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Chapter thirty-seven

Keala

Y ou’ve been avoiding me,” Ikaika said through his teeth as he smiled at the camera, Keala tucked into his side with a similar grin on her face.

It was family day for the Sirens, and since Keala had agreed to do social media, she was the one handling all the pre-game content on the field. Her teammates were teaching their parents choreography for videos that would go up this week, as well as photos of all the girls and their families.

Keala’s parents were late, but Ikaika had stepped in. The Sentinels loved any photo opportunity with them together anyway.

Before she could respond, someone yelled, “Get Ikaika a football. KayKay, shake your poms!”

Someone tossed a football to him, and Keala picked her poms up, shaking them for the photo.

“Keeks.”

She looked at him, not ready for this conversation. He must have read it in her face because he yelled, “We’re going to need a few minutes. Does anybody else want to jump in?”

Ikaika walked to the sideline. Before she followed him, she yelled to Nova, “Can you take over? Just keep filming everyone learning choreo—that’ll help me a ton.”

Nova gave her a thumbs up. Angelica glared at her.

When Keala stopped in front of Ikaika, his arms were crossed and it was clear she wasn’t going to get away from this conversation like she’d hoped.

Ikaika was right, she’d been avoiding him. She had been staying at her parents’ house all week, keeping busy by taking on two extra shifts and practicing with the girls or at the facility every night.

“I don’t know if now is a good time to talk about this,” she finally said.

Ikaika looked around, then dropped his voice. “Is this about Landon? Did he do something? I know you were excited about going to visit his family, but if things were weird…”

Keala shook her head, trying not to picture him. Something she’d actively focused on all week—anything but him.

“Are you sure? Because he’s been in a horrible mood, moping and shit.”

She closed her eyes, feeling them burn. “No, he didn’t do anything. I’m the one who ended things.”

“Why?”

“I needed space.”

“Space from what? If it’s from Landon, then I’ll tell him to stay out of the apartment. You don’t have to stop coming home because of that.”

Keala tucked her hands under her armpits, hoping it would stop her fidgeting. She looked everywhere except at him.

She’d planned to go home soon, get back to how things were before, but she’d needed some time to cool down and keep her head above the ocean of guilt that tried to drown her.

Six years, and Ikaika still struggled with Malia’s passing. Of course he did. But after the accident, it was clear he was still easily triggered, and the last thing she wanted to be was a trigger for him. Telling him what had been eating her alive…she didn’t know how he would handle it. That’s why she’d been working through the guilt on her own.

Taking her silence as an answer, he murmured, “So it’s not from him then.” Ikaika sighed. “Keala, what the hell is going on?”

“I…I fucked up. I switched shifts to go to LA…and if I’d been at the hospital, things would have been different.”

“Things…What things? Why are you talking in riddles?”

Keala took a deep breath. Hoping to keep her explanation vague, she said, “There was a pregnant patient. She came in with concerning symptoms. They operated under an assumption, but if I’d been there…” Maybe it would have gone differently, even if no one else agreed with her.

She waited for his expression to turn dark, to take on that hollowed, intensely sad look. For his light to dim.

Nothing. He just frowned. “And what you took from that was…that it was your fault for doing something for you for once?”

“I—what? Did you hear what I said? It was just like…”

“Malia, yes.” He swallowed. “Keeks, you have the biggest heart of anyone I know, but even you can’t save everyone. I’m so sorry that happened to another family, and I’m not questioning your abilities, but who’s to say things would have been different?”

“ Me . If my patient is pregnant, I’m always on the lookout for those symptoms. To make certain I don’t let something like that happen to anyone else.” Quieter, she said, “To make sure no one else goes through what you did.”

Ikaika put a hand on each of her biceps, squeezing softly. “Did you talk to someone at the hospital about this?”

She nodded.

“And?”

“They said there was nothing I could have done if I’d been there. The obstetrician got down there right away and asked all the questions she could, then operated without realizing what the woman’s condition was.”

He was quiet, staring at her with concern. Keala shifted back and forth on her feet, looking away. Gently, he asked, “Then why are you blaming yourself?”

“Because I’ve spent years making sure to keep watch. I never wanted anybody to go through what you have,” she reiterated. “I was terrified that if I came home and tried to keep it from you, you’d see the guilt pulling me under, and then I’d have to explain. You’re still dealing with Malia’s loss. I—I—” Keala stared up at the sky, willing her tears away. Her makeup was nearly done and she wouldn’t have time to fix it later if it smeared.

“Keala. Look at me.” She listened. “I am begging you to stop living your life for other people. Everyone has made it clear that even if you hadn’t changed shifts, even if you’d been there, the outcome would have been the same. You can’t keep putting your life on hold for something you hate. Something that’s slowly killing you.”

Her brain moved like molasses, still deciphering how Ikaika was taking this so well. She’d expected him to go quiet, decide not to suit up for the game, take some time for himself. Hell, the thought he might ask her to move out had entered her head before she’d recognized he wasn’t like that. Instead, his words were similar to Landon’s when he’d pleaded with her to stay.

“Keeks, have you been eating? Sleeping?”

