Give Into Me

Although she has planned on sleeping for a part of the flight, Kaelin didn't have the chance to even relax with the bratty ten-year-old behind her kicking her seat constantly. Every time she'd close her eyes for a moment, he'd jam his feet into the back of her seat and make her jerk forward. And no matter how many times his mother told him to stop, there was no end to the pushing on her back. Hopefully, in a few years, he'd start to be more considerate of the people around him.

That's why she wanted to teach high school rather than elementary or middle school. Most teenagers knew boundaries with adults. Not this boy, though.

On top of the kangaroo kid, her flight had been delayed by half an hour, the man sitting beside her was asleep from take off to touch down, snoring loudly, and there had been traffic almost all the way to her mother's residential area. In short, by the time she paid the cab driver and stepped onto the sidewalk beside the house with her purse hanging off her shoulder and her suitcases and cat carrier in her hands, Kaelin couldn't have been more relieved to be somewhere in her life.

She could already tell that this trip was going to be a whirlwind.

At least she would have somewhere familiar to stay. As she hauled the suitcases and cat carrier through the unshoveled lawn — Kaelin couldn't tell where the walkway was because of the thin layer of snow covering the front of the house — up the front steps onto the covered porch, the door opened and her mother peeked out, her face breaking into a smile at the sight of her daughter.

"Well, I thought I heard someone out here," she said, opening the screen and stepping out onto the dark wood boards of the porch.

Despite the effects of aging, Kaelin's mother still looked quite young for sixty. She stood five-foot seven-inches with the same auburn red hair as her daughter but streaked with silver. Having always took care to moisturize her skin and try to not frown in the face of all the tragedy in her life, Yvonne Bremner's face was sparsely wrinkled and freckled. Her blue eyes shined whenever she smiled, especially now as she greeted Kaelin.

"Hi, mom." Kaelin dropped her luggage where she stood and stepped forward into her mother's welcoming embrace. As she was five inches shorter than her mother, it was like she was stepping back into the past, coming home from a school trip to find her mother waiting to give her a big hug.

"Come on, let's get you inside. We're going to freeze our asses off out here," said her mother, stooping to pick up Poe's cat carrier, from which were emminating the early sounds of a cat who has been tricked into taking a sedative for the umpteenth time.

The inside of the house was as familiar as ever, but the usual smell of cooking wasn't coming from the kitchen.

That's weird, Kaelin thought. Mom is always making something.

Although Kaelin had lived in that house for nearly ten years, she was lead down a hall branching to the right of the entry way, dropping her boots in the wooden crate beside the door. Along the walls were old family photographs and some truly horrible pictures Kaelin, her brother, and her sister had drawn when they were younger. All the way at the very end was the "guest" room, but the only person who ever came to stay at the house was Kaelin so it was still technically her bedroom. But the walls had been painted and the decorations that had marked it as her own were taken down so that if any of the distant relatives from New York decided to make the rare visit, they would not be offended.

Her mother placed the carrier beside the bed and opened the latch. Groggily, Poe stumbled out of the cage growling, padding off down the hall toward the litter box in the laundry room. His little claws could be heard skidding on the wood floor as he picked up speed.

As Kaelin dropped her suitcases by the carrier and was about to take a seat on the bed next to where she had thrown her purse, her mother gave her a hopeful smile, raising her eyebrows as she did so. Kaelin sighed.

"What do you need to me do?" she asked.

"I hate to do this to you, but I was hoping that you could go out and pick up some dinner for the two of us?" said her mother, folding her hands in front of her in an act of pleading. "I know you just got here, but I didn't have time to start making dinner and I still have some cleaning to do before Christmas —"

"Where do you want me to go?" Kaelin grabbed her purse off the bed and headed down the hallway to put on her boots.

"You pick since you're going to get it." Handing her daughter the keys, Yvonne added, "Call me if you get lost."

Kaelin just rolled her eyes and walked out the door, closing the screen behind her. In the short time they had been inside the house, a light snow had started to fall outside. Once again, as she walked toward the car where the driveway should have been, Kaelin nearly tripped on the edge of the grass, having stepped where a sprinkler would have popped up in the summer. She cursed under her breath, shuffled the rest of the way to the car, and climbed into the Range Rover, slamming the door behind her.

It hasn't been that long since Kaelin was last in town; Thanksgiving break only a few weeks prior. As she drove deeper into the city, she ran through the list of restaurants and fast food places she had compiled in her mind since the age of ten. The food that stuck out in her mind were sandwiches.

There was a little shop just down the street from the Consol Energy Center that sold some of the best sandwiches in Pittsburgh — in Kaelin's opinion. Usually, it was difficult to find parking, but, thankfully, someone was pulling away just as Kaelin arrived. She quickly parked and dashed inside before she could be caught out in the snow any longer.

"Kaelin?"

Someone said her name as soon as she walked through the door, but it wasn't until it was repeated that she heard it clearly.

"Kaelin Bremner?"

She looked up to see a group of women gawking at her from the booth by the door, most looking extremely confused save for the blonde nearest her, whose expression was halfway between shock and pure joy. Her blue eyes widened when she caught Kaelin's hazel ones.

At first, Kaelin didn't recognize the woman and didn't know how she had known Kaelin's name, then suddenly, it hit her.

"Tammy!"

The blonde leapt out of her seat and rushed toward Kaelin, pulling her into a back-breaking hug. Still, Kaelin returned her embrace, memories from high school flooding back.

