The Wall of Winnipeg and Me: A Novel

“You can’t.”

“I am,” I insisted calmly as I watched the man on my laptop screen. “Aiden told me to let you know.”

Trevor gave me a look that said he didn’t even remotely believe me, and I found myself not really giving much of a crap what he thought. While it took a lot for me to dislike someone, Aiden’s manager was one of those people I avoided like the plague whenever possible. Something about him just made me want to abort mission each time we had to interact. At one point, I really tried figuring out what it was about him I didn’t like, and it always came back to the same reasons: he was snobby, but mainly he just gave off massive amounts of asshole-ish vibes.

Leaning forward, Trevor planted his elbows on what I could assume was his desk. He tented his hands and hid his mouth behind them. He exhaled. Then he inhaled.

Maybe, just maybe, he was thinking about all the times he’d been a jerk to me and was regretting it; like all the times he’d chewed me out or yelled at me because Aiden wanted something done that frustrated him. That had been pretty much every week since I’d gotten hired.

But knowing him, that wasn’t the case. To regret something would mean you would have had to care about it at some point to begin with, and Trevor… the only thing he cared about was his paycheck. His body language, and the way he’d spoken to me even back when he’d first interviewed me, made it abundantly clear I didn’t rank very high on his list of priorities.

Me quitting was going to make his life slightly more difficult for a little while, and that he wasn’t a fan of.

Apparently, he was bothered a lot more than Aiden had been the night before when I sucked it up and told him the deep, dark secret I’d been withholding. “I want to thank you for everything you’ve done for me” —in hindsight, that had been pretty suck-up of me to say; he hadn’t actually done anything besides pay me, but oh well— “but I’d like for you to find someone to replace me.”

While I’d always known and accepted that we weren’t friends, I guess a small part of me had been foolish enough to think I meant just a little, tiny, microscopic something to him. I’d done a lot for Aiden over the course of the time we’d worked together. I knew I would more than likely miss the familiarity of working for him at least a little bit. Wouldn’t he feel the same way?

That answer to that had been a big, fat nope.

Aiden hadn’t even bothered looking at me after my admission. Instead, his attention had been focused on his bowl when he replied easily, “Let Trevor know.”

And that was that.

Two years. I’d given him two years of my life. Hours and hours. Months at a time away from my loved ones. I’d cared for him on the rare occasions he got sick. I was the one who had stayed with him at the hospital after his injury. I was the person who had picked him up after his surgery, and read up on inflammation and what I could feed him, that would help him heal faster.

When he lost a game, I always tried to make his favorite breakfast the next morning. I’d bought him a birthday present that I may or may not have left on his bed, because I didn’t want to make it awkward. You didn’t remember someone’s birthday and not get him a gift, even if he never thanked you.

What had he given me? On my last birthday, I spent it in the rain at a park in Colorado because he’d been filming a commercial, and wanted me to tag along. I’d eaten dinner by myself in my hotel room. What did I expect from him now?

There had been no begging me to stay—not that I would anyway—or even an “I’m sorry to hear that,” which I’d heard when I’d left every other job before this one.

Nothing. He’d given me nothing. Not even a damn shrug.

It had stung more than it should have. A lot more. On the other hand, I recognized that we weren’t soul mates, but it became even more apparent after that.

It was with that thought, that slight amount of bitterness in my throat at being so dispensable, that I swallowed and focused on my video chat.

“Vanessa, think about what you’re doing,” the manager argued through the camera.

“I have. Look, I’m not even giving you a two-week notice. Just find someone sooner than later. I’ll train them, and then I’m out.”

Trevor tipped his chin up and just stared forward at and through the computer’s camera, the hard glint of the hair product he used catching in the sunlight in his office. “Is this an April fools’ joke?”

“It’s June,” I said carefully. Idiot. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

His forehead furrowed at the same time his shoulders tensed, as if what I said was finally really sinking in. One eye peeked at me from over his fingers. “Do you want more money?” he had the nerve to ask.

