They had reached the Shakespeare garden by this time, and Jamie wandered around the paths, deep in thought. Catherine was similarly silent, each woman lost in her own private musings. "Are you sorry that you married Daddy?" Jamie asked, her voice abruptly cutting through the stillness.
Catherine’s head snapped up as she was ripped from her contemplations. She started to answer automatically, but then stopped and considered the question for a moment as Jamie’s green gaze burrowed into her. "No, no I’m not," Catherine finally answered. "In a perfect world we would have waited until we were a little older, but the world isn’t perfect, Jamie. We’ve had to overcome a lot of problems, but we’re still together. Many couples can’t say that."
"Um…do you want to talk about the problems you’ve overcome?" Jamie asked hesitantly. "I’m happy to listen if you feel like talking."
Catherine smiled at her daughter and approached her, lifting one tentative hand to cup her cheek. "I know that, Jamie, but the issues we’ve had to face are just between me and your father. I wouldn’t want him to talk about the problems we’ve had, so I shouldn’t either."
Covering her mother’s small hand with her own, Jamie turned her head slightly, placing a gentle kiss on the inside of the older woman’s wrist. "I think it’s nice that you don’t talk about him behind his back, Mother. That shows that you respect him and your relationship."
"I try to, Honey. Sometimes it’s hard…like with his problems with Ryan. But I think his good sense will come back so that we can both respect him again."
Jamie sat down on a carved wooden arbor bench, the intricate woodwork supporting a heavy purple-flowered clematis. "Mom?" she asked pensively, "do you think it’s inevitable that Ryan and I will lose the joy we have in being together?"
Catherine sat down next to her and relaxed against the bench. "That’s a tough one, Jamie." She lifted her head and stared into the night sky, so heavy with stars. "I think most couple do lose the vibrancy that they have when they’re first together, but if you’re lucky you replace it with a depth of feeling and intimacy that, in some ways, is even more rewarding."
"Have you lost it, Mom?" Her question hung between them for a moment. Catherine didn’t want to answer, but she felt that she needed to be open with her daughter so long as the questions didn’t intrude on the privacy she felt that she needed to maintain.
"Yes, Honey, I’m afraid we lost the joy in our relationship far, far too quickly."
Jamie nodded, not surprised in the least. "I’m worried about that, Mom," she admitted. "I don’t know how to make sure we keep the spark going between us. How do you avoid taking each other for granted?"
Catherine answered immediately, obviously not needing to reflect on the issue. "You make each other your top priority," she said firmly. "Not your careers, not your hobbies, not even your children. You have to put your spouse first, and remember that all of your other decisions ultimately have an impact on you as a couple."
"Have you done that?"
Catherine sighed, shaking her head slightly as she did so.
Has she always been able to see right through me?
I suppose she has
, she thought fondly, giving her daughter a smile. "No, Jamie. We have not." She could have gone on at length about the things that kept both her and Jim from focusing on each other, but she didn’t think those issues were to be shared with her daughter, so she kept them to herself.
"I didn’t think so," the younger woman mused. "I was really shocked when Daddy told me he might accept an appointment to fill Senator Sommers' seat and move to Washington. It didn’t seem like a decision you were making jointly."
"No, it’s not," Catherine said quickly. She caught herself and realized that she was doing exactly what she was trying to avoid, so she softened her voice and said, "This is important to him, Jamie. I’ll support him in this, even though it’s not what I would choose for him."
Jamie caught the slightly defensive tone in her mother’s voice and asked, "Is this hard for you to talk about, Mom?"
"No, not really, Dear. It’s funny, but I’ve spent more time thinking about my own relationship since you’ve been talking about yours. I think it’s helpful for both of us to talk about our loves."
"I miss mine," Jamie sighed. "Sunday seems soooooo far away."
Reaching out to grasp her daughter’s hand, Catherine gave it a squeeze and said, "Enjoy this time, Jamie, and hold on to it as tightly as you can.
It fades all too soon."
