Room for More

by Beth Ehemann

  His eyes widened while he continued grinning at me, enjoying my anger. “Whoa! Did I hit a nerve? Relax, Murph. I was just asking a simple question in case I wanted to look her up. Ya know, since you two are done and all…”

  Breathe. He’s just trying to get under your skin.

  I laughed, trying my hardest to look amused by his threat. “Regardless of whether we’re done or not, she’s way too classy to give your dumb ass the time of day. I would say good luck, but it wouldn’t help anyway.”

  “That’s too bad.” He skated closer, leaning in. “I heard that hot little cunt of hers is worth all sorts of trouble.”

  I. Lost. My. Fucking. Mind.

  I dropped my gloves on the ice and lunged at him, grabbing the collar of his jersey and pushing him backward. He fell back hard, his helmet slamming against the ice. I climbed on top of him and started punching as hard as my restrictive pads would let me.

  Left. Right. Left. Right.

  I lost track of how many times I hit him.

  Blood splattered the ice next to his face as he wrapped his hands around my throat and tried to push me off.

  “That’s enough, you two!” It felt like a dozen arms wrapped around me, pulling me off of him. Two refs and most of my teammates were standing around as I stood up, my chest heaving. Fans were banging on the glass as his team skated up behind him screaming at me, but I was so zoned in on getting my hands on him again that I didn’t even hear what they were saying. He got up off the ice with help from Pekarske, their center, and wiped his mouth, smearing blood across his cheek. He looked up at me and grinned again, now missing a front tooth.

  “Both of you, off the ice!” the ref shouted.

  Viper skated up next to me, “What the fuck are you doing?”

  “Back off,” I roared, staring straight ahead.

  “Dude, you just got a game misconduct penalty. Now you’re out the rest of this game and maybe the next. What the fuck were you thinking?”

  “Get away from me!” I pushed his chest back, sick of him yelling in my ear.

  I skated over to my bench and past Collins, whose red face stared out at the ice as he gritted his teeth. “Louie, get in there,” he yelled as I made my way to the locker room where I watched the rest of the game by myself.

  My team lost 4-2, but I lost a hell of a lot more.

  “What is he doing?” I yelled into the stillness of the living room. I watched in horror as Brody climbed on top of a guy from the opposing team and started punching him. There wasn’t even a play near them at the time.

  “Oh my God, this isn’t good.” My mom pulled her hands up over her mouth.

  “Wait.” I squeaked, slightly panicked, “It’s normal, right? There are always fights in hockey.”

  “Not like this.” Fred shook his head. “Goalies very rarely fight. They are off-limits. And the game wasn’t even going on. Something else happened here.”

  Brody was relentless, hitting the guy over and over. Viper and a couple other guys I didn’t recognize rushed over with the refs and pulled Brody off of him. The other guy stood up and had blood all over his face.

  “Did he just smile at Brody?” I asked incredulously.

  “I think so.” Fred scratched his head, frowning at the TV.

  “What is going on down there?” one of the TV announcers asked.

  “I’m not sure, but we were still in intermission. Something must have set Murphy off,” responded the other man.

  “You know, Bill, that’s par for the course with Brody Murphy lately. He’s been a little off the whole season, but particularly this last week. That stunt he just pulled will most likely get him suspended for at least one game, maybe more.”

  Suspended?

  The ref said something to both men and pointed off the ice. Brody turned and started skating away with Viper following right behind him.

  “Wait. Did he just push Viper?” My eyes widened.

  “He did.” My mom still stood with her hands cupped against her cheeks. “What is going on with him?”

  Once he was off the ice and out of sight, I sat on the couch and dropped my head into my hands. “What should I do?”

  She sat down and put her arm around me. “What can you do, honey? Unfortunately, nothing.”

  “I just… I wish he would talk to me.” Tears stung my eyes as I searched my mom’s face for answers. “I haven’t spoken to him in days. How can he just turn it off like that?”

  Mom bit her lip as her eyes danced nervously around the room like a couple of jumping beans.