Of course I wanted more money. Who didn’t? I just didn’t want it from Aiden. “No.”

“Tell me what you need.”

“Nothing.”

“I’m trying to work with you here.”

“There’s nothing to work with. There isn’t anything you can offer me that will get me to stay.” That was how dead set I was on not getting wrangled back in to the world of The Wall of Winnipeg. Trevor got paid for making things happen, and I knew if I gave him an inch, he would attempt to take a mile. It would probably be easier for him to convince me to stay instead of finding someone else. But I knew his tricks, and I wasn’t going to fall for his shit.

Picking up the glass of water sitting on the kitchen counter next to my tablet, I took a sip and studied him over the top of it. I could do this, damn it. I would do it. I wasn’t going to keep my job just because he was giving me the closest thing to puppy eyes pure evil was capable of.

“What can I do to get you to stay?” Trevor finally asked as he dropped his hands away from his face.

“Nothing.” If a slight bit of loyalty to Aiden and genuine worry had gotten me to stay since I realized I could afford to quit, the night before had cemented me leaving.

I didn’t want to waste any more time than I already had.

Another pained expression took over Trevor’s features. When we’d first met two years ago, he’d only had a couple of gray hairs scattered throughout his head. Now there were more than a couple, and it suddenly made so much sense. If I considered myself a fairy godmother, Trevor must have been seen as a god; a god who needed to make miracles happen out of the most dire of places.

And I wasn’t helping by quitting on who I was sure was one of the most difficult of his clients.

“Did he say something?” he asked suddenly. “Do something?”

I shook my head, not fooled at all by his act. He didn’t care. Before I’d asked him to call me—and he’d insisted we do a video chat instead—I had asked myself whether to tell him why I was quitting or not. It didn’t even take a second to decide. Nah, he didn’t need to know. “There are other things in my life I want to pursue. That’s all.”

“You know he’s stressed out about coming back after surgery. If he’s a little on edge, it’s normal. Ignore him,” Trevor added.

Normal? There were different standards for what ‘normal’ could be considered when dealing with professional athletes, especially athletes like Aiden who breathed and lived for his sport. He took everything personally. He wasn’t some burnout who played because he didn’t have anything else to do, and wanted to make money. Maybe I understood that better than Trevor.

Plus, if either one of us had more firsthand experience with the way Aiden had been since his Achilles tendon rupture, it was me. I’d witnessed it all up close and personal; I also knew how he usually got right before training camp started, and that was right around the corner too, adding on to the things he worried about. Trevor had worked for him longer, but he lived in New York and only visited a few times a year. Aiden only talked to him directly on the phone once a month, if that, since I was his scapegoat.

“I’m sure there’s at least a hundred other people who would love to work for Aiden. I really don’t think you will have a problem finding someone to replace me. Everything will be fine,” I told him smoothly.

Was there at least a thousand other people in the world who would love to work for Aiden Graves? Yes. Minimum.

Would Trevor have a problem finding a new assistant for Aiden? No.

The issue would be finding someone to stay who could deal with the long hours and his prickly personality.

“This isn’t going to be easy,” Trevor had said to me after the workforce agency had sent me his way. “Athletes are demanding. It’s basically part of the job requirement. Will you be able to handle it?”

Back then, I’d been working three jobs, sharing a tiny house with Diana and Rodrigo, and unable to sleep some nights because all I could dream about was the massive student loan debt I was swimming in. I would have done just about anything to get out of that situation, even if it meant dealing with someone who may or may not be a psycho by the way others portrayed him.

While Trevor hadn’t been lying—Aiden wasn’t that bad once you figured out what made him tick—at least he’d given me a warning of what I’d be facing.

A demanding, cranky, perfectionist, workaholic, arrogant, aloof, clean freak of a boss.

No biggie.

Aiden Graves needed an assistant, and I had been lucky enough to get the job.

