Broken bones. Broken heart. Yeah. It was time to get everything set so I could heal.
“I’m just glad you’re okay. Is your brain…you know…normal?” Avery asked, sitting next to my bed a few hours later.
“Yeah. A concussion, but the swelling is already down. Plus, my cast is pink. Who doesn’t like that?”
She smiled. “I’m so sorry.”
“Hey.” I took her hand. “This was not your fault, and I would do it all again.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t think the weather was going to get that bad, I swear. Even when she called to tell us to close the gym, you know? She keeps apologizing for not being there.”
“This isn’t her fault, either. She had a manager on duty, and she didn’t know you were going there until you’d already been left.”
“Yeah. I just really wanted to show you what I found, and instead I showed you the inside of a locker.” She looked away.
“Well, in your defense, I didn’t actually see the inside of the locker. I woke up here.” I lifted my good arm and smiled.
She laughed. Mission accomplished.
“Okay, tell me what you found out.”
“Really?” She grimaced. “Right now? While you’re here?”
“I can’t think of a better time, or a more needed distraction. Plus, this room has been a revolving door of visitors. You staying with me a little longer gives me a reason to avoid the other stalkers.”
“Okay.” Her eyes lit up as her techno-speak kicked in. I caught a word here and there, but for the most part she lost me.
“Bottom line?”
“Oh, right. Okay, so bottom line is that your cyber bully is actually pretty stupid. She started one of the original accounts from her work email at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.”
“Wait. She?” It wasn’t Harrison?
“She is most definitely a she.” Avery pulled a piece of paper from her back pocket. “Michelle Proctor.”
Oh my God. Of course. His whole damn family worked for the CU system. “She works in the registrar’s office,” I whispered as everything fell into place.
“Yeah! How did you know?” She handed me the paper.
“Because I hurt her very badly without even knowing it.” The paper felt soft in my hands. Frail.
“Hurting someone doesn’t excuse what she’s been doing to you. Nothing does. You need to call the University and tell them. You need to stop her.”
“Maybe I deserve it.”
Avery’s eyes narrowed. “Okay, now that’s bullshit. You have to do something, Sam.”
I shook my head. “You don’t know what you’re asking me to do. I’d have to go back to Colorado—”
“Which you’ve wanted to do anyway,” she interrupted.
“Right, but not like this. I’d have to face a disciplinary hearing, and everyone would know the thing I’m most ashamed of. Could you imagine that? Walking into your school and telling them the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever done?”
“You mean like handing the hottest football player in school a pencil that asked him to homecoming?” She arched an eyebrow.
“This is different. This is putting my most private shame on a public stage.”
“Which has got to suck. I’m not saying it doesn’t. But what about the others?”
My chest tightened. “What others?”
“There’s at least five other email addresses that she’s sent similar emails to. I bet she’s done the same thing to their transcripts, too. And I also bet that they don’t have the slightest clue she’s the one doing it. If you won’t stand up to this girl for yourself, then stand up for them.”
Other girls? I wasn’t the first. “When was the last email sent?”
“She started attacking another girl about two months ago.”
I wasn’t the last, either.
“I’m just saying that I know this girl, and she’s amazing. A great tutor, and an even better friend. She ran into a tornado to save me. A tornado! If she could do that, she could do this. Maybe you should ask her.” Her eyes bored into me in an open challenge.
Five other girls were going through the same thing I was. Five girls who couldn’t get into colleges, or move on with their lives. Five girls who had their futures stolen all because they made the same stupid mistake and slept with the wrong man.
I had to go back to Colorado.
“Do you mind if I say hello?” Grace asked from the doorway.
“W-what are you doing here?” I asked, then shook my head. “I’m sorry, that was incredibly rude. I blame the pain meds.”
She gave me a soft smile and then claimed the chair next to my bed. “We were driving to Texas for testing, and Gray asked if I would swing by and check on you.”
