Us Against You

The violence between Hed and Beartown escalates with Leo’s burning of the Hed flags, and when a local politician suggests that hockey players in Beartown start supporting Hed, she finds an axe in the hood of her car. Benji has been following Maya and Ana because he wants to show them something. He passes them the hammer, knowing that “he’s regarded as such a wild animal in other people’s eyes” (49). Meanwhile, in Bearskin, the local pub, a stranger appears with two men in black jackets. The stranger wants to ask Ramona, the pub owner, some questions. She is immediately suspicious of him, and he passes her a list of names of Beartown citizens. Neither he nor Ramona disclose information.

Benji, accustomed to finding hiding places in the woods to run away to, shows Maya and Ana a small hidden island. The girls spend the summer there, Ana sneaking home for provisions and Maya writing songs. Benji is now left on his own, without his best friend or a father to turn to.

Kira Andersson, who is accustomed to her husband’s absence in the house for his hockey job, waits for him yet again the day Beartown Ice Hockey Club is declared finished. Peter is riddled with guilt: for what happened to his late son, for the rape of his daughter, for the destruction of Beartown Ice Hockey. For the first time, Kira and Peter go to sleep with nothing to say, without holding one another. They are fully in their own worlds of sorrow; they worry if this is the beginning of the end. 

The stranger goes to Bobo’s father’s car garage for new tires, then follows Amat as he runs. Both boys are talented hockey players in their own right, and both were disgraced after Maya’s rape. Amat witnessed the rape and told the truth. Bobo defended him when the other hockey players beat him up. The stranger, who identifies themselves as Zackell to Bobo’s father, keeps Amat and Bobo’s name on the list, then follows Benji as he beats his father’s grave from his desperate sadness. Later, Zackell meets with Richard Theo, an unpopular local politician. Richard offers Zackell a job coaching hockey, but Zackell points out how clear it is that there is technically no club. Even so, both seem excited about the challenge.

Kira and Peter struggle to communicate with each other and themselves. Peter snaps at Amat, who stops him to ask where he can play hockey. Amat’s mother Fatima is close friends with Bobo’s mother Ann-Katrin, who confides in Fatima that she is sick and will die. Fatima convinces her to tell Bobo the truth, who is devastated that is happy family will lose their mother. Meanwhile, Benji continues to deal with his anguish at his sister Katia’s bar in Hed, where his tattoo representing Beartown causes a stir. He meets a stranger who follows him out the bar and they go home together. Richard Theo holds conversations with business friends in London; he is brokering a mysterious deal.