At that point, I had a plan that worried me to death, and student loans that were giving me an ulcer. I’d thought it over a million times and concluded that working for him, while keeping my own business on the side and trying to grow it at the same time was the best way to move forward in my life, at least for a little while.

The rest was history.

Saving money and working seventy hours a week had all finally paid off. I saved enough to keep me afloat in case my business slowed down, and I had my goals to guide me. When things were tough, it was my aspirations and the hope they brought me, that kept me going.

So even on the days when Aiden had me standing behind him, envisioning myself stabbing him in the back because he wanted me to do something ridiculous, like rewash his sheets because I’d left them in the washer for too long, I always did what he needed. All I had to do was remember my student loans and my plans, and I persevered.

Until now.

“You’re killing me, Vanessa. You’re fucking killing me here,” Trevor literally moaned. Moaned. He usually just bitched and complained.

“It’ll be fine. He doesn’t care that I’m leaving. He probably won’t even notice,” I said, trying to be as understanding as I could and at the same time, not really giving much of a crap that he was sweating bullets.

The grimace on his face quickly dropped, a total act, and got replaced by a glare, making him look more like the manager I’d been forced to get to know, than the one who was attempting to backtrack and be nice after so long. He sniped, “I highly doubt that.”

I understood why I was a good fit for Aiden. I was pretty patient, and I didn’t hold his callus, picky nature against him. I knew how to handle crazy in all its forms thanks to my family, but maybe I’d just been expecting so much worse from him, and he’d never gone straight into anger-management zone. He was way too controlled for that.

Realistically though, especially after yesterday, I wasn’t going to hold my breath. Maybe I’d feel worse about quitting if Aiden was my friend or if Trevor had actually been nice to me, but neither one of them would remember me two months from now. I knew who cared about me and who meant something to me, and neither one of them were on my list… and sure, that made me feel a little bad. But survival of the fittest and all that crap, right?

Both Aiden and Trevor would dump me like a hot potato if our roles were reversed. I’d let my misguided sense of loyalty, paranoia, and self-doubt keep me shackled to my not-so-bad cell.

All Aiden needed was someone who could do what he wanted. Cook, clean, wash, fold, answer e-mails, call Trevor or Rob when he wanted things out of my jurisdiction, and post things on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Then there were the things I had to do when he traveled. It wasn’t anything crazy.

Anyone with a little bit of patience could do it.

But from the look Trevor pierced me with, he didn’t feel the same way. Mostly, I thought he was just being lazy. He blew out a breath, and started massaging his temples as the chat buffered and his image blurred for a moment. “Are you positive you want to do this? I can talk to him about reducing your hours…” His voice carried over the speaker even as the screen froze.

I only just barely managed not to ask him to let me think about it. “No.” I couldn’t. I wasn’t going to half-ass this opportunity in my life to go solo. I didn’t want to invite failure in the door by being hesitant.

“Vanessa…” he groaned. “You’re really doing this?”

This was exactly what I’d been working toward from the moment I finished school with my undergrad in graphic design. Graduating had been an uphill battle that sometimes felt like plain torture, and I’d done terrible, awful things to get my schooling done. It was why I had worked multiple jobs at once, why I now technically only had two, and why I had been sleeping four hours a night for the last four years and lived off the bare minimum. I took almost any and every job that hit my inbox and jobs that didn’t: book covers, web banners, posters, bookmarks, business cards, postcards, logos, T-shirt designs, commissioned pieces, tattoo designs. Everything.

“I’m positive.” I had to fight the urge to smile at how confident and determined I sounded even though I definitely didn’t feel that way.

Back at massaging his temples, Trevor sighed. “If that’s how you’re going to be, I’ll start looking for a replacement.”

I nodded and let a sense of hesitant victory tickle my throat. I wasn’t going to let that smart-ass comment at the beginning bother me. This was exactly how I was going to be.

He waved a hand in front of the screen. “I’ll let you know once I find someone.”