“You went hundreds of miles out of your way?”
“He’s my best friend, no matter what’s happened, and the woman he loves won’t take his phone calls. So yeah, that’s worth a few hours to me. And I wanted a moment with you that wasn’t an awkward phone call.”
“So awkward drop-in visits are better?”
“Jury’s still out,” she said with a laugh. “So, you’re feeling better?”
“It’s been a few days, and I’m out of ICU. No brain swelling, so they think I might be able to go home tomorrow.”
The phone in my room rang, and I ignored it. “Did you want me to get that?” Grace asked.
“No.”
“Oh, okay.” We sat in silence until it stopped ringing.
“So Texas?” I asked, trying to move conversation along.
She nodded. “Yeah, they need to poke me like a lab rat.”
“You are the miracle,” I said with a smile. Maybe it was a little forced.
“Not really.” Her smile fell. “The treatment made it possible for me to wake up, that’s true…but…”
“But you were always aware,” I finished.
Her eyes snapped to mine. “Yes. How did you know?”
“You told Morgan that One Tree Hill had been played out and the last season ruined it.”
She blinked at me.
“The last season of that show came out while you were in your coma. Mia had them play it for you after she read about that guy who’d woken up after a twenty-year coma or something, and he’d been forced to watch Barney.”
“Oh. No cartoons, those were awful.”
“How long were you aware for?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. It was gradual, and time started to jump a lot. I think about two years in, maybe? I was trapped in my own body. When Gray came, begging me to wake up, it was the worst. I loved his visits and I dreaded them because I couldn’t talk to him, or help him with what he was going through.”
“Losing you was hell for him.”
A nurse knocked on the door. “Ms. Fitzgerald? There’s a Grayson Masters on the phone for you.”
I swallowed and avoided Grace’s eyes. Awkward. “Could you tell him that I’m sleeping?”
“Sure thing,” she said, and left.
“He’s going out of his mind. Maybe you could call him?”
I shook my head. “No. I need a clean break. He’s better off with you, no matter what he’s thinking right now. You’re his miracle. His Grace. If I see him, talk to him…I just can’t.”
“You love him.”
“Deeply,” I answered, and then studied my blanket. “This has got to be the most awkward conversation ever.”
She laughed. “No. Try having constant one-sided conversations for years, and then we can chat awkwardness.”
“True. Wait. If you were aware all that time, you met me. You knew about us, and you still kissed him.” I took my hand back.
She swallowed and looked away for a moment. “Yes. People do things they’re not proud of when they’re scared. I woke up and everything was different. The whole world had moved on while I’d stayed stagnant. Gray was the one stable thing I’d always had. I should never have kissed him, or even come to Al
abama. It wasn’t fair to you, or him, and I am truly sorry. I hope you can forgive me.” Her voice faded to a whisper.
“Grace, he belongs with you. I’m doing everything I can to walk away from him for his own good, and for yours. Please don’t make it harder for me.”
“Well, I’m trying to do the same. Especially now. He’s changed so much. He’s harder, more distant, not as quick to laugh. He didn’t used to be like that. Oh, and he used to love raspberries! I put them on his cheesecake at dinner with my folks after the beach, and he didn’t even eat them.”
“The seeds get stuck in his teeth,” I explained.
She nodded. “Right. What I’m saying is that I’m the same Grace, for the most part, but he’s not the same Gray. And as much as I love him, as my best friend, I don’t think we’ll ever be more. I want him to be happy, and that goes for you, too.”
“There’s too much history between you. You have nicknames for each other, and you know him on a level I never can.” And that hurt more than anything, knowing there were pieces of Grayson I’d never have when he owned every inch of me.
“He calls you ‘squall,’ you just don’t know it,” she said.
“What?”
“Squall. Like a sudden storm that comes out of nowhere, shakes up the ocean, overturns everything. You did that to him. You were the only thing to pull him out of himself and get him to live, and I watched that transformation from the first time he told me about you a couple weeks after you met.”
