Chapter Nineteen
Dawn
It was an awkward flight home the next day with Logan’s dad. At least, awkward for me; I don’t think Mr. Balanchuk noticed. He was too excited, too busy celebrating.
And it wasn’t a selfish, mean kind of celebration. I’d seen the way Tyler MacDonald’s dad had treated him, acting as if Tyler was a tool for his own benefit rather than a person with independent goals and dreams. Mr. Balanchuk was happy for Logan, not for himself. Well, maybe for himself a bit, because I’m sure it was fun for him to relive his glory days or whatever, but mostly for Logan. He’d loved his son when Logan had been injured, and he’d stood by him and supported him and now that things were looking up, Mr. Balanchuk was still supporting him. It was nice to know Logan had that in his life.
But also kind of hard to pretend I was just as cheerful. Which, of course, was a sign of what a selfish bitch I was. Someone I cared about was getting everything he wanted, and it was making me sad? Terrible. Pathetic. But true.
Logan had loaned me the keys to his Jeep so I could get home from the little airport, and my mom gave me a weird look when she came into the kitchen after work. I was washing vegetables at the sink and she came to stand beside me, picking up a knife and asking, “Stir fry?”
I nodded, and she started chopping and we worked in silence for a couple minutes. Then she said, “You’re dating Anton Balanchuk’s son. I heard about it at the damn grocery store, instead of from you.” I didn’t have anything to say to that, so I just kept chopping, and eventually she said, “That’s his Jeep in the driveway? Where is he?”
Yeah, now that there was a connection to hockey—and to money—she was interested. “We’re not really dating. He’s in Montreal—might not be coming back.”
“So, what, the Jeep’s a gift?”
“No, I—I guess he’ll have to come pick it up at some point. And get his stuff from the camp, I guess. But he won’t be staying. Maybe.”
“Sounds like a lot of stuff you’re not sure of. And what do you mean you’re not really dating? You’ve been out of the house with him every night for the better part of a month.”
I didn’t want to get into it, not with her. There was absolutely zero chance that she’d understand, especially when I didn’t have great words to explain it even to myself. So I said, “It’s just a summer thing. He’s back in Montreal, now, so—it’s probably over.”
“You’re moving to Montreal,” she reminded me.
“Yeah, but—you know. Don’t want to drag it on past its best-before date.”
“He’s dumping you for some fancy city girl?” she asked, but it wasn’t really a question. It was more like she was waiting to have her insight confirmed.
And that was what did it. I’d managed to hold everything together for a full day; no tears, no yelling, self-pity all properly internalized. But standing there with my mom assuming I was worthless—because the only real value I could have would be from whatever guy I was with—it was suddenly too damn much and my self-control was gone.
“He’s not dumping me,” I said. Or I’d meant to just say it, but it came out more like a—I don’t know, a wail, maybe? “He’s maybe going to play hockey again, and if he does, I’m—I can’t—I won’t do that again! It was bad enough with just an OHL player, but Logan’s already in the NHL. It’d be even worse. No way!”
My mom stared at me, then looked down at the carving knife she was holding and laid it very deliberately down on the counter. No weapons when emotions were high—I could say I’d at least learned one useful lesson from my mother.
But when she spoke, she didn’t sound angry, or even disappointed. More confused, maybe. “Why is it so important to you that your life be more difficult than it has to be?” She sounded like she was asking the universe as much as asking me. “You’re going to do this two times? You’re going to walk away from perfectly good guys—they’re both good guys, right? Neither one of them has ever raised a hand to you?”
“There’s more to a relationship than not being abused, Mom! Of course they’ve never hit me. They’re both good guys. They’re both great. But this isn’t about them, it’s about me. I want to be the star of my own life. Is that so hard to understand?”
She frowned at me like it really was hard to understand, then looked down at herself. Then around at the kitchen. “I’m the star,” she said quietly. “I’m the star of the job I hate, and the house that I never have the energy to clean, and the marriage that survives because we’re both too damn worn out to look for anything better, and the daughter who knows so much more than I do, and the car that won’t turn left without stalling and the life stuck in the same small fucking town I was born in and will probably be stuck in until I die. I’m the star of that. You think it’s something to be proud of?” Her voice had gotten louder as she was speaking, but she dropped it back down again as she added, “You think I’m wrong because I want something better for you?”
It was more honesty than I wanted from her, more honesty than I felt like I could handle. But she’d given it to me and I tried to respond in kind. “I don’t want there to be only two choices. I don’t think I have to date a hockey player in order to have a good, interesting life.”
She nodded slowly. “Sure. There’s a chance. Maybe you’ll be the exception.” Her voice hardened a little. “Maybe you’re smarter than me and stronger than me and you can make a better life than I did. Right?”
“It’s not too late for you to change things,” I told her. “You’re barely forty. You’re not even half done. If you don’t like living here the way you are, you can still change things, you know.”