Without another comment, he logged off the chat like a rude jerk. He reminded me of someone else I knew with his lack of manners. If it wasn’t for Zac and some of the other Three Hundreds he’d introduced me to over the years, I would have figured everyone in their industry was self-absorbed. But no, it was only a few people, specifically the ones I had to surround myself with. Go figure.

It wasn’t going to be my problem anymore though, was it?

“Vanessa!” a familiar voice bellowed from somewhere upstairs.

“Yes?” I yelled back, exiting the app on my tablet, and wondering if he’d overheard my conversation with Trevor or not. I mean, he was the one who told me to call him in the first place, wasn’t he?

“Did you wash the sheets?” Aiden hollered from where I could only assume was his bedroom.

I washed his sheets Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and I had every week since getting hired. For someone who worked out almost every day of his life, and sweating had become as natural as breathing, he was religious about having ultra-clean sheets. I learned from the very beginning how important it was that his damn sheets were clean, so I never missed doing them. Ever. “Yes.”

“Today?”

“Yes.” Why the hell was he asking? I always… oh. I always left a piece of the chocolate peppermint patties he liked on his pillow—because it made me laugh—and I hadn’t put one on there this afternoon. The store had been out of them. I guess I couldn’t blame him for being uncertain, but I could blame myself for spoiling him. He’d never acknowledged my little gift, or told me to stop leaving them, so I hadn’t figured he cared. Now I knew better.

Aiden didn’t immediately respond, and I could already envision him humming to himself with uncertainty before sniffing the sheets to make sure I was telling the truth. When there wasn’t a response, I figured he confirmed I wasn’t lying. But then he started yelling again. “Did you pick up my clothes from the dry cleaner?”

“Yes. They’re in your closet already.” I didn’t flinch, roll my eyes, or have an annoyed tone. I had the self-control of a samurai sometimes. A samurai who wanted to go ronin.

I’d barely managed to put my tablet back into my purse when he hollered again. “Where are my orange runners?”

That time, I couldn’t help but cross my eyes. Dealing with him reminded me of being a little kid and asking my mom to help me find something after I’d looked about a total of five seconds. They were where he’d left them. “In your bathroom.”

I could hear movement upstairs. Zac hadn’t made his way back to Dallas yet, so it could only be the big guy looking for his tennis shoes, or when his Canadianisms kicked in—runners. I rarely ever touched his shoes if I didn’t have to. It wasn’t as if his feet smelled—strangely, they didn’t—but they did get sweaty, and I mean, really sweaty. He’d been training so hard the last two months, the sweat had reached an all-time high. My fingers tried not to go anywhere near them if it could be avoided.

I was in the middle of looking through a cookbook trying to decide what to make for dinner, when the thunder that followed a two-hundred–and-eighty-pound man jogging down the stairs started. Seriously, every time he came down the stairs any faster than a slow poke, the walls trembled. I wasn’t sure how the stairs survived. Whatever kind of materials the builder used on them, it had to be good stuff.

I didn’t need to turn around to know he’d made his way into the kitchen. The refrigerator door opened and closed, followed by the sound of him munching on something.

“Pick up some more sunblock for me. I’m almost out,” he said in a distracted tone.

I’d already ordered him some days ago, but I didn’t see the point in telling him it was cheaper to order it than to buy it at the store. “You got it, big guy. I’m taking two of your shorts to the seamstress later. I noticed when I was washing them that the hems were loose.” Considering he got half of his clothes specially made because ‘size behemoth’ wasn’t widely carried, I was a little unimpressed those same shorts already needed to get patched.

Juggling the pear he was eating and two apples in his other hand, he tipped his chin up. “I’m running some drills tonight. Anything I need to know before I leave?”

Fiddling with the leg of my glasses, I tried to think about what I had planned on telling him. “There’s a few envelopes I left on your desk this morning. I’m not sure if you saw them already or not, but they look important.”

