Finnie Walsh (11 page)

Sarah was three and a half years old and was still yellow. She had been a quiet baby, but as a small child it was all we could do to shut her up. My father and Pal loved it; the more questions she asked of them, the happier they were. She never got tired of their arguing; sometimes one simple question would send the two of them into a discussion that could last half an hour. Sarah just waited, listening to everything they said, and as soon as there was even a tiny lull in the conversation she would pose yet another question, which would lead to yet another discussion. It was as if she was trying to ask the perfect question,
the one that would keep my father and Pal talking forever.

Sarah also talked to Finnie for hours on end. He was infinitely patient with her, but with him her task was harder. Finnie tried to give her the most concise answers possible, which meant that she had to have more questions on hand.

Sarah had learned that I rarely knew the answers to her questions. Instead she took it upon herself to share with me the extent of knowledge she had acquired each day, coming into my room before she went to bed to demonstrate what she had learned. On the day that Sarah discovered how to use the light switches, my mother had to take her to bed kicking and screaming. She came into my room and pushed a chair up to the wall, below the switch. Climbing onto the chair, she said to me, very seriously, “Watch.” She flicked the light on and off, over and over again, clapping her hands with delight. To her it was magic. I suppose, for all I know, it might as well be. “I am the sun,” she giggled. “Nighttime.” Flick. “Daytime.” Flick. “Nighttime.”

Unlike Louise, Sarah was a very sociable child. But because of her yellowness, many children were initially reluctant to play with her. Some parents were even worried that she had a contagious disease. She usually won people over, though, in the end. Sarah was impossible to resist.

I had just started my fourth season of hockey in the city league. Every summer I earned money to pay for equipment and league fees by painting Mr. Walsh’s fence. In hindsight it is possible that Roger Walsh paid me more money than was reasonable for the job and it is also possible that the fence didn’t need to be painted each year. But I was grateful for the opportunity; without it, I wouldn’t have been able to play hockey.

I had been steadily improving my game, though I was not a flashy player, or so said Finnie, and had only scored a handful of goals. I could pass the puck up the middle pretty well and
opposing players had a hard time getting by me. Still, I had an awful lot to learn and it seemed that everyone else was getting better at a faster rate.

Finnie was becoming a star. He had recorded several shutouts the season before and had been voted our team’s most valuable player. He was, simply put, one hell of a goaltender. He seemed to have conquered his weak glove side and his ability to read plays was fantastic. I had even heard “NHL” whispered occasionally in reference to Finnie.

On November 13, 1985, Finnie’s 13th birthday, we were scheduled to play a game against the team that had beaten us in the league finals the year before. The rivalry was intense, not only between the players, but also between the parents. Both our families were in attendance and I was a lot more nervous than I usually was before a game. In the locker room, I sat quietly off in one corner, collecting my thoughts, waiting for the coach to give his usual pre-game speech.

Coach Hunter was a grizzled man who had reportedly played half a season for the Boston Bruins. Whether that was true or not he would never say for sure. “Doesn’t matter what you’ve tried to do,” he would say, “only matters what you’ve done.” He now worked as a millwright in the Walsh sawmill. I’m not sure it was a job he actually enjoyed. He was an excellent coach, though.

As I laced up my skates, I realized that Finnie wasn’t there yet, which was unusual. At least 45 minutes remained before the opening face-off, but Finnie was usually one of the first players to arrive. It took him a while to put on all his equipment and he liked to be alone before a game started. When it did, he was always the first member of the team to step onto the ice and the last one to step off it.

Fifteen minutes before the game, when Finnie still hadn’t
shown up, Coach Hunter began to panic. “Woodward! Where’s Walsh?” he asked me.

“I don’t know, Coach,” I said. I was just as worried as he was. Finnie had been looking forward to this game for weeks. It was his birthday; we were destined to win.

“Jesus Christ, where is that boy?” He looked at Tom Kazakoff, our backup goaltender. “I hope you sharpened your skates, Kazakoff.”