"Okay, guys," Ryan said to the assembled group, holding out the long string of tickets Cami and Heather had just purchased. "I think we should play in two teams of seven. Any objections?"
The group all agreed and Ryan handed out five tickets to each woman while they tried to come up with an equitable means of choosing sides. Jordan finally spoke up, "Let’s go by class. Every team should have two freshmen, two sophomores, two juniors, and one senior. Argue amongst yourselves for who goes with Ryan and who goes with me." When most of the players started lining up next to Ryan, Jordan shot them a glare and said, "Remember that I lead warm-ups during the season." Now all of the players scooted over to Jordan’s side, giggling as they did so.
"I have a car for making ice cream runs for the rest of the week," Ryan taunted, and miraculously she was surrounded by 12 bright smiles.
"This could go on all night," Jordan decided. "Let’s go in alphabetical order. I’ll take the first two of each class alphabetically."
"The first shall be last, and the last, first," Ryan teased, surrounded by her six smiling teammates.
As the members of her team got into their reflective vests, Ryan gave them a few pieces of advice. "Okay guys, the key to winning in laser tag is to move unpredictably. This should be easy for us, since we’ve been hurling our bodies all over the gym since Sunday. Don’t move in a straight line–start and stop repeatedly. And don’t stay on the same plane for long. Stand up tall, then drop into a crouch quickly. Don’t ever let them be able to guess where you’re going to go next. Any questions?"
"Does it hurt?" Amy asked, her eyes darting from Ryan to the laser tag gun in her hand.
"Hurt? You mean the laser?" Ryan shot her a puzzled look and scratched her head. "Um…they’re not surgical lasers, Amy. Why would they hurt?"
The embarrassed woman shrugged her shoulders helplessly and said, "My brother had welts all over himself when he played."
"Nah…he was probably playing paintball," Ryan guessed. "My brother plays that all the time, too. He looks like someone’s been hitting him with a ballpeen hammer!"
No one else knew what a ballpeen hammer was, so her joke didn’t have the desired effect, but Ryan had successfully allayed their fears.
The teams took off when they were given the signal, running through, around, and over the obstacles and barriers placed around the huge space. The room was completely devoid of natural light, instead using black light to provide the dim illumination. The darkness made maneuvering difficult, but the reflective vests showed, in eerie contrast, the exact path that every woman trod.
Using the skills they had been honing for the last four days, the women followed Ryan’s advice beautifully, and managed to pick off two members of Jordan’s team before their opponents copied their strategy and began to follow it as well. They all dropped, weaved, jumped, rolled, and squatted, moving from obstacle to obstacle, doing their best to stay unpredictable.
After running around like mad for quite some time, Ryan realized that very few people were being "shot". Then she realized that few of the women had probably ever had real or fake "guns" in their hands before. She got down behind a low barrier and relaxed for a moment, taking her time to slow her breathing. Dropping to one knee, bracing her free arm across the other leg to help steady her weapon, she aimed carefully, picking off three more members of Jordan’s team, leaving just two of her opponents standing. She had no idea where the other two members were, but she found out the location of one of them very quickly when Jordan popped up on the other side of the barrier and shot her right between the eyes. "Die, sucker!" she cried, obviously enjoying herself immensely.
Hating to lose at anything, Ryan grumbled all the way back to the sidelines, only partially cheered when her team emerged victorious a few minutes later. "Hey this is like in ‘Saving Private Ryan,’ Erika said. "We won, but the captain died."
"Great. Just great," Ryan grumbled, still a little miffed at being killed.
"Quit crying, O’Flaherty," Jordan teased. "We have to do your stinking laundry for the rest of the week. That should give you some satisfaction."
Ryan immediately brightened at the prospect of her friend having to wash all of her very ripe clothing. "Now that you mention it, Jordan, I’m feeling better already." She smiled as she draped an arm around her new laundry woman, and they made their way to the bus for the short ride home.
The minute Ryan arrived at the dorm she tried her cell, grumbling to herself when she could not get a strong signal.
