She's Got Game

by Laura Heffernan

  Before she argued further, I hung up. While I appreciated my friends looking out for Dad while I traveled, they were no substitute for his daughter. Until I saw him with my own eyes, I wouldn’t be able to think about anything else. Planes flew regularly between Chicago and Boston, surely some airline would have a free seat on one of them. Even if I only made it to Providence or New York, I’d rather rent a car and drive the rest of the way than wait around in Chicago.

  I picked up the clothes Cody and I had flung around the room earlier and shrugged into them, tucking my dirty panties into one pocket. No time to look for anything else I might’ve dropped or forgotten, especially since I didn’t want to wake Cody. If he caught me getting dressed, he’d want to know what was wrong, and I didn’t trust myself to talk about it without breaking down.

  With a pang of regret, I glanced back at the bed where Cody still slept. A small part of me cursed him for being such a sound sleeper, for not waking up to offer comfort, so I wouldn’t have to ask for it. I wanted to feel his arms around me, put my head on his shoulder, and let the tears flow. Part of me wanted to kiss him awake, tell him what happened, promise to see him later.

  But I couldn’t. I’d never been great with sympathy. If he said he was sorry and pulled me close, I’d lose it. I needed to keep myself together at least until I got a plane ticket. We may have spent the last two days rolling around together without clothes, but telling him about my father would make me feel truly naked. I didn’t have the emotional capacity to lay myself even more bare before him.

  Instead of waking him, I smoothed back his hair and placed a soft kiss on his forehead. I didn’t want to leave him, couldn’t stay. Couldn’t deal with a big, emotional goodbye. Instead, I wrote a note.

  Cody,

  I’m so sorry, but I have to go. Emergency. Will explain later. TTYS, and if I don’t see you, good luck in Vegas.

  XOXO,

  Gwen

  The plan was to stick the note on the door, but I didn’t have time to look around for tape. Whoever owned the place hadn’t invested in any refrigerator magnets. Instead, I left the paper on the kitchen counter, next to the coffee maker. He’d see it when he made coffee in the morning.

  With a heavy sigh, I snuck out like a thief in the night, letting the door close with a soft click behind me.

  Only instead of taking things that didn’t belong to me, this thief left part of her heart behind.

  Part V: Boston

  Homegirl Holly

  August 28

  Greetings! I’m Holly, filling in for Gwen for a couple of weeks to share my most excellent adventures with you. I’ve lived near Boston my whole adult life, and while Gwen’s hit a lot of popular sites over the years, I want to introduce you to some of the hidden gems. The Bostonian’s Boston, as it is.

  Sure, the Freedom Trail is fun and all, but that’s tourist Boston. The “Cheers Bar”? Most of us won’t even call it that—at least not the original (Don’t get me started on the replica.). So gather round and let a local show you the real sights this week.

  First up, I’d like to take you on a tour of my favorite store in Cambridge, Game On!. Sure, the big names and online stores might have lower prices, but nothing compares to the charm of a locally owned shop and owners who will chat about game strategy all day long.

  Chapter 18

  On my way to the airport, I quickly swapped my flights, thankful my frequent flier status allowed changes without a penalty. Then I emailed Holly, asking her to take over my blog for a week or so. I refused to think about my fight with Cody. One crisis at a time, and all my emotional energy was needed to care for Dad.

  Less than four hours later, I made it the hospital, weary but too worried to sleep. Shannon and Holly lay sprawled across the seats in the waiting room, and a wave of love hit me. They’d stayed all night with Dad when I couldn’t be there. They were the best friends a girl could possibly have.

  Not wanting to wake them, I made a beeline for the nurse’s station. The woman behind the desk said my father was doing much better, but probably wouldn’t be awake for a few hours.

  “Can I see him?” I asked.

  “You can go in if you want, but he’s pretty heavily sedated. He won’t know you’re there.”

  “I won’t bother him. I just…” Tears threatened, making it impossible to continue.

