“Mmmm ... that one.”

“That one?”

“Yes.”

“That one ?”

“Yes,” he replied with more of a hiss.

“Man Skiwee, you have some horrible tastes in women.”

Tony “Lemur” Lerman wrapped his lips around his flimsy white plastic straw, watching the white alcohol laced liquid slide up from his coconut tumbler with the green paper umbrella in it. Martin never imagined that one could actually order something like this ... a drink that came in a coconut with a straw! What was next? Hula girls and a hammock tied between two palm trees?

But all he had done for almost eight months was play hockey without the slightest hope of a vacation or a day off, so the part of him that thought this was cheesy and touristy was quickly beaten into submission by the part of him that really really wanted that hammock tied between two palm trees.

“Why? She's nice.” Martin Ostrowski frowned and adjusted his sunglasses as they slid down on his face.

“Oh sure, she's nice but we're in Miami! Skiwee! Miami! Girls in bikinis are everywhere! Enjoy it a little.”

“Mm...” Martin shrugged, took a tiny sip from his coconut and dug his toes into the white, perfectly groomed sand below. His heavy Polish accent made the words ripped from dozens of country western songs sound like lumps of glue. “I am a simple man. I like my women way I like pierogi. Potato, cut onions, no cheese.”

Lemur snorted. The mix of salt air, heat and sand made his short hair stick up and ruffle more than usual as he ran his hand roughly through it. “Skiwee that makes no sense.”

“Makes perfect sense.”

“Only if you mean you like your women starchy and so smelly they make you cry.”

“Ha!” Martin laughed.

Somewhere around the boardwalk, Gabby-- the third player in their trio-- was looking for something to snack on. They were just hoping to get one more season out of the tank like Russian before he discovered the corn dog and went from acceptably bulky to downright rollable. Lemur cleared his throat and scratched the skin itchy and irritated by the sand and salt just under the waistband of his swim trunks. He changed the subject. “So ... What's your plan for the off season Skiwee?”

Martin shrugged, the sun and humidity had turned his messy curls into a puff of wire-like hairs. “Go home to Poland, see Mama ... sleep.”

“You' going back to Russia to train?”

Martin's lips pressed tightly together and he swallowed. That wasn't advisable. Alex had maybe pulled a few strings so that the Red Army was no longer going to bust down his door and drag him off kicking and screaming into the night, but that didn't mean he would be able to cross the border without issue. It was an uncertainty he'd rather not risk.

“No ... as for training ... I have not decision yet.”

“Hm.” Lemur nodded, adjusted his sunglasses and tried very hard to look aloof, but Lemur did not have the face nor the personality for aloofness. His big brown eyes broadcasted exactly what was going on in his head like a giant glittering marquee and his soft, young face had no lines to camouflage telling dimples that set in even before the smiles or frowns were visible.

“What?” Martin said.

“...Nothing.”

“What?”

“...It's nothing really...”

Martin scowled, his annoyance seemed to make his hair curl into tighter ringlets. “Speak.”

“Well ... it's just ... I was thinking about going to New York early and working out before training camp.”

“So?”

“So, you know, after you go home and see your family ... you should come.”

“To New York?”

“Yeah ... in July or so when you're ready to start on-ice stuff again.”

“Mmmm ... dunno ... maybe.”

“... you know by July your mother will be driving you nuts anyway. You'll be itching to get out.”

“Hmmm...” Martin tried not to move his head and give himself away as his eyes steadily followed a couple of girls in bathing suits walking and giggling across the beach, the surf lapping at their heels. Fortunately, man invented sunglasses just for occasions like this.

“Anyway, Gabby's going to be there too.”

“Yeah?” Martin replied softly. He lost sight of the girls ... but he had a couple of freckles where he did not remember there being freckles before and this proved infinitely more interesting than whatever Lemur was going on about.

“Actually I think I'm bringing him home for the break to meet my parents...”

“Uh-huh...” One freckle looked kind of purplish. Should he be concerned about that or was it some weird reaction to the sunscreen he was using ... which, by the slight pinkness of the rest of his skin, didn't seem to be doing much of any screening really.

Martin was too busy picking at rough skin on his elbow to notice the withering glare Lemur shot him when his light facetious comment-- “Hopefully they'll approve and the wedding will go through.”-- garnered absolutely no reaction at all.

“Uh-huh,” Martin said instead.

“...But I was hoping, since it's Gabby and all, that you would give me away.”

“Uh-huh...”

