The Last Season (40 page)

“Buss will honour your contract if you go permanently to the minors.”

“Thank you, and I mean that. But no. You understand.”

Maguire nodded. “The best we can do is buy out your contract.”

They were generous, but in the end it was all meaningless. Wheeler had finally pleaded guilty, with me and six other NHLers and two NBAers and a single ball player ready to skin him alive if he walked out a free man, and he'd gotten eight years. But what good did that do us? We all had lawyers' fees, and even if the players' association picked up a big portion of it, it was still going to cost me big. That plus the fact that Wheeler had somehow spent money of mine I hadn't even received from the Kings yet meant I was down to $20,000 clear, with luck. And not even in Pomerania do you retire on that. My pension wouldn't come through for eight more years.

Maguire, bless his heart, called me in again.

“There's one more thing. The NHL Players Association is trying to help out all you guys caught in this. I've someone wants to talk to you as soon as you can call him, okay?”

“What for?”

“There's a coaching job up.”

Me? A coach? So soon?

“That might be alright. Where?”

Maguire smiled, his hanging face working up pulleys and blocks and tackle until it stood out sideways on both cheeks. He looked underwater, sinking down.

“Helsinki.”

“Where the hell's that?”

“There are those who go through life gently touching those they meet, and those whose every touch hurts. Examine Batterinski: the uncle who died when hit by a half-ton when Felix was racing to a party; the best friend, Danny, who told me he gave up trying to prove who was the better player of the two because it obviously meant so much more to Batterinski; and who returned to whatever future the impenetrable bush of Pomerania would yield; Torchy Bender, the one-time NHL all-star now bearing his soul on morning religious programming; Erkki Sundstrom, unfairly fired from his job as manager of Tapiola Hauki, his stomach a Swiss cheese of ulcers — all of this thanks to Felix Batterinski.

Intriguingly, none are women. Batterinski, known to enjoy the ‘bonuses' of road life, never managed a lasting relationship with a woman his whole life. There was, apparently, a friend in Finland, but he refused to tell me her name or to even talk about her. I discovered much later she was Kristiina Jalonen, an architect, who refused to be interviewed for this story. We spoke but briefly and by telephone, and the single emotion that spilled out before she cut off the call was neither pain nor anger, but a strange and weary sadness. She would not, however, talk about it.

How intense this relationship between a hockey player and an architect could have been is something we cannot know, but it is fair to say that Felix Batterinski was a throwback socially as well as athletically. According to those who knew him best, Batterinski viewed women as either fallen or precious saints. Danny Shannon told of Batterinski's first experience, when he was a raw teenager in Vernon, and how even the local prostitute laughed at him. Who knows how many blows he would later land on the ice thinking it was her he was striking out against?

He came from a closeted world where women had a specific function, he was never able to realize that when he came into the modern world it was
he
who could not function properly. Just as hockey was surely passing his kind by, human relationships had left him behind from the start.

So when I said Kristiina Jalonen seemed struck with ‘sadness,' the temptation was strong to resort to another, perhaps more condemning word: ‘pity.' But we shall never know.

What was it about Batterinski that made him such a critical force in so many lives, albeit usually a negative one? It could be nothing more than he was accident-prone — although his hockey career was remarkably clear of serious injury — but certainly his touch seemed to spread like iodine on a potato, forever blackening….”

— Excerpted by permission from “Batterinski's Burden” by Matt Keening,
Canada Magazine
, June 1982

W
e
are a two-hour drive directly north of Helsinki in a small city called Lahti for the deciding game of the first-round playoffs and I don't give a sweet fuck who wins. Tapiola has already managed the impossible. Thanks to the second best record in the league since Christmas, we're the talk of the country. None of the analysts can figure it out. And I'm not saying.

My own season has also been a delight, the incident in Sweden excepted. In thirty-six games I scored eleven goals, had twenty-three assists and served a mere fifty-two minutes in penalties, a career low. To put it in proper context, though, I still led the league.

Kovanaama
. Bully. It seems to have become my third nickname. Not as fine as Frankenstein, but a whole lot better than Canucklehead. Since the Swedish thing, hardly a day has gone by without my name getting into the news. So I was not only selling seats for Erkki, I was selling newspapers. But I also had a problem, and it, too, involved the press. Despite my attempts to block him, that son-of-a-bitch Keening had come over from Toronto. First I knew of it was a telegram giving his arrival time, where he'd be staying and that
Canada Magazine
wished us luck in the playoffs. Sneaky.

He caught me at the worst possible time. We'd just trounced Helsinki Jokerit 8–3 at the Ishallen to make the playoff cut, and I'd been the star of the game with a goal and three assists. I was sitting naked in front of my locker, sucking on a Koff beer and smiling for the cameras while a camp of Finnish journalists asked simple questions in simple English. Are you happy? Can you beat Lahti? How does this compare to the Stanley Cup? (Yes, yes and a diplomatic fudge.)

“Super game, Felix.”