Tom looked like he was going to throw up. He was a terrible goalie and he knew it. His father made him play and the only reason he played goal was that he got to spend most of his time on the bench.

It was time for us to go out onto the ice and Finnie still wasn’t there; Coach Hunter was about to blow a gasket. “I don’t ask much of you boys,” he shouted. “All I ask is that you try your best. And that you show up. Now can anyone tell me where the hell Walsh is?”

Of course, no one knew.

We went out onto the ice, without Finnie, and we got slaughtered. After 60 minutes of humiliatingly painful play, we skulked into the dressing room, having lost by a score of 14-2.

We sat there forlornly, waiting for Coach Hunter to come in and chew us out. God knows I wanted him to yell at us. We were terrible out there, every one of us. Tom Kazakoff was the worst, without a doubt, but the rest of us were pretty bad, too. We deserved to lose that game.

But Coach Hunter didn’t yell at us. He was mad, for sure. A large vein bulged in the middle of his forehead and he rhythmically clenched and unclenched his fists. “If anyone sees Walsh, tell him he’s benched for the rest of the season.” He walked out of the dressing room, mercifully leaving us alone with our shame.

I showered, got changed and left the arena. I avoided both my own family as well as Finnie’s. As I crossed the parking lot,
I heard someone call my name. I turned and saw Joyce Sweeney running to catch up with me. “Hey Paul,” she said, breathing hard. Her face was flushed from the cold.

“Hey,” I said. I had never been around Joyce without Finnie. It felt a little weird.

“Where was Finnie tonight?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t say anything to me about missing the game.”

“You guys lost pretty badly.”

“Yeah. It was brutal.”

There was an uncomfortable pause and I shifted my gaze to the ground, pretending to be very interested in a particular square of pavement.

“So you don’t know what happened to Finnie?” she asked finally.

“Nope. I wish I did.”

“Me too.” She started to leave, then turned back. “When you see Finnie, tell him I said hi.”

“Sure,” I said, a little disappointed.

Joyce walked off in the direction of the arena. I watched her until she disappeared, then continued across the parking lot. I didn’t know what was wrong with Finnie, but I had an idea where he was. I jogged to the sawmill and, picking my way along the dark trail, negotiated my way to the reservoir.

We hadn’t made a rink that year. What with school and our fairly busy city league hockey schedule, we just hadn’t had the time.

I found Finnie in what would have been the goal crease. He had lit a fire and was tossing his hockey card collection into it, one card at a time. “Hey Finnie,” I said, sitting down.

“Hey Paul.”

“Where were you tonight?”

He didn’t answer me.

“Remember, the game? Coach Hunter is mad as hell at you.”

He still didn’t say anything.

“We got shellacked.”

He shifted his attention from the fire to me. “Pelle Lindbergh is dead,” he said. He continued to flip his cards into the fire. He refused to say anything more.

Pelle Lindbergh had been out celebrating a win over the Boston Bruins with the rest of the Philadelphia Flyers the preceding Saturday night when, driving home, he lost control of his car and slammed into a wall. Suffering from severe spinal cord and brain injuries, a fractured skull and broken legs, he was pronounced brain dead at the hospital. After two days, his family requested that the life support be turned off and his organs removed for donation. Pelle Lindbergh was 26 years old. His blood-alcohol level was 0.24 percent.

Lindbergh’s death had a marked impact on Finnie. He no longer displayed any interest in professional hockey; when Wayne Gretzky and the Edmonton Oilers were eliminated in the second-round playoffs that year, he didn’t say a word. What was more astonishing was that he refused to have anything to do with a rookie goaltender, Patrick Roy, who led the Montreal Canadiens to the Stanley Cup that year. Even when Peter Stastny and the Quebec Nordiques finished first in their division, he remained silent. Stastny had 122 points that year, the league’s sixth-best total. Gretzky had 215 points, the highest of his career.

