The Truth Is...

'I missed my flight.'

James couldn't help but let out a loud laugh at that, shaking his head as he read Claudia's message that had popped up on his phone just after he had turned it back on. He sat down in his locker room stall and sent her back a series of emojis- mostly the monkey covering his eyes and the cat crying with laughter ones.

However he didn't laugh when her next message came through.

'The next flight is in the morning.'

He let out a sigh and ran a hand through his unruly mop of brown hair, he knew he should cut it but that wasn't happening any time soon. He barely had the time to breathe lately, if he wasn't on the road or at the rink for home games or practices he was setting up various rooms in the house to get them ready for Claudia or he was out trying to learn how to live in Vegas.

The only thing that had gotten him through the last month was that little, okay large, star drawn in red permanent marker on the calender that sat on the kitchen counter. He had only bought the calendar for that reason and he knew it was going straight into the trash the second Claudia walked through the doors. Now it seemed that was happening later than he had been anticipating.

Sure, it was only another night, a few hours would go by fast enough but those few hours of change practically drained him on the spot.

Still, he tried to sound happy when he responded to her text, he didn't want her to get even more upset with herself for missing her flight.

'I guess I'll take you out for breakfast instead of dinner.'

'I'm soooo sorry. Call me when you get home so that I can explain?'

'Will do. Talk to you soon.'

James looked up when a wadded up ball of sock tape landed between his feet, over to Marc-Andre who had been the culprit and his brow raised as he asked, “Can I help you?”

“I asked you the same question like four times.” He stated and James rolled his eyes.

“Sorry, what did you want?”

When James glanced back at his phone Marc-Andre pointed out, “Your nose has been shoved in that thing since you sat down you know.”

“Yeah, it's Claudia.” James told him, stuffing his phone into the pocket of his jeans before he added, “She missed her flight.”

“Ooh... so... no big dinner tonight then, huh?” Cody asked, and James was beginning to realize that he was the nosey one on their team. He was also the obnoxious one.

“Nope, guess not.” James muttered as he got up from his stall and grabbed his wallet and keys, before he said, “Guess I'll go home and cancel the reservation.”

“You wanna come out for dinner with some of us?” Cody asked him, motioning to a few of the guys that were going.

James simply shook his head and said, “Nah, I'm actually kind of looking forward to a quite night.”

“Suit yourself, I'll be sure to bombard you with Snaps all night.” Cody stated with a grin.

James' eyebrow raised and he couldn't help but state, “I don't have Snapchat.”

“Insta videos then.” Cody told him.

“I'll be sure to delete my account when I get in my car.” James joked, and he heard the guys laughter as he left the locker room and headed to his vehicle in the player's parking lot.

He had only recently stopped using his navigation in the car to drive to and from the arena, something he was a little proud of, but the drive home seemed longer than usual until people started honking and he realized he was driving well below the speed limit. Once he sped up he was pulling into the driveway before he realized it.

The dogs greeted him, as they always did when he came home, and James was sure to give them each a couple of treats to occupy them with before he ventured down into the 'creepy murder basement' as Claudia referred to it as. He spent half an hour organizing the at home dark room he had built her with plenty of help from Google and even a photographer in the area and when his phone buzzed in his pocket he remembered he was supposed to have called Claudia.

As he headed upstairs he ignored her message asking if he was alive and clicked on the little phone icon on her contact tab, it rang only twice before she picked up the phone and her cheerful voice filled his ears, “I was beginning to wonder what happened to you, thought maybe you stopped for a burger on your way home since I now you were probably gonna ask me to cook tonight.”

James let out a laugh and it nearly melted Claudia's heart to hear it. Their extra month apart had very nearly killed her, she hadn't even been aware just how deep in this she was until then. All she wanted to do lately was call him, she had probably been driving him crazy but she missed him so much all she could think about was the sound of his voice, especially the sound of it first thing in the morning or late at night when it was a little deeper, more groggy, a little scratchy.

“By the way I'm so not wearing underwear on the flight... you know, easy access for our quicky in the car before we get home.” She informed him and he let out another loud laugh, he would never admit it but he had missed her probably even more than she so obviously missed him.