  “Mom?”

  She closed her eyes and let out a big sigh. “I’m not supposed to tell you this, but I can’t let you sit there and think he’s just forgotten all about you. He texted me… this morning.”

  Every nerve ending in my body tingled with a combination of fear and excitement. “What? When?”

  “Earlier this morning. They got back into town late last night. It was brief and we didn’t get into anything about Zach, but he desperately wanted to know how you were and said he missed the girls.”

  For the first time in nearly a week, my heart was filled with hope instead of utter soul-crushing sadness.

  He texted. It wasn’t to me, but he texted. That must mean he still cares, right?

  “What did you say?” I fought hard to swallow the huge lump in my throat.

  “I said that you were miserable but hanging in there. I said that you were incredibly sorry, and I said that the girls missed their Brody, all three of you.” She reached over and squeezed my hand.

  My heart raced so fast that I had to remind myself to slow down and take deep breaths. “Did he respond?”

  “He just said he missed you guys too. I didn’t want to ask him a lot of questions or push him, so I left it at that.”

  I took a full shaky breath. “Thank you,” I whispered to my mom, “for telling me. I know you weren’t supposed to, but I’m so glad you did. I might actually be able to sleep tonight for the first time in days.”

  I kissed her on the cheek and hurried off to my room.

  I threw myself on my bed and grabbed my cell phone.

  Okay, Kacie. Calm down.

  Brody texted my mom under the assumption that she would be discreet and not tell me. I couldn’t reward her for telling me by ratting her out, so I had to think really hard about what to say to him. I considered leaving it as is and going to bed, but given what I saw at his game and what he was probably going through right that second, I needed to reach out.

  HEY. SAW YOUR GAME TONIGHT. I HOPE YOU’RE OKAY. PLEASE CALL ME. WE DON’T HAVE TO TALK ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED. I JUST NEED TO KNOW YOU’RE OKAY. I LOVE YOU.

  I knew he wouldn’t respond; his game wasn’t over yet. Even if it was, I wasn’t confident that he would, but knowing that the game was still going on gave me an excuse to cling to. I curled up in bed and turned the light off.

  My eyes snapped open to nothing but darkness. Everything was black, but I know I’d heard my phone beep. Squinting in the dark at the bright screen, I blinked several times, waiting for the text to come into focus. It was from an unknown number.

  UNKNOWN: KACIE, IT’S VIPER. CALL ME ASAP. BRODY GOT ARRESTED.

  My eyes still weren’t completely focused when I read his next text with the number. I dialed, pretty sure I got it right. It started ringing and I glanced at the clock on my nightstand. Just after three o’clock in the morning.

  “Hello?” A gruff voice answered.

  “Viper? It’s Kacie. What the hell is going on?”

  “Dude. I don’t know.” He sounded out of breath. “He played like complete shit tonight, so I figured he’d want to go straight home and sleep it off, right? Well after the game, he tells me he wants to go blow off some steam at the bar. Fine. We’re sitting there having a drink; everything is great. I go to the bathroom, come back, and he’s in some fucking barroom brawl with like four guys. Next thing I know, the cops were there and he got cuffed.”

  “Oh my God
.”

  “You have to come, Kacie. He’s fucking spiraling. I don’t know how to get through to him.”

  “Text me the address of the station. I’m on my way.”

  I threw a hoodie over my head, put my flip-flops on, and wrote my mom a quick note in case I wasn’t back in time to put the girls on the bus.

  An hour and a half later, my hands were shaking as I circled the same city block for the eighth time, trying to find a parking space.

  I finally found one and parallel parked like a pro for the first time in my entire life. I grabbed my phone from my purse and texted Viper.

  I’M HERE. WHERE ARE YOU?

  A loud knock on my driver’s side window nearly made me scream out loud.

  “Jesus!” I yelled, glaring at Viper’s grinning face, which was pressed up against the glass. “You scared the shit out of me.”

