Bluebirds

Kelley nodded at Hope, grabbed her purse keys, slipped on some flip flops and began to leave. Tobin quickly stood, hopped off the bed and started towards Kelley. Twisting her body, she threw a quick wave at Hope, said, “See ya later” and they were gone.

Picking her book back up to restart the page she’d been reading, Hope squirmed in her bed. She read through half of the page before she got too frustrated with her distractedness and closed it. Slinging her feet off the bed, she shuffled over to one of her bags and pulled out her phone. Sighing, she opened a new message and began typing. 15 minutes later, there was a slow tap at her door and Hope was greeted by her friend. “Can we get some coffee Car?”

They ended up at a small café a block away from their hotel. Carli, of course, signed everything that was thrown at her, not stopping until Hope literally dragged her to a small table in the corner. When they reached their table, Hope sat and waited, slumped with a loud huff. Carli’s eyebrows shot up and her to slowly put her phone down. “Alright Hope, spill.”

She sat there in silence for a moment gazing out of the window, torn between needing to talk about it and really really not wanting to. “I don’t even know why it’s bothering me.” Hope complained, “It’s not like it’s my business. It’s not like we were ever a thing.” She picked at the muffin sitting on a plate between them, balling it up in little pieces and flicking it back onto the plate.

Carli tapped at her fingers and gently pushed them away, scolding, “Alright, hey, we’re sharing that. Come on, don’t play with your- our food. Anyways, we’re talking about...”
“Kelley,” Hope finished. She looked down at her hands and shook her head. “I don’t get it Car. I just don’t get it.”

“Okay what exactly is it Hope?” Carli said, moving the muffin away from the keeper’s restless hands. “You still haven’t told me what’s wrong here and I can’t say that I’m not confused.”

Exasperated, Hope sighed before she answered. “I don’t get why it bothers me that she isn’t smiling as much, why it even catches my attention. I don’t get why I can’t stop thinking about it either, ya know? After I heard about her and Ann, it’s all I can think about.”

“And who is Ann? Kelley’s girlfriend?” Carli asked carefully, trying to watch Hope’s face for any hints. 

“Ex-girlfriend.” Hope corrected quickly. “I mean, I’m not saying that I have a chance here, or anything of that nature. I’m just saying it’s interesting. I’m curious if things were different, you know? Like what if we had, well, nevermind…and before you ask Carli, NO I don’t still have feelings for her. What happened in London was such a long time ago an-“

“Woah, pause. What happened in London?” Carli interrupted and grabbed Hope’s sporadic hands, looking at her for an explanation.

Hope pulled her hands back and covered her face. “Shit, shit, shit, shit! I didn’t tell you,” she whispered.

“Hope, what the hell do you mean by ‘what happened in London’?” Carli questioned, “Did you and Kelley do anything?”

Rubbing her now aching temples and before saying anything, Hope looked up, briefly made eye contact with Carli, who gave her a pointed look, and eventually broke. “It was just a fling. I thought I told you. But see? It really wasn’t that big of a deal or I would’ve told you, right? And it was such a long time ago. It hardly matters, right? Fuck. Don’t be mad,” she pleaded.

Carli shook her head and looked up. “Hope, I’m not mad. I’m just shocked. And clearly this is a big deal or we wouldn’t be here otherwise, right? So what the hell are you gonna do?”

Hope searched Carli’s eyes for the answer to her question, but knew it wouldn’t be there. She sat and slumped back into her chair once more before answering quietly, “I don’t know.”

__

Once the girls were finished getting their nails done, they made their way down to the beach. They were planning on meeting Ash there, who had been spending as much time as she could with her family while she was in town. And of course, the reason everyone was laughing and having a good time could only be accounted to her sneaking up on the group, wrapping her arms around Krieger’s waist and twirling her around, causing her to scream and flail. Once Ash put her down and Ali realized who it was, she began to chase and splash after her in the shallow bits, which made everyone laugh even harder.