Hmm…maybe it’s the building
, she decided. Shrugging into one of the Cal Volleyball sweatshirts they had been issued, she went outside and turned on her phone, smiling to herself when the signal strength meter indicated that there was an acceptable level.
I wonder if maybe I can get this a little stronger
. She walked around aimlessly, not paying any attention to where she was headed, looking only at the level of the signal. She wound up near the tennis courts and took a seat on a wooden bench, spreading her arm out across the back of the bench as she settled in for a long chat with her beloved.
Jamie answered on the second ring. "Now there’s the voice that makes me smile," Ryan said upon hearing her partner’s warm tones.
"Ooh, that goes double for me, Love. I just want to listen to you breathe." She sighed heavily, wishing there was some way to crawl through the phone lines to wrap her body around her partner.
Ryan thought that was a pretty good idea herself, not wanting to go into any of the upsetting topics that she knew she had to broach. "I’ve uh…got a few things to talk to you about, Hon," she said. "Can I do that before I breathe for you?"
"Of course, Honey." She paused a beat adding, "Nothing is wrong, is it?"
"No, no, not wrong…but I don’t have a lot of good news," she admitted.
"What is it, Ryan?" Jamie’s voice was a little sharp now, and she felt her heart start to beat faster. "It’s so hard to do this on the phone," she moaned. "I can’t see your face and look into your eyes to see how you really are."
"I’m fine, Love," she assured her. "Let me stop torturing you and tell you what’s going on."
It took 20 minutes to discuss the revocation of the scholarship. Ryan had chosen this item first since she needed to talk to Coach Placer the next day, and she didn’t want to run out of time. As expected, Jamie felt strongly that the scholarship should have no impact on Ryan’s decision to play, and Ryan felt very secure and happy to know how enthusiastic her partner was in her support. Jamie’s point was that if her father gave them a hard time about the money, she would ask her mother for a loan. Ryan had never considered this option, but she had to acknowledge that it made sense. The suggestion made Ryan feel better immediately, and she thanked the heavens that Catherine was being so supportive of their young relationship.
As they continued to talk Ryan could tell that Jamie was fading fast, and she considered continuing their discussion the next day. But the incident at the Boardwalk had bothered her much more than she had let on, and she knew that Jamie would be angry if she didn’t tell her something like this as soon as she could.
"Anything else going on, Hon?" Jamie asked sleepily.
"Umm…" Ryan thought fast and made a decision. "Yeah, actually there is. I uh…got into a little scrape tonight and…"
"Scrape?" the sharp voice demanded, now very alert. "What kind of scrape were you in, Ryan?"
"Um…we were all at the Boardwalk and some guys were harassing two of the freshmen. I um…made them stop."
"Ryan," Jamie said slowly. "Did you get hurt?"
"No, no, really I didn’t," Ryan assured her. "My face is a little red where this asshole slapped me…"
"WHAT?! Someone slapped you?" Her voice was now firm and low, and Ryan knew that trouble was a-brew. "I’m coming home on the first plane," she announced, not sounding like this was a topic for discussion.
"Jamie," Ryan soothed, "please, Honey, don’t make this into a bigger deal than it was."
Damn it, damn it, damn it! I knew this would upset her! I should have kept my big mouth shut!
"How can you even say that? Someone assaults you, and you don’t want me to make a big deal about it?! Have you been to the police station to make a statement?"
"Uhh…we decided not to press charges," she said weakly, immediately realizing that Jamie did not agree with her decision.
"Pardon me?" Each word was enunciated slowly as Jamie tried to understand her partner’s words. "You didn’t press charges…after someone HITS YOU!"
Oooh…sounds like someone else would hit me if she was in town. Thank God for Rhode Island
. "Jamie," she soothed in her best placating voice, "I handled it, Honey. Believe me, I gave him a much harder whack than he gave me, and I got in a very good knee to his chest. He’s gonna have a bruise that will remind him of me every time he breathes."
"Did…
you…
start…
the…
fight?"
