HI! I swear I'm still here and that I deeply apologize for not updating for two months and then when I did, I uploaded the wrong chapter. That was a chapter from a different story. I am so sorry about that. Thanks to everyone who is still interested in this story.

Chapter 25: Worrying

Lizzy pulled a patio chair over to where the girls were sitting and sat down next to them. "Are you okay?" Julie asked.

"Learned a lot last week, some not sure I like," Lizzy answered as the boys set up for another play.

"About yourself?" Julie asked.

"No, about my grandfather, and actually, I guess a little about myself."

"Can we help?" Connie asked. Though the two brunettes didn't really get along, they were both Ducks and respected that, meaning Ducks stuck together and if one was in trouble it was up to the rest of them to help out.

"I don't know. I feel like I'm going through an identity crisis. It's no secret that my dad is a lawyer and that my oldest brother plays pro hockey. From that, most of you can figure that I'm from a pretty well off family. I've always known that and that money doesn't make a person. I feel like sometimes Guy and you and Charlie are richer than I will ever be. Sure, money makes things easy and gains some system of respect, but it doesn't make you a good person."

"Lizzy, we've always know that you could rival Banksie when it comes to financial wealth but we, like you, know that it's not about money. Sometimes you may go a little too far when you get us to do things we don't want to do but you'd never put us in danger. None of us fear you or judge you. So what if you've got money? You're a good person and you would do anything for anyone on this team. Even me despite how we act at times," Connie said.

"But—" Lizzy started.

"Can I have some of that?" Guy asked, motioning to Connie's lemonade. All three girls looked up as he had appeared out of nowhere. Connie handed it over and gave him an expectant look. "What? We've shared things more intimate than a glass of lemonade." Connie jerked her head towards Lizzy. Guy looked her over noting the dejected and unsure look on her face. "Hey, guys!" he called, getting the rest of the teams' attention. "Time out." Everyone turned towards him. "Our brilliant motivational speaker needs a pep talk." Lizzy was famous for her motivational speeches. She always knew just what to say to get them up and working. It's part of why she worried so much about being manipulative. They came over and Fulton grabbed Lizzy's hand pulling her up out of her chair and sitting down in it before pulling her down sideways on his lap.

"What's wrong, oh motivator?" Fulton asked smirking.

"I don't know. I guess I'm scared."

"Our can-do Lizzy is scared of something?" Averman asked.

"Shut up, Averman," Adam said. Lizzy cuddled against Fulton and blinked up at him.

"Is this about your grandfather? Did he say something to you? I'll kick his butt if he did," Fulton said. Lizzy smiled and tried not to laugh.

"What happened?" Portman asked as he and the rest of the guys dropped down to sit around the girls' chairs.

"I'm not sure I should be talking about this," Lizzy said, toying with her fingers.

"Hey, no one here is going to judge you," Charlie said.

"Yeah, come on, I'll sit on anyone who tries to judge you," Portman added.

"I still feel like I'm about to complain about something I have no right to complain about. We should be talking about how your summers have been, our plans for next year, not about ... me being a brat." Her eyes avoided the team, especially Connie sitting right next to her. Of all their teammates, Connie was the most judgmental, even if she didn't mean to be. She knew it could be worse, like if Jesse Hall had been there.

"You feel like you're being a brat?" Fulton asked. He twisted the ends of her hair between his fingers giving it a soft tug.

Lizzy took a deep breath. "Would it make you feel better if I told you that we all had boring summers and that yours is probably more interesting?" Dwayne asked.

"Not really," Lizzy answered.

"Liz, come on. None of us did anything nearly as interesting as meeting our grandparents for the first time in 16 years. Tell me what happened," Charlie pushed.

"Hey, no secrets remember?" Fulton said softly. "You'll always be my Lizzy."

"Don't wanna talk about it, you ain't gotta. We're here to help though," Portman told her. Out of the corner of her eye she could see his hand flex like he was going to reach out to her but kept himself from it.

Lizzy took another deep breath and slowly let it out. "It's no secret that my dad's a lawyer. White collar crime and all, so he's pretty well off. On top of that, my brother plays pro hockey for Detroit."

"So you're worried about what? Becoming spoiled?" Russ asked.

"Dude," Portman snapped. Russ looked at Portman and instantly simmered. The boy looked angry and ready to make the darker-skinned boy pay for any rude or insensitive statements.

"I'm worried about how you'll react when you find out it's not just them. I found out my Gram, who is very sweet, is the head chef at the most popular high-end restaurant in Savannah and my grandfather, he owns a pro baseball stadium. Minor league. It's like—" Lizzy stopped short.

Adam moved from the ground to sitting on the edge of Connie's lawn chair. "Look, I get it." His fingers slipped under her chin and gently lifted until her blue eyes met his. "People find out you're loaded and it changes things but having money hasn't changed who you are. You're still really sweet, when you need to be, and you still care about this team. That's not going to change no matter how much is in your bank account," Adam explained as he dropped his hand.