He was a storm in my life, too.
“I have to go back to Colorado. There are things I have to do there…on my own. The odds are stacked too high against us. He made up his mind and chose North Carolina.”
“Then make him change it.” The ferocity in her voice brought my eyes to hers.
“Would you? Force him to choose between love and his family? Or make him wait while I get the rest of my life sorted out? He waited five years for you to wake up. I can’t ask him for that.”
“I would choose love.”
How simple she made it seem, instead of the crazy Jenga tower we’d built ourselves, pulling the blocks out one by one until we crumbled.
“Yeah, well, I choose Grayson’s happiness, and the two don’t go hand-in-hand at the moment.”
There was no answer.
Chapter Thirty
Grayson
“Where the hell is she?”
Morgan flinched in her doorway. “I told you. Yesterday the movers arrived and took her stuff. I don’t know where.”
I was ready to rip my fucking hair out. “No forwarding address? Nothing?”
Morgan shook her head. “No. Nothing. I’m so sorry, Grayson.”
“Yeah. Me, too.” I made it back to my truck in a daze and climbed behind the wheel. A week. I’d been gone a week, and in that time she’d checked out of the hospital, cancelled her cell phone, and moved out of her apartment.
How the hell was I supposed to find her when she didn’t want me to?
My phone rang, and I hit the button on the wheel to answer it. “Hey, Mom.”
“Grayson.”
“Oh, hey, Dad. Sorry, I saw the number and assumed Mom.”
“No, she’s out shopping. I wanted to call and tell you that she told me about your long-distance flight.”
“Oh, yeah? It was crap timing, but I did really well.” Hint being—get off my ass.
“It was foolish.”
“I had orders.” Like he was ever going to understand. We could go rounds and rounds, and we’d still end up at the same place.
“I waited for you to see the light, son. To be safe.”
“Yeah, well I’m a chronic disappointment there, Dad.”
“I need you to know that I love you. That everything I’ve done is out of a place of love, and needing to protect you.”
“Dad, I’m twenty-three years old. I don’t need you to protect me.”
“Yeah. You do. God, I love you, Gray.”
“I love you, too, Dad.”
He hung up, and I blinked. Was he apologizing for being such a dick while I was home? Probably not. It wasn’t in his nature, and he wasn’t exactly approving.
Thirty-seconds and two blocks later, my phone rang again.
“Lieutenant Masters?”
“Major Davidson?” Please don’t send me anywhere else. I have to see Sam.
“Son, I’m going to need you to come in and see me.”
My chest clenched. “Okay, sir. When do you need me?”
“Right now. I know you just landed a couple of hours ago, but I need you to come to my office.”
“Yes, sir. I can be there in ten minutes.” There was an audible click. Good thing I hadn’t changed out of uniform.
Had I fucked up something on the flight?
I went through every detail of the flight as I pulled onto post, trying to find where I could have made an error. I’d had Mr. Stewmon with me, who would have blasted me if I had, that was for sure.
I parked next to Jagger’s Defender and headed inside. At least none of us had moved a thousand-pound polar bear in the last week. I couldn’t shake the sense of foreboding, like what waited was a hell of a lot worse.
Jagger sat in the hallway with Mr. Stewmon on his left.
“Any clue what this is about?” Jagger asked.
“Not unless I made a mistake during the flight?” I looked to Mr. Stewmon, who shook his head.
“Lieutenant Masters,” Major Davidson called from his office.
“Sir,” I said, stepping inside. It had been a year since I’d been here last, and he still hadn’t decorated.
“Have a seat.”
I did so, but didn’t lean back. He tapped his fingers on his desk, thumbing through a file. My medical records. Shit.
“I received a call today that made some very serious allegations about your health history, Lieutenant Masters. Allegations that, if true, would end your place in the flight school program.”
My fucking father. “Sir?”
“Are you dyslexic?”
