Ryan felt her stomach rebel at her partner’s wish that she had shot them in the head, but she recalled Rory’s words and she tried to push that element out of her brain. Finally, she spoke, and Jamie could feel the love in her voice. "Only you could make me feel better about something so awful."
"You have nothing … nothing to feel bad about, Ryan. You did the most heroic things I could have ever imagined, and you tried your best not to kill those assholes. The fact that he was already sick was a little quirk that you had no control over."
"I was far from heroic, and I had plenty of control," she grumbled, her statement puzzling Jamie. "I have plenty to feel bad about."
"Pardon? What does that mean?"
"Never mind," Ryan said, not having any desire to get into her guilt feelings then, or ever. "I’ve got too many things running through my mind to be making any sense at all."
"Are you sure you’re going to be all right? I’m really struggling with being so far away from you, baby."
"Yeah, I am. I think I’m in a little bit of shock," she said. "That asshole reporter tried to freak me out, just so he could get my reaction."
"I know," Jamie said quietly. "I saw it on TV."
"Oh, crap! It was on TV?"
"Yes, honey. That’s how we knew about it. They just used a snippet on CNN, but locally they showed his question, your reaction, and the coach screaming at everyone to get out and leave you alone."
"I missed most of that," Ryan said. "The last thing I remember is hearing him tell me the guy died."
"I had a feeling you were out of it," Jamie said. "Wait a sec, okay? My cell is ringing."
She was gone for a few minutes, then came back on. "Daddy found a charter company that can leave in an hour," she said. "I’ll be there by dawn."
"Jamie," Ryan said softly. "I don’t want you flying on some small plane to get here a few hours earlier. I’d be worried about you the whole time. It’s okay with me if you change your reservations to come here instead of Miami, but you really don’t have to take such extraordinary measures."
"But I want to be with you," she said. "It broke my heart to see you so upset. I feel so powerless, Ryan."
"Honey, you can hear that I’m better now. Please, please, don’t leave tonight. It would really make it worse for me."
She waited a second, trying to decide if she should push Ryan to give in. "Okay. You know what will make you feel the best. Hold on a sec." She spent a few more minutes talking to her father, then came back on the line. "Since I can’t be with you, can we stay on the phone for a while?"
"Sure. Let me get ready for bed. The doctor gave me a sleeping pill. I think I’ll take it," she said.
"Okay. I’ll go tell your family that you’re much better, so they can all go home. Then I’ll get ready for bed, and call you back."
"Deal," Ryan said. "One more thing, babe. Have Da or Aunt Maeve call my aunt and my Granny. Even in Ireland, they’ll see this crap on CNN and be worried all over again."
"Consider it done."
Jamie called the airline and changed her ticket, dismayed that she wouldn’t arrive until 6 o’clock the following evening. She dialed Ryan’s number, and wasn’t surprised in the least when the low voice already sounded slow and sleepy. "You took the pill, huh?" she asked.
"Yeah. It’s already working.
"You’d have the cheapest drug addiction in the world," Jamie said. "You’re so susceptible to everything you take."
"Fast metabolism," Ryan said through a yawn.
"I love your fast metabolism," Jamie said. "Now you go to sleep, honey, and call me the minute you wake up. I want to hear your sweet little voice as soon as possible."
"Okay. Love you, Jamie."
"I love you, too, Ryan. More than words can say."
"I know. Me too." She hung up quietly, and Jamie did her best to soothe her jangled nerves by imagining the gentle beauty of her partner as she slept.
The next morning, Jamie ran around the house getting ready for her flight. She was thinking of Ryan every minute, anxiously waiting for her call, but was slightly cheered that her partner was at least sleeping well. But as time ticked by she began to worry, debating over whether or not to call and wake her. Her indecision lasted until she was waiting near the gate for her flight. With just a few minutes to spare, she dialed the hotel and asked to be connected to Ryan’s room. The phone rang and rang, and finally the operator came back on. "There’s no answer," she said.
"Please try it again, and let it ring," Jamie said. "I know she’s there."
"All right, ma’am. I’ll try again."