  She nodded, as if this sort of thing happened all the time. It probably did. Wordlessly, I followed her down the hall. Dad looked so vulnerable in the hospital bed, with one leg in a cast, a bunch of tubes attached to different places. The little girl inside me wanted to crawl into his lap and beg him to hold me until I believed everything would be okay. Not knowing what any of those tubes did, Adult Gwen didn’t want to accidentally rip out a catheter or a heart monitor or something important, so I stood in the doorway watching for a long moment, taking slow, deep breaths.

  The nurse motioned for me to close the door before heading off down the hall, back toward her station. Once inside the room, I collapsed into a chair, finally letting loose. If he’d been lying in a slightly different position when the car fell, or if Jorge hadn’t been there to call 911…

  Coming within a few inches of losing my father forever shook me to my core. My mother didn’t love me; she’d made her feelings clear in New York City. My lifestyle wasn’t conducive to letting people in. The first guy I’d let get close in years looked down on me because of my job. It seemed a stupid thing to argue about, and yet, his attitude made me wonder if we were fundamentally too different to make it work. Maybe these obstacles kept popping up because it wasn’t meant to be.

  Dad, Holly, and Shannon were the only people in the world who cared about me. Thankfully, Shannon and Holly had been here for him, but they both had their own stuff going on. He could be stuck in bed for weeks. Who was going to take care of him while his leg healed?

  Losing the competition hurt now more than ever. I’d been working toward the finale for years. Yesterday morning, I could feel the ten thousand dollar check in my hand, taste the croissants and espresso we’d get in Paris. Paying my dad back for the damage to his garage would allow him to cut back all the extra hours he’d been working. Worse, if I didn’t get some cash flow soon, I’d have to give up my blog. That would only reinforce all the things Cody said last night, and I couldn’t let him be right. Not about this. Blogging was part of me; I had to make it work. There must be a way.

  The reminder of Cody only made me cry harder. How had this happened? I had two rules: don’t return for seconds, and no gamers. But he wormed his way into my heart with his stupid charm and jokes and calling me “Carrots” while looking like Gilbert Blythe and darn it, he made me care about him. Then he had to ruin everything. He knew I was a blogger. He knew I traveled constantly, and I loved it. He knew I avoided relationships, but somehow made me want one with him, anyway. Then it all fell apart, like I feared from the beginning.

  The anger dissipated some of my sadness. It also left me exhausted. After the argument, the make-up-sex-that-resolved-nothing, the accident, the stress, and the flight, my batteries needed to be recharged. Even the thought of moving to the marginally more comfortable chairs in the waiting room seemed like a Herculean task. Not gonna happen.

  Already, the sun peeked over the horizon. I should get up, go get a Diet Coke, and ask what I could do to help Dad. But my legs wouldn’t work. Sandbags made my eyelids heavy. Too tired to fight it anymore, I curled my legs beneath me, put my head on a stuffed animal someone left by the bed, and let exhaustion claim me.

  * * * *

  Buzzing in my pocket woke me some time later. Bits of light poked through slats in the blinds, but they weren’t stabbing me in the face, which suggested I’d slept at least a few hours. Not nearly enough, but a good start.

  When I’d arrived, I texted my friends but didn’t check my notifications. My heart lurched at the four texts from Co
dy, starting about twenty minutes before my flight landed.

  Not now. I lacked the emotional bandwidth to worry about him.

  Shannon had sent me a message. Glad you made it. Holly’s still out, but I’m headed to the cafeteria. What do you need?

  In the bed, Dad slept, but I didn’t know if his unconsciousness was natural or the result of the drugs. Ordinarily, he slept pretty lightly, and I didn’t want to wake him. Even the vibrating from my phone wasn’t silent. Instead of texting back, I went into the attached bathroom to rinse my mouth out and splash some water on my face. When my eyes met the reflection, I winced.

