Chapter 26 #2
“Thank you,” I whisper, watching them walk away.
I can’t believe they’re here, that they showed up for me like this. It’s both a comfort and a hurt that they’re here. I’ve missed them so much, but now I’m going to have to watch them walk away again. I’m not sure my heart can take it.
“Hey, Mom, how are you feeling? Any pain or discomfort?” I ask stepping into the room. “The nurse said the procedure went well.”
“Has your dad called back yet?” asks Mom, her voice a little raspy.
“What?” She just got out of surgery to repair a punctured lung, and this is her first question?
“You called your dad earlier. Did he call back yet? Is he worried about me?”
I’ve spent all night by her side and this morning, and she doesn’t even care that I’m here. That I’m missing classes to support her. All she can think about is my asshole father.
“No, he hasn’t.”
“He’s going to,” says Mom confidently. “But call him again just in case. He’ll want to know I came out of the surgery okay. He’ll be worried.”
“Mom, I—” I start to explain that I’m not doing that, and he’s not worried about her, only ever about himself, but she cuts me off.
“Who’s out there?” asks Mom, trying to see around me. “Who’s outside my door?”
I turn around and see the guys hovering just outside the door.
“Sorry,” Sebastian says, taking a few steps back. “We didn’t know she could see us.”
“Rebecca! Who’s out there?” Mom asks again.
“Do you … want to come in and meet my mom?” I say with a deep sigh. I’m so embarrassed the guys I like are about to see my mother like this, but I don’t see way around it.
I lead them into the room. “Mom, these are my friends.” The guys all look from me to each other, but I keep going, “Lukas, Sebastian, Felix, and Elliot.”
“Nice to meet you,” says Lukas. He, Sebastian, and Felix wave. Elliot tucks his hands in his pockets.
“Four of them? That’s good,” says Mom, not even acknowledging them. “At least one of them will always be able to take care of you.”
I bite my tongue and force myself to stay civil. “I can take care of myself,” I point out. I’ve always taken care of myself. Mom certainly never took care of me.
“But of course, all four of us will always take care of her if she wants it,” agrees Sebastian, and I shoot him a dirty look. He meets my gaze. “I said, if you want it.”
“I can take care of myself,” I say again.
It comes out harsher than I intend, but I’m just so tired right now and just the thought of relying on someone else, as I sit here looking at my mother in her hospital bed, broken because of how much her identity is tied to my father, makes me want to scream.
The guys nod, looking like little puppies I just kicked. As if I wasn’t already feeling shitty enough about everything, now I feel even worse for hurting them.
“We’ll just … wait in the hall. If you need anything, we’re right here,” says Lukas, gesturing for the others to follow him. They all file out, but the tension in the room stays.
I feel like an asshole. And it’s Mom who put me in this position.
“You should be nicer to them,” she admonishes me, “You’ll never find a man to take care of you if you’re mean to every man you meet, and you’re not supposed to take care of yourself. That’s not how it’s supposed to be. The men are supposed to take care of their women.”
I can’t take it anymore. All these years of watching her do this to herself, the past weeks of hurt and heartbreak, and the past twenty-four hours of worry and exhaustion, coalesce into one giant glob of emotion in the center of my chest, and I snap.
“No!” My voice is loud in the tiny room, but I’m not going to temper myself for her anymore.
“That is it! I’m going to be the best goddamn reporter you’ve ever seen, and I will support myself.
I will not throw away my life like you have by expecting someone else to take care of me and never giving myself an opportunity to be the one to do it.
I won’t tie myself to another person so tightly that I don’t know who I am without them.
I won’t be like you.” I take a deep breath.
“Dad left you, and he’s not coming back!
Even if he does come back, you shouldn’t let him! ”
“He loves me.” Mom shakes her head. She’s not even listening to me. I don’t think she’s heard a single word that’s left my mouth.
“No, he doesn’t. Those guys out there,” I point toward the hallway, “they’re missing Worlds to be here with me right now, but Dad wouldn’t even miss happy hour for you.”
“That’s not true. He just has to work late a lot. He works so hard to support me,” says Mom. Her delusional refusal to see the truth runs so deep, I’m not sure she’ll ever be able to climb out of the hole she’s in.
“No, he doesn’t. And that’s not what love is. It’s not whatever you and Dad have.” My words falter as everything I’ve experienced over the past weeks since meeting the guys plays out in my mind, clicking things into place like a perfectly-solved cube.
Love.
That’s what the guys feel for me. They’re here even though I didn’t call them. Supporting me even when I told them I don’t need them. Putting me above their own goals in a way I’m not sure I would have done for them if the tables were reversed.
Well, that ends now.
I stare at my mom for a beat, as she stubbornly continues to insist that my father loves her and that as soon as he’s able, he’ll be here. She’s still talking when I turn and leave the room.
The guys are standing outside her door, looking uncomfortable. They’ve heard everything, I’m sure, but we don’t have time to worry about that right now. I reach for them.
“Do we still have time to make it?”
“Make it where? Do you need us to run out and get something for you?” asks Lukas, standing up from where he was leaning against the wall.
“To Worlds,” I tell him, starting for the elevators. They don’t follow, and after a few steps I turn back.
“But your mom is in the hospital,” Sebastian points out, brushing his hair off his forehead. “Is she being released?”
“She’s going to be fine. She doesn’t want me here, and I don’t want to be here anymore.”
“I can’t hear what you’re saying, Rebecca. Speak up,” calls Mom from her hospital bed.
“I’m leaving,” I call back into the room. “Call me once you’re in therapy.”
