RTN Chapter 2 The Answer (Patreon)

A/N: Tell me what you think of the second chapter of this fanfic and what you think of Isabelle: Which option—A or B—should she look like?

Dallas, Texas

In a small two-story house surrounded by nature and a large yard in the Lakewood neighborhood of Dallas, Texas, a person could be seen sitting on a sofa in the living room, intently examining documents in his hand while the television buzzed in the background, reporting on the progress of Hurricane Claudette and the precautions that should be taken.

From the hallway leading from the kitchen, a woman walked in holding two cups of tea in her hands as she approached the sofa, placing both cups on the coffee table before walking around the couch and resting both hands on the person's shoulders, her head gently leaning against his shoulder.

“What are you looking at so intently?” the woman suddenly asked, looking closely at the sheets of paper, which were filled with various charts and technical details.

As if snapping out of his stupor, Logan immediately turned his head with a smile as he looked at the person who had spoken to him, before a grin appeared on his face and he set the papers aside for the moment.

“It's nothing important,” Logan answered her while the woman walked around the couch before sitting on Logan's lap in a natural way, as if it were something she had done many times before.

“It doesn't seem like something unimportant,” she replied while her arms wrapped around his neck and she planted a chaste kiss on his lips.

“Seriously, Isa, it's nothing,” Logan answered her with a smile while separating slightly from her and taking her hand, where a delicate ring rested on the ring finger, before planting a kiss there.

The woman sitting on Logan's lap was his wife, Isabelle “Isa” Anderson, to whom he had already been married for two years.

Logan met her during what was one of the darkest and most difficult moments he had to face in his life: the moment he suffered the injury that practically ended his career in the NBA.

At that time, Logan entered a spiral of depression in which he didn't know where his life would go, now that something he had worked so hard for over several years had been taken away from him, only to vanish so quickly.

Because of the injury, and the fact that he was practically cut without mercy by the Pistons' front office, Logan had no choice but to leave Detroit and return to Wisconsin, where he continued his rehabilitation with the help of his parents.

The physical wounds healed, but the psychological ones were another story. Logan's parents were the first to notice how hollow Logan was compared to before, since now he practically lived in isolation in his room, barely speaking a word or two.

Under his mother's insistence, Logan agreed to go for a visit to a mental health clinic in Milwaukee.

It was in that place where he met Isabelle, who received him with a warm smile and a cup of tea already poured, waiting for Logan to take a seat and ask him a series of questions about himself to get to know him better.

With the passing of the sessions, Logan gradually opened up even more with Isa until finally, in one particular session, they addressed the issue of the injury, which was the core of the whole matter.

“And tell me, how do you feel now regarding the injury?” Isabelle asked in a slow and clear tone, while still maintaining a professional smile on her face.

“It just feels like a void,” Logan began. “Now it's simply like waking up and not knowing what to do. Before, I used to get up and go straight to practice, or get ready to go play in another city,” he answered her while his hands were clasped together on his lap.

“And have you thought about what you're going to do now?” Isabelle continued asking while taking some notes on a notepad resting on her lap.

“To be honest, I have no idea. Maybe go back to college or look for a job,” Logan said, without having a plan in mind or a concrete idea about what direction to take.

“And have you thought about staying in the world of basketball?” Isabelle suggested to him with a smile. “Maybe your playing career ended abruptly, but that doesn't mean you have to step away from that world. You could work as an agent or even as a referee,” Isabelle said.

“What I want you to try to understand, Logan, is that despite what happened to you—which was unfortunate—it doesn't mean that everything is over or that you have to set aside what you're passionate about. You just have to change your focus,” was the last comment she made to him.

That last sentence was what awakened something in Logan that he believed was dormant, which was hope. With it, he didn't hesitate to follow Isa's advice and start looking for ways to stay in the NBA world, but by changing his focus.

After that, the change in Logan's attitude gradually improved until finally, his therapy sessions with Isabelle came to an end.

But throughout all those sessions, a feeling gradually began to grow inside Logan, which he couldn't entirely decipher at first.

Despite finishing their sessions, Logan and Isabelle maintained informal contact as friends, seeing each other occasionally or making plans, which did nothing but confirm that Logan was starting to have feelings for her.

On one of those occasions, he opened up to her by inviting her out to dinner, to which Isabelle accepted with a smile, beginning what was a blossoming relationship.

Months later, Logan secured a position as a video analyst under the command of the new Spurs coach, Popovich, who became immediately interested in the opinions and breakdowns Logan showed in his interview.

The only drawback was that the job required Logan to relocate and spend the entire season in San Antonio.

With that, Logan felt slightly conflicted over whether or not to turn down the opportunity, but it was Isabelle who encouraged him to accept, as it was a great job opportunity for him at that time.

So, without looking back, Logan set off for San Antonio, gaining valuable experience and learning the importance of a good video analyst and how the analysis of specific patterns and plays could give your own team an advantage.

Despite the distance, Logan traveled to Milwaukee whenever he could or on game days to have sporadic dates with Isabelle, no matter how short they were.

After a few years, Logan landed what was his best opportunity yet, with Don Nelson offering him a spot on the Dallas Mavericks staff, where he had contact with players like Dirk Nowitzki.

At first, Logan joked, saying that Milwaukee made a mistake by trading him straight to Dallas, earning a laugh from Dirk and becoming one of his great friends on the roster while Logan helped him perfect his shooting technique and mechanics, making it more refined and a weapon to be reckoned with.