  Mascara streaked my face, turning my image into something from a horror movie. And my hair. Oh, man, my hair. The combination of sex hair, sleeping on an airplane, Boston humidity, and then my night in the chair had turned me into Carrot Top. With a groan, I yanked my fingers through it, saying a silent thank you that I’d spotted the mirror before Dad or my friends saw me.

  After redoing my two mutilated braids into a single one down my back, I found my way back to the waiting room. Shannon scrolled through her phone, wide awake. Holly now snored from the floor, using her sweater as a pillow.

  When Shannon met my eyes, I forced a smile. She tilted her head and sent me a questioning look. I didn’t know if she meant to ask how I was doing, Dad, or both, so I shrugged, not wanting to wake Holly. One of the three of us might as well catch some sleep, and if she was comfortable sleeping on the floor, good for her.

  My friend hadn’t had the best year, and doing well in the competition meant a lot to her. Getting knocked out in Charlotte hurt, especially when I went on to Chicago without her. I pointed to Holly and mouthed, “How is she?”

  Instead of answering, Shannon pointed at a sign behind me. Cafeteria, third floor. Hospital food didn’t sound remotely appetizing, but I wanted caffeine, so I nodded.

  She started talking as soon as the elevator doors crashed shut behind us. “You saw Nathan?”

  I nodded, tears again springing to my eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m really emotional…after everything.”

  She hugged me. “I know. It’s going to be okay, though. Your dad isn’t going anywhere. He’s not your mom.”

  “We’re all going to die someday.”

  “And with any luck, that day will be far, far away. He’s young and generally healthy. Holly would call him virile.”

  I chuckled and tried not to roll my eyes. Only Holly.

  “He’d never abandon you.”

  I knew that, of course, but the past forty-eight hours or so had been such an emotional roller coaster, I couldn’t think straight. With a start, I remembered the texts from Cody, which I couldn’t read while standing next to Shannon. Instead, I changed the subject. “How’s Holly? Any updates on Lucas?”

  “Ugh, Lucas. Well, you know he’s been charged with fraud and stuff. After taking her condo, the feds came back, said she had to give up everything associated with the business. They took her computer and phone to see if she was involved in the scam.”

  I gasped. “Holly without her devices? Well, I guess that explains why I haven’t seen her on social media.”

  “Yeah. She transferred her number to a new non-smart phone, but still. She’s been living on my couch for a couple of weeks. I think my roommate’s about to put her foot down. The place isn’t big enough for three of us.”

  “That sucks. But I get it.” Shannon also met Ellen in grad school. She got along well enough with us, but mostly kept to herself. She went to work, came home, repeat. In all the hours spent at Shannon’s place, I could count on one hand the number of times Ellen hung out with us. Heck, I saw Shannon’s Nana more than her roommate. But they got along well together, for the most part. For someone as introverted as Ellen, having an almost-stranger sleep on her couch must be torture.

  “Yeah, and I don’t want to ask her to leave so Holly can stay. We’ll figure something out.”

  The doors opened, and we entered the line in the cafeteria. I don’t know what I’d expected after hearing horror stories of hospital food, but it wasn’t trays of steaming waffles, pancakes, scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. The delicious smells filling the air almost made me swoon.

  “She can stay with us,” I said. “Our couch pulls out, but once I go back on the road, she can take my room. I never use it.”

  “I think she’s tired of mooching off her friends.”

  “Great! Then I wonder if she’ll want to help Dad for a bit? He’ll need someone to clean and make sure he eats and be around for at least a few weeks until he’s back on his feet. It’s perfect.”

  “What’s perfect?”

  We spun around to find Holly standing behind us. “How did you get down here so fast?”

  She pointed at the stairwell to the right of the elevator. When she was interning during college, a power outage had trapped her in an elevator for three hours. She hadn’t set foot in one since. I nodded at the memory. “Right. Stairs.”

  “I repeat, what’s perfect?”

  “You,” I said. “Moving in with Dad and helping him out for a bit, especially when I’m gone.”

  She turned red. “You know I can’t accept that kind of help. Not after discovering everything I had for the past year came from Lucas’s stealing it.”