Kaelin and Tammy hadn't seen each other since the summer after their senior year, just before Kaelin had left for Occidental on the west coast. The two had been inseparable all through high school, having met in eighth grade and instantly becoming best friends. It was funny but not surprising that the two recognized each other after four years.

"Oh, my God, it's been so long since I saw you!" Tammy said letting Kaelin breathe again. "What're you doing back in Pittsburgh?"

"I'm —"

"I thought you were going to school in LA?"

"Yes, I'm —"

"When did you get in?"

"Just now —"

"Are you just visiting for Christmas and New Year's?"

"Yeah —"

"Tell me everything!"

Before Kaelin could say another word, she was being whisked over to the booth and Tammy was pulling up a chair for her to sit in.

"By the way, this is" — she pointed to each of the other women as she introduced them — "Rosie, Marina, Della, Amy, Melanie, and Clare. Everybody, this is Kaelin. We went to high school together."

The others smiled broadly at Kaelin, nodding their heads in acknowledgment of her sudden presence at the table. However, they didn't seem too enthusiastic that another woman, one they had just met, was joining their table. Indeed, they had already received their food and were slowly chewing their way through their sandwiches, but they had stopped when Kaelin had walked through the door and Tammy had called out her name.

"So tell me, how's life?" Tammy said as Kaelin took a seat.

"Well, er, I'm almost done with college and I'll be graduating this spring. After that I'll start student teaching and hopefully start looking for a teaching position after I'm done with that."

"What college are you going to?" said the other woman with blonde hair — Rosie.

"Occidental."

"That's a nice school."

"Yeah."

"So . . . what do you want to teach?" asked the woman named Clare.

"I'd love to teach high school English. Literature specifically, but —"

Suddenly, something shiny on Tammy's left hand caught Kaelin's attention. It was a huge ring topped with a diamond worth who knows how much. An engagement ring.

"Oh, my God, Tammy! You're engaged?"

In true blonde fashion, Tammy looked down at her hand, as if confused by what Kaelin was saying. Then she looked up, smiling proudly and thrusting out her hand to let Kaelin get a better look at the ring.

"Oh, yeah. Yes, I am."

"Who's the lucky guy?"

What she did next was odd. Tammy looked around before she said anything further, as if she was making sure that no one else was listening. Then she leaned toward Kaelin and lowered her voice.

"Paul Martin," whispered Tammy.

"Paul —!" Kaelin started quite loudly, unable to contain her excitement.

"Shut up!" Tammy hissed before she could say anything else. "We're keeping it on the down low until after the wedding. The only people who know are the people we invited."

"Paul — freaking — Martin," Kaelin said, lowering her voice so much that the words were coming out in short breaths. "Paul Martin, the Penguins player?"

"Yes, you're still a fan of the Pens?"

"Of course. When's the wedding?"

"Actually, it's this Wednesday."

"Well, congratulations, Tammy!"

There was a slight pause, in which, Tammy tapped her fingers on the table, a smirk creeping across her face.

"Since you're in town, would you like to come?"

This time, it was Kaelin who paused. She suddenly felt that she was intruding on Tammy's life. She had only come back to Pittsburgh to visit for the holidays.

"Tammy, I couldn't do that. Wouldn't I be taking someone's seat or something?"

"No, no, no. You see, almost half of the people we invited can't come, so we have plenty of room. And, even if they could come, I would find somewhere for you. I mean, you were my best friend . . ."

Once again, Kaelin hesitated before saying, "Well, I don't even have anything nice to wear."

"Kae, I'm sure we could find you something."

Tammy gave her a hopeful look, much like the one her mother had given her when she had arrived that afternoon. It was the kind of expression that only the most pessimistic and hateful people could resist. As such, Kaelin finally gave in.

"All right. I'll come. But we'll have to talk about it later. My mom's gonna start calling if I don't bring her any food soon."

"Yay!" Tammy shrieked. "I'll call you later tonight if you want. Maybe we can meet up tomorrow to see about your dress? Do you mind putting your number in my phone?"

She punched it in quickly, bid good-bye to Tammy and her friends, and proceeded to the counter to order a couple sandwiches. After picking up the order when they were ready, she left the shop, waving to Tammy as she went. When Kaelin got home, she and her mother ate dinner together. For about fifteen minutes, they ate in silence, but after a while Kaelin felt the need to tell her mother her about her plans for the week.

"So, I ran into Tammy O'Connor," she said casually, feeling like she was a teenager again, talking to her mom about how her day had been.

Her mother grunted in recognition of the name.

"She's getting married," added Kaelin, not sure that she should mention to who.

"Goo' fo' her," Yvonne mumbled around a mouthful of meat and cheese.

"I'm invited to the wedding. It's on Wednesday."

"Okay." Yvonne gulped down the food in her mouth. "Have fun. You'll have to tell me about it."

Kaelin's mother was obviously distracted, much more than she had been only an hour earlier. Something was bugging her and apparently she didn't want to talk too much that evening. The rest of their dinner was eaten in silence, and her mother went to sleep early, leaving Kaelin to sit up for a while with nothing to do and no one to talk to.

Of course, Kaelin was just as distracted. All she could keep thinking about was that her best friend from high school was marrying a Pittsburgh Penguins player, and now she was invited to the wedding. She was going to meet Paul Martin.

At the moment, it hadn't occured to her that she would be meeting more players than just the defenseman.