The rest of the team shared looks. Then Portman spoke. "Did your opinion of me change when you found out what my parents did for a living?" Portman asked.

Lizzy's eyes shifted the big enforcer. She opened her mouth to say something then thought about it before shaking her head. "Not really. I mean slightly because your mother had to tell me and because of the context under which she told me about it, but after that, when you found out I knew, you were the same old Goose. You didn't really change," Lizzy said after a moment.

Then Charlie spoke. "And I can guarantee you that you won't either. Having more money isn't going to change how you treat this team and it's not going to make you think you're better than us now. In certain ways you are better than us, but you'd never act like it. And God knows you're not too good for us," he told her. "Look, no one cares about how much money you have. All we care about is how you treat us. You've never turned your back on us, despite us probably pushing you to the edge where you should have, but you care about us and—"

"As long as that never changes, we don't care if you're a starving artist or a cake-eating preppy," Guy finished for his captain. Lizzy looked around the team to see most of them agreed.

Then Fulton turned her head back towards him. "And even if they turn their back on you and you do start acting like all those rich kids we go to school with, I will always see you as that six-year-old little girl with chocolate all over her face begging me to play hockey with her. You're always going to be my Lizzy," Fulton said. Lizzy smiled but the wrinkles on her forehead told him she wasn't completely sold by his reassuring words.

"And I've always told you that it's you and me against the world and that will always be true whether you're dirt floor poor or sitting on a solid gold throne," Adam added. Lizzy peered at him, biting her lower lip.

"Really?" Lizzy asked.

"Yeah."

Lizzy shoulders slumped in relief. To Fulton it appeared that she finally agreed with them or was, at least, pacified by their pep talk. "You okay now?" Charlie asked.

"I'm fine, go back to playing football," Lizzy answered. The boys began getting up.

"I think I'll sit this one out," Fulton told them.

"Just don't break my mama's chair, kay?" Dwayne told him.

"Last time he broke a chair, he was eight," Lizzy said.

"And that was your fault," Fulton answered, wrapping both arms around Lizzy and pulling her to lie back against him.

"Nope," Lizzy smirked, "your fault for listening to me."

"How's that?" Adam asked.

"We were playing in my basement when we came across my old booster chair. I could still fit in it so I dared him to try," Lizzy explained.

"More like pestered me until I agreed," Fulton sassed.

"If you really didn't want to I would've stopped but you thought it was fun."

"Kinda," he reluctantly agreed.

Lizzy fell silent as she smiled thinking about it. He had tried to wedge himself into the small chair and it had split down the back. The rest of the boys went back to their game. "Take a walk with me," she said out of nowhere.

"Okay," Fulton said. He removed his arms from her and they walked down towards the fence and watched the horses graze in the pasture.

"I've been ... thinking lately. Thinking about why I've been so self-conscious."

"Oh yeah? Is it because of Matt? You've been a little off since you found out he wasn't actually dead," Fulton suggested. A few weeks after coming back to Eden Hall, Lizzy found out that her oldest brother hadn't been killed in a pickup hockey game like her father had told her in the seventh grade but rather had been picked up by the Detroit Red Wings.

"Maybe a little. I've always cared more about what he thought than anyone else. But there's something bigger and I think it's got something to do with McGill and you and Adam."

"You can tell me anything you know."

"I know," Lizzy answered as Saber ambled over. Fulton took a few steps back. "You scared of this big guy?" Lizzy asked, glancing at her friend as she began to stroke the horse's nose.

"It's a big horse," Fulton answered.

"He won't hurt you, I promise. Anyway, you remember when you convinced me to go to the mall and talk to McGill?"

"Yeah, not sure I ever really apologized for that," Fulton told her.

"Wasn't your fault and I'm not really upset about that. I think what bothers me the most is how I was set up. The way Adam convinced you and didn't feel guilty about it. I think about what would have happened had it been me pushing you or Charlie and how I would have felt. I want to think that I'd never do that or that I would at least feel guilty but I don't know. Would I feel guilty? Am I a terrible person? Okay, I know I'm not a terrible person, and neither is Adam really, he's one of the sweetest guys I know with a wicked sense of humor, but he tricked me into meeting with McGill even though he knew how angry I was at him and that I never wanted to see him again. He says that when you manipulate people and it comes from a place of love that it's not really manipulation, but it is. That's not the kind of person I want to be. I want to be supportive and I want to be a great friend, not just to you and Adam, but to everyone. The more I think about it, the more I keep thinking that I have manipulated a lot of you in the past. Not just for good reasons, but for my benefit too. The more I think about that event and how Adam felt, it makes me think about everything I've done before that, especially getting you to talk to Port, and it puts it in perspective. Maybe I have been doing something wrong."

