Sky Full of Stars

Job hunting is a nightmare just as she expected. There's nothing even remotely in her field out there and the longer she goes without working, the more frustrated she becomes. Luckily, there's a little in her savings that she can live on in the meantime, but it's not going to last long; in fact, it'll be nonexistent once her rent is paid next month. She's even gone as far as to check into a few other places to live that cost less than her current apartment. Of course it would be a fight with Jamie and Jordie and probably Tyler too, but she absolutely doesn't want any handouts and the bottom line is she can't afford her current place anymore. She ends up finding a place but it's way on the other side of town and it's not exactly in the best neighborhood. In fact, the only upsides to it are that it's the same size as her current place and half the rent. She knows that the guys would never in a million years let her live there if they could help it so it's pretty much a given that she'd have to move first and tell them after.

That's when it happens. A little over two weeks after her last day in the Dallas Stars offices, she's lying face down in her pillow having spent the better part of the morning searching for jobs with no luck. Her phone rings right next to her head and she groans at the loud volume as she rolls over onto her back, picking it up as she goes. The number is one that she doesn't recognize but it's a Dallas area code so she answers it anyway, albeit with a less than enthusiastic hello.

"Good morning, Miss Clark. My name is Charlie Ramsey. I'm the Director of Digital Media for the Dallas Mavericks."

That gets her bolting upright in bed, suddenly very interested and simultaneously nervous enough that she feels like she might be sick. Immediately, her attitude changes and she fakes her best cheerful confidence as she greets him in return.

"I'm calling because we have a position coming open soon that I think you'd be perfect for. Now, it's not quite the leadership role you played previously, but I don't see any reason you can't quickly work your way up to that again in the future. We'd like you to come in for an interview this week whenever's convenient, though it's essentially just a formality at this point. You couldn't have been more highly recommended by Seth Lennox."

Now that's a surprise she hadn't expected. She honestly isn't sure what to say to that so she focuses on the fact that she's actually just been offered a job and tries to accept graciously without blubbering like an idiot to the man who's going to be her new boss. They hang up as soon as her interview is scheduled for tomorrow morning and once she has a moment to herself to just absorb everything, the tears of joy and relief she's been holding back finally fall.

She decides to wait until after her interview to tell anyone just in case but as soon as she leaves Mr. Ramsey's office the next day ("please, it's Charlie. Mr. Ramsey sounds so old and I'm not ready to be old yet"), she jumps into her car and texts Jamie to tell him that she needs to talk to him. He of course automatically thinks the worst and invites her to come up since he's just gotten home from practice but she's still thirty minutes away. Her phone dings as she's pulling into the garage at their building and once she's parked her car in a space, she checks and sees that it's a text from Tyler.

everything ok? chubbs seems worried

She doesn't answer his question, instead just telling him that she'll be up in a moment and then she gets out of the car to make her way over to the elevator. She doesn't bother knocking once she reaches their door on the fifteenth floor, instead letting herself into the boys' apartment since they're expecting her, and she's not the least bit surprised that Jordie and Tyler are there with Jamie, all three of them spread out across the living room. Jamie immediately props himself up on his elbows to look at her over the back of the sofa with a worried frown.

"What's wrong?"

Calista walks around to the front of the sofa and he moves his legs just long enough for her to sit down before he props them up in her lap. "Who said there's anything wrong?"

"I just thought by your text-.....There's nothing wrong?"

"No."

"So it's....something good?" Calista nods her head and he sits up fully, giving her a suspicious look. "You got a job."

"I got a job!"

A wide grin stretches across his face and he lunges forward to wrap her in a tight hug, while all three of them express their congratulations. He presses a kiss to her temple before he pulls back, looking excited. "So, tell us about it."

"Oh, well it's for the Mavs."

"The Avs?" Tyler interrupts, allowing the panic to creep into his voice a little bit. "You're moving to Colorado?"

The others look over at him in amusement and Calista shakes her head, trying her hardest to bite back the smile. "Not the Avs, the Mavs. The Dallas Mavericks. Basketball."

"So how'd that happen?" Jamie asks, pulling her attention away and allowing Tyler to breathe a sigh of relief without an audience.

"Well, he called me yesterday to set up an interview but it was pretty much just a formality because apparently Mr. Lennox gave me a stellar recommendation. Which I guess is because of you," she adds, shifting her gaze over to Jordie.

He looks kind of bashful as he drops his eyes down to his hands in his lap and shrugs. "I told you, it's the least I could do after what happened."

"Thank you, Jord," she says sincerely. He looks up at her, nodding his head silently and they just stare at each other until Tyler breaks up the moment by asking what kind of work she's going to be doing at her new job. "It's kind of going to be the same stuff I was doing, with the digital media and a little bit of web design. I won't be as high up as I was with the Stars but since the NBA is-- no offense, boys-- a little more popular than hockey down here, my salary will end up being about the same."

