Chapter Seventeen
Logan
I managed to keep my dad’s warnings about getting too serious almost completely out of my head through the whole flight, the drive to my parents’ house, the lunch their housekeeper had waiting for us, and then the taxi ride to my apartment. But somehow as soon as Dawn and I stepped off the elevator and started walking down the hall, everything changed.
This was what we’d been waiting for. No first-time sex scrunched up in the Jeep or feeling weird at someone else’s house, not for us. No cheap motel, or even expensive hotel we’d have checked into just for the deed. No, we’d waited until we’d have privacy and comfort in a non-sleazy environment, and the reason we’d waited? The reason it had been my damn idea to wait?
It was because I was serious about Dawn. My dad’s warning had come far too late. I was already in way too deep, and I had no interest in trying to make things any shallower. Hell, I’d been about half a breath away from picking her up and carrying her across the damn threshold, that’s how far gone I was.
And as I stood there, watching her walk into my apartment, standing by the front door as she crossed the foyer and made her way down the two steps into the sunken living room, staring at her as she looked out at the view then turned back to me as if she was pleased but not all that impressed—I got scared. Whatever I was feeling was real. More real than anything I’d ever felt for a girl before, by far, and I wasn’t at all sure what that meant. She was—we were—it was just a summertime thing. What were the chances that I’d go to Corrigan Falls, Ontario and meet a girl who was moving to Montreal, Quebec? And when it came to that, what were the chances I’d even be in Montreal by the end of the summer? I had no commitments to the city and plenty of painful memories.
I had no plans. That was the key point. I hadn’t wanted plans, not until I met Dawn. And now I wanted them, but only with her. I didn’t want to plan for the city or my job or anything except for some sort of guarantee that it would be me and Dawn, together, for as long as I wanted.
Possibly that was a little selfish.
She sauntered back toward me from the window, a bit of an extra swing in her hips that let me know she knew I was watching her. Damn. Confidence was sexy as hell. Had I never known that before?
“Is that McGill?” she asked. “Are we right on the edge of it? Those buildings there are part of McGill, right?”
I kicked myself into gear and dropped down the stairs toward her. “Yeah, probably. Show me what you’re talking about.”
She took my hand and led me over to the window and leaned back against me as I pointed out the landmarks visible from a downtown apartment, looking north. McGill, Parc Mont Royal, and not too much else. Mont Royal was more of a big hill than an actual mountain, but it’s still pretty effective at dominating a view.
“I’m going to live there,” she said, and I could tell she was trying the words out, still not quite believing them, just as I had tried out I’m going to play for Montreal a little over a year ago.
“You’re going to discover your passion there,” I told her, and she turned to me, quick and light and perfect.
“I’ll discover some of my passions there,” she said. Her kiss was light, but still somehow made it clear there was more to come. “But I’ve already figured out some of them.”
And after that, her kiss was deeper, more intense, and I was absolutely with her. My apprehension was completely gone. She was Dawn, and I was Logan, and nothing else mattered, not right then. Our bodies were synched up and knew exactly what to do, and we mostly just let it happen. But I was with it enough, together enough, to stay with her as we worked through it all. And as her body crested, as it brought her to where she wanted to be, I knew that she was looking right at me, that it was important to her that it was the two of us there together.
And I knew I felt exactly the same way when it was my turn.
…
Dawn
“Logan’s been through a lot,” Mrs. Balanchuk said as she shuffled through the slinky blouses on the rack. “He’s a good boy—a strong young man—but he’s had to work at it.”
“I guess we’ve all had to work at it.” I tried to match her nonchalance, but I was pretty sure I wasn’t making it. My fingers moved the fabric too quickly, making me seem nervous, or too slowly, making me seem like I was faking it, or—I just wasn’t doing it right, one way or another. I tried to recover. “Growing up—it’s not easy for anyone, right?”
“Most people don’t have their dreams stolen from them when they’re eighteen years old,” she said, and she wasn’t flipping through blouses anymore.
Shit. She was Logan’s mom, she was my kind-of-hostess, she was older and wiser, and I honestly liked and admired her—but, damn, I wasn’t born to lie down. “Don’t they?” I asked. “I mean, Logan got closer to having his dreams come true than a lot of people do—I get that. But he’s hardly the only person to be disappointed about something. Maybe other kids dreamed of…I don’t know, of being dragon riders or princesses or knights or whatever, and their dreams got ‘stolen’ when they were a bit younger, but other than the amount of work he put in, he’s not much different, right? And how many young hockey players dream of making the NHL but don’t? Not because they didn’t work hard enough, just because—whatever. They weren’t quite fast enough or big enough or something. Right?”