  He laughed. “I was sitting on the stairs. I watched you circle the block a million times, thought maybe Stevie Wonder was driving the car.”

  “Not funny.” I rolled my eyes, trying not to laugh at him.

  The crisp autumn air slapped me in the face as I hopped out of the Jeep. It was a little surreal that two hours before I was sound asleep in my bed at home, and now I was in a city police station to help bail my boyfriend out of jail.

  “Okay.” I slammed my car door. “I’ve never bailed anyone out before. How does this work?”

  “I already went in and talked to them. He’s in a holding cell in the basement.” He fell in step beside me as we made our way to the building. “We go in, pay the bail, and sign him out. Then I hold him down while you slap some sense into him.”

  “I have an idea.” I narrowed my eyes at him. “Think any of those cops are hockey fans?”

  After Viper turned on the athletic charm and promised to hang around signing autographs for awhile, a fresh-faced, nice officer led me downstairs to the holding area. There were two cells. The one on the right held a few passed-out frat boys who’d clearly had too much to drink, evidenced by the putrid smell of vomit that assaulted my nose as I walked by.

  To my left was the other cell and in it, sitting on a cement bench, was Brody. He was leaning forward with his elbows resting on his knees, his head in his hands. I stood for a second, staring at the loose curls on top of his head. I was overcome with love for him and guilt for the part I’d played in his internal torment.

  I took a deep breath and mustered up every ounce of courage I had. “Hey,” I said softly.

  His head snapped up at the sound of my voice and his eyes widened when he saw me. Standing up quickly, he wiped his hands on his jeans and took a couple steps closer. “Kacie? What are you doing here? How did you know?”

  A sympathetic smile tugged at my lips. “Viper texted me and I got here as fast as I could.”

  “You didn’t have to drive all this way.” He shook his head back and forth slowly. “Viper could’ve gotten me out.”

  “I know that, but this actually worked out better.” I crossed my arms across my chest.

  He raised his eyebrows and looked around the cell. “It did?”

  “Yep.” I took a step forward and wrapped my hands around the bars. “He’s upstairs entertaining the officers with strict instructions not to pay the bail until he gets the ‘all clear’ text from me.”

  “Huh?”

  “You can’t run from me in there. You can’t ignore my texts. You have no choice but to hear me out.”

  A smile threatened to tug at his mouth. “Resourceful little thing, aren’t you?”

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures.” I took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. “Brody, I love you. I love you so much. You walked into my life almost five months ago and have completely changed it. You’ve changed me for the better. You’ve made me relax—a little—and taught me to live life less timidly. Every once in awhile, though, the scared, over-analyzing girl in me still rears her ugly head and stands at the edge of that damn catastrophe cliff.”

  He frowned at me, scratching his cheek. “The what?”

  “Never mind.” I shook my head quickly. “It’s something Lauren talked about; it’s not important. My point is when I went to the hospital for the first time a few weeks ago, I never in a million years expected to see Zach there. I never expected to see him again in my whole life.”

  The sides of Brody’s jaw twitched at the mention of Zach’s name, but I didn’t stop. It was now or never and I wasn’t about to walk away and leave anything on the table.

  “Should I have come straight home and told you? Yes. Would that have been the rational thing for a girlfriend to do? Yes. Did I do that? No.” My voice started to shake but I cleared my throat, determined to regain my composure and get through this. “It was our last week before you started practice and things had just settled down from the whole Kendall-Blaire fiasco. I chickened out. Selfishly, I just wanted to keep things as smooth as possible between us.”

  His eyes softened and he opened his mouth to talk, but I wasn’t done yet.

  “I’m a mama bear, Brody, quick to assume I always know what’s best and slow to admit when I’m wrong. But I admit it: I was wrong. I was wrong for not telling you sooner, but I was NOT wrong for lying to you. I never lied to you; I just made a poor judgment in my timing.” I swiped a tear from my cheek.

  He walked up to the bars and stood inches from me. “You’re not the only one who made a mistake, Kacie.”

  My heart stopped beating and I held my breath.