“I might not make it to the car, ever done it in an airport bathroom?” James joked, and her laugh made him smile. As he got comfortable on the couch he asked her, “So... you missed your flight?”

“I missed both of them, actually.” Claudia told him, adding in an explanation, “I, of course, didn't leave the hotel early enough and who would run into construction detours when they're already late but me? So then they bumped me to a later flight and I realized I left my camera at the hotel and thought I could make it back in time but you know, obviously not. I was an absolute mess today.”

James smiled to himself as he lifted his feet up onto the coffee table and told her, “I just want you here already, for good.”

“I know, me too.” She mused softly, adding in, “But one more sleep.”

“You know I'm not a child, right?” James asked her.

Not at all to his surprise her rebuttal was, “That's debatable even on the best of days.”

After a laugh escaped his lips James told her, “Don't miss your flight tomorrow or I'm changing the locks on the house and pretending you don't exist.”

“You would never be able to do that... who would cook your meals for you?” She asked him, no doubt a wicked grin present on her face, James could practically hear it.

“I mean... I also wouldn't do it because blue balls sucks.” He stated, and when she practically snorted he added, “I am a multifaceted man, if you must know.”

“You're something all right.” She told him, and James heard muffled noise on her end of the phone line before she told him, “Alright, I should get going, you know, get to sleep now so that I make it to the airport on time tomorrow. I'll see you around ten.”

“Or three, you know, just covering all the bases in case you miss another flight.” James joked.

He smiled when she told him, “Hey now, haven't you ever heard that the third time is the charm?”

“Yeah, yeah. Get to bed so that you actually get your butt out here tomorrow, I'm going crazy Claud.” James told her, he knew she would take it as a joke but he wasn't particularly trying to be funny. Two and a half months apart was far too long for him.

“Alright, goodnight. Love you.”

James had been caught off guard by her casually throwing out the love word, something they had never even come close to saying to each other before that he didn't have an immediate response. He heard Claudia suck in a breath of air, and after a few painfully long seconds of silence he heard the line click and the dial tone.

Did she really just tell him that she loved him? And did she mean it? Was that really something that just slipped out? Was James ready to say that to someone who wasn't his mother or sister? Had he even ever said it to anyone other than them before?



Claudia had monstrous butterflies in her stomach from the time she hung up the phone with James to when she stepped out of the airport and into the Las Vegas climate. No, she should clarify, they hadn't started out monstrous but the more time she had to dwell on her goodbye to James earlier on the phone the more and more intense they got.

She could have vomited the second she stepped out into fresh air, instead she took a few deep breaths and kept her suitcase close by her as she tried to flag down a taxi. When one parked in front of her she allowed him to load her suitcase into the trunk before she got into the backseat and gave the driver James' address.

While he drove she dug through her purse for the key she was absolutely positive she had tucked away inside, locating several containers of lip balm and even a mascara and an old roll of film that had apparently never been developed but no key. The panic rose within her as the meter on the dash of the cab got higher and higher, signifying that they were getting closer and closer to her destination and it was three in the morning and she couldn't find her key to get into the house.

For a second she thought about calling James, waking him up now so that she didn't have to be outside, alone in the dark but then her fingers brushed against the distinct cut of a metal key and she let out a sigh in relief as she pulled it out.

When she had cut their call short earlier after her absolutely mortifying proclamation she had immediately gone back to the airport, turned in the keys for her rental car and paid an absolutely ridiculous amount of money for the red eye flight from Nashville to Las Vegas. She had gotten there only an hour before the flight was supposed to leave and so with her rush through a rather slow security line she hadn't had much time to think about the ending of she and James' phone call.

However, the flight was four hours long and her cell phone had only five percent battery life so she had a very long flight to think about what she had said and she had come to the conclusion that she should be legally required to wear a muzzle.

The last thing Claudia had been intending to say was the love word, sure she had thought about saying it so many times that she figured her heart and mouth had finally conspired against her and done it for her if only to get her to stop analyzing it. But that was so, so not the way she had wanted to say those words for the first time to him.