I looked up, startled by the accent. He was so clearly a Canadian sportswriter that he could have formed the mold: thick glasses over nervous eyes, balding, a too-eager-to-please smile, cheap clothes in need of press and coordination, the kind of body that should say nothing but goes on forever about jogging and tennis and all those other bullshit words they invent to replace ability. The body of a true athlete speaks for itself. When a true athlete says “tennis,” he means the same thing as if he'd used the word “beer” — something social rather than beneficial.

“Mat Keening,” he said, shoving out a hand. A nail-biter. I took the hand slowly. Sweat. “Did you get the telegram?”

“Yah.”

“Good. I tried to call a dozen times, but you were always out.”

“You should have left a message.”

“I did. Didn't you get them?”

“No.”

“Shit, that's too bad. I swear I left them.”

I leaned back to haul out my shoes and socks, escaping to my own lingering equipment smells. “You should have checked with me first.”

Instantly defensive, eagerly apologetic — how typically the Canadian sportswriter. “It was my fucking editor,” he said. I caught the swear word as it was intended — a gift, to show he was of the earth, an athlete perhaps, who through injury (brain damage?) became a sportswriter — and I let it bounce away, ignored; I would clean up my own speech in retaliation, letting him worry that perhaps he'd offended me.

“He booked the plane and I had to go, eh? I'd never do it this way myself, you know. But it was out of my hands.”

Why are they always this way? If they truly live a life where all things — deadlines, pictures used, whatever faceless editor decided to cut out the important or put in the insignificant — are always beyond their control, why bother with such a life. They would have nothing if not for us. Yet they hold others responsible for everything; themselves for nothing.

“I hope you don't mind.”

I was tempted to say nothing, but I was game star, feeling generous. “Well, you're here. It's your money you're wasting.”

“It won't be a waste, Felix.”

“I can't give you much time,” I say. We are standing in the lobby of the Mukkulan Kesähotelli and he is begging for the interview.

“Problems?”

“I just get there early, that's all.”

He accepts because he has no choice. “Where'll we go?”

“You know as much about this place as I do,” I say wearily. “Anywhere you want.”

“Guy at the desk said there was an okay place called the Pizzeria Rosa or something. Can you believe it? Pizza, in Finland?”

“I'd rather just walk,” I say. Not because I would rather walk, really, but because I can't resist being mean.

“A walk!” he says. “Super idea!”

We set off toward the three ski jumps that bow toward the arena where our season will be decided in ten hours' time. I am glad to be walking, when I think about it, but would prefer to be alone. And I know precisely what I would do too. Straight down toward the thick, red-bricked town hall Timo pointed out on the bus ride in, straight to where the statue stands in a small square swept with black, crystallized snow from the roads. From the bus it was difficult to make out, but it seemed to be a statue of a gladiator, left arm raised in odd salute, right arm wrapped around one of those helmets you imagine Victor Mature was born wearing. But all that I could care less about. What I really like is that the statue is bare-assed naked. There is no Paavlo Nurmi to pat here in Lahti, and I forgot to go for some good luck before we left Helsinki.

We are not two friends out for a stroll. We are a stubborn ram and a sheep dog, and the dog, for all his scheming, tail-wagging and circling, knows the ram has no fear and will do as he pleases. Keening talks about the cold, the town, Finland, the flight, his hotel, how much he liked Erkki and then, warned by my snort, how he saw through the amiable facade of Erkki and knew him for the asshole he truly is. The sportswriter trying to ingratiate himself. That, not the typewriter, is the most important tool of his trade.

We turn into a coffee shop for warmth, and the note pad makes its first appearance. It is time to begin.

“Just coffee for me,” I say to his suggestion of drinks. “But you go ahead.” And he does, ordering a Koff. I can see he is clearly disappointed not to have alcohol doing part of the interview for him.

We talk for a long time, me working through three coffees, which are going to have me short-circuiting by game time, Keening matching me beer for coffee, his hand circling like a vulture as he looks for corpses to pick at. But I am tossing him bones. We discuss the make-up of Tapiola Hauki, the company's involvement, the NHL Players' Association's part in getting me here, the trial of Vincent Wheeler, the years in Los Angeles, Torchy....

“I guess you heard all about him,” Keening says with a smile.

“Torchy? No, what?”

“You haven't?” Keening acts like he thinks I'm putting him on.

“No. Is he all right?”

Again, the laugh. “I suppose. You know he's got his own television show, eh?”

“Torchy?”

“Yah, Torchy Bender.”

“What kind of television show?”

“It's called
The Torch
— It's one of those religious talk shows for shut-ins and little old ladies. Only his guests are all athletes.”

“No!”

“Yes. I've seen it. I bet he's put on fifty pounds too. And he's got this beard that makes him look like a damned Mennonite.”

The beard I understand — the scars. The show I guess I can too. The scars. He's willing to talk on about Torchy but I am not. Keening would never understand. He sees I am uncomfortable.