It was cute but after a while Kelley couldn’t force herself to watch anymore. Pulling herself away from the group, she sat in the sand and slowly dragged her feet back in forth, allowing the crystals to run over and between her toes. A small smile played across her lips as she watched her friends take selfies with the beach and laugh, but it was really just to save face. She felt guilty for the sadness, the jealously, but she really couldn’t help it. She was starting to get frustrated with herself because every small thing reminded her of Ann. How the hell was she supposed to move on when she had this ghost of a relationship following her around? She angrily pushed her feet deep in the sand and let her head fall back so she could stare at the sky.

“Kel. Kelley! Hey, what are you doing over here? C’mon we almost took the picture without you.” Alex smiled down at her and offered her a hand. Pulling her close once she was upright, she whispered through her smile and into Kelley’s ear, “Just one good picture, and then we can talk, yeah?” Kelley nodded and walked to the group, smiling. “Are you children done messing around? I couldn’t have you ruining this hat, now could I?” She teased, fake accent back. 

Ten selfies later, the gals started back up the beach to their waiting cars. Just as they were about to split up into groups, Alex quickly turned around and started back toward the water. “Hey guys, I left my bag down there, I’ll be right back,” she explained. Understanding, Kelley fished the keys out of her pocket. “Hey, y’all go ahead in Ash’s car. I’ll wait here for Alex and we’ll just meet at the hotel, we’ll be right behind you.”

After everyone had left, Alex turned around and climbed into the car with Kelley. “Alright, Kel. What’s up? Was it a fight or something else this time?” Alex stared at Kelley from the passenger side waiting for a response. Eyes glued to the road and gripping the wheel until her knuckles turned white, Kelley simply shook her head no. “I’m not a mind reader, help me out here,” Alex groaned.

Kelley shook her head once more and sighed. Alex was one of her best friends. There’s no reason to hide this anymore. “Alright fine. Well, yeah we had a fight and uh… she broke up with me.” She took the following silence as a bad sign and risked a peek at Alex, who was staring at her, eyes wide and mouth agape. Kelley refocused her eyes on the road and the silence drew out.  Gulping, she decided to break it. “Sooo.. you okay over there bud? Doing alright?” She pulled into the hotel parking lot and stopped the car.

Suddenly realizing how dumb she looked, Alex cleared her throat and readjusted herself before firing a slew of questions her friend’s way. “Kelley what the fuck? I thought…. you had a ring, right? Does she know that? Did you propose yet? Did you tell her? Can you fix this?”  

“Jesus Alex! No I didn’t tell her! It wasn’t going to change anything anyways, so no. I guess she had been feeling this way for a while and was just waiting for me to figure it out and change on my own. She wanted me to come out and say we were dating. She just wanted to be publically claimed. And I didn’t. I had no idea and she got tired of waiting. I can’t blame her. I just wish I knew, you know? I would’ve done it in a heartbeat if I knew.” Regret and a huge desire to be alone quickly filling her, Kelley began moving to get out of the vehicle. She was suddenly stopped by Alex’s hand on her arm. She looked up to meet her gaze and was shocked to see tears in Alex’s eyes. “Kel, I’m sorry. I had no idea, I’m so sorry,” she whispered. Feeling her own eyes being to water, Kelley quickly batted away the tears and sniffled. “It’s okay Al. It wasn’t meant to be I guess.” She paused while they both got out of the car before joking, “Unrelated side note, do know anybody that needs a ring?”

Alex smiled sadly before once again grabbing Kelley’s hand. “Oh my. Okay, hey, look at me. You don’t have to brave this one out. This is one where you are allowed to scream and cry and be a bitch. No one will blame you. You don’t need to laugh this one away for anyone. You are allowed to feel this Kelley, okay? Let someone else be brave for you.”

Kelley’s smile faded and she nodded. Alex put an arm around her waist and they began walking into the hotel. Kelley thought about what she just said. They saw their friends waiting for them in the lobby and were greeted by a bunch of smiles. While they walked together to their afternoon team meeting, Kelley felt a small weight lifting off her shoulders. Alex had reminded her that this group of women were her community, she had a roomful of staff and teammates that were going to help her through this and rebuild her.  Remembering that, the first real smile in days spread across Kelley’s face.