by Tara Wimble
Bella sighs, opening the door a little wider. “Fine.”
Sadie, forgetting herself for a moment, makes to sit on the bed but at the last minute corrects course and stands, leaning up against the wall. “I haven’t been very fair to you these last couple of months.”
“No, but I get it.” Bella sits on her bed. “I appreciated why you were the way you were to me. Someone had to have Jacque’s back and you stepped up.”
“But?” Sadie softly urges her on.
“But Jacque doesn’t need you to protect her from me.” Sadie looks down, suddenly embarrassed. “I’m not trying to hurt her. I don’t want to ever do that again.”
“I don’t know how you did it in the first place.” Sadie blurts out and there’s the anger that Bella had been waiting for, the confrontation. “How could you cheat on her? You two were so good for each other and you went and fucked it up. Blindsided her, blindsided everyone.”
Bella clenches her jaw because even if that isn’t technically true this is the story she subscribed to, the story that she had a large part in making. “I made a big mistake, one of the biggest mistakes of my life, and I damaged some of the most important relationships I’d ever had because of that mistake.”
She chokes up and it’s not like she can control it because this part isn’t a lie. It’s the honest truth and for better or for worse some of her relationships with these people, Jacque especially, but also the person standing right in front of her, will never been the same.
For her part Sadie let’s her collect herself and waits for her to speak again. “But how long do you plan on punishing me for that mistake? Because Jacque? She’s already forgiven me and we’re trying to move forward and try to work as friends and professionals. But we can’t do that if you keep taking us back to where we were. It just can’t happen.”
“Fuck.” Sadie mumbles, look down at her feet.
“We don’t have to go back to where we were, I’m not asking for that, but can we just try to be civil?” She asks calmly. “If not for me, I don’t care if you forgive me, but for Jacque. Because she cares. And if there’s one thing I know it’s that we both care about her a lot.”
“For Jacque.” Sadie nods slowly, walking across the room and surprising her with a hug. The first friendly contact since Bella can remember. She pulls back. “I can do it for her.”
“Thank you.” It’s really the most appropriate response. There’s nothing more to say, they can’t go back to where they were but there’s only been a few seconds to start on a new path.
“I’ll see you at practice?” Sadie asks as she backs out the door.
“Of course.” And Bella says it with a smile on her face because for the first time since she’s gotten to Chicago she feels a hesitant wave excitement to show up for practice.
But the high of making headway with Sadie comes to a resounding halt when she turns up to practice and there’s a huddle of people hugging Jackie. Her stomach drops as the news comes in. Chicago’s first trade sees Jackie heading to Seattle just as Bella was starting to count her allies and friends on more than one hand.
*
“So it looks like the Bella and Jackie show is getting cancelled.” Bella sulks on the couch next to an oblivious Lexi whose painting her toe nails. “Jackie just got traded to Seattle for Lindsey Taylor. So that’s over.”
“Too bad.” Lexi absently keeps painting her nails. She finishes the top coat and then looks over at Bella who’s still pouting. “Well, it was fun while it lasted.”
“I could do it by myself, I think.” Bella considers, ignoring Lexi’s concerned look. “Right? People like me?”
“I can neither confirm nor deny that but I’m sure someone does.” Lexi laughs at Bella’s affronted look and carefully caps her nail polish before Bella does something crazy like spill it. “Sure, go for it. It can’t be that bad.”
It’s awful. It’s a train wreck and according to Jacque there probably won’t ever be a sadder six minutes caught on tape, she adds a caveat that Sadie hasn’t made a sex tape yet so there’s still hope Bella can be upstaged.
Bella frowns at Jacque as she restarts the disastrous episode and watches it again. “What am I supposed to do? Jackie’s gone. Sadie refused. Nobody else wants to be on camera week in and out. It really is cancelled this time.”
Jacque pauses the video and watches as Bella panics in the middle of the living room. She hates to see Bella like this, in fact, she’s always had a soft spot for fixing all of Bella’s problems from the very start. Hence, how their lives turned out like this.