Funny thing about ripping off a Band-Aid—it still hurts like hell. “Not that I’m aware of, sir.”
He sighed. “That’s what he said you’d say.”
“My father.” The words tasted sour.
“Your father.” He nodded. “Would you care to explain?”
“I can’t explain what there’s no factual base for, sir. I have not now, nor ever been diagnosed as a dyslexic. I was slow to learn to read in school, yes, but by high school graduated in the top two percent of my class, as well as at the Citadel. Neither location found a reason to believe I would be dyslexic.”
“Why would your father say this?”
“Because he thinks I’ll kill someone while flying.” Be brutally honest, it’s the only way they know you’re not lying. “The night of my eighteenth birthday party, I was involved in a car accident where the other party was drunk. I didn’t react fast enough. My girlfriend spent five years comatose. My father believes it was my fault. He’s never accepted my decision to become a pilot.”
Major Davidson nodded slowly. “Can you prove that you’re not dyslexic?”
“Sir, can you prove that I am? I take tests slowly, yes. I read slowly, yes. But take a look at the Order of Merit list for Primary, where I finished in the number one position, and the Apache course, and I can guarantee I’m in the top five percent. Five percent because I’m in the class with the walking 5&9 book of Jagger Bateman.”
“True.”
“Sir, there is no record of any concern of dyslexia. Not since I began my education, or before. These accusations are unfounded.”
He studied me, and I stared back, unflinching.
“Send in Mr. Stewmon as well as Lieutenant Bateman, and wait in the hallway.”
“Yes, sir.” I gripped my cover so hard I thought I might rip it, and walked into the hallway. “He’d like to see you both.”
“Everything okay?” Jagger asked me.
�
�Family is a bitch.”
He clapped me on the shoulder and looked me straight in the eyes. “Until you find your own, right?”
“Right.”
He nodded and then went into the office, shutting the door behind him. I’d take a polar bear over this shit any day. At least I’d done it, moved the fucking bear.
I tapped my foot while waiting, watching the minute hand pass fourteen times until the door opened. “Come on in,” Mr. Stewmon said, holding the door for me.
I took the empty seat while he stood behind us. Major Davidson was on the phone in the corner with his back to us. More than likely ending my flight school career because my father couldn’t trust me. Ever.
“Did you move Sgt. Ted E. Bear?” Jagger whispered.
“Not the fucking time.”
“Oh, come on. Like you weren’t thinking it.”
“Since the moment I walked in.”
Major Davidson hung up the phone and turned. “There’s no record of the word ‘dyslexia’ appearing in your records from the Citadel or high school.”
“Sir, I will say it again. I have never, in my life, been tested for, or diagnosed with dyslexia. I think my scores and grades speak for themselves.”
“I concur,” Mr. Stewmon agreed. “Lieutenant Masters shows exemplary knowledge base, as well as reflexes that make him a superior pilot. He has excellent spatial reasoning, communication, and judgment. I can count on one hand the number of times he’s answered a question wrong, and I’ll be the first to say that I ask a shitload of questions. Bateman is wrong more often than Masters.”
My eyebrows shot up. Jagger shrugged in my peripheral vision.
Major Davidson looked between all three of us, settling on me. “Are you aware that dyslexia automatically disqualifies you from this program?”
“Yes, sir. As does poor vision, epilepsy, and stupidity, though they’re still developing a test for that last one.”
Now Jagger raised his eyebrows.
“Your attitude is far better suited to Lieutenant Bateman.”
“He’s rubbing off on me.”
“Do you have dyslexia?”
Blunt honesty. “My doctor says no, and he’s a hell of a lot better educated for making such a statement.”
“If Lieutenant Masters were to have dyslexia, I’m comfortable saying that it has had zero impact on his ability to fly, or to not only maintain, but dominate academics as well as fulfill his duties as class leader,” Mr. Stewmon finished.
Beyond What is Given Page 31
