Chapter 38

THIRTY-EIGHT

Anders

I’m on a plane, flying to St. Louis, when my phone buzzes and I see a text from Claudia pop up. I quickly open the app so I can read it.

CLAUDIA: Hey, I have bad news. It looks like we’re going to have to cancel Thanksgiving. I have to fly to L.A. first thing Friday morning—we’re starting the project with Cathedral Air early. And I have to spend part of Thursday prepping for the meeting, not to mention packing. We’d barely have any time together. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know this would happen.

Disappointment rips through me.

I can’t understand her having to work on a holiday weekend like this.

ANDERS: They want you to work over the holiday?

CLAUDIA: The client says it’s the perfect time to see their current software set-up in action since it’s one of the busiest air travel weekends of the year. It will help me understand the changes and updates they’re going to need, since I’m the one who’ll be doing the coding. It’s a whole thing.

ANDERS: Damn, baby, I don’t know what to say. Your job comes first, obviously. I’m just disappointed. I miss you.

CLAUDIA: I know. I’m really sorry. This just came up today and I figured I should tell you right away, so you can change your flight or whatever.

ANDERS: All right. I’ll take care of it. It was in first class, so I can make changes. Also, we still need to firm up Christmas plans since we didn’t book your flight and they’re filling up.

CLAUDIA: I’m going into a meeting that will probably last all afternoon. Can we talk about it tonight?

ANDERS: Sure. Talk later, sweetheart. XOXO

No response.

She’s already gone.

I sigh and lean back in the seat.

This sucks.

We knew her job would throw some obstacles our way, but this was very unexpected. Hockey takes me away for so much of the year, I hate that we’re losing out on time together, especially over a holiday. And now I have no plans.

Dammit.

“You look like someone kicked your puppy,” Jordan says to me.

“Claudia had a work thing come up,” I say, “so we had to cancel our plans for Thanksgiving.”

“Wife her up,” someone a few rows back calls out. “Then she won’t have to work.”

These younger guys on the team really don’t get what it’s like to be in a healthy relationship.

“I don’t think Claudia wants to be a stay-at-home wife or mom,” I respond. “She has a career, numb nuts!”

“Well, then be prepared for a lot of disappointment like this,” Jordan says. “If I was to ever get married—and you know how I feel about that—I think I’d want her to stay home. It’s just easier than trying to manage two professional schedules.”

“I think it depends on the woman,” Coach Petrov interjects. “If she has a career she loves, you can’t just ask her to quit. She’ll eventually resent you for it. Look at Jude and Chloe—you think she’s going to stop being a doctor?”

“Definitely not!” Jude calls out, laughing.

Coach nods. “These are the types of things you have to talk about if you’re serious about her.”

Damn, Coach typically doesn’t give relationship advice so he must think I need it.

“We’ve been moving so fast, we haven’t had time to talk about everything,” I admit. “That’s why we need to spend more time together.”

“You can talk about important things over the phone, can’t you?” Coach asks.

“Yeah, but between her job and my travel schedule and games, sometimes we’re both too tired for the serious stuff.”

“You have to make time for the important things. Trust me. Especially when you’re moving fast. Tessa and I went through something similar when we met since I was living in Vegas, and she was in Chicago. I moved her to Vegas, and that solved a lot of our problems. Not all of them, but it made a huge difference. Have you thought about that?”

“Oh, that’s the plan,” I say. “I was going to talk to her about all of that over Thanksgiving, but now I’m not going to see her until Christmas.” I probably sound a little put out, but I don’t give a shit.

“The only advice I’d give you is don’t make her feel bad about her job,” Zakk Cloutier adds. “ Your job takes up a lot of time, but you love it, so don’t begrudge her the same satisfaction in her own work.”

That makes sense.

“Unless she doesn’t make any money,” Jordan says. “I mean, if she’s making thirty K a year, what’s the point?”

Christ, I never should have brought this up in front of my teammates.

“Well, she makes quite a bit more than that, but not as much as me,” I say thoughtfully.

“She loves what she does,” Johan says, speaking up for the first time. “You can’t ask her to leave.”

“No. I can’t.”

So, I need to tamp down my irritation and go with the flow.

Christmas isn’t that far away, and if I can fly her to meet me somewhere one weekend, it’ll tide us over. Maybe I can meet her in L.A. at some point, if she has to go back.

I feel better by the time we land and send her a quick text telling her I’m thinking about her. She doesn’t respond or acknowledge the text, but I figure she’s working so I put it out of my mind.

It’s not until the next morning that I realize I never heard back from her.

I’m not typically the kind of guy who needs constant reassurance in a relationship, but something is off. I can’t put my finger on it, but Claudia hasn’t been herself. She didn’t feel well last week, and now she’s working even more hours than usual and starting to travel. I don’t know why this bothers me, but it does.

We’ve been so close, so in tune to each other, I know something isn’t right.

To test out my theory, I don’t text her all day.

And she still hasn’t reached out to me by the time I’m ready for bed.

Something is definitely off, but I don’t know what to do about it because she might just be crazy busy.

Instead of being a big baby, I decide to bite the bullet and reach out.

ANDERS: Just wanted to say good night. I missed talking to you today. Hope you weren’t too busy at work.

And to my disappointment, the message goes unread.