That big handsome face went thoughtful for a second before he nodded. “Did Rob cancel the signing?”

I almost winced from thinking of the conversation with his agent, another asshole I wasn’t fond of. Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if his mom wasn’t fond of him either. Rob was that much of a dick. “I told him to, but he never called back to tell me if he did or not. I’ll find out.”

He nodded again, crouching that massive six-foot-four frame to pick up his duffel bag. “Make sure you do that.” He paused. “Leslie’s birthday is this month. Send a card and a gift card over, would you?”

“Your wish is my command.” In the entire time I’d worked for him, Leslie was the only person who got a gift from him. I couldn’t even be remotely jealous that I didn’t get at least a verbal “happy birthday” on mine. Not even Zac received anything, and I’d know, because if he did, I’d be the one buying the present. “Oh, I made those granola bars that you like in case you want to take some with you,” I added, pointing at the plastic container I’d left by the fridge.

He headed to where I’d indicated, opening the container and pulling out two wax-paper-wrapped bars before shoving all his snacks into his duffel bag. “Come by the gym tomorrow with the camera and my breakfast. I’m going in early and staying until lunch. ”

“Sure.” I had to make a mental note to set my alarm for half an hour earlier than usual. Most days when he was in Dallas during the offseason, Aiden did cardio at his house, had breakfast, and then left to do his weightlifting and other kinds of workouts with whatever trainer he’d deemed to honor with his presence. Some days, he woke up earlier and went straight to the gym.

The facility was located on the opposite side of town, so I’d either have to make him breakfast at my house and go straight there, or wake up even earlier to drop by his house, which was out of the way, and then head over there. No thanks. I barely survived on my usual four to five hours of sleep most nights. I wasn’t about to lose what little I had left.

I stepped back from the counter and grabbed the gallon of water I’d refilled earlier, holding it out for him, locking my gaze on his thick neck before forcing myself to look him in the eye. “By the way, I talked to Trevor about me leaving, and he said he’d start looking for someone else.”

Those dark orbs met mine for a second, only just a split second, cool and distant like always, before he looked away. “Okay.” He took the jug from me as he threw his bag over his shoulder.

Just as he reached the door that connected the garage with the kitchen, I called out, “Bye.”

He didn’t say anything as he closed the door behind him, but I thought he might have wiggled a finger or two. I was probably imagining it.

Who was I kidding? Of course I was imagining it. I was just being an idiot for even thinking there was a possibility he’d done otherwise. While I wasn’t the bubbliest person in the world, Aiden had me beat by a landslide.

With a resigned sigh, I shook my head at myself, and started making my way around the kitchen when my personal cell phone started ringing. Taking a quick peek at the screen, I hit the answer button.

“Herro,” I said, slipping the phone between my ear and my shoulder.

“Vanny, I don’t have time to talk. I have an appointment in a minute,” the bright voice on the other line explained quickly. “I just wanted to tell you Rodrigo saw Susie.”

Silence hung between Diana and me on the phone. Two moments, three moments, four moments. Heavy and unnatural. Then again, that was what Susie did best—messed things up.

I wanted to ask if she was sure it was Susie that her brother, Rodrigo, had seen, but I didn’t. If Rodrigo thought he saw her, then he had. She didn’t have the kind of face that was easy to mistake, even after so many years.

I cleared my throat, telling myself I didn’t need to count to ten, or even five. “Where?” My voice came out in a slight croak.

“In El Paso yesterday. He was visiting his in-laws this weekend with Louie and Josh, and said he saw her at the grocery store by the old neighborhood.”

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

Nope. That wasn’t enough.

I had to start counting all over again, all the way to ten the second time. A thousand different thoughts went through my head at the mention of Susie’s name, and they were all pretty terrible. Each and every single one of them. It didn’t take a genius to know what she was doing in the old neighborhood. Only one person who we both knew still lived there. I could still remember our old stomping ground so clearly.

