Which makes me wonder what the fuck happened last night that I woke up on a beer-soaked carpet without her, rather than naked in the bed we shared at our apartment?
I checked my phone as soon as I dislodged the girl’s head off my leg. She did nothing more than let out a soft snore and roll over.
No messages.
I called Vale and it rang four times before I got her voicemail. “Hey,” I said with a voice crusted in some type of hangover gunk. I gave a hard cough and tried again. “It’s me. Not sure where you are. Hopefully at home. I’m on my way there now, so I’ll see you soon.”
I hung up, my stomach threatening to rebel on me, and stumbled down the hallway to wake up Oliver. I found him naked in bed with a girl I vaguely recognized from last night. It took me a good five minutes to rouse him so he could drive me back to our apartment, where I assumed Vale was waiting to drive me to the airport in Halifax.
Unfortunately, when I got there, my throbbing headache seemed to magnify even more when I realized she wasn’t. I started to get a sick feeling in my stomach—non–booze related—that something bad had happened. Bits and pieces were returning to me, and I did remember that she hadn’t been feeling well and wanted to leave the party. Period cramps, I think. I also distinctly remember me telling her I didn’t want to leave because this was my last night before flying out to Pennsylvania, and I wasn’t about to leave just because it was “that time of the month.”
I had been called up to the Titan minor league team and this was what I had been waiting for. My foot was back in the door and it was a moment of huge celebration. I was leaving, and if I was lucky enough to get solidified within the Titan organization, I probably wasn’t ever coming back here. In just a year, I had gained massive improvements in my conditioning, my skills, and my confidence. I was ready for the big leagues and they wanted me, so it was a night to party, celebrate, and say goodbye. I was going to be sad to leave this community where I’ve lived for the past four years, so I wanted to make it count.
Of course, I would be crushed to leave Vale, but in my mind, that was just temporary. I had to work on getting her to come with me. Despite her libertine ways, she was at heart a small-town girl deeply meshed within her community and even closer to her dad. So, we’d be separated for a while until I could get her to make that leap with me, but still…I’d be seeing her. Surely she’d come to visit me and we’d make our long-distance relationship work. But these guys…my bros that I’d played junior hockey with for so many years? This was my last night with them. Surely she understood why I didn’t want to leave.
Surely she wasn’t pissed at me for that?
Oliver made a quick call to Avery, his twin sister and Vale’s best friend. The call was short, and even though Oliver tried to find out where they went last night, the most he got out of her was that Vale wasn’t feeling well and was staying at her dad’s house. I’m sort of thinking that her “not feeling well” translates into her being pissed at me.
And as I look at the little gray house, which holds two bedrooms along the front and a small hallway that leads to a cozy living room and even cozier kitchen, my heads feels like it’s about to split open. I know that’s not from the hangover anymore, but has everything to do with the fact that something is seriously wrong for Vale to have stayed the night here without any word to me about it. I must have done something awful last night, and I’m practically choking on the dread rising within me.
My plane to Pittsburgh leaves in a little less than seven hours, but I have a four-and-a-half-hour drive to Halifax. I’m packed up and ready to go—made sure of that yesterday before the party—but I have to make things right with Vale, and that doesn’t leave me much time. My bags are in the car and Oliver is prepared to take me to Halifax, but I’m hoping a very sincere apology to my girl will put things right again and she’ll be the one seeing me off. Putting on my best hangdog look, I slowly walk up the immaculate sidewalk that Vale faithfully plants with flowers every summer for her dad. Apparently it was something her mom used to do before she died, and it was a tradition she took seriously.
Dave’s not home, and I know this because her father is the athletic trainer for the Oilers. At this time of day, he’s at the arena working on players before conditioning training, which I’m sure is filled with dudes that are as hungover as me. I noticed none of the people lying on Oliver’s floor this morning were my former teammates.
I knock on the door, hear the padding of footsteps, and when it opens, I’m staring at Avery. She’s Oliver’s fraternal twin sister and they look a lot alike, with auburn hair and dark brown eyes. You would think that with me being Oliver’s friend and her being Vale’s friend we in turn would be friends.