back of Nasty’s. Supposedly Knobbo showed up at the very end and got up on the Dumpster and pissed all over him.”
“Wow. I think I’ll take that other beer now.”
Wally went around to the fridge again, plucked out two Blues. “What’s your article about?”
“I don’t really know yet,” I said. “Knobbo apparently has some business interests up our way.”
“Better be careful what you write, eh?”
“Yeah. He only played that one year?”
“He got hurt, man. Old Meat cut him.”
“Meat?” I said.
Wally’s door swung open and a woman ducked her head in. “Hey, boss,” she said. Wally swiveled his big body around.
“What’s up, Claudia?”
“Got to get Annie up to Fraser.”
“Fraser? That shithole? What’s the matter with you? Rinks around here aren’t good enough for your little girl?”
“The sacrifices we make for hockey.” She grinned and pointed at Wally’s Labatt bottle. “Getting an early start, are we?”
Wally spread his arms wide in supplication and nodded toward me. “I have a guest. Meet Gus, an old hockey bud down from up north.”
“Hey there, Gus.”
“Nice to meet you, Claudia,” I said, but all I could think was, Meat? Jason Esper knew Jarek Vend? Could it be that there was no coincidence in Jason returning to Starvation not long after Gracie had?
“Don’t forget to punch that clock on your way out,” Wally said.
She chuckled. “Right on, boss.”
The door closed. Wally said, “Mark my words-her kid’s going to be the first babe to stick in the NHL. Great kid.”
“You talking about the same Meat I know?”
“Meat? Oh, yeah, Jason… Jason… Esper-yeah-he played with me on the ’Fitters. He was just a beanpole back then.”
“Yeah. He’s living in Starvation. What’s he got to do with Knobbo?”
“You don’t know?”
The Wonders were playing Big Bill’s from Inkster, Wally said. During a scrum at the net, a Bill’s center named McSween slashed Knobbo across the forearm. Knobbo went down just as Jason came zooming in with his stick up around his elbows, aimed at McSween’s forehead. McSween ducked. Jason went flying. As he catapulted over the pile, one of his skate blades sliced through the right side of Knobbo’s neck.
“I swear, man, I almost lost my lunch,” Wally said. “The blood shot up this high”-he held a palm flat at his shoulder-“and Knobbo was rolling around and screaming like he was going to die.”
“But he didn’t.”
“Nope. Meat, man, Meat saved his life. He cut him and then he saved his life. He got down and jammed his hands down on Knobbo’s neck until the ambulance came. It was lucky we were close to the hospital.” Maybe I imagined it, but I thought Wally went a little pale. “I can still see Meat in the dressing room, blood all over him, shaking like a leaf.”
“And that was it for Knobbo?”
“Yep. For Meat, too. Next time I saw him-the last time I saw him-was at one of Knobbo’s clubs, working the door.”
