Chapter 37 Maggie
MAGGIE
While riding the bus back to the apartment, I review the B&S Media story.
My parents are like sharks. Blood lures them—stories of death, loss, and destruction.
What made them change course, publish something that painted Declan in a positive light instead of Mrs. O’Mealley’s account, and then dedicate the story to me?
As the bus stops and heaves a sigh, I realize that I hold the answer in my hand.
When I switched my phone and Declan’s, there was a call from my parents.
Had they called and he answered or had Declan called them and they’d gotten back to him?
Whatever happened, it came out positively in the end and that is all I could hope for.
Declan’s story, as dark as it had been, is one of hope.
He’d overcome the odds that he would’ve turned out exactly like Keefe.
Declan had been afraid to tell anyone the truth about his past, but it was powerful and showed the resiliency of the human spirit, the community that consisted of his aunt, trainers, coaches and team, and his faith.
My parents, of all people, had been the ones to share it.
Tears fill my eyes. I may not get my happy ending with Declan, but maybe because of him, other people—teens like he’d been, those who thought there might not be a way out of difficult circumstances—will find the strength in his story to move forward.
Buoyed until I return to the apartment, I promptly fall onto the couch because the reality is, I’m homeless, jobless, and loveless.
My inner troll pipes up, attempting to quash my ambition and motivation.
Etta Jo had offered me a place to stay until I got back on my feet, but as I lay here, wishing to be part of the second half of Declan’s story, I can’t imagine getting up. At least not for a while.
I probably ought to go to Concordia or someplace else where I can be anonymous. Declan’s idea to sail around the world on his yacht sounds tempting. But there is no way we could ever be together.
I groan, feeling like I crash-landed. In the last days, Etta Jo has sat with me for hours, listening, sharing her insight, and supporting me, but I can’t imagine moving—my body or into a new place. I don’t know how I’ll get on with my life or where to go. I’m utterly alone.
Dozing, the door flies open and Giselle breezes in. She shuffles bags, boxes, and other items around. She’s in a frenzy, shoving things into Etta Jo’s room, tossing clothing and shoes in the closet. She stuffed stacks of magazines under the coffee table. Her long, lacquered nails flash.
I blink and sit up. “Everything okay? What are you doing?”
Giselle startles. “I didn’t see you there. You’re heaped under that ratty blanket.”
“Goblin mode.”
“That is not a vibe.”
“Do you need help cleaning up?” I ask.
“Oh, no, honey. You just keep lying there wallowing. Don’t mind me. I just have a player for the Miami Riptide coming over.”
“Are you still dating Garrison?”
Giselle nods. “I think things are getting serious. He wanted to come to see my lair.” She cackles.
I almost crack a smile. “Have you heard from Cateline?”
“No, she’s dealing with a football player of her own.” Giselle smirks.
I gasp. “The headmistress and Wolf, her pupil?” I thought they despised each other.
Giselle smooths her hair. “How do I look?”
“Gorgeous. As ever. Giselle, you could go through a hurricane and you’d look as fresh as spring rain.”
“It’s these Berghier genes. You might want to freshen up, too. Okay, lights, camera, action.” She struts to the door just as a knock sounds.
Without warning, several burly guys stride in. The one in the front is wearing the turquoise and yellow colors of the Riptide, but the others are in Boston Bruiser’s black and blue. They surround me on all sides and pick up the couch, then heft it with me still on top.
I squeak and then squeal as they march out of the apartment. “What is going on? Where are we going? Put me down!”
They don’t answer.
I try to sit up, being careful not to fall over the edge.
Carrying me like some misfit goblin princess, the football players parade down the hall and outside. They set the couch down in the courtyard at the same time a black dot fills the sky.
Just then, Etta Jo and Giselle sit down beside me with the football players at our backs. Everyone looks up.
The dot gets closer. My hands tent over my mouth. “Is that?”
“A bird? A plane?” Etta Jo asks.
“Nope. I’d say it’s a man.”
A man descending in a parachute. We watch in stunned silence until at last, Declan lands in the courtyard. One of the guys whistles and everyone hoots and claps.
I scramble up from the couch, trying to make myself look less like a goblin, which is a foregone battle, and rush over to him. “What are you doing—?”
“There was a problem with the airstrip and I couldn’t get clearance to land.” He unclips the harness and envelopes me in a hug.
I sink into him, never wanting to let go.
“I couldn’t let another day pass not seeing you. My only choice was to take the leap, the risk, and hope you welcomed me back into your life. I had the guys here, and with Giselle and Etta Jo’s help, get you outside on the fly.” Declan gestures.
“And you have to get to LA,” one of the other Boston Bruisers hollers.