“Sure,” she said. Not sarcastic or aggressive, just not interested in hearing any more. I guess maybe it was kind of scary to be reminded that you had a choice, if you weren’t sure you were strong enough to make the right one. She started chopping again and I had just picked up my own knife when my phone rang. Logan’s name showed up on the screen, and I could tell she saw it. “Go talk,” she said. “I’ll finish up here.”
It wasn’t like I couldn’t chop and talk at the same time, but I was about ready for an escape, so I grabbed my phone and headed out to the backyard.
“Hey,” I said.
And I don’t know if he was psychic or what, because one word should not have given him much of a clue, but he said, “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” A deep, cleansing breath. “Just dealing with my mom. What about you? What did the doctors say?”
And it was sweet, then, but sad at the same time, listening to him trying not to talk about hockey. Like he was trying to prove that we could be together without my world revolving around him, but of course he was the person who’d had a potentially life-changing day and I’d done nothing but sit in a plane and then hang out at my house. So he asked about every mundane detail and refused to say hardly anything about his own stuff, and I adored him for trying but it also made it so much clearer why things couldn’t work between us. He couldn’t be expected to put this kind of effort into twisting every conversation we ever had around to suit my pathetic needs.
Still, he kept trying. That night and every night for the rest of the week, he called me and we talked for hours, and sometimes he’d lose track and get excited and tell me about something he’d done—he stepped on the ice for the first time on Friday and that night while we were talking I went down to the beach and sat by myself and looked at the waves and listened to how excited he was, how happy, and I was finally able to let go a bit of my disappointment. I was able to be genuinely happy for him with hardly any bitterness about myself.
I was at work when he called on Saturday so he just left a message, and I texted him when I got home to see if he was awake, but he didn’t call back. I assumed I’d hear from him Sunday morning, but I didn’t, and even though I kept my phone on my hip all through brunch service at the Grill, he didn’t call.
So maybe that was the beginning of the end, I told myself. Maybe it was a good chance to get used to life without Logan. He wasn’t an asshole; he wouldn’t suddenly stop calling. But maybe he’d realized that things were going to end and he was adjusting to the idea. So maybe I’d just better hurry up and adjust to it, too.
Yeah, that was the tough talk I was giving myself right up until I hung up my apron at the end of my shift, left the restaurant—and saw Logan down the block, leaning against his Jeep, which he must have picked up at the house, waiting for me. And once I saw him there was no adjustment, no tough talk, just a gasp and then a sprint and then a full launch of myself through the air, charging into him so fast the collision alone was probably a good test of his knee strength.
He caught me easily, kissed me hard, shifted us around so I was perched on the Jeep’s passenger seat, legs out to the side and wrapping around his waist. “You’re here,” I whispered, and then I decided I shouldn’t be wasting my breath or my lips saying such stupidly obvious things.
“Can we go somewhere?” he asked the next time we came up for breath.
It was a good idea, assuming we didn’t want to get arrested for public indecency. But not without complications. “Where?”
“Hotel? I can’t sleep at the camp tonight, I don’t think—it’d be pretty cheesy to bail on them and then expect them to give me somewhere to sleep—so I’ll need to find a room somewhere anyway.”
“Logan, it’s peak season and a weekend. Good luck finding anywhere decent to stay without a reservation you made, like, last year.”
“I bet I can find something,” he said, then grinned wickedly at me. “You’re my inspiration. I want you somewhere private, somewhere with a big bed and clean sheets and maybe a hot tub or something.”
“Okay, hot shot—show me what you’ve got.”
Another grin and then he picked up his phone and tapped the screen. He lifted it to his ear, listened, then said, “Maggie, it’s Logan Balanchuk. I’m in Corrigan Falls, Ontario. I need somewhere to sleep tonight. Can you find somewhere for me? Somewhere nice. Hot tub would be good, or at least a big shower.” He listened, then nodded and spelled the name of the town. “Text me details when you’ve got them, okay? Great. Thanks, Maggie!”
And that was it. I tried to ignore the part where he was only staying for one night. Focus on the positive; make good memories. That needed to be my goal. “Who’s Maggie? Should I be jealous?”
“Jealous of me because my managers have such a great staff? Yeah, you probably should be. But it’s cool—I’m happy to share.”
If my mom had been there she probably would have passed right out. This could be my life. At least as long as Logan wanted me. I could share his access to his managers’ staff and whatever other perks came with his glamorous life, and all I had to give up in exchange was—
No, damn it, that wasn’t what I was supposed to be thinking about. Nothing heavy, just live in the moment. “Okay, Maggie’s on the job. Do you need to go to the camp to get your stuff? What’s the plan? I mean—it’s good to see you. But—” But apparently my focus-on-the-positive plan wasn’t working too well. “You’re not staying. Right? You’re just here to get your stuff and then you’re going back?”