  “We’re not helping you. You’re helping us. You think my father can keep the house clean while wearing a cast up to his hip? Besides, he’s going to be insufferable, not able to work. If you’re not there, I’ll murder him before the end of the week.”

  She smiled at me. “You two are too much alike. I don’t mind helping him. And I guess Shannon would like her living room back?”

  She shrugged. “I love you and would let you stay forever, but I have to consider Ellen, too. Her rent money helps pay for my game making.”

  “How’s the game making going?” I asked, hoping she’d finally spill something about her super-secret project.

  “Nice try,” Holly said. “I’ve been asking for weeks. She even puts a screensaver up when I walk into the room. Like I’m going to steal her ideas or something.”

  “It’s not that! This is a different type of game. It’s full of surprises. When it’s time to play test it, I need you to go in blind. Just like the average buyer. Give me more time. I’m still writing the rules.”

  With Holly’s fate—and my father’s—temporarily decided, we filled our trays and grabbed a table. For the next half hour, we chatted about new games, work, and how frustrating it was to try to make a living doing what you loved when you also wanted such luxuries as food and a heated place to stay in the winter.

  When we returned our trays, my phone buzzed yet again with a text. I’d been ignoring it during breakfast, but the last time, Holly and Shannon exchanged a knowing glance. Curiosity filled the air. Both knew something happened with Cody, but they were waiting for me to assure myself Dad was fine before pouncing on me. Good, because I didn’t know what to say.

  The nurses had told me earlier no one was allowed visitors during shift change, which ended in about twenty minutes. When we got back upstairs, we’d have to sit around the waiting room, and there’s no telling how many other people might be there. I might as well face the music now in private. As soon as the stairwell door dropped shut behind us, I stopped. “So…I slept with Cody.”

  Shannon’s squeal of delight filled the windowless chamber, bouncing off the walls and echoing until it could be heard in Florida. I winced.

  “I KNEW IT!” Holly said. “But what made you change your mind? You were dead set against hooking up with the competition.”

  “This wasn’t a hookup,” I said. “We talked. I like him. He says he likes me. We spent the entire weekend together.”

  Holly clapped loudly at my revelation, but Shannon put a hand on her arm. “Hold up. Then why do you look like you found out he kicks puppies in his spar
e time?”

  “We had a big fight last night, a couple of hours before you called. We tabled it and went to bed, but then I had to leave before he got up. That’s why he keeps texting me.”

  Shannon tilted her head at me. “Did you put a fight on pause to have sex? Because that’s what it sounds like.”

  “I didn’t want to fight with him. I wanted to enjoy the time we had left. We were going in circles.”

  “About what?” Holly asked.

  “He doesn’t respect my blogging. Said flitting around the world is fun and all, but at some point, you have to grow up and get a real job. I should’ve known—that first night he made a comment about settling down. But it wasn’t until Sunday that he made it very clear he doesn’t respect me or what I do for a living.”

  She blew out a breath. “Ugh.”

  Holly frowned. “Take it from me, you don’t want to give up everything for some guy. I put all my trust in Lucas, and now I’m living on friends’ couches with no job.”

  “You’ll be fine,” I said. “And I’m not. I need to travel, explore the world. I don’t want to be stuck at a nine-to-five job. I barely know Cody. I can’t give up my dream for someone I met three months ago. No matter how good he is in bed.”

  “Amen!” Holly said.

  Shannon said, “You don’t have to give up your dream for him, but have you thought about trying to make it work? You do come back to Boston pretty regularly.”

  “Long distance relationships never work,” I said. “What’s going to happen when he resents me for never being around? Or when I resent him for making cracks about my career?”

  Holly blew out a breath. “Maybe. Still, after all this time, it sucks to see you give up before things really get off the ground.”

  “Or maybe it’s better to know now that we’re a bad fit.”

  “Maybe,” Shannon said, “or maybe you can work this out once you both have some time to cool off. Meanwhile, check your messages? He’s probably worried about you.”