“So you will Skiwee?”

“Sure ... fine, sound good,” Martin mumbled.

“Do you have a tux?”

Stop. Martin looked up. “A what?”

“A tux. A tuxedo ... you know the very very formal black suits people wear to parties?”

“Oh...” The Pole thought about this for a few minutes. “No.”

“You'll need to get one right away then!”

“Oh...” His expression was now one part puzzlement, one part worry. The worry was what Lemur found most amusing.

“For what?” Martin said after a few moments of uncomfortably shifting in his lounge chair.

“To give me away!”

Martin's vacant pale green eyes blinked once. “Away?”

“Yeah!” Lemur grinned.

“...Who would take you?”

With a startled snap Lemur reached across the gap between their chairs and punched Martin in the arm. “Plenty of people!”

“Ow! Fine fine ... do I really need tucks?”

“Tux .” He slid back into his seat and took a sip of his coconut cocktail. “And no, I was kidding about that part, but Gabby really is coming to stay with me for a while.”

“Oh...” Martin went back to watching the people move across the seashore. “Why?”

“I don't think he has anywhere else to go. I mean ... actually maybe you could ... you know ... ask him? He might talk to you more easily than me.”

The tight worried frown that created uncomfortable lines on Martin's forehead made it obvious what he thought of that suggestion. Mikhail “Gabby” Gabrelovic was the perfect stereotype of the moody, enigmatic Russian hockey player; the only person he was consistently nice to was Lemur. Everyone else found themselves with either a puppy or a pit-bull at their side depending on a wide range of factors that were difficult, if not impossible, to predict.

“If he has family in Russia he doesn't talk about them to me and he's not going back to see them. So maybe there are some burned bridges, but I find it hard to believe that Gabby is the hockey playing Oliver Twist.”

Martin didn't have the heart to tell Lemur that the restrictions in Gabby's vacation plans probably had more to do with the circumstances under which he left Russia rather than anything as heartbreakingly pedestrian as having a fall out with his family.

“So he's going to stay here, and you know all the guys are going back to their hometowns same as you. That leaves him all alone.” As Lemur explained this Martin already knew where it was going. He smiled as Lemur awkwardly shrugged and mumbled through the rest of the story, ending off with a strong, confident, “but he really should consider going back to visit his family.”

Martin grunted and reached for his drink. “It is his business. Besides, girlfriend come over visit ... right?”

“Oh right, I forgot about that.”

The young American player did not sound especially satisfied.

“He be fine. Gabby not baby-- wait, okay ... Gabby is baby, but not like this.”

“You're so sure...”

“Of course.” Martin shrugged. “He does what he loves for money.”

“Well yeah...” Lemur fell silent, limbs hanging limply over the edges of his lounge chair. For a moment there was silence, until a shadow started to spread across Lemur's body like his own personal storm cloud, and then a greasy tentacle dappled in dry beige crust curled down towards his face almost unseen until a tiny droplet of clear oil landed with a splat on his cheek.

Martin jumped in his seat as Lemur screamed ... a harsh, sharp, girly, cry that flew out before he could stop it. Standing over him was the missing Russian, smiling evilly and holding a bit of breaded fried octopus just above Lemur's face.

“What?” Gabby said. “It is good.”

“Don't sneak up on me like that! Waving strange squid things under my nose! What do you think this is? Detroit?”

Gabby shrugged, dipping the bit of fried octopus in some hot sauce and popping it in his mouth. “Screw you, it good.”

And after a few minutes of staring he reluctantly offered some to Martin, then looked disappointed when Martin took advantage of that.

“Honestly Gabs.” Lemur adjusted his shades and poked the Russian in the ribs. “Be careful not to let yourself go. We have to make a case for ourselves this year. Show that we're ready for the major league.”

“Hmm...” Gabby grumbled.

“Cause it's going to be vicious.”

“Too much,” Martin frowned. “You worry too much. You be fine.”

“I suppose you haven't heard,” Lemur's teeth pinched his plastic straw closed as he muttered.

“What?” Martin asked, stretching out the 'a' sound and skimming over the 't' so that the word came out like 'whawwwwd?'

Lemur winced.

“They cut Coley loose.”

No response from Martin. The Pole tilted his head, waited for a longer explanation, and then when nothing came he retreated shyly into his coconut.

“I know, I figured they'd wait until after free agency or something. I can't remember if he's restricted or unrestricted ... probably unrestricted so maybe that's why they told him...”

“Told what?”

