Chapter 26
TWENTY-SIX
Elizabeth
"I'm so happy that you’re here," Mona squeals with excitement. "It is very unfortunate that it is under these circumstances, but I’ll take what I can get."
"I know, me, too."
The last few days have been hard. Sebastian being in this accident changed everything in my relationship with Logan. He suddenly doesn’t think he’s good enough for me, and says that life is too short for me to waste it on him.
I, on the other hand, see things differently. I think life is too short to waste it by not being with the people you love. And I love him with everything I am.
I tried talking to him about it, but I got nowhere.
I can’t believe how stubborn he is when he puts his mind to it.
I tried to remind him of all the things he did for me, and how he put so much effort into making me feel better when he thought I needed it.
I did manage to get out of him that he does love me, but that was followed by him saying that would be the reason why he has to let me go.
It all made sense in his own head, I suppose. But it left me frustrated to no end.
In the end, I decided to come to New York with him.
Seeing me with my bag at the airport seemed to calm him down a little bit.
He did not notice that I never packed up my art supplies in his spare bedroom, or the rest of my clothes from his closet.
In his mind, he thought that he was bringing me home to my father
After we landed, he insisted on getting me to my father‘s house. Unfortunately, for him, I could be just as stubborn. I told him that I had it handled, and that I did not need his help. The flash of annoyance in his eyes gave me hope that this would be a very short separation. I fought for our relationship from the beginning, and I wasn’t about to give up on it now.
I ordered myself an Uber while at the airport and had them take me to Mona‘s apartment. I had given her a heads up from the plane that I would be here. Her place is extremely small, a lot smaller than the one I had in Austin, but she was more than happy to let me crash here for a few days.
"What are you going to do now?" She watches me with worry in her eyes. "What if Logan is serious about breaking up with you?"
"I will have to cross that bridge when I get to it," I tell her. "But I understand that he’s going through a lot right now. I just wish he’d let me be there for him."
My eyes fill with tears at the thought of him having to walk into that hospital room and face the lifeless body of his friend.
Right now, Sebastian is breathing only because of all the machines he is connected to.
Last I heard, they were going to run some tests and see if he had any brain activity.
Apparently, that would be the deciding factor on whether he should remain on life-support or not.
"Have you thought of calling Leyla?" Mona asks. "She seems to have all sorts of inside information, right?"
"Yes," I nod in agreement. "I left her a message while on my way here from the airport. I really hope she’ll call me back, and I hope that she won’t tell my father about it."
Mona looks at me with apprehension in her eyes. I can tell that she has different ideas than me on how I should approach things with my father.
"Have you thought of maybe just calling him?"
Having expected that question, I’m not surprised when she asks.
And yes, I have thought about calling my father.
I just don’t know what he could do for me.
He’s been so against my relationship with Logan from the beginning, it’s not like now he would be willing to jump through hoops to get us back together.
"I did think about that," I reply to my friend. "We’ll see how that goes."
I pick up my cell phone and stare at it, willing it to ring. But it’s not just any number that I wish for. I really want to see Logan‘s name on the screen.
"I hate love," Mona says out of nowhere. She throws herself, very dramatically I might add, against the couch in her living room. "It never brings anything other than stress and pain."
I stare at her for a few seconds, and while my first instinct is to agree with her, I have to remind myself that the love Logan showed me was the kind that I want to have for the rest of my life.
"Love is not always bad, Mona," I tell her. "You just have to find the right person who will love you back as much as you love them."
Her eyebrows lift in a sarcastic move, and a small smirk forms in the corner of her mouth. "Well, how’s that working out for you?"
"It’s not working out for me very well at the moment," I admit. But I have faith that it will all work out. Logan is a good man, and I will help him through this," I say with determination.
Mona gives me a wistful look. "I really hope that it will work out for you. I hate seeing you sad like this."
I slap my hands against the cushion of her couch, determined to change the topic as I wouldn’t want her to feel that I don’t care about her life at all.
"Enough about me," I say. "You have to tell me about your dates. I know you said before that they were bad, but there’s got to be one person out there that's normal."
Mona just rolls her eyes at me but doesn’t say anything.
"Come on," I beg. "Tell me."
"I signed up for a new app," she mumbles. "It’s different than the other ones. It’s supposed to match people with others who only need a date for a certain event, but there are no expectations beyond that."
"That sounds pretty interesting," I smile at her. "It should make things easier, too, since all you need a date for is one event, right?"
"Yeah…"
We are interrupted by the ringtone of my cell phone when it goes off. I get so startled that I drop it to the floor. When I pick it up and look at the screen, I see that it’s Leyla, and not Logan, like I was hoping. Better than nothing, though.
"I hear you’re in my neck of the woods," Leyla teases as soon as I answer the phone. "Welcome home, chickie."
I chuckle when she says that. I’ve never heard the more playful side of her, and it throws me off a bit.
She is always so serious, a true ball buster, that it’s hard to picture her in a more relaxed setting despite the fact that I think she’s only in her thirties.
She sure acts like a grouchy grandma sometimes.
"Yes, I am in New York. I came here with Logan."
"That’s interesting," Leyla says. "I just spoke with Logan, who told me that you were at your father‘s. But while talking to your father, he didn’t show any signs that his daughter was home."
When I was little, my great grandma used to make me watch an old TV show with her.
It had a detective in it, whose name was Colombo.
When he was working on a case, he always pretended to be clueless while asking questions, when in fact, he knew all the answers already.
Leyla is Colombo, just a much prettier version.
"Logan insisted I would go to my father‘s house," I tell her. "But he never asked me if I wanted to do that. So I took it upon myself not to go."