The rational part of her brain tells her to stay out of this. To keep an appropriate distance for once and to stop falling into the same old readily avoidable traps. But this show means a lot to Bella and it means a lot to the fans and it’s like she can’t even control her mouth when she says it.
“I could be your co-host.”
Bella stops her pacing and freezes. “You?”
“I mean, sure.” Jacque suddenly feels like she’s said the wrong thing. She’d kill for a rewind button right about now. “No? Bad idea?”
“It’s just, won’t that be a little bit awkward?” Bella spells out cautiously, trying to avoid all of the landmine topics of their fragile friendship.
“It doesn’t have to be.” Jacque reasons, unable to look Bella in the eye. Feeling the sting of rejection bubble up in her chest. “Whatever. it was a stupid suggestion. Forget I said it.”
“No!” Bella rushes out, coming over to kneel in front of Jacque. “Maybe it’ll be good for us. We always got along pretty well. Maybe it’ll help us become even better friends, you know?”
“I guess.” Jacque agrees, still hesitant despite being the one to suggest it. Second thoughts rearing their ugly head. “Plus it’d spare people the pain of either losing the show or, god forbid, having to watch you try and do it alone again.”
“I didn’t think it was that bad.” Bella mumbles bashfully.
Jacque laughs and stands, maneuvering so Bella is in the place where she was. Patting Bella on the head once she leaves her with one last thought. “You watch that video a couple of times and then tell me you still think it wasn’t a train wreck in slow motion. Super slow motion. With a small cute animal caught in the mid--.”
“Okay!” Bella holds up her hand before Jacque can get even more graphic. “I get it, geez. Let’s hope the Bella and Jacque show is better.”
“Jacque and Bella show.” Jacque banters back. “It’s gonna be awesome.”
Famous last words.
*
“One more?” Bella asks in the direction of the camera. She taps the pen acting as microphone on her hand and sucks on her bottom lip in indecision.
Jacque sways forward with her hands on her hips, trying to psych Bella out. “You’re setting me up here I know it-”
Bella laughs nervously. “Pfft- Whoooo is your actual favorite player on the Red Stars?”
Jacque doesn’t miss a beat. “Maribel Dominguez.”
“Fuck. Oh crap-” Bella covers her mouth. “Wait, let me re-ask that question. “Who’s your favorite player on the Red Stars?”
“Sadie Marsh.” Bella loses it. And Jacque grins.
“Third time's a charm. Who is your favorite player that wears cutoffs and is supporting you right now wearing cutoffs?”
“Boxxy looks really good in cutoffs.”
Bella throws the pen to the ground and the published video reaches a thousand views by the end of the day.
*
The Royal Court is assembled in the American apartment to watch the finished product and while Bella is relegated to the floor even though there are free seats, it’s a hit.
Over the tinny speakers she can hear Jacque asking her who her favorite striker is and there’s an embarrassing cat call that comes from Lexi over the ‘natural blonde’ comment that forces Jacque to pause the video while everyone calms down.
“Well, now the world knows.” Bella bemoans, shaking h
er head at Jacque.
“I think they might have guessed already.” Quenby speaks up, deadpan look betraying a slight smile on her face.
“Well now the world has the opportunity to take cheap shots about it.” Bella corrects.
An actual split second passes in which Bella feels like she has to pretend that what Sadie, Lexi and Quenby are suggesting is true. That Jacque knows the answer to that question. It’s only when she looks over her shoulder, intending to joke about it more, that she’s hit with the thought that Jacque -does- know.
London flashes into her mind like lightning. The bolt attracts her to Jacque, unable to turn away, and then they’re both remembering it. The thunder follows, the rumbling emotion that she felt that night storms through her and she doesn’t recognize the lack of unease fast enough before she’s diffusing her gaze and the sudden connection in the room. “Alright, we’ve got like another minute of this. Can you all contain yourselves to give us your honest opinions?”