No. She’d barely slept in the week since she’d returned to San Jose. And like nothing had changed, the couple of times Keala had needed to stop by to grab something at the apartment— when she’d known Ikaika wouldn’t be there—there had been food left in the fridge for her, sans a note.

It made her heart hurt just to think about it. At the start of the week, she’d been able to eat a little, but as Sunday had approached and she’d known she’d have to see Landon again, nothing had been staying down. Not the food he’d made her, not her carrots, not even her Pedialyte or protein shakes. Anxiety had slammed through her every time she’d tried, and then she’d ended up throwing it all up again.

It had been a tough few days, especially with how much energy she’d expended at the hospital and dance.

“I’m okay,” she lied.

He recognized it immediately, raising an eyebrow. “Come home, please. If, even after recognizing that you couldn’t have changed anything, you don’t want to be with Landon, that’s fine. I’ll make sure he stays out of your way. But come home. I’ve missed you. And I’m convinced you won’t take care of yourself unless someone else forces you to.”

Keala blinked, still reconciling. Someone called her name from across the field, but she hardly registered it.

If even Ikaika was okay with this…maybe she could find a way to forgive herself too. And maybe, instead of using her guilt to drown out the ache of missing Landon, it was finally time to think through her options when it came to him.

But she didn’t have that time now.

“I’ll be back after the game,” she promised.

He pulled her into a hug. “Good. I love you. Do you need me for anything else?”

Keala saw Nova waving at her over Ikaika’s shoulder and pulled away. “Unless you want to get roped into dancing before your warm-up, I’d head back to the locker room.” She gave him a reassuring smile when he shot her another concerned look. “I’m good, I promise. I love you. Go kick ass.”

He nodded and jogged off the field.

The rest of her social media work and their practice flew by. When it was time to line up in the tunnel for the pregame dance, Keala felt fatigue settling in her bones. She put on a smile anyway.

The sound of cleats on concrete made her turn. Instant regret.

Seeing Landon on the field during last week’s game had been brutal. Seeing him now in this confined space, so close and yet so far, was excruciating.

Her eyes were drawn to him like magnets. His helmet was off, hair in complete disarray, and when he finally looked at her, she saw an almost hollow quality to his cheeks and under his eyes. Her first thought was to run to him, jump into his arms, and kiss him. Tell him how proud of him she was after the way he’d played last week. Tell him how much she missed him and how she couldn’t stand to be away from him.

But she remembered where they were and why she’d ended things in the first place, even if she was rethinking it all.

He looked haggard beyond belief, and when their eyes locked, she realized how shattered he seemed. She thought he was about to walk over, eyebrows drawn like he couldn’t fathom doing anything but touching her, making sure it was truly her.

He seemed heartbroken and looked as horrible as she felt.

She would have looked like that too if she hadn’t slathered a disgusting amount of makeup onto her face. She had looked like that all week; she was sure of it because her mother hadn’t made a single comment about her job. If she had, Keala would have broken down, something she’d been trying hard not to do.

His coach yelled something that echoed through the tunnel. Landon looked at her one last time before running out onto the field for a short practice, his hand barely grazing hers as he went by. He’d been so good about giving her space, keeping his distance, only communicating with the food he left for her.

This was the first time they had touched in eight days, and heat shot through her body at the contact. Like every individual cell was calling out for him to come back.

Zoe, who’d gotten a call about the situation the night Keala had flown back to San Jose, shot her a worried look, stepping closer as if to protect her. Keala was lucky Angelica was at the front of the line, talking to Jordy. She didn’t miss the look Cora sent her though, and her stomach turned as she hooked pinkies with Zoe and focused on her breathing.

She couldn’t think about him anymore. It was going to be a long, grueling day, and she couldn’t start it off feeling even more shit than she already did.

After the team came back, she and the Sirens went out and performed their pregame dance. Keala felt shaky the whole time, but she attributed it to her heart still picking up the pieces of her own mistakes.

She couldn’t think about eating the lunch provided to them, her stomach in knots.

Game time came quickly, and before she knew it, she was back on the field, shaking her poms, throwing her hair around, and smiling like it was what she’d been born to do. Baltimore came out strong, but the Sentinels pushed back hard.

Right around the end of the first quarter, Keala’s vision began to blur. Breathing became difficult. She was dizzy but put all her energy into each movement, watching Zoe for her cues.

Arms extended up, then dropped down. Left pom to her waist, right elbow to her side. Shake poms as arms move to low V, jazz walk to the next formation.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight , she counted in her head as she hit each beat. Something still felt wrong, but she powered through, terrified that if she made the smallest misstep, she would lose the last good thing in her life weeks before she was supposed to.

During the break between the first and second quarter, their group met up with Jordy’s in the end zone to do one of their four pieces. It was the one Keala had choreographed, so she smiled a little brighter, knowing the cheers of the crowd were because she’d done a good job.

She nailed a high kick, then took Zoe’s cue to spin, cueing Carol to her left. Right as she began dance-running toward their next formation, her blurred vision went dark.

The sound of thousands of gasps was the last thing she heard before she blacked out.