by Selena Kitt
"No," I said, firmly and quickly, not willing to allow the interviewer to twist my words. "No, that's not it at all. It wasn't her fault, it was mine. I couldn't let go. I treated her badly and when I realized what I'd lost, I tried to erase it all with alcohol and...other things."
The interviewer, Phil Jackson, a man known for his candid, smart takes on hockey and hockey players, raised one eyebrow at me skeptically.
"Really? So, you expect us to buy that everything - your loss of form, your appearance in countless tabloids and your personal demons all come down to this one high school relationship?"
I knew he was trying to throw me off. It wasn't going to work.
"Is that so unbelievable?" I asked. "I mean, why does anyone drink too much or get addicted to drugs or spend all their money on stupid shit they don't need? It's all about hiding from your own pain. Hiding from shame. That's exactly what I was doing. I may be in the public eye, but I'm also a human being. I'm surprised you're surprised, actually."
Phil leaned back in his seat and thought about it for a few seconds before continuing.
"Alright. So moving past that, what are your plans for the future? Do you think you can make a comeback?"
I hesitated for a split second, wary about promising things I wasn't going to be able to deliver but determined to put the past behind me.
"Honestly, Phil? I don't know. I don't have a crystal ball. But one thing I know for sure is that I can play hockey. It's the only thing I've ever been able to do, really. Do I think I can make a comeback? I don't see why not, I'm still pretty young."
The interview continued for another twenty minutes or so but the rest of it was mostly about the specifics of my training and nutrition regimen. Just before it ended, Phil asked me one more question.
"So, Cade, I think we're just about to wrap things up here. Is there anything else you'd like to add?"
Fuck it, I probably wasn't going to get a second chance. Maybe Ellie would, somehow, hear what I had to say. Even if she didn't forgive me, at least she would know the truth.
"Actually, there is. I just want Ellie to know that I'm truly sorry for how I handled things with her. I want to her to know that and I...I want her to know that I love her."
As soon as the microphone was switched off, Phil turned to me.
"Do you know how much shit you're going to take for that?"
The thing is, I did know. But by that time, I'd already been through the real shit. If my teammates wanted to give me hell, if the media and the sports bloggers wanted to write stories about what a pussy I was, they could have at it. It didn't matter. When I left the studio, there was a lightness in my step that I hadn't felt for years.
Jessica called me as soon as I was in the car. I could hear the smiling incredulity in her voice.
"Holy shit, Cade. You did not just do that!"
"Well, it looks like I did," I answered, laughing and still not entirely able to believe I'd just said those things live on air. "Are you pissed? I didn't want to throw you under the bus or anything."
"Nah, Cade, forget it. I've got two movies coming up - if anything my publicist will think this paints me sympathetically. Poor Jessica Ray, Cade Parker never really loved her. Do you think Ellie's going to hear what you said?"
"I don't know. I hope she does."
"Well what if she does hear it? What are you hoping-"
I had to cut Jess off. "Let me call you back, Jess, it's my mom."
I took the call from my mom, knowing she wasn't going to be happy but not aware of just how bad it was going to be.
"Hey, mom."
"Cade." Her voice was brittle.
"Yeah?"
"What was that?"
"What was what?"
"Don't be smart, Cade. That interview. What the fuck was that?"
I felt my eyes getting big at the word 'fuck' coming out of my mom's mouth. She never cursed.
"Mom, what 'that' was is the truth. You want me to get myself together, right? You want me to renew my contract and go back to scoring goals and making you and dad look good? Well then I have to tell the truth. And that was the truth. I've loved Ellie Hesketh since high school. I think you knew it, too. That's why you and dad were so goddamned eager to get me away from her."
"Cade! I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about it. How dare you accuse us of having something to do with this. Your father and I have done everything we could for your career-"
"Yeah, mom, my career. What about me? You didn't think Ellie was good enough for me."
"That's because she wasn't - she isn't - good enough for you, Cade. That's what you never seem to have gotten through your skull. Your father and I didn't raise you to fall apart simply because some little white trash slut from high school rejected you."
I wasn't going to be drawn. Not by my mother's cursing and not by her insults. I felt bulletproof after that interview, untouchable. I replied casually, without anger.
"Well, mom, apparently you did, because that's exactly what happened. And Ellie isn't the slut, I am. Do you know how many women I've been with?"
"Don't be disgusting, Caden, that's your business."
"Exactly. It's my business. I'm not a kid any more, I haven't been one for a long time. You and dad are going to have to back off a little, because I think I'm going to take things from here."
"You sound like you're drunk. Or high. Are you drunk, Cade?"
"Mom, seriously, don't bother. Listen, I have to go now. Talk to you soon."