Lexi leans back in her chair. “Proceed Peasant”
Her neck feels the heat of Jacque’s stare right the way through the rest of the video.
*
The team picks up a point when they travel to Boston for the first time and it feels like maybe the result could indicate the start of something new.
A 4-1 thrashing at Sky Blue brings those dreams back down to earth.
It’s been a long road trip and Bella can feel the unrest of the team starting to build and it makes her extremely nervous. She’d never in a thousand years think that this Red Stars club could reach the personal lows of her old Magic Jack club but, then again, she’d been blind to those woes until it was too late.
So she keeps an eye on it as they fly coach back to Chicago, keeps an eye on the chemistry and the morale and hope that their continue misfortune doesn’t start to breed content.
But she sees Leslie attempting to use her yoga obsession to climb over Rory and into the aisle and Jacque is trying to film the whole thing, even though Bella’s well aware that she’ll be showing Jacque how to make the Vine video later. Taylor’s watching this whole thing go down and taunting Leslie the whole way and the flight attendant looks like she wishes she had ejection seats.
It makes Bella feel ridiculous in the best way possible. There’s no way this team is anything like the one that sent her across the border in the first place. A little bad luck won’t suddenly turn them against each other. She looks at Sadie who’s fallen asleep with her head rested against the seat in front of her.
This locker room is solid, their luck will change soon enough, they just have to weather the storm.
*
Jacque has spent the last six years of her life being careful. That’s the nature of the game when you’re committing a fraud and hoping to get away with it on the scale that they did. It’s almost ironic that the minute they stopped pretending, they stopped being careful.
She gets a call from Kathryn just after eight. It’s insane considering the time difference but Seattle is traveling back from an away game and Kathryn hasn’t slept yet. Jacque almost doesn’t answer the call. She’s wearing her running gear and ready to head out before the rest of the apartment wakes up but she can never say no to Kathryn.
“Ayoooo.” She starts laughing before she can even finish her greeting. “Kathryn, you just caught me. What time are you even running on-”
“Hey, Jacque.” Kathryn sounds deflated. “Have you got a second? It’s kind of urgent.”
“Urgent?” Jacque puts her keys down. “What’s happened?”
“I’m not even-” It sounds like Kathryn is talking to someone in the background. “Okay. So, Jess, Jan and I just got back from Rochester and we got a bit buzzed catching up on actually having wifi-”
Jacque scratches the back of her neck. “That sounds interesting but-”
“You’ve been burned.”
Now Jacque is wondering how much Kathryn has had to drink.
“-give me the phone-”
“Jan, no-” There’s an audible struggle.
“Hello?”
That’s an accent she’s never heard before. “Hello?”
“Hey, It’s Jess Fishlock?” She sounds the most sober out of all of them. “Kathryn is swaying so I thought- what she was trying to say is we think you might need to contact your press agent on the national team or whoever you contact in Chicago-”
“Wait, what?” Jacque freezes. “What’s happened?”
Jess is blunt. “I think some fans may have just gotten access to your divorce records online.”
Jacque clutches the phone to her ear. “Are you serious?”
“Kathryn got a tagged in a few tweets or whatever it is and someone’s posted a link or a screen shot?”
“How the hell did they-?” Jacque covers her mouth, suddenly feeling sick.
Jess sounds sympathetic. “I’m sorry. I only know what Kathryn’s told me but I know you girls don’t need this right now.”
Jacque frowns deeply and presses her fingertips into her forehead. “God. Okay. Can you- can you maybe roundup what’s out there? If you’re not too tired. Jan or Kathryn will have my email. I’ll need to call someone about it.”
“I can do that.”
Jacque paces quickly. Unsure of where to turn next. “Was there anything else? Like how they found this? How do you even find records like that?” This isn’t meant to happen to people like her. This is the type of stuff you only see on TMZ or connected with the latest Disney disaster doing who knows what- not her.
She hears Jess typing. “The first one we found retweeted the Chicago Red Stars link to your webshow thing. The last one with you and Bella not Santacaterina.”