"Good for you," Leyla praises me. "I always knew you had a backbone, a very strong one."
Her compliment throws me off, especially since we don’t know each other very well on a personal level, in fact, not much at all.
“I do need your help, Leyla,” I tell her. “Logan is so upset about what’s going on with Sebastian that he thinks I’m making a mistake by being with him. My father got into his head, and now he thinks he’s not good enough for me. He also said…”
I hesitate for a second, wondering how serious Logan was when he mentioned this, or if I should even share the information with anyone, especially someone who is not a friend of Logan’s. But I do need to help him, and this is the only way that I know how.
“Logan says he might want to quit playing for the Aces.”
Once the words are out of my mouth, I can’t bring them back, but I sure want to when I hear her small gasp of surprise. She tries to cover it with indifference.
“Players move around a lot, Elizabeth,” she tells me, and I am beginning to think that the slightly condescending tone happens only when she tries to play it cool.
“I know that…” My voice comes out barely audible.
Leyla’s sigh echoes over the line. She clears her throat a couple of times, sounding like she is about to say something, but then she changes her mind each time. We remain in awkward silence, neither one of us willing to continue this particular line of conversation.
Mona, who is still sitting on the couch next to me, turns sideways so she can stare at me better.
Her eyes look big and round as she tries to guess what’s going on.
At some point, she moves closer and puts her ear by the phone, but when there’s no sound coming out of it, she leans back and gives me a funny look that almost makes me burst into laughter.
“Are you with your girlfriend?” Leyla asks right then, like she can see through the damn phone.
“Yes,” I confirm. “This is a good time for us to catch up.”
Leyla hums in approval but doesn’t say anything else about it. Then she sighs. She takes a deep breath in, lets it all out. Repeats it a couple of times.
“I was hoping you could help me with a little more than just breathing exercises, Leyla,” I tease her.
When she doesn’t laugh, I worry that I might have offended her, but then she starts laughing, and it is the cutest thing.
“I really regret not getting to know you better when you lived here,” she tells me. “Such a missed opportunity…”
“Yeah,” I say, but I have no idea what she even means. This call is very confusing.
“I really think you need to talk to your father, Elizabeth,” she encourages me after she lets out another long puff of air.
“He is willing to talk to you. Calmly,” she emphasizes when she senses that I am about to interrupt her.
“I understand that he was a bit pushy before, and that he couldn’t understand why you wanted to have a life of your own with the man you fell in love with… ”
My eyebrows go up in surprise. From the sound of it, Leyla knows a lot more about my relationship with my father than possibly even me.
“He would love the opportunity to make amends,” she informs me. “And I would be very appreciative if you gave him a chance to do so.”
I am temporarily stumped by this turn of events.
“What is my father to you?” I ask, a suspicion taking root in my head.
“He is my boss,” she replies, maybe just a tad too fast.
It is now my turn to sigh into the phone as I mull things over and figure out what to say to her.
“Look, Leyla, I appreciate you trying to get yourself involved in that, but that is not what I need your help with,” I tell her.
I start pulling on a piece of thread that’s hanging from the bottom of my shirt, twisting it around my finger as I try to buy myself a little more time.
“I need your help with Logan,” I tell her. “If he wants to leave the Aces, where else can he go? How does it work? Is there a portal he can enter his name?”
Leyla laughs, but only out of frustration. “Your father would be the best person to talk to about this. I also think that Logan is making a mistake. You can’t just quit at the first sign of trouble…”
“They wouldn’t let him come see Sebastian,” I try to explain.
“That is not true,” she argues. “When you sign a contract, you are under the obligation to respect the rules set forth. While these are special circumstances, you still have to make some hard choices. The Aces’ first line goalie had what they thought might be an injury that would bench him for that game.
They needed Logan to be ready, just in case. ”
“But…” I try to further argue, but she cuts me off.
“Logan knows this, and he understands.” She makes it sound like she went through all this with him already. “There is no need for anyone to stir this particular pot anymore. Once he is done here, he is going back to Austin to complete the remainder of his contract. No one is going anywhere.”
“But Logan said…”
“Logan misspoke,” she snaps at me, albeit in a gently tone. “I will make sure to call him and clarify the terms of his contract with the Aces.”
My forehead wrinkles when I frown at that. “How do you know the terms of his contract with the Aces?”
She sighs, but it’s hard to tell if she does that because she is annoyed with me, or because she is exhausted by the entire conversation.
“Your father negotiated the entire deal for Logan…”
“What?” I yelp out loud.
“He personally called the team manager for the Aces, and they worked out a deal. He made sure that Logan would get a better deal than what he had with the Sliders, even if not necessarily in monetary compensation.”
“Why?” I whisper when she stops talking.
Leyla sighs again, and this time I can tell for sure that she is tired. “Because he is a very complicated man. And even though he hated the idea of losing his daughter to a hockey player, he couldn’t make himself destroy his career because of it…”
My mouth trembles, like I am about to cry. “Does Logan know?”
“Absolutely not,” Leyla responds right away. “He would hate for anyone to think that he’s not actually heartless.”
I press my fingers to my lips and drop my eyes to the floor. Mona rubs her hand in circles against my back in support.
“I don’t know what to say,” I whisper into the phone.
“Just promise me one thing, Elizabeth,” Leyla asks in a much gentler voice. “Talk to your father while you’re in town. You two need to make peace.” She then chuckles. “He’s driving me crazy.”
I have no idea what she means by that, but it’s something I’ll have to analyze once I can think straight.
“I will call him,” I promise.
We hang up, and I let the phone drop to the floor. My mind is exhausted, and I don’t know where to start between Logan and my father.
Either way, things will work out, I tell myself. They have to.