"So no moving?" Jamie asks and she can't help but smile at the hopeful look on his face.

"No, no moving."

He pulls her into another hug, squeezing her tightly against him as he says, "We should celebrate, go out to dinner somewhere. Invite the boys." Calista makes a noise of protest against his shoulder and when he pulls back to look at her, she scrunches up her face like she's in pain. Jamie gives her an amused grin. "What? What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing, I just-....doesn't everyone know now?"

"Pretty much," Tyler supplies and they all shoot him a look but he just shrugs innocently. "What? She asked!"

"So what if they know?"

"It's kind of humiliating, Jamie," she mutters but then immediately looks over to his brother on the other sofa. "No offense."

"So you got fired for fucking my brother," Jamie shrugs. "It's not that big a deal."

"Jesus Christ," she groans, mildly embarrassed that they're having this conversation with an audience that includes not only Tyler but also the brother in question. "It is a big deal! The whole organization probably thinks I'm just a slut now."

"C'mon, Liss, no one thinks that." She gives him a look so he backtracks a little. "Okay, I'm not gonna say no one, but the guys don't think that. They're your friends and they know better. And if anyone were to say anything, they'd have to answer to me."

Calista lets out a little giggle. "You're not scary."

"Hey," he scoffs. "I am when I have to be."

"If you say so."

"It's not gonna be bad anyway," he says, waving his hand dismissively. "I mean, look at Tyler. He's been chill about it."

Calista's eyes widen a little and she glances over to catch Tyler's gaze before she looks back at Jamie. "Yeah, he....kind of already knew."

"Wait, what? He knew before I knew?"

She shrugs. "Well, you said it-- I'm, what, about as subtle as a puck to the face? He figured it out."

"Plus, it helped that I saw some shit," Tyler adds helpfully and Jordie's head snaps over to him in surprise.

"You did?"

"Well, there was that Halloween thing. And then that night we were all at her place and-"

"What Halloween thing?" Jamie interrupts. "This Halloween?"

"Yeah, at the team party-"

"Tyler," she says softly, looking over at him with wide, pleading eyes and shaking her head. "Stop." He does, and the room goes quiet as Jamie tries to process that some of this whole thing has taken place recently and Jordie tries to process that someone else, a teammate and friend, had been witness to his behavior. The complete silence is excruciating and after only a few moments, she nudges Jamie with her elbow and changes back to the original subject of conversation. "Fine, call the boys. Let's go out."

He looks hesitant. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," she replies, quickly standing up from the sofa and smoothing out her dress. "I'll see you guys later tonight."

Calista is on her way out the door before any of them can even react and she knows even as she shuts the door behind her that the conversation she'd stopped is going to continue now that she's gone but she honestly doesn't care what Tyler tells them now because at least she doesn't have to sit there and listen to it.

--

Jamie doesn't mention it when he shows up at her door at twenty til seven. He doesn't mention it when they step onto the elevator to go down to the garage or on the ride to the restaurant. In fact, it's starting to worry her how far he's going not to mention it; she wonders what Tyler or Jordie could have possibly said to him after she left to make him like this. He's continuously talking about anything and everything humanly imaginable that doesn't involve Tyler or Jordie or both.

Tyler is waiting for them, or rather her, just inside the door of the restaurant across from the hostess station. Jamie looks immediately put off at seeing him and when Tyler tells him that most of the guys have already arrived and been seated at their table, he just nods wordlessly and leaves the two of them standing there to go and find the rest of his teammates. "Look, I'm sorry about earlier," Tyler blurts as soon as they're alone. "I didn't mean to cause anymore trouble."

Calista ignores the apology. "What happened after I left? Jamie's acting really weird."

"He forced it. Wouldn't let it go until I told him about the Halloween thing. He got pretty pissed after that and when they started full on yelling, I got the fuck outta there. It didn't have anything to do with me by that point anyway."

"Fuck."

The first thought she has is that this is not good news. She's causing problems between the two Benns and now she's going to have to do something to fix it. Jamie never goes after Jordie in a serious way. He might be the team's captain but, to Jordie, he's still just the little brother so the fact that they would actually start fighting because of her makes her very uneasy. She's going to have to do something about it tonight because just letting it lie is not even an option. She refuses to be the reason for strife between the two brothers.

"Jordie still showed up though, if that means anything."

That is a positive sign, but still, she's sad that the boys are fighting and also it just dawned on her that now Jamie knows what happened on Halloween. "Alright," she sighs before she gets a minute to think about that too much. "Guess we should get over there then."