At the next practice, Finnie played horribly but didn’t seem to care. It wasn’t until after practice, in the locker room, that I noticed what he had done to his jersey. He had unstitched and reversed his old number, Pelle Lindbergh’s number, from a 31 to a 13. Lindbergh had died on the 13th of November, Finnie’s 13th birthday. I don’t know if Finnie switched the number to pay homage to Lindbergh or as some ominous symbolic gesture and
I didn’t ask him. I’m not sure I wanted to know.

Coach Hunter stuck to his guns regarding Finnie’s benching. Maybe if Finnie had played better in practice he would have been more willing to go back on his decision. As it was, Coach Hunter had no choice but to back up his threat. He had, after all, announced Finnie’s punishment in front of the entire team. Team discipline would have almost certainly suffered and we needed all the discipline we could get with Tom Kazakoff between the pipes. So it was settled; Finnie would ride the pine for the rest of the season.

Tom Kazakoff was as disappointed with Coach Hunter’s decision as the rest of us, if not more. He was physically ill before every game and sometimes again between periods. Once he even begged Finnie to switch jerseys and equipment with him and take his place on the ice. He hated playing and, if his father hadn’t been so determined his son would become an NHL star, would have quit instantly. By the end of the season, we had lost all but five games and, of the five, two were ties and one we won because the other team forfeited.

With Finnie out, and such a poor goaltender in his place, it was my turn to shine. Defence suddenly became our top priority and, since I was the most defensive of our defencemen, I got plenty of ice time.

What I gained in skill Finnie lost. Finnie had always been a hefty kid and would probably have been overweight if he wasn’t constantly wearing his goalie equipment and playing hockey. When Pelle Lindbergh died and Finnie got benched, he stopped wearing his equipment and stopped playing except in practice, where he put in little to no effort. He began to gain weight. He began to slow down.

I first noticed it when he came back from Christmas vacation. Mr. Walsh took Finnie and his brothers to Hawaii for the holidays,
so I didn’t see him for nearly three weeks. I was shocked. His once-solid frame had softened and his face was much rounder. At the age of 13, Finnie had what looked to be a beer belly.

I suspected that Finnie’s lethargic lifestyle was causing the decline in his physique. Since there was absolutely no chance of Coach Hunter changing his mind, there was only one option. I would have to rebuild the rink.

The problem was that, unlike Finnie, I didn’t have access to the supplies. The boards were rotten and our hose and squeegee were gone. I would need Finnie’s help.

“No way,” he said when I proposed the idea.

“Why not?”

“I don’t
want
to play anymore.”

“Come on, Finnie. This is a good idea.”

“No, it’s not. Look, I know what you’re trying to do, but it won’t work. I just don’t care anymore. There’s no point to it.”

“It’ll toughen us up,” I said.

“Big deal.”

Years later, when I was told the details, I realized that Finnie’s obsessive desire to be stronger, faster and tougher was a direct result of his mother’s death, an incident that Finnie was far too young to even remember.

Driving home from the hospital after Finnie’s birth, Mr. Walsh, Mrs. Walsh and Finnie were sideswiped by a transport truck carrying a load of hiking boots. Their car spun out of control and they careened down an embankment and onto the frozen river. It was late November and the river was covered with a shroud of ice, but the impact cracked it. Roger Walsh was stunned, though basically unharmed, but Finnie’s mother sustained serious injuries, not the least of which were two broken legs.

She was unable to leave the car under her own power and when Roger Walsh attempted to free her she insisted that he first take Finnie to safety. Finnie, due to good fortune and the experience of a woman who had already raised three children well into boyhood, was securely strapped into a car seat in the back. Roger Walsh did what his wife told him; she was always more clearheaded in times of crisis than he was and he had learned to listen to her. He freed a tiny, screaming Finnie from the car seat and scrambled along the ice, slipping several times, until he got to the riverbank. He wrapped Finnie in his sweater and placed him in a snowbank, then went back for his wife. He moved as fast as he could, but he was not a man accustomed to extreme physical activity. As he returned to the car, the ice creaked and cracked; Roger Walsh feared that it would break. He had read somewhere that when you’re on cracked ice you should lie on your stomach and crawl across it, dispersing your weight and lessening the stress on the ice.