Love on the Line (Beaumont Legacy #2)

5. Maya

Chapter five

Maya

M aya stared up at her ceiling, tucked tightly under her duvet, counting the glow-in-the-dark stars her mother had helped her stick there when she’d been seven. Counting them took her mind off the panic, just like Colton had taught her one of those late nights a handful of weeks after her mother had died.

Before her father had told her Colton’s sleep had been more important than her night terrors.

She counted them over and over, breathing in deeply, holding, breathing out deeply, holding. Just like her brother had taught her. The paralyzing panic subsided slowly until her tunnel vision cleared and she could feel her body again.

Get up , she thought to herself. Get up, get up, get up .

What would Colton have thought of her? Landon? Lucia? Cooper? Her friends? Worse, what would her mother have thought if she saw Maya as she was? None of it, not even the biting feeling of knowing they would all have been disappointed in her, pushed her out of her bed.

Being with Delilah yesterday had made her want to try harder, just like her brothers and Cooper had made her feel. But now that she was alone in the house, she’d fallen back into the same thoughts and worries as before.

What now? Her money was dwindling, and she could barely bring herself to think about physical therapy. After talking to Delilah, she’d very nearly called her physical therapist. But today? She knew she needed to, but all she could think about was that her dream was dead. What was the point of physical therapy if she couldn’t play at the level she wanted to?

Of course, if she was going to coach for a little until she found what she really wanted, she had to start soon. Cooper’s words about his brother’s injury rang in her head.

“They said if he’d started sooner, he would’ve gotten his mobility and strength back quicker.”

God , what was wrong with her? She was up and down constantly. Her good days felt good, and her bad days were ugly . She knew she needed to just bite the bullet and go, so what was stopping her? Frustration at herself turned to anger before it subsided into nothingness.

Her phone buzzed on her nightstand, and Maya’s eyebrows pinched when she saw it was Landon calling. She’d always been the one to reach out, but like he’d known she needed someone, here he was.

“Hi?” she said, her voice tilting up at the end as if she were questioning the call.

“What, I can’t call my favorite sister?”

Maya smiled just a bit at that. “Sorry, hi.” This time, there was no question.

“Better. How are you?”

“I’m okay,” she lied. He didn’t need to know the thoughts that’d been flying through her mind the last few minutes. He’d only worry.

“Are you being honest ?”

“Maybe. What about you? How are you?”

“I’m good. Offseason is offseason. We only really have a few free weeks before training and camp, so I’m trying to enjoy them while I can. Speaking of which, I was planning on coming down to hang out in the next few weeks.” He paused, almost like he was trying to convince himself to continue. “Would that be okay with you?”

Maya smiled softly. Landon, who to everyone else was so rough around the edges, could be very sweet on the inside. She didn’t have the closest relationship with him, especially since she and Colton had always been closer and his and Colton’s relationship was lukewarm at best, but she and Landon were certainly trying.

Maya hated the idea that he might be coming to check on her. But the part of her that wished she could go back and keep her brothers together, keep them friendly and keep their unit close, wanted to see him. Wanted to rectify what she hadn’t been able to while she was playing tennis.

“Of course! Colton and Lucia are forcing me to come to Charleston in a couple of days, which, honestly, I think will be good for me. I need to get out of the house,” she rambled, then realized this might be making him feel excluded. Maya knew he probably hadn’t been invited, and she’d never really gotten a read on how that sort of thing made him feel, since he always seemed okay. “Anyway, you can come next week or the week after if you’d like.”

“Great, I’ll text you when I decide on a day.” He was silent for a moment and then said their mother’s goodbye quietly, “Love you to the moon.”

“Love you to the moon,” she echoed before they hung up. Typically, she heard her mother’s part of the phrase, “and back,” in her head. But since her wrist had started hurting in July, long before the final injury in January, her mother’s voice had disappeared entirely, even in their favorite goodbye.

The call had seemed to give her the motivation she’d needed to get out of bed. Maya headed downstairs and grimaced at the empty bags of gummy bears and bread littering the counters of the kitchen. She threw them into the trash bin and then stared at the couch, where her mother had oiled her hair while they’d watched TV together. Maya gritted her teeth to prevent the tears from falling .

It seemed she only had three emotional states nowadays: anger and sadness traded places often, emptiness peeking in infrequently. What happened to the five stages of grief? Why was she not moving from one to the other seamlessly? It was more like someone had written out the stages and scribbled on the page, sending her all over the place.