“That they were cutting him loose.”

“...Was he tied up?”

“Was he-- Skiwee no! Cut him loose! You know... they're not going to renew his contract.”

“OH!”

“Yeah!”

If they told him already that meant they saw absolutely no value in him as a defenseman in either the major league or the minor one. If New York had even a sliver of interest they would have strung him along until probably about July 14th or so, just in case things didn't pan out the way they wanted when the feeding frenzy known as free agency opened up.

The off season was the one vacation they got. Roughly three months liberty, but not always three months of relaxation. While they were on the beach scouts and corporate bodies were mulling over contracts and floating names around the war room. This was prime trading season until the draft when things would cool off for a day or two before a new round of would start up to clear room (and sometimes finances) for big names holding big contracts with the ink still wet on them.

“So, who do you think will be available once they get to our pick at 6?”

Evan Parks straightened his suit jacket and tried to look like he understood everything that was going on around him in the small, cramped hotel boardroom. On the far wall index cards had been taped up with scotch tape, names scribbled up in black marker so dramatic it overpowered the thin blue lines the letters were presumably printed on. Head of Scouting, a tall but stocky man, stood in front of the wall of cards, occasionally reaching and plucking a name off the wall and pounding it into position somewhere else.

After hours of this, followed by long periods of arguments, discussion and digression, it looked like they might finally have the first draft of The List.

The List was a product of months of exhausting work by every person in the room except Evan, who-- for his part-- tired to minimize the stigma of that by staying as quiet as humanly possible through the process. He held his breath through lulls in the arguments and sat not at the conference room table but in the corner, virtually behind a potted plant. Still, though, even willing himself into invisibility wouldn't have helped settle the resentment that spiked every time he shifted his weight.

The List is a hockey team's single most important document. For most of the year it exists only in abstract form, mentally sorted through quiet consensus and thousands of anxiety ridden situational analyses. What if... What if... What if... The what ifs were eternal. What if this player put on fifty pounds of muscle? What if that one was merely padding his numbers by playing in a weaker league? What if a good team made an average player look better? What if a bad team had hidden away a real gem?

Then as June came and even the last traces of hockey began to melt and recede for summer sports, The List finally started to appear-- tentatively at first-- in written form.

It was very very top secret.

“We need a defenseman, for sure. The team is really weak on defense and I don't believe that the guy we drafted last year is enough to shore things up.” The Head of Scouting didn't even bother to look back at his underlings. He just stared at The List in its first almost embryonic form on the wall.

“Chicago has fifth,” he noted.

“Washington fourth,” someone answered back.

“And Buffalo is seventh,” the Head of Scouting said, although who got to draft after them only mattered in a very prideful academic sense. You don't want the teams under you to draft better players ... players that you could have had first. It makes you look stupid.

“So who will be around at 6?” he wondered out loud.

“Maybe ... Kirill Nikitin?” one scout suggested.

“Ugh ... what a name, where's he from again?”

“Russia.”

“Figures.”

“A little light still but tall, very tall, so he should fill out soon. Playing quiet solid defensive hockey in the Dub.”

The words 'the Dub' got Evan Parks's attention. He was still playing catch up on most of this hockey stuff, but he knew the Dub was the nickname for the Western Hockey League ... in Canada, not Russia.

“Hmm ... maybe, who else is in the top ten and plays defense? Jones?”

“Most likely gone before sixth.”

“You think?”

“I have him going at three or four.”

Jonathan Jones was about as promising a defenseman as the Canadian juniors was offering lately, or at least that was the story this week. Come draft day everything could be completely different. Charged with the task of seeing into the future and divining the real talent through growth spurts, injuries, goal slumps, line shuffling and new roles, scouts were notoriously fickle. A player could be ranked nationally in the top five at the beginning of the season and then plummet into the darkest of the later draft rounds by June. Jonathan Jones, however, had remained ranked at the top of the pile for his class pretty consistently.

But whether he was around when the sixth pick came was another story. Some teams drafted the best player they could, some teams drafted players that fit their mold, and still other drafted to fill a hole they saw coming. New York wanted a defenseman, but whether they got Jones or Nikitin depended on what the five teams in front of them wanted.

“Who else?”

“Well there's the Minnesota kid, Scottie Apps.”

“Apps?” someone scoffed. “As in Syl Apps ... but on defense?”

“No relation.”

“No political ambitions I hope either.”

Their head scout smiled and quickly thumbed through the papers below him. “None listed,” he replied facetiously.