Her heart was pounding heavily as she tried to figure out who to call if she couldn’t rouse her partner, but finally the receiver was picked up. "Ryan?"
"Yeah." Her voice was thick and slurred, sounding like she’d been pulled from a very deep sleep.
"Oh, honey, I’m so sorry for waking you wake up. I just needed to talk to you before I left."
"Huh." Ryan’s voice was slow and muddled, and Jamie could tell she was still not firing on all cylinders. "Left what?"
"Left San Francisco, honey. I’m getting on my plane. I’ll be there by this evening."
There was a silence that lasted longer than Jamie was comfortable with. "Am I staying here or are we going on vacation now?" Ryan asked.
"What do you mean by that?" Jamie asked, her eyes wide.
"Coach said I could leave … I think."
"Uhm … they’re calling final boarding for me, Ryan. It’s a little late to have this discussion right now."
"Oh." There was a moment of silence, then Ryan said, "The team’s going to Chapel Hill on a bus. Should I go with?"
"Ryan," she said, "you’re starting to worry me. Of course you should go. I’m coming to meet you in Chapel Hill. My flight will arrive in Raleigh/Durham late this afternoon, then I’ll take a cab to your hotel."
"Do you know what hotel to go to? I forget," Ryan said, thoroughly puzzled.
"Yes, sweetheart. I have your itinerary." She waited a beat and said, "Can I speak with your roommate?"
"Don’t have one. They moved me to a single so I could be alone. Why do you want to do that?"
"Because you don’t seem right, honey. I’ve never heard you sound so out of it. I want to make sure someone keeps an eye on you today."
"I’ll be fine," Ryan said. "Just tired. I’m gonna take a nap now."
"That sounds like a good idea," Jamie said, her worry increasing. "You get some rest, baby, and I’ll see you tonight. I love you, Ryan."
"Love you."
Jamie shoved her phone into her pocket and ran for the gate, managing to slip past the attendant just as he was closing the door. As soon as she sat down she got on the phone again, and managed to track down Coach Hayes. "Hello," she said, "this is Jamie Evans, Ryan’s partner."
"Oh, hi, Jamie," the coach said. "What can I do for you?"
"I just spoke to Ryan, and she seems very out of it. I’m terribly worried about her, Coach Hayes. Will you make sure that someone keeps an eye on her?"
"Sure, Jamie, I’ll make sure she’s all right. We’re just about to leave for Chapel Hill, so I’ve got to go."
"About to leave? She was just going to go back to sleep!"
"Oh, shit! Thanks for calling, Jamie. Gotta go!"
The blonde hung up, then leaned back in her seat, her stomach so upset that she was afraid she’d have to use a barf bag before the plane even took off.
Jamie didn’t get to Chapel Hill until almost eight o’clock that evening. She’d called Ryan from the road, and was profoundly relieved when her partner sounded completely lucid. Jamie told her she’d be arriving in just a few minutes, and when the cab pulled into the drive, Ryan dashed out the door that the friendly doorman held for her. She had her arms thrown around her partner and was hugging the stuffing out of her, while Jamie was still paying the cabbie. "My sister," Jamie said to the stunned man, who had been speaking to her in a genteel Southern accent. "She�
�s very affectionate."
Ryan yanked the bag from the back seat, and gave her partner the most inappropriately sisterly kiss since Sappho was a girl. The shocked driver actually leaned his head out the window while his car moved very slowly down the driveway, unable to reconcile the brazen woman locked in a passionate lesbian kiss, with the demure young lady with whom he had spent the last half hour conversing.
"You’re scaring the livestock," Jamie murmured, her lips curling into a grin as she relaxed into Ryan’s embrace. They were right in front of the entrance to the hotel, and the few people entering and exiting the building were openly gawking at them.
"Fuck ‘em," Ryan said, leaning in for another kiss.
"Honey, as soon as all of this turmoil calms down, could you go back to your former way of expressing yourself? I feel like I’m married to a merchant marine."
"Aye, aye," Ryan said, placing one last tender kiss upon Jamie’s lips, then leading her past the stunned doorman to the safety of their room.