The evening sun shone through the trees in the backyard, casting a pretty glow on the lawn. She missed lying out on the grass and reading a book, or hanging out in the backyard and watching the clouds go by.

There’d been a lot of that after her mother had passed. Her father hadn’t so much as looked in her direction other than to agree to pay her tuition and get her a credit card connected to his account—things that had taken months for him to actually complete.

Their father had kept Colton and Landon too busy. Where he had been ever-present for them, their father had been entirely absent for her, which meant after her mother had died, she’d been left to amuse herself.

Her mother. Her best friend. Her first hitting partner. The woman who had spent every waking second devoted to her children, Maya especially. The ache of her loss was forever present in Maya’s daily life. Win or lose, Maya was on that court for her mother and because of her mother. Win or lose, her mother was who first came to her mind.

The months after losing her had been the hardest, but Maya had thought she’d gotten through that pain. Now that she spent day in and day out doing nothing but sleeping, staring into space, crying, and wondering about her future, the loss had begun to feel fresh again. All she wanted was for her mother to sit behind her, massaging coconut oil into her hair while they watched cartoons or The Princess Bride .

Why had Maya stopped hearing her voice encouraging her? What would she have said if she had been there with her? It’d been so long since she’d read her mother’s journals from during her time in chemotherapy that she’d forgotten the shape of her mother’s sentences, their ins and their outs.

Maya was up the stairs in a matter of seconds.

The door to the master bedroom had been closed since her father had moved away her senior year, when he’d followed Colton to Charleston. She’d only ever gone in to read her mother’s journals, put off by the strange, cold feeling of being in the room.

Maybe the journals would reignite her mother’s voice in her head.

Maya opened the door slowly, feeling a gust of cool air hit her as she did. After stepping inside, she headed straight for the box under her mom’s side of the bed.

She’d never thought to take the journals from the room, certain it was their rightful place all throughout high school. But now, as Maya sat on her heels on the floor of this chilly, unpleasant room, she decided it was time they came with her. It wasn’t like her father would care anyway .

Maya tucked the three leather-bound journals tight against her chest as she walked out of the bedroom, closing the door behind her with her foot. Although the journals were all practically the same from the outside, Maya knew their order by heart.

She opened the first, smiling at the loopy script she’d missed seeing, even as her vision blurred with tears.

Hello, my little ones,

I’ve finally decided to write in these journals I’ve had lying around for years. I can’t even remember where I got them, but I figure I better use them while I can.

Being away from you is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do, but I hope the chemo does what it’s supposed to and then I can come home to cheer on Colton, cook with Landon, and oil Maya’s hair in front of the TV. I hope you’re all happy at home and that your father is stepping up and taking good care of you without me there. Just because I’m not there to remind you doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be doing your homework (looking at you, Landon).

Also, Nani and Nana may come by more now from Michigan, so make sure to make them feel welcome. They’ll be so excited to see you.

Maya’s eyebrows pinched, and she wondered what Nani and Nana, her grandparents, were doing now. They’d visited during her mother’s chemo, but never after. Where were they living? What had happened to make them stop contacting her and her brothers entirely after her mother had passed? Had she done something? Or had they just been too heartbroken and hadn’t wanted to be reminded of the loss?

She swiped away a tear.

Anyway, it’s my first full day of treatment and I’m quite fatigued, so I don’t have much to say today other than I love you. I’m going to try out daily journaling and see if it works for me.

Sending you all big hugs and kisses, and remember, if life gives you melons, you might be dyslexic!

Love you to the moon and back,

Mom

Maya wiped another tear from her cheek quickly, worried about the already crinkled pages that were full of tears from when she’d been younger and first read her mother’s words. That was her mother’s way—vibrant despite the pain and sickness. She had always tried to make Maya and her brothers laugh, even when she was hurting.

PS don’t forget to do something today that gives back to others.

And there was one of her mother’s favorite phrases. She had uttered it often, especially when she would take Maya to volunteer at a soup kitchen, or when they’d go on long drives around the city, dropping off meals to people in need.

Maya flipped through the pages, reading entry after entry, consuming the words swiftly. She wanted to read every last letter, and then maybe she’d be able to figure out what her mom would have told her to do now .

After she’d finished all the journals and still couldn’t hear her mother’s voice or feel the gentle brush of her fingers pushing her hair back, Maya started again. And again and again.

She read long into the evening, clinging to the love between the pages, preferring the sadness that settled around her over the anger and emptiness her mother’s voice chased away.