“And that. Will you come with me?” Declan asks, windswept and out of breath.
“Go to Los Angeles?”
The air is still, but everything is happening so fast it’s like high-speed winds blew into town and turned my world upside down.
“Please. I won’t ever give up on myself or us again.” He tells me how he’d forgiven himself for the past and tried to make it right by talking to my parents so we’d have a shot at a future together.
A smile crests from my heart and reaches my eyes. “I won’t give up on us again either. Ride or die, but I refuse to jump out of a plane.”
Declan laughs, then angles my chin to face him and leans in. His gaze dips to my lips. The flurry of the last minutes slows, my surroundings blur. The past dissolves. All that matters is right now.
Declan’s hand cups the back of my neck as he draws us together. Our lips meet.
I’ve never jumped out of an airplane, but imagine the swooping and diving from the bluebirds in my belly are a lot like the thrill of flying through the sky. I drop through fluffy, swoony, blissy clouds.
My heart rushes as his pounds against mine.
I melt inside as he deepens the kiss.
Our elbows bend and our fingers lace together. I squeeze tight.
I no longer feel alone, but connected. To Declan, to our future.
Another round of cheering comes from the guys and my friends, reminding me we have an audience. Not my favorite.
The next minutes are a matter of Etta Jo and Giselle getting me cleaned up, packed up, and ferried off to the airport where the private plane waits.
During the flight, Declan catches me up on everything that has happened since we parted in Ireland.
“Thank you for talking to my coach. He can be an intimidating guy.”
“Thank you for talking to my parents.”
“So you’re not mad?” he asks.
“I was hurt that you didn’t tell me about Keefe and Siobhan, but I also understand you were trying to protect yourself. Just like I’ve been doing since I distanced myself from my parents, never letting anyone get too close. It was almost like it was easier to be alone. But not really.”
He nods in understanding, then tells me about his ultimatum and the donation.
“I guess some things don’t change. I thought maybe they’d done that out of a sense of goodness.”
“I didn’t put them up to the dedication. That was all of them. But I understand how the past may have hurt you and I won’t keep anything else from you, Maggie.”
“No more secrets?” I ask.
“None. No more omissions?”
I shake my head. “We have a long flight ahead of us. Let’s tell each other everything.”
“We might need longer than that.”
“Who goes first?” I make a fist and shake my hand up and down, signifying that we do rock, paper, scissors. “Best two out of three.”
Not to brag, but I win. “What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever eaten?”
“Oh, this is easy. Aunt Maureen came back from a flight to...I forget where. She had this thing called a hundred-year-old egg.” He makes a gagging face. “It was as disgusting as you’d imagine.”
“Then you definitely wouldn’t be interested in Sylvester’s spiced pickled egg relish mayo combo.”
“That would be a solid no. But I am interested in us.” Declan squeezes my hand. “Maggie, you and the guys on the team are my found family. I want to be yours. I want a future together and don’t want the past to come between us.”
“I want the same things. But I don’t want your fame to come between us either, so I’ve decided to let the past go—and accept my childhood for what it was and forgive my parents so that I can be present for us and our future.”
We move in for a kiss and then chat for the rest of the transcontinental flight, talking about life, our hopes, plans, and more.
“So, when we get to LA, I have a lot of training to do, but I will spend every other second with you. I don’t want you to get bored, though, so on the flight from Dublin to Florida, I set up a cupcake crawl for you.”
“A cupcake, what?”
He pulls out a piece of paper and a sketch.
“In Ireland and cities like Boston, there’s a thing called a pub crawl where people go from pub to pub.
So, I thought you could do the same, but with cupcakes.
I mapped out every café, bakery, and restaurant in the city that sells cupcakes.
I figure you can visit each one, try out their offerings, write up a review, create a blog, or just do research for fun. ”
“Really? This is the coolest thing ever.”
Declan smiles. “Even though I have a demanding job and, like it or not, I will be in the limelight a little, I want to be with you the most. I’ll do anything to make that happen. But I also think it’s important for you to follow your dreams wherever they lead.”
I nuzzle close to him, surveying the list of cupcakeries and the map. “I know where my heart leads, Declan. To you.” I kiss him on the cheek and he turns to me, kissing me fully on the lips.
The plane cruises toward Los Angeles. I haven’t been to my hometown in years.
My parents’ office is nearby, but I don’t think about that right now.
The sun has set and instead of the stars glittering above, the city shines below.
Our kiss deepens, but all the lights on the ground or all the stars in the sky can’t make me feel more electric, more plugged in and connected than I do right now.
“I love you, Maggie,” Declan says.
“I love you too,” I answer.