Thinking about that, Logan snapped out of his daydream while Isabelle remained comfortably seated on his lap. “So, are you going to tell me how the interview went?” she asked him, slightly excited.

“Still nothing, Isa. You know a coach my age is something almost unheard of,” Logan answered her, no longer having high expectations after not receiving a response and with the draft getting closer and closer, giving him little hope.

“Just because it's something unheard of doesn't mean it's something impossible,” Isa answered him while her hands placed themselves on Logan's face so he could look her directly in the eyes.

“Besides, if it's not now, it will be later,” Isa finished saying before leaning in again to kiss Logan.

The kiss gradually turned into something more, with Logan lowering his hands under Isa's knees to carry her princess-style while she wrapped her arms around his neck and let out a soft groan against Logan's mouth as he began walking toward the stairs and to the bedroom.

Toronto, Canada

On the other hand, far away in Canada, the Raptors' front office was locked in one of the conference rooms in the offices, where a heated debate was taking place at this very moment.

“So which one should we choose?” Glen Grunwald asked the group of people sitting in the chairs alongside him, while two profile photos could be seen on the table.

Logan's photo was on the left side, while beside it was the photo of a man who, despite not looking that old, had a receding hairline on his head along with glasses that made him look older than he seemed.

“It seems to me the choice is obvious,” said one of the executives sitting farthest in the left corner of the room. “Say what you want, but Anderson is very young. On the other hand, Kevin O'Neill has more experience and has done a good job assisting Carlisle with the Pistons,” he said, as if the obvious choice was to pick someone more experienced.

“Maybe, but the proposals Anderson gave us are very innovative,” said another who leaned more toward Logan's side. “No matter how innovative they are, that doesn't guarantee us that they'll work,” said the same executive while slamming his fist against the glass table.

“But if they work, it would be something never seen before in the entire history of the league,” said the executive unwilling to back down, with several others echoing both opinions without reaching any agreement until Glen decided that enough was enough and slammed his hand against the glass table, drawing the attention of everyone present.

“Maybe you all have your doubts regarding Logan because of his youth and his ideas, which are something never seen before by any NBA team,” Glen began, with some of the executives nodding in agreement. “But I also agree that right now, what we need most is someone with an innovative vision,” he declared while his eyes looked at each of the people present.

“We are one of the newest teams in the whole league and the only one in Canada since the Grizzlies left Vancouver,” as his speech continued, his voice gradually rose. “So right now, we shouldn't view what Logan proposes as a bad thing, but rather as an opportunity to give the Raptors team its own identity,” he finished saying, causing a silence to settle for the first time in the whole room without any of the executives being able to say anything else at that moment.

“1 season,” was the only thing Glen said after the silence had settled long enough.

“Let's give him a single season to see how well Logan can do implementing his tactical ideas on our team,” Glen said. “If in the end he doesn't get the results we expected, we fire him and simply rethink the problem,” was the last thing Glen said, waiting for what the rest of the executives had to say.

“One season doesn't sound so bad. Rather, it gives us time to look for a more suitable replacement for the next season,” said one of the executives most skeptical about the idea of someone so young taking charge of an NBA team.

“Besides, if the season is a failure, we can blame everything on him,” said another, agreeing with his colleague. “And on top of that, we save some money,” said the team's financial director, who was the one most concerned about figures and numbers.

“So, any objections?” Glen asked everyone present, but none of them raised any complaint, leaving the matter completely settled at that moment.

Back in Dallas, the sun was already setting, letting the sunset be seen through the bedroom window in which Logan was lying in bed with Isa sleeping peacefully with her head resting on his shoulder, while he gave absentminded caresses to her back.

An atmosphere of calm could be perceived in the whole place, which was quickly broken by the sound of Logan's phone, which was still in the living room.

Originally, Logan planned to let whoever was calling leave a message on his voicemail, but after a few minutes of continuing to hear the ringing of the phone, he assumed that whoever was calling must have an important matter to discuss.

Carefully, he stepped out of bed without waking Isa while putting on his boxers, which had ended up on the floor, and headed downstairs, picking up his Nokia resting on the living room coffee table.

“Hello?” Logan asked, accepting the call from the unknown number calling him.

“Logan, it's Glen,” said the voice on the other end, causing Logan to immediately pay full attention to whatever was going to be said next.

“Listen, the board and I talked, and we think that what you showed us has potential. So congratulations, you'll be the Raptors' coach next season,” Glen said, causing Logan's mind to go blank for a second, not fully believing that he had actually gotten the job.

“But listen to me: right now, we're only going to offer you a contract for one season, so you have all that time to show us something that tells us what you're proposing works,” Glen finished saying, before telling him that he has a week to get everything ready and move to Toronto before the draft starts.

Hanging up the call, Logan was still processing everything that had happened, without hearing the footsteps coming down the stairs. “Honey, is everything okay?” asked Isabelle, who was dressed only in one of Logan's shirts.

“I got the job,” Logan said simply, still processing the news he had received.

“What did you say?” Isabelle asked suddenly, wanting to confirm that what she heard wasn't a mistake.

“I got the job,” Logan repeated, this time even more excited, while Isabelle let out a squeal of excitement and quickly ran toward him before jumping and being caught in Logan's arms, before slamming her mouth against his.

Pulling apart afterward, Isa fixed her eyes on Logan's. “Does that mean I'm going to have to get used to watching hockey?” she asked, earning a laugh from Logan before kissing her again, knowing that this would be a major change for both of their lives.

a)

b)