After a long time spent just holding each other, they ventured from the room to get Jamie a snack. There was a coffee shop in the hotel, and the blonde decided to order breakfast, thinking that her stomach couldn’t handle anything heavier than a waffle. "How are you feeling?" she asked after their server left.
Ryan nodded. "Better. I uhm … we … spoke today, didn’t we?"
Raising an eyebrow, Jamie said, "Yes … we spoke right after you woke up."
"Huh. I thought Coach Hayes woke me up."
"She did … after I called her to tell her I was worried about you."
"Oh. I uhm … guess I was pretty out of it."
There was something about her partner’s demeanor that Jamie didn’t like, and she was determined to find out what was behind the troubled blue eyes. Reaching across the table, she grasped Ryan’s hand and said, "You’re not telling me something." Ryan’s eyes didn’t meet hers, and Jamie said, "Holding something back from me is the same as lying, Ryan, and I don’t want to be lied to." She tugged on Ryan’s hand, then brought it to her lips and kissed it. "Please don’t lie to me, honey."
Ryan slumped back into the booth and linked her fingers with her partner’s. "I uhm … had a tough night. The sleeping pill knocked me out, but I woke up again not 10 minutes after I fell asleep."
Jamie didn’t say anything, just gave Ryan’s hand a squeeze to encourage her to continue.
"I don’t remember doing it, but I must have gotten up and taken another sleeping pill."
"Why did you have two?" Jamie asked, her eyes wide.
"Lynette got me one for last night and one for tonight."
"God! No wonder you were so out of it! Do you know what you took?"
"No, she didn’t say."
Jamie was getting more agitated by the minute, and after shooting several irritated glances off to the counter area, she crooked her finger at someone who Ryan couldn’t see from her vantage point. Their server came over and Jamie jutted her chin out and glared at her. "I can’t believe we’re the first lesbians to ever visit this fine establishment, but even if we are, I think you and your pals have giggled and stared at us long enough." She reached into her pocket and pulled out a fifty-dollar bill, slamming it onto the table. "Here’s your tip," she said, venom dripping from her voice. "If you keep your beady eyes off of us, I’ll leave it there. But one more snarky look, and you get stiffed. Your choice." She turned back to Ryan, her face remarkably composed, "You were saying, sweetheart?"
The server stormed away without a word, and Ryan wasn’t able to manage one either. After staring at Jamie with wide eyes she finally said, "You’re really stressed, aren’t you?"
"Hell, yes, I’m stressed! Something is going on with you, and it’s like pulling teeth to find out what it is!"
"Okay, okay," Ryan said. Just then, Jamie’s waffle was delivered by a young man who she guessed was a bus boy. She was a little leery about eating it, but after inspecting it for foul play she took a bite, even though she wasn’t particularly hungry. She knew that her stomach misbehaved when it was empty for too long, and she was determined not to vomit – at least in public.
Ryan waited for a minute, letting her partner get some of her waffle down, then said, "I must have gotten up again some time during the night. I swear I don’t remember this, Jamie, but I got into the mini bar and drank a few of those little bottles of liquor."
Placing her fork quietly on the table, Jamie folded her hands together and stared at the table for a moment. Finally, she lifted her eyes and looked at her partner. "You could have killed yourself. Alcohol and sleeping pills can be a fatal combination."
"I know, I know," Ryan said. "I’m sorry, sweetheart … it wasn’t intentional. I just … I was about to go mad from the thoughts racing through my head. I just … I needed them to stop."
"I want to go home," Jamie said, looking at her partner with pain filled eyes. "I want to go home and get you to a psychiatrist. You’ve got to talk to someone, Ryan, and I think it should be someone who can prescribe medication."
Ryan’s eyes grew wide, and her head started to shake. "I don’t need that!"
"Yes, you do!" Jamie’s green eyes were blazing, and her voice had risen enough so that all of the other patrons looked her way.
Indicating the waffle, Ryan asked, "Are you going to finish that?"
"No."
"Let’s go to our room," she said, taking ten dollars out of her pocket and tossing it to the table.
