Beartown: Chapter 4 Summary & Analysis

This early in the morning, the rink is almost empty, but the upstairs offices are filled with loud men’s voices. The club president sweats at his desk, messily eating a sandwich. From the outside, the president seems to be in charge. He appoints the general manager (Peter), who recruits players and hires coaches. In reality, the president answers to board members and sponsors—many of them major investors and employers in the district. Right now, all these men are gathered in the president’s office for an “unofficial” meeting, agreeing on one thing—who should be fired.

Peter Andersson grew up in Beartown and has occupied most of the hockey-related roles in the town, from promising youth player to NHL star. But right now he’s just hunting for the keys to his Volvo. He keeps getting texts from the club president about the meeting. As GM, he does just about everything—besides his official duties, he helps out with rink maintenance and arranges team travel, too. He was hired for this job by Sune, his own youth coach and father figure. Sune had explained to him that as GM, it’s Peter’s role to pull together all the hockey club’s stakeholders. To Kira, Peter explained that his job is to “make sure no one catches on fire” from Beartown’s burning passion for hockey.

When Sune and Peter set the goal of rebuilding the junior hockey team to become the best in the country, many people laughed, but no one is laughing about that now. As the club president and the other men wait impatiently for Peter to arrive, some of them joke that Peter’s wife probably has a more important meeting than him, and that maybe they should hire Kira instead—stilettos suit a GM better than slippers. They all laugh.

In his kitchen, Peter finds Maya’s best friend, Ana. She’s making a huge mess while preparing a smoothie. She greets him cheerfully and explains that she’s spent the night again. Peter tries to look pleased about this while shouting for Kira again. Kira, meanwhile, moves through the house much more calmly and gracefully. She urges Maya toward the shower and says that she’s fine with Ana staying here as long as Maya teaches her how to clean a kitchen. She hears Peter yelling as she slips the Volvo’s keys into her pocket.

Fatima comes into the club president’s office while the men are still laughing over the joke about stilettos. She apologizes, but nobody looks at her. When she finishes emptying the wastepaper bin, she briefly clutches her painful back, not wanting anyone to notice and tell Amat, who would only worry. Downstairs, on the ice, Amat races across the rink again and again. He appreciates his mother’s gratitude for Beartown, but his job is to dream—he dreams that Fatima “will one day be able to walk into a room without having to apologize.”

When Kira finally appears in the kitchen, Peter desperately asks her about the car keys. Kira explains that she’s taking the Volvo to work while he takes the other car to the garage; her morning meeting at the law firm is more important than his meeting at the hockey club. They play rock-paper-scissors, Kira clearly cheats, and Peter can only yell in protest as she takes the keys and leaves.

Back at the club, the president assures the sponsors that Peter always does what’s best for the club and won’t disrupt the sponsors’ plans. The president is confident that this is true even though Peter is going to be asked to fire his mentor, Sune.