That was supposed to be a special moment in their relationship, something she would over analyze to the point where she had it all planned out so that it was spontaneous and special but came at the exact right time. Certainly not casually tossing it out on the phone and then hanging up almost directly after.

She knew James and she was terrified that her little slip of mouth would send him running for the hills. No, not running sprinting.

Claudia was sure, now that she had all that time to think about it and agonize over it, that he had told her at one point, perhaps earlier in their friendship that he had never said that to any female that didn't share his last name. So given the fact that he had never had a relationship that had seen outside of a bedroom in the years they had been friends she was sure that hadn't changed any time soon.

Basically she had tossed out the most meaningful words two people share like it was nothing to a guy who probably didn't want to hear them any time soon.

Right now Claudia had decided that she was the one who self-sabotaged, not Lucca.

When the driver pulled into the driveway of James' home Claudia noted the fact that every light but the one in the foyer was off, and the bulb outside the front door must have been broken because it wasn't on but she knew James turned it on every night. She paid for her cab, got her own luggage out of the back and approached the front door, pulling the glass door open and sliding her key into the lock.

“Well I guess it's a good sign he didn't change the locks.” She muttered to herself as she stepped into the house, pulling her suitcase in behind her carefully and quietly.

She slipped out of her shoes and she cringed when she bumped into the table by the closet and knocked over a picture frame. She picked the frame up and stood as still as she could, listening for any movement upstairs but not even the dogs barked. She wondered if anyone was even home, maybe she had scared him off so much he had taken the dogs and took off so she couldn't find him.

Setting the picture frame down Claudia locked the front door and she left her suitcase in the foyer as she carefully wandered through the house in the dark. She slid her hands along the wall in the living room where she knew the light switches were and she flicked the lights on, screaming loudly when she caught sight of James, standing in nothing but boxer briefs holding an umbrella like it was a baseball bat.

From the surprise of finding her in the house and not a thief and her scream James let out one of his own and both dogs started barking from upstairs, James could hear their heavy feet pounding against the hardwood as they came to investigate what was going on downstairs.

James muttered, “Really great guard dogs you two are.”

Claudia stiffled a giggle, and she motioned to what he was holding in his hands, asking him in amusement, “You were gonna throw an umbrella at me?”

James' cheeks flushed bright red and he laughed at himself before he explained, “I don't have a bat, I thought someone broke in.”

“Yeah, making that ruckus wasn't exactly part of my whole sexy surprise thing.” Claudia told him with a smile and his eyebrow raised as he failed to understand what she was trying to tell him.

In fact, it didn't even appear like her words registered with him because all he asked her was, “What are you doing here? It's like three in the morning.”

“Yeah, I paid an obscene amount of money to get on a red eye because I was kind of afraid I may have sent you packing with that whole... phone call thing.” Claudia told him honestly, her cheeks flushed as she fidgeted with the ties to her trench coat jacket.

“Oh... right... that.” James fumbled with his words, his cheeks equally as red as Claudia's as he remembered that particular moment. He hadn't meant to brush it off but he changed the subject out of pure anguish, “What was that about some sexy surprise?”

Claudia expected that, but she couldn't deny that the way he so easily dismissed what she had said struck a hurtful chord within her. Still she pushed that out of her mind, reminding herself that she had completely blind-sided him and expecting him to say it back just because she had allowed her mouth to speak without communicating to her brain was unfair.

So she smiled and told him, “Alright, so this is totally cheesy and I'm copying like every rom-com out there but... who doesn't love a good welcome home present?”

James watched her, eyebrow raised as she reached for the ties to her coat. His eyes followed her hands as they slowly undid the knot at the centre of her coat and when the ties fell to her sides the front of her coat pulled apart enough that he could see a whole lot of skin, he noted the fact that from even the little bit that he could see now it didn't appear that there was anything covering the parts of her he particularly enjoyed and had missed.

That thought was confirmed when her coat slipped off, pooling at the floor by her platform sandals, red in color, for some odd reason he noted the fact that her toes were painted black, before his eyes travelled up her tanned legs, her toned stomach, right up to her face again, meeting her coy smile with a grin of his own.

“I think I need to watch more rom-coms.”