He nods silently and leads the way through the restaurant to the massive table that her friends have claimed in the far corner against the back wall. None of the guys have brought their better halves which she's massively grateful for because she knows they're not going to keep their mouths shut for the entire dinner and she really doesn't want any of the ladies to think badly about her. Fiddler is sitting at the head of the table like the total team dad he is with Daley and Goligoski on either side of him. Nichushkin and Eakin are beside them with Roussel and Dillon beside them. Jordie is sitting next to Roussel with Jamie on his other side and there are two empty chairs across from them for her and Tyler.

They all shout greetings at her when she approaches the table, with the exception of Jamie and Jordie who stay quiet on the end, both of them still in weird moods after the earlier events of the day. Calista smiles and waves in response, sliding into the chair across from Jamie so that she's not face to face with Jordie through the whole dinner and Tyler takes the last empty seat between her and Dillon. The waitress comes to take their drink orders once they're seated and Calista makes sure to get her favorite wine because she's definitely going to need it to get through tonight. Thankfully, the boys at least wait until they're alone to start up.

It's innocent enough in the beginning when Fidds asks about where she got a new job and what she'll be doing. They let her talk about it without interruption but when she's finished, Eakin leans forward in his chair so that he can look down the table at her with a cheesy smirk on his face. "So now that you don't work for the Stars anymore, does that mean we can finally be together?"

Calista laughs. "Shut up, Eaks."

"Who said it gets to be you?" Roussel protests, crossing his arms over his chest and Dillon agrees with him.

"Yeah, I mean, seriously we all know it would be me."

"You guys are ridiculous," she says, shaking her head and taking a sip from her glass.

"Not ridiculous, Calista," Eakin corrects matter-of-factly. "We'd have to be idiots to not want to date you."

It takes a moment for his words to resonate in everyone's heads but they all slowly look to Jordie while he's studying the label on his beer bottle like it contains the secrets of the universe to avoid his teammates' gazes. Calista keeps her eyes on the dark wine in her glass because it's absolutely safer than looking anywhere else. She takes a few more sips from it and then it's empty and she turns to look over her shoulder for the waitress because she's going to need a refill ASAP.

"Seriously, all the good choices you have on this team and you picked this guy?" Roussel jokes, clapping Jordie on the back, in an attempt to break the tension after a long few moments of awkward silence.

That earns a few laughs around the table but Calista ducks her head down, letting her hair fall over her shoulder to block most of them from seeing her face because she's pretty sure she's never been this embarrassed. She knows they're her friends and that it's just some good-natured ribbing but it's a touchy subject on top of it having been a well kept secret for what feels like forever so hearing anyone talk about it so flippantly is just too much.

Jamie is the only one who can actually see her face now and since he can obviously tell she's uncomfortable with the conversation, he leans forward in his seat so that he can see all of his teammates and says, "Alright, change the subject now, c'mon."

Any other time, the boys would probably chirp him too for trying to be so serious and authoritative, but they know better when it comes to Calista. Fidds immediately changes the subject at the other end of the table and Calista throws Jamie a thankful look but he just nods and turns his attention over to the story that Goligoski and Daley are taking turns telling. Calista picks up her water glass since her wine glass is empty and takes a few large gulps to hopefully ease her suddenly dry throat but the feeling of a large, rough hand slipping over her knee causes her to jump reflexively. She looks over to her left just as Tyler leans in a little so that he can speak to her quietly. "Hey, you okay?" he asks, and the care in his voice coupled with the way his hand radiates the warmth across her bare skin gives her goosebumps.

"Fine," she replies with a little huff that contradicts that. "This whole thing's been a secret for a very long time. The fact that everyone knows now is a little disconcerting but....something I'm gonna have to get used to, I guess."

"It'll blow over," he gently reassures.

She looks up then, directly into his eyes, and catches a brief flash of something in them that reminds her of his past-- how he'd been the subject of gossip and speculation (most of it not completely unfounded, but that's beside the point) for a good bit of his career in the NHL so far. "Will it?" she asks earnestly.

He breathes out a laugh. "To be honest, I haven't experienced that yet myself. But it will for you."

"I guess I'm lucky it's just the organization that knows and not the whole world."

"Believe me, the whole world knowing sucks."

"Well don't count me out yet. I wouldn't put anything past Megan at this point," she mutters bitterly.

"It's gonna be okay, ya know. Even if the rest of the world does find out, it'll still be okay."

"I know, I just-....it would be hard."

"Yeah, but you're tough," he says, nudging her elbow gently with his.

Calista shakes her head but it does get her to crack a smile. "Thanks."

"You feel better now?" She hums her agreement and he grins in satisfaction, giving her knee a gentle squeeze before he withdraws his hand so that he can pick up his beer and sits back in his seat to join in on the story going on at the table. Even though his hand isn't in contact with her skin anymore, she can still feel the warmth from where it had rested and she stares down at her lap as if she can actually see the spot through the table. And when she finally looks up, she finds Jordie watching her from across the table and by the confused, weirdly jealous look on his face, she gathers that he probably caught everything that just happened.