There’s no way I can help her. She needs someone more than me. A professional who can help her realize that she’s put her entire life on hold for a man who doesn’t love her, and help her figure out how to start it over and actually live it.
Meanwhile, I’ve got four beautiful, wonderful men who love me, and have been showing me that for weeks. They deserve so much better than me, but if I’m who they want, I’m going to help them achieve their dreams.
That doesn’t mean I’m going to let mine go, but for now, we have a world championship to get to.
“Are you sure?” asks Felix, glancing back at my mom.
“I am. Let’s go.” I start walking down the hallway and when I get to the elevator and look behind, they’re still hovering outside Mom’s room, looking uncertain. “Come on!”
As soon as I push the elevator call button, I can hear them hurrying to catch up. They’re going to have to hurry a lot more than that though, if we’re going to make it in time.
“We’re so glad you made it,” says Lukas’s mom the next morning, wrapping her son in a hug and then hugging all the other guys, then me.
“Sorry we’re so late,” I say, embarrassed that they probably all know how badly I’ve behaved these last two weeks. “It’s my fault.”
It hurts to admit that, but it’s true. And if I’m going to treat the guys fairly, I need to be able to acknowledge where I’ve gone wrong.
“There’s no way you could have planned what happened to your mom,” says Sebastian’s mother, stopping me before I can say anything else. “We’re just glad she’s doing well enough for you to be here.”
Hmm. It’s odd that she’s only commenting on our being late due to Mom’s hospitalization.
I look over at the guys, who all have a slight pink tinge to their cheeks.
I don’t think they’ve told their families what I’d done.
How I ghosted them. If they had, their parents would certainly hate me and not want me to be here.
“What time did you get in?” asks Elliot’s dad.
“We didn’t get to the hotel until well after midnight,” says Elliot, stifling a yawn.
Lukas’s dad frowns. “That’s not enough sleep.”
“Well, we got you registered,” Lukas’s mom tells them, handing out their lanyards.
The guys shuffle along to the competitor waiting area and I follow their parents to the audience viewing area. It’s even more crowded than Nationals and it’s only the first day. I’m sure it’ll get even more packed before the world champions are named.
“Thanks for checking them in,” I say, as we settle into our seats. “It helped to sleep in a few extra minutes.”
“You’re welcome. We’re family, we’re here to help. Besides, they needed all the sleep they can get if they’re going to win this week,” Mary says, smiling.
Her words are sweet, but fill me with guilt.
It’s my fault they arrived so late. If it weren’t for me, they would have arrived early yesterday, checked in, and gotten a full night’s sleep last night.
We were all so exhausted, we didn’t fool around at all once we got here.
Just crashed into bed. I think Elliot even considered skipping some of his cleaning steps.
He didn’t do it, but he really looked like he was thinking about it.
The guys all make it to the next day of competition, but by the time we’re heading up to the hotel room at the end of the day, they’re all rather subdued with exhaustion.
“At least you’ll have some good material for your class article,” says Lukas as we step off the elevator onto our floor.
I wince. I haven’t told them yet about everything that happened at my work.
“I actually already turned it in. My professor loved it, so I sent it to my editor at the newspaper,” I explain, taking a deep breath to help mentally prepare myself for the next part.
“That’s awesome!” says Felix, pulling out the key card to open our door.
“Of course he loved it, you’re a great writer,” Elliot agrees.
“I got fired.” I let the words tumble out as we go inside, and I drop onto the bed to stare up at the ceiling.
“I’m confused,” says Sebastian, sitting down next to me so he can lean over and look down at me. “Did your editor not read it? He has to read it to know how wonderful it is. How would you showing him an article you wrote get you fired?”
“Oh, he did,” I assure him. I don’t want to tell him that I didn’t get fired because of the article, but because I was fooling around with them and one of the other reporters figured it out.
“Will you send it to us so we can read it?” asks Elliot, taking off the shoes I’d left on and replacing them with my hotel slippers.
My mind had been too distracted, but not Elliot’s. Even when I miss something, he takes care of it, without complaining.
“Thank you,” I tell him, reaching out to squeeze his hand. He smiles down at me. “You want to read the article from class that got me fired?”
“Of course,” says Lukas immediately, taking off his outside shoes and sliding on his room slippers. “We want to support you, and be involved in your life.”
“And we meant it when we told your mom that we would always support your goals,” adds Felix.
I’d thought they meant it in the way Mom had earlier, that they would financially support me and keep me. That’s why I’d been so pissed and snapped at them. But of course they mean that they’ll always support my goals. They’re better guys than I’ve ever given them credit for.
“Well, my advisor is working on finding me a new internship, so hopefully I’ll be back in a newsroom for the fall semester at least. There’s nothing you can do in that department, but I appreciate the thought.”
“You know we’d do anything to help you,” says Sebastian, leaning in to kiss me.
It’s so sweet, and I want to sink into the feeling. Or maybe cry. I’ve missed them so much. I never should have let Ronnie’s teasing freak me out so much that I threw this away.
For the first time in my life, I think that maybe I can have both a career and love. The I can let someone else care for me without losing a piece of myself.
“And support you,” says Elliot, turning my chin so he can capture my lips with his own.
“I should have said this a long time ago,” I say when we pull apart, “but I was an idiot and didn’t realize what was happening.”
“What was happening?” Felix asks, leaning in for a kiss of his own.
I look around at each of them in turn. “I was falling in love with you.” I grin at the looks of shock on all their faces. “I love you. All of you. And I’m sorry it took me so long to realize it.”
I pull them towards me, and we all fall together in a tangle of limbs on the bed. Suddenly, no one seems to be very tired anymore.