Jacque blanks on the fact that Jess has seen those videos but then files that away for a better moment. How would they jump from the show to hacking public records?
“They seem to have latched onto it and gone from there?” Jess is muffled again and the next voice on the phone is Kathryn again.
“The rings, Jacque.” Kathryn blurts out. “You guys stopped wearing your rings which is fine for like playing but half the comments on the YouTube video are people pointing out the fact that you’re not wearing them.”
Like an anvil. They stopped being careful. “Shit.”
Kathryn tries to work it out with her on the phone but there’s nothing more that can be done. “Can you just attach it all in an email to me? I need to look it over and figure something out.” She glances down the corridor. “And I need to tell Bella.”
The evidence she gets from Kathryn and Jess is overwhelming and unignorable. When she logs onto twitter herself she’s bombarded with her own personal flurry of tweets and direct messages from people that she hadn’t told. It borders on crazy. People have taken screenshots of the public records detailing the dissolution of their marriage in 2012 and the onslaught of people, fans, crying out is almost scary.
It’s not just fans voicing their surprise or their upset over this news, but a barrage of accusations. Hate mail almost. Directed both at her and at Bella. The word betrayal is thrown around and for a moment Jacque panics thinking that their ‘story’ has been leaked, about Bella ‘cheating’, but it’s in reference to them keeping this a secret.
That irks her. She keeps her hands off the keyboard of her laptop and just for a second lets herself get angry over that. How dare they. How dare they go digging and expose something that was none of their business. And to then feel betrayed because they chose not to drag this out in public? It’s irrational and stupid because this wasn’t real at all but the fans treat it as if it was and her reaction falls in line with theirs.
Kathryn was right. Their last video had been a hit as far as the audience for the Red Stars can call it that and they hadn’t exactly hidden their hands from the view. Both of them missing their rings on a day that didn’t have a game or call for them to not be wearing them? That was stupid. Careless. But they haven’t worn them for so long and even though they hadn�
��t come to discuss when they’d break the news, because eventually the time would have called for it, they’d assumed to have the power in that decision.
Someone’s trigger happy Googling had taken that away.
Jacque sorts through what she’s found and calls her divorce lawyer to see what he can do to lock down the information. She then calls Alyse because she doesn’t know who else to turn to and the wheel is in motion. They can’t deny anything, they can only attempt to regain control of it, in the few hours they have between practice today and their game on Saturday. It’s not a lot of time.
She stares aimlessly at her twitter feed until her eyes start to well up with tears. It shouldn’t make her upset. It’s not real. But the divorce for her was. The pain that she’s been through since the World Cup definitely was and the confusion that this leaking brings up reminds her of everything. And now she has to tell Bella. Now she has to figure out how they’re going to go from here and still function with this thrown in their faces. The PR for the National Team is going to flip because all this was going on during their homecoming tour and they’re going to have to make a statement incase this gets any bigger.
And knowing the buzz coming up to the 2015 Women’s World Cup, their faces are going to be on a morning news show sometime within the next week. God fucking damn it.
All hope for her morning run has disappeared and now she just wants to crawl back into bed and restart the morning. With a final refresh of her twitter feed Jacque is presented with a single bright spot that makes talking to Bella seem less daunting than before.
*
@Kathryn9: It’s amazing what people think they have the right to comment on. PRIVACY. #shutyourmouths
*
The rest of the apartment seems to emerge from slumber ten times slower when Jacque is actually waiting for them. Quenby and Lexi shuffle into the kitchen and mumble through making breakfast together, only stopping to ask Jacque is she wants more coffee, while Sadie walks out of her room wearing huge beats headphones and blasting some sort of sad song as she grabs some fruit to take back to her room.
Bella is the only one of them not to head straight for the kitchen. She’s rubbing her eyes and trips just as she walks into the living room where Jacque has made her base. It’s on tripping that she sees the dark storm clouds hanging over Jacque’s face.