  Oh, God. Is he telling me good-bye?

  “Pushing you away this past week was my mistake. Whether I understand you’re reasoning or not, I can’t tell you how bad I wish we would’ve had this conversation right away. It’s my fault that we didn’t.”

  “I wish we would’ve too.” I sniffed and rested my forehead against the bars as the tears ran freely down my cheeks. “Can we be done with all this, please? I really need to hug you right now and these damn bars are in my way.”

  “I’m not done,” he said cautiously.

  “Oh.” Deflation washed over me.

  “I’ve actually done a lot of thinking this week, and let me tell you, being inside my brain is a crazy place to be lately.” He laughed in such a foreign, nervous way that goose bumps covered my skin and my stomach flipped. “I talked to my parents this morning, trying desperately to figure out a way to convince them to give it one more try. Then I started thinking… I’m a total hypocrite.”

  “A hypocrite?”

  “Yeah, think about it. My parents are separating. I’m twenty-seven and fucking devastated about it. I would give anything, pay anything, do anything for them to give it one more try. What if it wasn’t their own stupidity but a person who had come in between them? How would I feel about that person? I would hate them for the rest of my life, assuming I didn’t spend it in prison for killing them.”

  The tiny hairs on the back of my neck stood up. “What are you saying, Brody?”

  “I love your girls, Kacie. I can only pray that the way I feel about them is the way I’ll feel about my own kids one day. The last thing in the world I would ever want is for them to hate me or resent me in ten years because they think I came in between their mom and dad.” He blinked as the rims off his eyes grew red. “As sick as it makes me to say it, I think I’m going to step back and let you figure this out with him first.”

  My mouth fell open as I let go of the bars. “Are you serious?” I asked, struggling for a full breath.

  “I am.” He pressed his lips together and swallowed hard.

  As quickly as the confusion took over my body, it evaporated, leaving anger in its wake. I stepped back and started pacing the length of the cell as I scratched my head. I didn’t look at Brody, but I knew his eyes were following me. I could feel them.

  “Kacie, talk to me,” he uttered slowly.

  I spun on my heel to face him. “Do you love me?”

  His head jerked back in surprise and he licked his lips. “Yeah.
That’s why I’m doing this.”

  “No.” I took a step toward the bars. “Do you really love me?”

  “Yes,” he responded firmly.

  “Then screw you.”

  “What?”

  “Screw you.”

  “No, I heard you. I just don’t get it.”

  “Do you know why Zach left me?” I cocked my hip to the side and crossed my arms across my chest.

  He rolled his eyes. “I have no idea.”

  “He was dealing with some major substance abuse. I had no idea it was as bad as it was, so he thought he’d do me a favor and leave. Ya know, for my and the girls’ sake,” I said sarcastically. “Then yesterday, he told me he’d decided to leave—again—for me and the girls. I told him I didn’t want him to.”

  His eyebrows shot up at my news. “You did?”

  “Yep, you heard me. I told him not to go, that we would give it time and see about introducing him to the girls eventually. I also told him there was no chance of us being together again—ever. You see, I’m twenty-four years old. I’ve been a single parent for five years. In that time, I’ve managed to all but finish my nursing degree, help my mom run an inn, and fall in love with the most amazing man. The same man who now thinks he knows what’s best for me and should walk away.”

  “Kacie—”

  “Nope. I’m not done,” I interrupted. “I’ve made a decision. From now until forever, I’m going to be the one who gets to decide what’s best for Kacie and her girls. If you’re no longer in love with me and think it’s best we separate, that’s one thing. But please don’t think for a second you’re doing me any favors by turning your back and walking out on me.”

  Brody walked right up to the bars and rested his head against them, staring at me.

  “I need you, Brody. I would give up everything in my life, with the exception of Lucy and Piper, to have you by my side—forever. I don’t care about money or celebrity status or any of that crap. I just need you. If you get traded, I’ll move tomorrow. If you get hurt and can’t play anymore, I’ll work two jobs to support us.”