There's a Shark in My Hockey Pool Read Online Free

captured the fire-wagon flare with each brush stroke of the
Canadien player garbed in the Club de Hockey bleu, blanc et rouge.
Meanwhile, the Maple Leaf's pristine white with navy blue trim home
sweater was the rest of the country's flag, caught in a gale and
sure to blow away from the not-quite flying frenchman at any
second. The colors splashed into each other. The figures were
recognizable ... yet strangely foreign.
    Here he was, a hockey player, in advertising.
Players hope their careers have been eye-catching enough to garner
lucrative marketing endorsements. Marcotte found himself at the
other end of the spectrum. With little or no name recognition, he
couldn't go straight to the marquee. Instead, he had to hang out
his shingle like every other advertising schlep.
    At least he had Artie. Thank God for that.
Artie had seen the cracks, but had decided to ride out the storm
with Derek. A big black Vancouver rain cloud continued hanging over
their office.
    Derek returned home each night ... to Helen.
Quiet, unassuming ... she'd gone beneath the surface repair, behind
the drywall, and nursed him back to health with her plastering
care. Helen's bedside manner had quickly enveloped the other rooms
of the house. He reminded himself almost daily she was a blessing
in disguise. But what exactly was she when the mask came off? When
convenience begged compassion? After eight years, her mind still
had many unprobed lobes for him. Marriage, children, RRSP's ...
these were all conversational items that the magic of common law
simply swept under the carpet.
    Their relationship was rife with renovations.
Your basic fixer-upper. She got him to where he was going, safe and
sound, watered and fed. For good or bad, he was stuck with the
stucco queen.
    The psychological ramifications hit home
harder every day. At work and at home, Derek Marcotte at 32, was
restoring his own Sistine Chapel while standing on his head. All
the more laborious ... when working with chapstick.
     
    ... 2 ...

    A pair of boys wristed a sponge rubber hockey
puck back and forth along the quiet street in front of the
fifteen-story, post-war building. One boy aimed for the parked
two-door Shove-Pet beside the other boy, some fifty yards distant.
The other boy returned fire upon a Pontiaque LeMensa to the right
of the first boy. In this game of "park the puck", the first one to
hit their target three times would win. Adults peeking out of
windows never watched the game long enough to realize their
vehicles were under siege.
    Inside apartment #714, the Leafs fluttered
across the TV screen. The room's homey decor was modest,
contemporary and embossed with a woman's touch. A model spitfire
waited for clearance to take-off from atop a bookcase. The bookcase
contained several history books that were outnumbered by text after
text of medical information. A pompous bust of Winston Churchill
made for an indignant bookend. Derek leaned forward in the
Lazy-boy, wolfing down his meal. Helen entered the room with a
glass of milk and placed it on the coffee table in front of him.
Her actions were mechanical. Like clockwork, she still blocked his
view of the TV during instant replays.
    "Thanks."
    "Can I get you anything else?"
    "How 'bout a coupla goals for the Leafs?"
    Helen paused to watch the action. She'd lived
with Derek for nearly a decade and was still never sure when he was
being serious or sarcastic. She treaded water in these situations,
waiting for some life-saving cord of reality to be thrown her way.
There was none coming. Derek spoke a different tongue when a hockey
game was on. His dialogue was fired out in short, staccato
syllables ... so as not to step on the announcer's
play-by-play.
    The problem was that she was never sure which
team Toronto was. Sometimes they wore blue, sometimes white. But
the other team often wore white as well.
    "What's the score?" she asked finally.
    "4-2, Hartford."
    Her brow furrowed at this trivial
revelation.
    "Hartford has a