“I’m here to see you,” he said, his face intent. “I don’t care about my stuff. I care about you. I’m here to see you, and I’m here to talk to you, and to figure out what we’re going to do to make this work. To make you and me work, even if I’m playing hockey. I don’t want to lose you, Dawn. Tell me what I need to do to keep that from happening.”
I stared at him. Apparently he hadn’t gotten the live-in-the-moment memo. “Is it real, then? You’re going back?”
For a second I thought he was going to refuse to answer. Then he gave in and said, “They still don’t know. They want to do another damn surgery—arthroscopic, at least—to get rid of some scar tissue. But they think—” He gave me a look that made it clear he was delivering bad news. “They think it might work.”
“That’s great,” I said. I sounded convincing, at least to myself. “That’s really exciting. You must be totally over the moon.”
“No,” he said. “Not totally.” And he just stood there and let me absorb the meaning, let me figure out what the problem was.
And, damn it, I didn’t want to be his problem. I didn’t want to be the dark lining in his silver cloud. But what was I supposed to do, lie and pretend everything was okay? “Do we have to worry about it right now? Nothing’s for sure yet. So can we just not think about it? Do you want to go down to the beach and say ‘hi’ to people? The guys are back from the development camps, so there’ll be a big fuss to welcome them home—could be a big party tonight, but it might be kind of weird for you, if you aren’t sure about all that stuff yet. We could just—”
His phone buzzed then and he held up a finger to pause my speech, then looked down, tapped the screen, and held it up so I could see it. There was a picture of the Albertson house, a local landmark, a huge Cape Cod-style mansion right on the water. He said, “Air B and B. It’s ours for tonight. You want to just go there and hang out? There’s a pool and a hot tub, the listing says.”
It was a lifestyle I shouldn’t let myself get used to. One I couldn’t let myself get used to, not if I wanted to come out of this intact. But I was supposed to be living for the moment that night, wasn’t I? So I nodded. “Yeah. Let’s go there and hang out. And let’s not talk about hockey, or the future, or anything. Okay? Can we do that?”
“I want to figure it out,” he said. “I don’t want to give up.” But then he said, “So just for tonight, okay? Tomorrow morning, we’ll talk. For real.”
“Are you going to have any more facts by tomorrow morning?” I asked. “Because until you know something, there isn’t too much point in talking, is there? I mean, talking about the future. We can talk about other stuff, obviously. You’re probably dying to hear about Mrs. McMann’s decision to eat completely locally for the next two weeks. Like, completely local. No ingredients or anything unless she can find someone who’s making it within a fifty-kilometer radius.”
He didn’t look like he was completely thrilled by the distraction, but then, as I’d expected he might, he started thinking about it. “No salt, no sugar—”
“She bought maple syrup, and we boiled some of it down into maple sugar. She was going to use that for her coffee, but then she realized, oops, no coffee. No tea. We ground up some dried chicory root and brewed it up, but she spat it out.”
“That’s a weird adventure she’s on,” Logan said, and there was something in his tone that made me brace myself. Sure enough, he continued with, “How come it’s okay for you to go on her adventures with her, but you don’t want to go on mine with me?”
“She’s paying me, Logan. It’s my job.” I probably could have gotten away with leaving it at that, but Logan was really trying, and he deserved my best efforts, too. “And—everybody thinks she’s crazy. I mean, I think she’s kind of crazy. I think she thinks she’s kind of crazy. So me supporting her with all this? It’s—” What the hell was it? Why had I started this train of thought? “It’s special. Unique. I bet there’s nobody else in the country right now whose summer job involves helping a crazy eighty-seven-year-old woman kick a caffeine addiction with home-grown herbal teas.”
“So you want to feel unique,” Logan said, and I could tell he was working on a plan. A solution. And as much as I wanted there to be some way to make things work, I worried that there wouldn’t be, but he’d work so hard and be so well-meaning that I’d end up going along with it even though it wasn’t really a solution, and then what?
“When do you have to leave?” I asked. “You’re driving back?”
He clearly didn’t want to change the subject yet, but he let it happen. “Yeah, I’m driving. I’ve got ice time tomorrow night at seven, and it’s about an eight-hour drive. Nine if I hit traffic. So I need to leave pretty early.”
“I’ve got work starting at nine.”
He looked down at his watch. “Three o’clock. So that’s eighteen hours.” He gently shoved my legs into the footwell of the Jeep. “Buckle up. We need to get this show on the road.”
That was more like it. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes, letting the sun warm my face and relax my body. Logan climbed in beside me and started the engine and I didn’t even open my eyes, just reached over and found his hand waiting for mine. We’d even worked out a system for keeping our fingers entwined while he shifted gears, which was kind of over-the-top, obviously, but right then, sitting there with him for maybe the last time? It didn’t feel like too much. It felt perfect.