It was where Diana and I had met. Back when I lived with my mom, Diana’s family had lived next door to us. They’d had the pretty house—the freshly painted blue one with white trim and a nice lawn—the dad who played with his kids outside, and the mom who kissed boo-boos. The Casillas were the family I had always wanted when I’d been a kid, when things had been at their worst, and the only thing I found consolation in was my notebook, not the mess within the walls of my house.

Diana had been my best friend for as long as I could remember. I couldn’t count the number of times I’d eaten over at their house with my little brother until Mom had lost custody of us. Diana had always done what my own family didn’t, and that was watch out for me. She was the one who had found me—Stop it. Stop it. It wasn’t worth the energy it took to think about things in the past I was over. It really wasn’t.

“Huh. I had no idea she was back.” My voice sounded just as robotic aloud as it sounded in my head. “I just talked to my mom a week ago and she didn’t say anything.” Diana knew I was referring to my real mom, the person who had actually given birth to me and my four other siblings, not my foster mom of four years who I still kept in touch with.

At the mention of my birth mom, Diana made a small noise I almost missed. I knew she didn’t understand why I bothered trying to have a relationship with her. Honestly, half the time I regretted it, but that was one of those rare things I never told the person I was closest to in the world because I knew what she would say and I didn’t want to hear it.

“I figured you would want to know in case you were planning on visiting,” she finally said in kind of a mutter.

I didn’t visit El Paso often, but she was right. I definitely wouldn’t want to go now that I knew who was there.

“I really have to go in a sec, Vanny,” my best friend quickly added before I could say anything. “But did you tell Miranda you’re leaving?”

The ‘Miranda’ went in one ear and out the other. I’d been calling him that for so long, it sounded so natural it didn’t even register. “I just told him yesterday.”

“And?”

She couldn’t just let me sulk in my reality. “Nothing.” There was no point in lying or making something up that would make me seem more important to Aiden than I was. While I didn’t tell anyone a whole lot about him because of the non-disclosure agreement I signed when I first started working for him, Diana knew enough to get why his name was saved on my personal phone under Miranda Priestly from The Devil Wears Prada.

“Oh,” was her disappointed response.

Yeah. I thought so too.

“He’ll miss you once you’re gone. Don’t worry about it.”

I highly doubted that.

“Okay, I gotta go, my client is here. Call me later, Van-Van. I get off work at nine.”

“I will. Love you.”

“Love you, too. Oh! And think about letting me dye your hair once you’re out of there,” she added before hanging up on me.

Diana’s comment made me smile and kept me smiling as I headed into Aiden’s office to tackle his inbox. Talking to Di always put me in a good mood. The fact she was one of the most easygoing people I’d ever met, had also soothed my soul more often than not. She never gave me shit for how much I worked because she worked a lot too.

But I told her the same thing my foster dad had told me when I was seventeen, and I told him I wanted to pursue my artwork: “Do what you need to do to be happy, Vané. Nobody else is going to watch out for you but you.”

It was the same belief I held onto when I first told my foster parents I wanted to go to school a thousand miles away, and what I told myself when I didn’t get a scholarship and my financial aid was merely a drop in the bucket to go to said school. I was going to do what I needed to do, even if I had to leave my brother— with his blessing—in the process. I’d told him the same thing when he was offered a scholarship for a college right after I moved back to Texas to be closer to him.

Sometimes it was easier to tell other people what they should do than to actually practice what you preached.

That had been the real root of my problem. I was scared. Scared that my clients were going to disappear and my work would dry up. Scared that one day I’d wake up and have absolutely no inspiration any more when I had my photo-editing program open. I was worried that what I’d worked so hard for would crash and burn and everything would go to hell. Because I knew firsthand that life could be taking you in one direction, and the next moment, you’d be going in a completely different one.

Because that was the way surprises worked—they didn’t tend to pencil themselves in to your schedule and let you know they were visiting ahead of time.