She frowned. “But Logan—”
“He was good enough. I get that. But his body wasn’t quite strong enough. Or he wasn’t lucky enough to avoid a bad hit. Or whatever. But is it that much worse for Logan to not make the NHL than it would be for someone else to not make it? At least he’s getting a lot of money out of the deal.”
And now it was my turn to pay attention to the speed of her finger-flicks as she looked through the clothes. Or possibly that whole thing was a weird diversion that no one but me would ever pay attention to. I know I was distracted from watching her hands when I realized how slow my own were going and had to force myself to speed up in order to maintain the right level of casualness. Chit-chat about Montreal—flick, flick—mention Logan—flick, flick—say something about her son, say something about my boyfriend, maybe think I was insulting her son—flick, flick, flick—get in a big fight in a pricy boutique?
“So you don’t think Logan’s situation is that serious?” she asked, and even without my careful attention to blouse-inspection-rate I would have known she wasn’t as casual as she was acting.
“For him? Sure, it’s serious.” Flick, flick. “But cosmically? He’s young, mostly healthy, lots of money, stable family, great girlfriend, has a good job for his age, potential for the future—and I’m going to feel sorry for him?” Flick, flick, still trying to act like we were just a couple of girls having a fun chat while shopping. “Logan’s got a great life. Not being able to play hockey? Seriously? Who the hell cares?”
She gave up even pretending to look at clothes at that point and turned to stare at me directly. “Logan cares.”
And I was way over-drawing on my sassiness account, but I managed to pull off a flick, flick, flick of the tops in front of me before I said, “Yeah. He cares. But he can grow out of it.”
“Grow out of it?” she said, making it sound like the words were in a foreign language.
“It’s just hockey. It’s a game. That’s all. There are kids starving in Africa or whatever, people all over the world suffering and dying—like, actually dying—and we’re going to act like it’s a tragedy that one rich, smart, good-looking guy can’t play a stupid game like he wants to?” I was probably going to regret my honesty, considering that it was her precious baby I was talking about, but for the moment I didn’t seem to care. It wasn’t that I didn’t feel bad for Logan; it sucked that he couldn’t do what he wanted. “He’s having fun this summer. His life isn’t over. I know you saw him when he was at his worst and I’m just cruising in now that he’s mostly better, but—he’s mostly better. There’s no tragedy here. Right?”
She frowned, then turned back to the rack of blouses, lifted her hand, then lowered it and looked back in my direction. “There’s no tragedy,” she said. “Logan’s still a lucky guy. Rich, smart, good-looking.” I was waiting for a but. Instead, she nodded. “And he’s got good taste in women, too.”
I could feel my cheeks heating up and it didn’t help when she noticed and laughed at me. “You’re totally happy giving me a lecture about my son, but I say something nice and you get uncomfortable?”
“I wasn’t totally happy giving you a lecture. I’m just not all that good at backing down.”
“I like that about you,” she said and then laughed. “And now you’re blushing again!”
I couldn’t deny it, so I just laughed a little myself.
And that was our afternoon. We shopped, we walked, we chatted; I blushed, she laughed. And then we drove together to the medical building to pick Logan up. He was waiting for us outside and as we pulled up to the curb he moved toward us and I let myself admire him. His broad shoulders and easy grace, the warm smile I knew I’d get as soon as he’d made it into the car.
This was my guy. My Logan. We had another night together in his gorgeous apartment, and for the first time I let myself start thinking ahead a little, start dreaming about how maybe we’d still be together in the fall, and I could come to Montreal for school and for my hot, sweet, sexy boyfriend. Everything was perfect.
Then he slid into the backseat, pulled the door shut, and I turned around to smile at him. He smiled back, but it wasn’t the full, beautiful radiance I’d been expecting.
“What happened?” I asked at the same time as his mother demanded, “What did they say?”
He looked at each of us in turn, but it was me he focused on as he finally said, “They think—I’m healing better than they thought I could. They say it’s practically a miracle. They say…” He frowned as if he was thinking back over it, trying to find the catch, the trick. “They say they think I might be able to play again. Like, really play. They want to do some more tests, but they think it’s worth trying.”
And just like that, my perfect world turned into something much, much different.