Chapter 10 #2
What would have happened if I hadn't pulled away? If I'd let myself have that moment, consequences be damned?
I shifted again slightly, trying to get comfortable, trying to quiet my racing thoughts.
"Can't sleep?" Cam's voice came softly through the darkness.
I sighed. "No."
"Me either."
More silence, but different now – acknowledged, shared. I could hear the distant sound of the AC unit, the music of the occasional night bird, the eternal rhythm of the waves.
"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked after a moment.
"Talk about what?" I hedged, though we both knew exactly what he meant.
I could practically hear him smile in the darkness. "The weather. The fascinating economic state of the NHL. Why your Aunt Margaret owns seventeen pairs of the exact same sandals in different colors."
Despite myself, I laughed softly. "How do you know about Aunt Margaret's sandals?"
"She told me. In great detail. Something about the company discontinuing her favorite style, so she bought out their remaining stock in every color. She seemed very proud of her foresight."
"That sounds like Aunt Margaret."
"She also told me you went through a phase where you only wore purple. For an entire year."
I groaned. "I was seven! Why is she telling you these things?"
"Because that's what families do," he said, his voice warming. "They embarrass you in front of people and tell stories you'd rather forget and show baby pictures where you're naked in a bathtub."
"Oh dear dawg. Did she show you bathtub pictures?" I demanded, horrified.
"Not yet, “ he teased. “But there's always tomorrow."
I rolled onto my side to face him, though I could barely make out his profile in the darkness. "If you see a single naked baby picture of me, Murphy, our deal is off."
He chuckled, a low rumble that I could feel through the mattress. "No deal. Those pictures are actually my primary motivation for this whole fake engagement. Besides, I want to see what our imaginary children will look like."
The easy banter settled something in me, eased the tight knot of tension that had been coiled in my chest since the beach. The darkness made everything feel intimate, cushioned, safe. As if the words we spoke here couldn't follow us into daylight.
"Your family is amazing, you know," he said after a moment, his voice shifting to something more serious. "I didn't really know it could be like this."
"They're... they're pretty great."
"They love you. Really love you. Not because of what you do or who you know or what you can give them. Just because you're you." There was a wistfulness in his voice that made my heart twist. "That's rare."
I thought about what I knew of Cam's family, which wasn't much, despite working with him for years. He had a complicated relationship with his mother and father. A collection of step-parents that seemed to rotate every few years. But the details were fuzzy, the full picture unclear.
"What was your family like?" I asked. "Growing up, I mean."
He was quiet for so long I thought he might not answer. When he finally spoke, his voice was softer, lacking its usual bravado.
"Chaotic. Unpredictable. Always changing.
" He shifted slightly, the sheets rustling.
"My mom remarried three times before I graduated high school.
My dad, four times. I had different bedrooms in different houses almost every year.
Christmas looked different each year: new traditions, new step-siblings, new rules.
By the time I was ten, I'd learned to sleep with my hockey gear in my room so I wouldn't forget it when we moved again. "
The image of a young Cam, clutching his gear like a security blanket in an ever-changing series of bedrooms, made my throat tighten.
"You learn not to get too attached," he continued, "because that stepmom who makes the good brownies, or the stepdad who helped you with your algebra homework might just disappear one day and never call again.
My third stepdad taught me to ride a bike, took me fishing every weekend for a year.
Then one day, my mom tells me they're splitting up, and I never saw him again. Like, poof!" He paused. "I was eight."
"That sounds hard," I said quietly, wanting to reach for him in the darkness but holding back.
"You adapt," he said simply, though I could hear the cost of that adaptation in his voice. "You figure out how to fit in, how to be what each new family needs. What will make the new step-parent like you, what will keep the peace."
Something in his tone made my chest ache. I thought about what he'd said on the dock about learning to read rooms, to adjust to new situations. It hadn't just been about making small talk or navigating social events. It was about survival.
"Is that why hockey was so important to you?" I asked. "Something stable?"
"Yeah." The admission came easily in the darkness.