Oh boy…when it takes two minutes to get out five words, I’m in big trouble
. "No, no, of course I didn’t. I was defending my friends, Jamie. He clearly asked for it."
"My point exactly, Ryan," she insisted. "Some thug hits you…you press charges. How could you let him off scot-free, Ryan? That gives him permission to do this again."
Okay, so I didn’t think of that
, she admitted.
So maybe I do need Jamie close by to keep me from doing stupid things.
"I screwed up, huh?" Her voice was low and soft, and Jamie could just picture the big blue eyes peeking out through the long bangs.
"Yes, Honey, you screwed up. I’m proud of you for helping your friends, but I think you were wrong to let the guy off. People like that have to suffer some consequences or they have no reason to behave civilly."
"I’m sorry, Jamie," she said, very contrite. "I should have been thinking of the long term, but I just wanted out of there." Her voice grew quiet as she admitted, "The whole thing upset me, Honey, and I wasn’t thinking."
"Ryan, I’m going to come down there and make sure you’re really all right. I’m feeling very uneasy about this."
"Jamie, please don’t do that," she begged. "I’m absolutely fine, Honey, and if you came down I wouldn’t be able to spend any time at all with you. I swear it would be more stressful than reassuring for me." It was clear from the pleading tone in her voice that Ryan was serious, but Jamie had such a bad feeling about the incident that she had a hard time acceding to her wishes. "Please, Honey," the dark woman continued. "I really don’t want you to come."
With a heavy sigh, Jamie capitulated. "All right, Honey. I don’t want to make things worse for you." She sounded tired–defeated, and Ryan immediately felt guilty for the way she had presented her last point.
"Jamers," she soothed, using the pet name she invoked infrequently, "I always feel better when you’re with me, Love. You know that, don’t you?"
"Yes, Honey," Jamie replied softly. "I know that. This is just hard for both of us. My imagination runs wild since I know you downplay everything."
Thinking of a solution to the problem, Ryan said, "I’m outside now. Call me on the dorm phone in ten minutes, okay?"
"Okay," Jamie said slowly. "What’s--" But Ryan had hung up by the time she uttered her question, and she was forced to wait to determine the point of the exercise.
Exactly ten minutes later, Jamie dialed the dorm phone, smiling to herself when Ryan’s out-of-breath voice said, "Jordan wants to give you the story, Honey. She’s impartial."
"Hi Jamie," Jordan’s soft soprano voice said. "I’m looking at Ryan’s homely mug right now, and I promise that she’s no uglier than she was earlier in the day."
An amused chuckle greeted Jordan’s news, and Jamie asked, "Did she get hit on the head, Jordan? I don’t know if you know this, but she’s had a number of head injuries. She really has to be careful."
Recognizing the seriousness of Jamie’s question, Jordan assured her, "No, she didn’t really get hit, Jamie. The idiot slapped her on the cheek and he’s the only one who touched her."
"How many were there?" Jamie gaped, not realizing there had been multiple assailants.
"Four," Jordan informed her. "She kicked one guy in the gut, two of them ran, then she took the last guy out. She did pretty good for herself, to be honest. I was there to back her up of course, but she didn’t seem to need it."
Ryan wrestled the phone from her friend’s hand, informing Jamie, "With backup like Jordan, I’d better carry a firearm." Looking up at the outraged look on her friend’s face she said, "Dismissed, pal. Thanks for your help."
"Anytime, Ryan. Remember, I live to serve."
As Jordan shuffled back to their room, Ryan said, "Feel any better, Love?"
"Yes, Honey, I’m sure Jordan would have loved to bust you if she could."
At her gentle laugh Ryan had to agree. "You’ve got that right! She’s worse than my brothers!"
"Here’s the deal, Babe. I’ll call you tomorrow to make sure you still feel all right. If you have any…and I do mean any…pain or stiffness or anything…you will tell me, right?"
"Yes, Dear. If I feel any pain other than the chronic pain from two-a-day practices, I will let you know. My health is worth more than this camp, Honey. I promise you that."