He asks me about my Stanley Cup ring and I am grateful for the change. I take it off and he tries it on; it looks like a truck tire on a Volkswagen. I grab it back and put it on quickly, laughing. He writes something down, probably pride. We leave Torchy and move through the WHA the junior years. We cover more than I thought possible and sit stirring my coffee watching faces in the small whirlpools: Gus, Sugar, Sanderson, Shack, Lafleur, Dionne, and always Orr, Orr, Orr, forever in mid-air with his hands raised in victory, his knee first to hit the ice.

“Tell me,” he says, as we head back out into the wind. “How does a hockey player prepare for something like the end of his career?”

“You can't,” I say. “And anybody who says he does is lying. It's like a car accident. If you could prepare for that you'd avoid it, wouldn't you? But you never even see it coming until it hits you.”

I think of Torchy. I think of Ig.

“Not at all?”

“Not at all.”

“Does it seem to happen quickly?”

“One day you think you've arrived, the next day you're gone.”

I am falling into my own mouth again. And do not like it.

“So this is a bit of a lifesaver for you, then?”

“I guess. Kind of.”

“You need the money, eh?”

“Yah.”

“But what if it doesn't work out?”

I stop, turn on him, tilting my head into the wind.

“I just had the best season of my career.”

“But let's say sometime down the road it stops being fun or worthwhile. What if this doesn't work out, either?”

I tell him with my eyes as much as my tongue. “It will.”

“I'm sure it will. But is there anything you could do if you quit hockey altogether? Do you have a trade?”

Worms? Bait? Outhouse painting for the highways
?

I decide to laugh it off. “Well, there's always used cars to be sold in Renfrew.”

“Renfrew? What's it like up there.”

“It's God's country.”

“Heavily Catholic?”

“
Very
heavy.”

Keening laughs, a touch forced. “Did you have a sense of God there watching while you played?”

I should stop but don't. “Well, you were always told He was. But it was pretty hard to believe he had time to take out for a hockey game.”

“But they said He was?”

“They said whatever it took to keep you in line.”

“But I understood you to have been a server.”

“Who told you that?”

“Torchy. Why, are you embarrassed by it?”

Torchy — had they discussed Tracy, the accident? What else?

“No, of course I'm not. All the guys were.”

“So you were a true believer?”

“I guess.”

“Do you think He approved?'

“Who?”

“God.”

“God? Approved of me? Are you nuts?”

We have not moved. We are still stopped in the middle of the street, with Finns moving curiously around us. I move deliberately but regret it. Keening will think I am running from the point — whatever the point is.

“Well if you thought He was watching you, you must have thought He was thinking about you. So you must have wondered what he thought of what He saw.”

“Huh? I wanted him to like me. Like any kid.”

“But did you feel at all ... guilty about playing the way you did?”

I see now where the bastard's going. “You mean violence?”

Keening backs off, pretending he, too, has just now seen the connection. I almost admire him. He's got more than one move. But he cannot get around Batterinski.

“Well,” he says. “Not exactly violence. Aggression. Your style, you know. Did you ever feel you were perhaps playing too aggressively?”

“Not much.”

“What about that time in North Bay?”

The Billings fight. Torchy probably told him all about that too.

“I don't know. Maybe.”

He laughs, catching me off guard. “It served its purpose, anyway.”

I laugh, too. “Yes, it certainly served its purpose.”

“Have you got enough?” I ask on the way back to the hotel. Keening seems hurt, but I suspect he has heard it before, just as I have heard his answer.

“Well, I'd kind of hoped I'd be able to hang around you as much as possible. You know, to pick up the textures.”

“Yah, sure. But just give me some time alone, first. I want to get prepared for the game. You know?”

He does not know at all, but he says: “Sure.”

“I'll see you later then. Okay?”

Completely agreeable, he steps off the curb into the dark slush toward the direction of the hotel. I watch him up and around the first corner and then turn, retracing our steps until I reach the street that leads to the town hall.

There are pigeons all over the park. Someone had spread dried bread all along the shovelled paths and I presume the dumb birds have mistaken me for whatever fool is bothering to feed them, for they run at me like I am a three-day-old crust myself. I am afraid I am going to step on them. I shake a leg and they scatter, flying up like a small twister and circling onto an area in front of a bench, landing in what appears to have been strip-mined with toothpicks.

I stand staring up at the tall statue and I think of home and everything in between. I know my nostalgia is caused by the interview. But this time there are no words to trace the time and the faces whip up like the rising pigeons and do not settle. The gladiator has a flat nose like Ig's, like the sculptor had dropped his work face first before the clay had hardened. But the eyes, the eyes are deep-drilled hollow holes and I see Batcha accusing from within. I see Batcha dying and I wonder — will Ig be there? I doubt it. If
I
cannot understand what happens to someone when they die, then how could someone like poor Ig ever hope to? He'd be scared. He'd arrive in heaven more frightened of it and God then he was of the half-ton ploughing across the gravel at him.

I jump up quickly, reaching onto the statue's helmet for grip and gain a leghold on the pedestal. I reach quickly and give one quick slap to the gladiator's bare, frozen ass.

No one has seen and it is done. We will win.

I feel full of energy, but when I skate out I find I am concentrating, and that is not me. Batterinski does not need to think when he plays hockey.