"The rink was always the same. The rules never changed.
I knew exactly what was expected of me. It was, uh, predictable.
Safe." He shifted again. "When everything else in your life keeps changing – your home, your family, your school – you hold onto the things that stay the same.
For me, that was hockey. No matter where we moved, I could find a rink, find a team. "
I'd never thought of hockey that way; as a refuge. For me, it had always been about the game we all love, family, about belonging to the Decker dynasty. I wondered what it might have been like to find the sport on my own, to choose it rather than inherit it.
"That's why the team means so much to me," he continued, his voice deepening with emotion.
"The guys, coaches, even staff." It's the closest thing I've ever had to a real family.
People who are actually sticking around, who want me to be there, not as someone who has to be crowbarred into their new life plan. "
"Even Zayne?" I teased gently, trying to lighten the moment.
"Especially Zayne," he said seriously. "He was the first person I met my freshman year at BU. He’s constant.
Solid. When everything else was shifting, Zayne was just Zayne.
Same in the dorms as he was on the ice as he was in class.
Never pretended to be something he wasn't, never expected me to be anything but myself. "
His voice softened, became reflective. "I'd never had that before, someone who didn't change depending on the circumstance. He's always Zayne. Loyal, steady, Zayne."
I felt a sudden surge of affection for my stoic, grumpy brother. For all his flaws and overprotectiveness, Zayne did have a steadiness to him that I'd always taken for granted. I'd never considered how that quality might have appeared to someone like Cam, whose life had been defined by instability.
"We're lucky to have him," I said softly. "Even when he's being an overprotective pain in the ass."
Cam laughed quietly. "He loves you. He just wants to protect you."
"I know." I paused, then added, "He's not about to murder you in your sleep for coming within five feet of me, is he?"
"Nah. He's more the broad-daylight murder type. Witnesses, consequences… he's not afraid."
I snort-laughed, then sobered. "How bad was it? Moving around so much?"
"On the positive, it taught me to adapt.
To read people, adjust, become what was needed.
But... yeah. Never feeling like you belong anywhere, like you have a home base?
It wears on you. Especially as a kid." His voice had taken on a reflective quality I'd rarely heard from him.
"Some days, even now, I'll wake up and not remember which house I'm in.
Just for a second. Disoriented until I remember it's my place, and I never have to move unless I want to. "
He paused, and I could hear him swallow in the darkness. "That night in college, with you... that was only the second time I felt like maybe I could just be me. Not whoever I needed to be to keep the peace or fit in. Just... Cam."
My breath caught at the unexpected pivot. We'd been carefully avoiding any direct mention of that night for years, dancing around it with practiced precision. Now here it was, suddenly looming large between us in the darkened room.
"I didn't think you remembered that night," I said carefully, my heart suddenly pounding so loudly I was sure he could hear it.
His laugh was soft, disbelieving. "Lana. How could I forget?"
The simple question was loaded with implication. My pulse skittered wildly, and I was grateful for the darkness that concealed my expression.
"You left," I said finally, the words coming out before I could stop them. "You didn't even say goodbye. You never called."
He was silent for a long moment, and I could sense him gathering his thoughts in the darkness. "I know."
"I woke up, and you were just... gone." The memory still stung, even after all these years and I felt my eyes burning. Do. Not. Cry. I breathed slowly to manage my emotions so Cam wouldn’t hear.
"I felt so stupid. I thought we had this.
.. connection. This amazing night. And then you disappeared like it meant nothing. "
"It didn't mean nothing," he said quietly, intensely. "It meant everything."
"Then why did you leave?" The question I'd wanted to ask for ten years finally escaped, hanging between us.
"It's complicated."
"That's not an answer."
He sighed, a long exhale that seemed to carry the weight of a decade. "No, it's not."
I waited, but he didn't elaborate. The silence stretched between us, taut with unspoken words. Outside, the waves continued their eternal conversation with the shore, indifferent to our human struggles.
I was not dropping this. I’d waited ten years to have this conversation.