Fulton swallowed hard. He really didn't want to approach the horse, he had heard what they could do, but his best friend needed him. He stepped up and slipped a hand over her shoulder. "Okay, so maybe you did manipulate me into doing some things I was uncomfortable with but you never had any ill intention. Even with Portman—"

"I made you uncomfortable so I could be comfortable; so I could have some peace of mind—"

"So you could move on," he flat out stated. "You were hurt and were unsure of the truth. There was only one way to get it out of him. That's why I agreed. You would put yourself in an uncomfortable position if I needed you to and you have. Yes, manipulation can be very bad and when taken to the extremes, it can hurt people but you've never done that. None of us blame you for anything. Anyway you can't go back. You just have to move on. Make better choices and not do it again, not that I believe you did anything wrong, but you know."

"Yeah, I guess you're right, but I still feel bad about it."

"You might for a while. Like I said, moving on and changing how you act, how you deal with people now, will help put that behind you," Fulton told her.

Lizzy turned to face him, looking up into his greyish blue eyes. "And this is the side more people need to see from you. If they did, you wouldn't be as scary," she told him.

"I like being scary; helps me protect my team."

Lizzy smiled and they wandered over to the rest of the team. They played football a while longer before showering off in the barn, then headed to lunch. They spent the afternoon on the back patio, under the overhang, talking about their summers and like Charlie stated, none of them seemed quite as interesting as Lizzy's, not that she liked being the most interesting one.

"You know, that's one thing I like about not having so many girlfriends, you don't have to worry about them coming over to just drool over your older brothers. I'm sure my brothers appreciated that," Lizzy said after Julie finished her story of the time she had some of her Maine friends over to reconnect and they couldn't stop staring at her brother and his friends.

"Hey, Liz, you remember the first time I came over and met your brothers?" Dwayne asked.

"You mean when they threatened you?"

"Sorry, the third time, and your brother had all those friends over," Dwayne said.

"The time I had just gotten out of the shower. If it makes you feel any better you weren't the only one staring," Lizzy said. There were several catcalls. "We were in eighth grade and Ben had just challenged me to a race. I was sweaty and dirty so I took a shower not knowing that Ben had already invited a bunch of his friends over." Lizzy rolled her eyes.

After a cookout for dinner, Dwayne's father let them build a bonfire and handed the matches to Lizzy who lit the fire in under ten seconds. It took about ten minutes to get it going, but that was enough time for Dwayne's mom to bring out s'mores stuff and Dwayne's guitar. "So what are we up for tomorrow?" Charlie asked, looking at Dwayne.

"The local pool isn't too far from here, I think I can convince Rosie to swing by and help me and Lizzy take you guys down there," Dwayne answered.

"I wish I could, but it's a 17 hour drive and I'm not making that drive in one day. I'll have to leave tomorrow to get back on time," Lizzy said regretfully.

"Bummer," Kenny said.

"You're not avoiding going to the pool, are you?" Charlie asked.

"Of course not," Lizzy said.

"Lizzy, you know what my parents do for a living," Portman said, turning to look at her. She nodded. "So you know how the rest of us are getting back to Minnesota, right?"

"Yeah, a jet," Lizzy answered.

"My parents' private jet. And since you know, and the rest of the team deserves to know, that my parents own a large car company that does a lot of work for athletes, you know they have to be ready to fly out to look at cars. How do you think they get them back to Chicago? They don't trust many people, so they got a plane big enough and specially designed to fit a car in the cargo hold. I'll just call the pilot and have him put your car in there when we get to the airport on Monday. You'll fly back with the rest of us," Portman explained simply.

"Wait, your parents own a car dealership?" Russ asked.

"Don't judge a book by its cover. I'd look just as at home in a monkey suit." Portman rolled his eyes.

"You'd do that for me?" Lizzy asked.

"Of course. For the team," Portman said.

"Thanks, Goose." Lizzy smiled that smile that Portman loved so much and his heart melted. It didn't matter what the rest of the team thought of his preppy upbringing, all that mattered was that he had made her happy.

"Sing for me, Lizzy," Fulton suggested softly.

"No," Lizzy whined.

"Please," Fulton answered in the same tone. Then he broke out his puppy dog eyes.

"I hate you," Lizzy said.

"No, you don't," Fulton answered, grinning as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Lizzy rolled her eyes as Dwayne began playing a song she knew the lyrics to by heart.

When they went to bed that night, Lizzy felt ten times better about her summer and about everything she had learned about from her grandparents.

Okay so the previous version of this chapter had Portman asking Lizzy out and then Matt coming back and her talking to Fulton, which if you went back and read chapter 24, it completely didn't fit, I swear this is the correct chapter this time. Also about my hiatus, between procrastination, a bit of a room makeover, and a new fandom I just didn't find the time to update. I am sorry about that. Leave messages below if you wish, thanks.