Jamie nodded and got to her feet. After a moment’s indecision, she left the fifty, since their original server had assiduously avoided eye contact once she had called her on it. "Sixty fucking dollars for a God damned waffle," she grumbled, walking behind Ryan as they exited.
Ryan snaked an arm around her and said, "Your language has gotten a little colorful lately, too, babe. Should we go to Curseaholics Anonymous?"
"Best fucking idea I’ve heard all God damned day," the blonde said, a hint of a smile settling onto her face.
Once in their room, Jamie started to undress, then stopped and stared at her partner. "Are we allowed to sleep together?"
"Yeah," Ryan said. "Coach apologized for making the stupid rule, as a matter of fact. She rescinded it yesterday. She’s actually been really nice to me, babe. I didn’t even get in trouble for sleeping in."
Jamie said little as she got ready for bed. Her body believed it was barely dinnertime, but the dark circles under Ryan’s eyes indicated it was already past her bedtime. She wanted to make sure Ryan got some rest, but she was not ready to table their earlier discussion. Sitting up against the headboard, she patted the mattress, and Ryan gamely joined her. "Lie down and put your head in my lap," she said, "I need to rub some of the bad thoughts out of that troubled little mind."
"I’ll be all right," Ryan said. "It was just too much yesterday. It was hard to be away from home, and the reporters and photographers really got to me. I felt like a lab rat."
"It was hard to tell how bad it was," Jamie said. "The announcers said there was a big crowd of reporters, but they never showed them."
"It was bad," Ryan said. "Luckily, I was able to use the distractions to concentrate even harder." She shook her head and said, "That is such a gift."
"It is," the blonde said, "but I think it makes it worse for you when you come out of your fog. It must have been horrible to be in that little interview room and have all of those jerks firing questions at you."
"That was pretty bad," Ryan agreed. "But I was doing fine until that jerkoff had to tell me the guy died." She reached up and grasped Jamie’s hand and placed it on her cheek. "I kept having nightmares about him and me in the water. He was fighting for air, and I kept putting my hand on his head, pushing him under. He finally stopped struggling, and I felt an enormous amount of satisfaction when his lifeless body bobbed to the surface." She shivered violently and admitted, "It was like a never ending nightmare … I had to make it stop, Jamers."
"I understand that, sweetheart, but yo
u can’t do that with substances. You’ll be just as bad off as you are now, but with a drug habit!"
"It was just one night," Ryan said. "I’ve never done anything like that before, and I won’t do it again. I was just so fucking frightened," she said, her tears starting to flow.
Jamie scooted down and held her tightly. "I’m so sorry I talked you into coming here alone," she said, her own tears mixing with her lover’s. "I’m so, so sorry, baby."
"It’s not your fault," Ryan said. "You did what you thought would help me."
"But it’s turned out so badly."
"It’ll be okay," Ryan said. "We’re together now, and we’re staying together. I don’t care if we quit school at this point. All that matters is that I’m with you."
"What are we going to do for the near term? I checked when I was at the airport, and we can’t get a flight to Miami before our scheduled one. Holiday travel is really heavy."
Ryan sighed and said, "I think I should stay and play."
"What?" Jamie sat bold upright and stared at her. "Play?"
"Yeah. I think it would be best."
"But, Ryan …"
"I think your advice to come to North Carolina was good," she said. "Keeping things as normal as possible seems like the right move. I’m feeling so damned shaky, that I think I’d feel better if I just stayed with the team and played my heart out tomorrow night. That’s what I had decided to do – so I should do it."
"All right," Jamie said. "If you’re sure."
"I am. I don’t want to go back to California yet. I need to go on that vacation, baby. I know that will help me as much as seeing a shrink would. It’s all arranged, and I don’t want to cancel on Mia and Jordan. Following through with our plans really feels right."
Jamie gazed deeply into her eyes and said, "Here’s the deal. We can stay and follow through with our plans, but no more abusing alcohol and no more sleeping pills. If you’re too stressed to get through this without help I’m going to make sure you have the help you need, and it’s not going to be by self-medicating. If you need sleeping pills, you’re going to get them from a doctor who closely supervises you."
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