On the forty-first floor of Toronto Maple Leaf Kyle Dubas waits. He is standing at the door to Lou Lamoriello’s office and he has been there for some time. Kyle does not want to knock until Lou is finished yelling. Kyle can’t make out what Lou is yelling about but every time he thinks it is over Lou starts screaming again. A hand lands on Kyle’s shoulder surprising him.

“What’s going on?” It’s Brendan Shanahan with Mark Hunter behind him.

“I didn’t want to disturb Lou, it sounds important.” Kyle says.

A profanity laced tirade streams out from behind the door. Brendan nods to Mark who opens the door. Lou is pacing across the length of his palatial office. He is holding his phone so pacing is not easy since he insists on using a land line.

“This is garbage Murray! Garbage! What kind of monkey wart horse chunks is this prick trying to pull? Who does he think I am? I’m the boss! Fuck Bruce Springsteen! Although his show is still magnificent.” Lou notices Brendan, Mark, and Kyle. “Make this right Murray. I’ll call you later.” Hanging up, Lou sits at his desk with his phone in his lap. “Pour me a drink will ya.” He says to no one specific. Mark, who was going  behind the bar anyway, nods his acceptance of the task.

“Whats the matter Lou?” Brendan asks.

“Oh, it’s my agent.” Brendan and Kyle each look to the other but neither man can offer any sort of clarification. Lou continues. “I am trying to play the role of myself in Plug Life; The John Scott Story: Making an All-Star but I am getting totally screwed.”

Mark brings Lou a quart of rum which the GM gulps down noisily. He finishes the drink and waves his glass at Mark. Shaking his head, Mark gives Brendan and Kyle their drinks and gathers Lou’s glass to refill.

“How are you getting screwed?” Brendan asks.

“It’s total crap. The studio is trying to tell me that I am not in the story. I don’t buy it. I have shot down more trade proposals for that hump than anyone in the league. One time I went over to his house to tell his kids how brutal their dad was. Who does that kind of crap? Only me! It’s a total conspiracy.”

“Maybe they just didn’t write you into the movie Lou.” Kyle has learned how to aggrivate Lou and rarely misses an opprotunity to do so.

“Oh please. Next you’ll tell me that the U.S. government didn’t fabricate the Zika virus as a way of testing mosquitos as a bio-weapon delivery system.”

Mark brings Lou another quart of rum then returns to the bar for his own drinks. While Mark drags the two kegs over to his seat the three other men in the room stare at each other in silence. Instead of drinking, Mark begins a series of stretches to limber up his back. Eventually Kyle can’t help himself.

“Those are only rumours. Nothing has ever been proven.” He says.

Lou rolls his eyes. “Sure thing ass. It’s all just a theory. Though no one denies that the discovery of the virus took place in a laborotory in Rockefeller center, and it was found in a monkey that was bred in captivity and subsequently destroyed. Just  a cluster fuck of strange coincidences right. God your gullible. I bet the Easter Bunny leaves a note under your pillow when he collects your teeth too.”

Mark get on top of one keg in a handstand with the tap in his mouth. As Kyle begins to answer Lou, Brendan waves him off and changes the subject. “We are getting ready to head to the airport. Are you all set?”

Lou perks up. “Are you kidding? I’m super excited for our Western Canadian trip! I packed my good sandals, my triple thick condoms, my denim suit, and all my fanciest jerked meat. The only thing I’m gonna need to pick up when we land is KY jelly. God I love Calgary. The tap water tastes just like the East river back in New York. Call me sentimental, it tastes like home.”

Mike Babcock bursts through the door of the office. The Toronto Maple Leafs head coach looks frustrated. Peter Holland slips in behind his coach trying to go unnoticed.

“Lou are you trading Pete?” Mike demands.

“Who?” Lou asks with a shrug. Mark slips out of his keg-stand and lands with a crash on the floor. There is a pause while Mark shakes off the fall and gets himself set up again.

Mike turns and pulls Peter in front of him. “Peter Holland. Our Peter. Are you trading him? He told me that he read he is going to get traded on this trip and he doesn’t want to go.”

“I thought it was Dion?” Lou looks over to Kyle who gives a tiny head shake. “Let me think.”

Lou stands up and walks over to the Leaf. He wraps an arm around Peters shoulder and takes a swig of his rum.

“Petey, can I call you Petey? Listen, hockey is a business. And business is like family. Sometimes a family member moves away to another organization, and even though you still love them you may have to hide their corpse in the concrete foundation of your new house. It’s an unfortunate set of circumstances but these things happen all the time. So you see, everything will work itself out. Traded, not traded, it’s just a state of mind right.” Lou puts his glass in the Leafs hand and forces him to drink.

“There you go.” Mike says grabbing Peters arm and pulling him from Lou’s grip.

“I bet your more nervous now then before” Mike takes the rum and downs it in one gulp. He tosses the empty glass to Lou and drags Peter to the door.

“Now go pack your things. It’s an eighty minute jog to the airport and we are leaving in twenty.” Closing the door behind the bewildered Leaf, Mike turns back to the group. “I hate Twitter. I am sure it was invented to drive me insane. Can we say it quick before I go?”

Brendan, Kyle, and Lou bow their heads with the coach. Mark lets the keg tap fall from his mouth with a clang but stays upside-down. After a moment of silence the men speak in unison as if the words were a spell. And maybe words do hold the power to create.

“Dear god and Lord Stanley, thank you for bringing us together here in Toronto and, please help Steven Stamkos find his way home.” Mike is already headed out the door when the others look up. “Gotta go. Lot’s to do. Lou, have a little respect for yourself, buy some better rum.”

Lou grumbles all the way to the bar. As he fills his glass he looks to Brendan.

“Anyone who doesn’t understand that cheap rum is every sailors wet dream needs to be fired. Please Brendan. I’ve fired coaches for less.”

“No.” Brendan says in a tone that invites no dissent.

“Great.” Lou whines. “What else can go wrong today.”

Mark sucks the first keg dry. With an unexpected dexterity the big man hand walks from the empty keg to the full one. He almost losses his balance switching the tap over, but manages the difficult manuever with style, using his head to pump the tap with an upside-down pushup.

“And you know what else ass,” Lou says turning to Kyle. “Lyme disease is man made too. The Nazis invented it during the cold war.”

“Okay, let’s go.” Brendan says. Herding his management team to the airport will take the better part of the afternoon. But they will be ready when they are needed because they are true professionals.