The Penalty Box

Epilogue

I grunted as I picked up our now one year old daughter," We're going to be late Coty!"

He laughed as he straightened out his tie," No we won't, it's fine. Take a deep breath."

"This is potentially the biggest night of our son's life," I reminded him," Deep breaths won't cut it anymore."

"Are you guys ready?" Ty asked, poking his head into our hotel room.

"Yeah bub, let's go."

An hour later, we all sat inside the arena not so patiently waiting for the event to start. Ty, who was sitting next to me, was bouncing his leg so hard it was shaking even my chair. I looked over at Scarlet who only shrugged and whispered something to Ty.

He had every right to be nervous, there was no doubt about it. But we knew one way or another tonight was going to end alright for him.

But as the Blackhawks made their way to the podium to start off the night, we didn't expect what they said," For the first overall pick, the Chicago Blackhawks would like to select, from Province University, Tyler Bruner."

We all stood and Ty almost immediately hugged me, "We did it mom. I made it."

I wanted to cry, and  tell him that we didn't do anything, he was the one who'd just been first overall. We knew he was going to get drafted pretty high. He'd had quite a few teams looking at him last season, but we didn't expect him to go first overall.

Over the course of the night, people kept referring to him as the next Auston Matthews. Or saying that he was going to be the savior of Chicago. But the entire night he just kept saying that he was just a kid from Raleigh who loved hockey, and was so incredibly grateful that he now had this opportunity.

"So, they're saying you and I are going to make history," Ty told Coty.

"Oh? Why is that?"

"Because, father and son get to battle it out against each other every year now," He laughed," You best get your boys ready, I'm coming for blood."

He said it all with such a big smile. I couldn't help but laugh," If you drop gloves, you'd better win the fight," I told Ty.

"Callahan!" Coty laughed," You're supposed to be on my side."

Ty wrapped his arms around Scarlet and smiled," So, how do you feel about being the girlfriend to a Blackhawk?"

She shrugged," Well, I love you too much just to breakup with you because you'll be playing for Chicago. So I guess I'm stuck with you."

We all laughed," I guess the Bruner family now has an NHL legacy."

"Not a bad thing to have," Coty shrugged," Oh by the way, don't turn your phone off Ty. I'm sure a couple of your new teammates will be giving you a call soon."

"Oh, and Auston texted and asked for you number. Seems he wanted to congratulate you too," I added.

"Wait, what?"

"Welcome to the league, son," Coty smiled," Get ready for a wild ride."

Not long after, Ty was seated up at a table waiting for the press conference to start. He looked over at the four of us and gave a nervous smile before turning his attention to the first of many questions.

"Honestly I owe my success to my coach," He replied," Callahan Bruner, whom I now have the pleasure of calling mom, took a chance on me after all the other teams had turned me down. I wasn't exactly a level headed player back then," He laughed almost nervously," But she saw something in me I guess, and decided to take a chance. Then her and Coty decided they wanted to foster me, and they adopted me not long after. See it's because of the fact that she took a chance on me, that I'm here. So, I owe every single ounce of my success to her, she's both my favorite coach and the best mom I could've ever had."

He made eye contact with me and smiled," I also owe it to the penalty box too, I guess. If I hadn't spent so much time in there, I wouldn't have needed someone to take a chance on me."

"I'm immensely grateful to the Chicago Blackhawks," He continued," For the second time in my career, a team is taking a chance on me off of blind faith. I don't plan on letting them down, that's for sure."

Emmy tugged at my shirt with one hand, and pointed to Ty with the other. She was far too young to even begin to understand what was happening, but I was positive she'd love that she'd get to watch her dad and brother play against each other next season. At just a little over a year old, she already love the game. She'd bang on the glass and yell at the players as much as she could, even if no one could understand her.

When I was a kid, all I wanted to do was play hockey. I only wanted to make it into the NHL, be one of the first women. Now, years later, I'd come to realize there were more important things. I found that I loved coaching, because of moments like this. I loved being a mom even more, not just because of tonight, but because of all of the simple day to day things.

I loved that I got to walk through life with my best friend, and or children. I loved where life had taken us, and I wouldn't change a bit of it.

Just as the press conference was ending, Ty grinned at me and tapped his chest with his fist, and mouthed two simple words.

Lightning forever.