Chapter 28

So for some reason I can't add songs onto my playlist, which bums me out. So if anyone cares, the song for this chapter is Falling In by Lifehouse. You can listen to it here.....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO4WosPJbi0










The sound of my cell phone ringing jolted me out of sleep. Without much movement, I felt around the bedside table for it. I heard Patrick’s groggy groaning as he rolled over and pulled the blankets up over his head. I glanced at the clock and saw that it was only 9 at night. Patrick and I hadn’t intended on going to bed early, but we’d been tired and wanted to watch TV in bed. Obviously we had fallen asleep.

“Hello?” I croaked into the receiver.

“Aunt Gabrielle?” I heard my niece’s voice ask.

“Kaylen, is something wrong?” I asked, sitting straight up in bed. Patrick shifted and looked up at me with concern.

“I…..I don’t know…..” Kaylen’s voice trailed off.

“Are you okay?” I checked.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Are your parents okay? Your grandparents, aunt? Quinn?” I added, my voice cracking on Quinn’s name.

“Yeah, I think so. It’s just…..something’s going on. Everyone’s here at my house,” she told me.

“I don’t understand,” I replied. Kaylen took a deep breath that I could hear over the phone.

“Grandma, grandpa, and Aunt Bailey all came over tonight. I was supposed to be in my room doing homework, but they never come over unannounced so I was curious. I heard part of the conversation, and I know something’s going on that’s not good. They were arguing with each other.”

“What were they arguing about?” I still wasn’t sure what was going on or why Kaylen was calling me.

“You,” she said.

My breath caught in my throat at the one word response. Why was my family arguing about me now? It had been months since Kaylen had showed up at my door, and I hadn’t done anything to try to get back in contact with them. It didn’t make any sense. If they wanted to talk to me, they would have done it then.

“What about me?” I asked.

“I don’t know. They were arguing over whether they should tell you something. I didn’t hear what it was. It seemed bad though. All I know is that they were considering going out to see you to tell you whatever it was. That’s how I know something has to be going on. I heard them decide not to though,” Kaylen explained.

I wasn’t sure what to do with this information. Something so significant had happened that the family who shunned me and then killed me was considering coming out to see me to tell me about it. I had no idea what that possibly could be. All I knew was they’d decided not to include me on the information, and even though it shouldn’t have, it hurt.

“Okay. I don’t think you have to worry. If it was really important they’d tell me,” I lied to Kaylen. I didn’t know if they would, but I didn’t want Kaylen upset. “Thanks for telling me though.” We hung up a minute later and I fell back onto my pillows.

“What’s going on?” Patrick asked, cuddling up next to me.

“I have no idea,” I told him truthfully.

I heard his breathing pattern change a little while later and I knew he was asleep. I, however, was not going to fall asleep anytime soon. Confusion mixed with pain and anger as I thought about what Kaylen had told me. I knew she meant well by calling to tell me something was going on, but I wished she hadn’t. Sometimes ignorance really was bliss. I forced my eyes closed and tried to clear my head so I could get to sleep. Eventually I did.










Patrick stood off to the side and smiled to himself as he watched Gabrielle smooth out the summery dress she’d put on. She never wore dresses and it was a sight he could get used to. She turned around and smiled when she caught him staring at her, a slight blush forming on her cheeks.

“What?” she asked.

“You just look beautiful, that’s all,” he told her. The blush got a little darker as she moved over to him, stood on her tip toes and kissed him lightly.

“You’re looking good yourself,” she complimented him. He caught her chin before she could turn away and placed a longer kiss on her lips.

“Are you ready to go?” he asked when they pulled apart. She nodded and followed him out to his car.

Ever since they’d lost out in playoffs, Patrick had been spending nearly every second he could with Gabby. He was heading back home in a couple of days and then he didn’t quite know when he’d see her next. He wasn’t going to waste any time.

He opened the car door for her and then got in himself. He followed Gabrielle’s directions to her school’s principal’s house. Every year after the school year was over, Isaiah had a barbecue at his house for the school staff to celebrate another year.

Gabby had told him he didn’t have to come, but he wanted to go. He knew people were probably going to bring up the playoffs all day, but he wanted to support his girl. He could suck it up for a couple of hours for her. At least he’d know both Paige and her boyfriend Harding were going to be there.

They arrived and Gabby immediately began introducing him to her co-workers. Much to his surprise and delight, they didn’t seem all that interested in talking hockey with him. You can ask any hockey player and they’ll tell you the last thing they want to do in the offseason is discuss hockey. He got a couple of questions about what it was like from a few of the men, but he knew that was inevitable since it was most kids’ dream to play a pro sport.

He happily made the rounds with Gabby, but mostly stood back and watched her. He knew that she didn’t think she had many friends in the world because she felt like she’d always closed herself off, but being here, he saw that wasn’t the case. If he could have guessed, he would think that everyone here loved her. Every person at the party made sure to say hi to her and ask how things were going. She was definitely well liked.

After a while he excused himself to go grab a drink from a cooler on the deck. He paused before heading back just to watch Gabrielle. It put a smile on his face to see her smiling. He felt a tug in his gut that confirmed what he felt. She was something special.

“I hope we’re not too boring for you,” he heard a deep voice say to him. He turned to see Isaiah walking up and grabbing a beer out of the cooler he was standing next to.

“No, not at all. Everyone’s been very nice,” Patrick assured him.

“Good. If anyone steps out of line, just let me know and I’ll have them fired,” Isaiah joked. Patrick laughed.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Isaiah followed Patrick’s gaze out to Gabby and he let out a little laugh of his own.

“She is something special,” Isaiah told him.

“I completely agree.”

“A few years ago our school’s psychologist was retiring and we were interviewing for a new one. Usually I would have only considered more experienced candidates, but when Gabrielle’s resume came in, I thought ‘what the hell’ and set up an interview. The interview time came and passed with no sign of her. I tossed her resume into the ‘no’ pile and wrote her off,” Isaiah told him.

“So what changed?” Patrick asked, figuring this was as close as he was going to get to a proud parent gushing about their child.

“I left my office half an hour after he scheduled time to do a routine walkthrough of the school. I turned a corner and found a woman I’d never seen before talking with a female student who looked to have been crying. The student had been having trouble in school lately, so I started to approach, worried about the situation. Only before I got there the student hugged the woman before smiling and walking down the hall.

Not sure what was going on I asked the woman what had happened. She just told me that she’d seen the girl crying in the hallway and had stopped to find out what was wrong. She refused to tell me what they’d talked about, but seemed confident that the problem was resolved. When I asked her what she was doing in the school she told me her name was Gabrielle Tunney, and she’d been here for an interview she was now very late for and probably wasn’t going to get because of that. She didn’t sound the least bit apologetic.”

“That sounds just like Gabby,” Patrick interjected with a laugh. Isaiah nodded.

“I wanted to hire someone who really cared about the students. The fact that Gabrielle was willing to cost herself a job to help a student she’d never even seen before showed me what kind of person she was. I told her who I was, brought her back to my office, and did the formal interview, but I’d already decided she was hired,” Isaiah finished.

“What happened to the student?” Patrick asked curiously.

“I never found out what the problem was, but her grades went up, and she graduated top ten in her class.”

Patrick wasn’t at all surprised. He and Isaiah talked for a bit longer, but he kept his eye on Gabrielle. She turned towards the house and spotted him looking at her. She smiled and sent a little wave over to him that he returned. After hearing Isaiah’s story it became clear to Patrick what he’d been feeling all along. He was ready to answer Olivia’s question now, because he knew without a doubt. He was in love with Gabby.