I hung up to the sound of my mother's angry huffing, before she could say anything else. Then I looked down at my phone to call Jess back. Just before I made the call, the sound of screeching tires filled my ears and suddenly everything went black.
Ellie
I was at work when I found out about Cade's accident. It was a slow day at the salon and I was scrolling through the news on Yahoo when the headline popped up.
'NHL Player Cade Parker Shatters His Leg In Car Accident, Alcohol Suspected To Be Involved.'
I looked up quickly to make sure my co-workers weren't watching me as my heartbeat quickened but also half-hoping that when I looked back down again, the headline would prove to have been a figment of my imagination. It didn't. With one trembling finger, I clicked on the link. There were no real details. It had happened the previous night in Los Angeles, after an interview in which a 'source' said he behaved 'erratically.' He was in the hospital. Alive, stable, and unsure about whether or not his career was over. Alive. Thank God.
My very first thought was to go to him. No matter what Cade Parker did there was always going to be a part of me that couldn't bear the thought of him alone or in pain. All day I checked and re-checked the news but there were no updates, it wasn't a huge story. When I got back home, there was a strange woman outside my trailer.
"Ellie? Ellie Hesketh?"
"Yes...?" I replied, warily. My bills were all paid, everything was up to date. Who the hell was this?
"I'm Marcia Stevens from Sports Gossip dot com, I'd like to ask you a few questions."
It didn't dawn on me right away that Marcia Stevens was there because of Cade.
"Umm..." I said, eager to get inside and see Christopher and my brothers and check my phone to see if the story about Cade had been updated.
"Are you the Ellie that Cade Parker was talking about in the interview last night?"
I looked at her sharply when she mentioned Cade.
"What?"
"Are you the Ellie that Cade Parker said he loved in his interview last night?"
I had no idea what Marcia Stevens was talking about, nor did I have any interest in finding out from her.
"I'm sorry, where did you say you were from, again?"
"Sports gossip dot com. It's a website, we cover the personal lives of famous sportsmen and women. Last night, just before he got into the accident, Cade Parker said in an interview that he loved someone named 'Ellie' - someone he went to high school with. Is that you?"
> My stomach flipped in my belly. Cade had said he loved me? During an interview? That didn't sound like the behavior of a sober man. I brushed past the reporter.
"I don't have anything to say about that."
"Wait! Could you just give me a brief statement? Could we take a photo?"
"No."
I opened the front door and then closed and locked it behind me.
Jacob was right there in front of me. He had a weird look on his face.
"Ellie! Did you hear about Cade Parker? Did you listen to the interview?"
There was a flash of light from outside. The reporter was taking photos of our trailer. As soon as Jacob saw her he rushed outside, yelling at her to get off our property. He was pretty tall by then, just about six foot. Marcia Stevens did not need to be asked twice. When he got back in, he looked at me expectantly.
"Well? Did you hear it?"
"No! Jacob, no I have not heard the interview. That's what that woman was asking me about. What the hell is going on? What did he say?"
Jacob handed me his phone.
"Press play."
I sat down on the sofa and pressed play. Cade didn't sound drunk at all. He sounded wistful and slightly sad. When the interview finished, I looked up at Jacob as my mind spun with confusion.
"Holy shit."
"He said he loves you, Ellie."
"Yeah, he did say he loves me. It's easy to say things, Jacob. Sometimes it's a lot easier to say something than do something, you know?"
Who was I trying to convince? Jacob, or myself? I'd never known Cade to be a liar. I also couldn't think of any reason he would say any of the things he'd said in the interview if they weren't true. Jacob was staring at me, obviously expecting me to say something.
"What? I only just heard the interview. I don't know what to say."
Jacob was quiet for a few moments before continuing in a gentle voice.
"Maybe you should tell him about Christopher."
I leaned forward and put my head in my hands, a futile gesture to try and organize the thoughts racing around inside it.
"Maybe I should. It's not like it's my plan to never tell him. It just - it's never seemed like the right time. I know you keep track of Cade's career online, so you know as well as I do that things have been really rough for him for a while now."
"Yeah, they've seemed rough ever since he saw you that last time, before Christopher was born."
Jacob was still talking in that slow, gentle voice. I looked up at him and caught his eye.
"I'm so proud of you, Jakey."
"Why?"
"Because you're pretty perceptive for a seventeen year old boy, that's why."
He rolled his eyes, embarrassed.
"Ellie, think about it. He knows he fucked it up. If he's been in love with you this whole time, doesn't everything kind of...make sense?"
"I don't know. Maybe it does. I'm not sure loving someone gives you an excuse to treat them badly, though."
"Yeah, it doesn't. But men are stupid, Ellie. I haven't spoken to Emily for five days, but it isn't because I don't care. It's because I do."
Emily was Jacob's girlfriend - at least his sometimes-girlfriend. He'd mentioned something about having a fight with her recently.
"Yeah, I said something dumb to her when we had a fight. All I want to do is call her, see her again. But it just feels like...I dunno, it feels like giving in. Like losing."
"Jacob, women are stupid like that, too. No one wants to get hurt. We all want the other person to call us first, even when we're the ones who did something stupid."
"Maybe I should call her."
"You should. I mean, if you're the one who screwed up, you should call her and apologize. Tell her you miss her."
"Maybe you should call Cade."
"But I'm not the one who screwed up."
"You love him too, though, right?"
I stood up quickly. "Damn, Jacob! Can you give me a few minutes to absorb all this before you go all Dr. Phil on me?"
"See, you're getting upset. It's because you do love him."
Smiling, I pointed towards the kitchen. "Get out, troublemaker, we need to make dinner!"
I spent the next few days pre-occupied with thoughts of Cade and the things he'd said in the interview. He'd been released from the hospital with a cast on one leg - the media had a photo of him on crutches, about to get into a large black SUV and looking towards the camera with a hostile look on his face. At work, everyone had heard about the interview and it was difficult for me not to respond to any of the questions people had. It was also difficult to deal with some people's obvious surprise that Cade Parker still had some kind of interest in me - enough to make a public declaration of love. Most of North Falls seemed to view our high school relationship as a slip on his part, a mistake that he corrected the day his parents flew him back to New York to finish high school, almost ten years previously.
Ten years. In some ways, it felt like yesterday. In other ways, it felt like a hundred years, a lifetime ago. Christopher was in kindergarten, old enough to have asked me a few questions about his dad, the answers to which I'd kept deliberately vague. It eventually dawned on me that I wasn't going to be able to keep it from him forever. Even if I tried, someone was going to say something to him, probably sooner rather than later given the recent media kerfuffle over Cade's interview and the car accident. And if I was going to tell Christopher, I also had to tell Cade. It wasn't about me, it was about my son and making sure he found out the truth in as gentle a way as possible, from people who loved him.
I went online and bought a cheap ticket to Los Angeles. There wasn't enough money to buy one for Christopher as well. I knew just showing up with him wasn't a good idea anyway. I had to tell Cade first, face-to-face, so he had time to think about how he wanted to handle things. Or if he wanted to handle them.
A couple of weeks after Cade's interview, I landed in Los Angeles and stepped outside into the bright California sunshine with a belly full of nervous butterflies.
Cade
Everyone walked on eggshells around me for weeks after the accident, scared the setback was going to send me running back to the nightclubs and women and darkness of the past few years. Funnily enough, I didn't even consider it. The break in my leg was bad, but it was fixable. Even the rumors about a DUI didn't bother me - I knew I was sober that night, and I knew when the results came out they would confirm it. Jess came over on the day they were released to the media with a big bouquet of flowers in her arms.
"Jesus, Jess, I don't even think I have anywhere to put those."
"You don't have flower vases?"
I looked at her for a few seconds and she started laughing.
"Of course, what was I thinking. Well, do you have, um, well we could put them in glasses?"
We spent a good twenty minutes putting flowers in glass tumblers and placing them at various points around the house.
"It looks like someone died. Or had a baby."
"Shut up, Cade." She wrapped her arms around me and gave me a hug. "I'm so happy that DUI thing is cleared up. I knew it was bullshit, but the media loves their drama. How's your leg?"
I looked down at my broken limb, encased in a hard, high-tech looking cast.
"It's fine. Doesn't hurt at all. It fucking itches like crazy, though."
Jess took a step back and looked me up and down.
"You look...you look good, Cade."
"I know."
"Asshole. I mean it. You look different. I can't put my finger on it, you just seem lighter somehow. Who knew breaking your leg would have such a positive effect?"
We grabbed a couple of beers and headed out onto the balcony that overlooked the city. The sun was just setting.
"It's not the leg, Jess."
She took a sip of beer and looked at me. "I know. It was the interview. Telling the truth. That was ballsy, Cade. I hope you haven't gotten too much shit for it."
"Ha! Everyone is being really, reall
y nice to me. They're all afraid I'm gonna turn back into a party animal and fuck my career for good."
Jess gave me a look.
"I'm not going to do that, by the way."
"Good," she smiled.
We sat out on the balcony until the sun set completely and the city lights twinkled into life beneath us - my favorite view of Los Angeles. Beautiful, but removed. When Jess left, she gave me another hug.