Page 9 of Lines We Cross
And damn if I didn’t like it.
Hobbling to the door, Rae didn’t even spare me a backward glance. I’d been tortured and dismissed. I got in the truck, situated my leg, and turned the engine over. A country song calledIn Love By Nowpoured out of the speakers and I’d never related to a song right down to my very bones before.
He sang about the girl from his past moving on and finding someone new. I’d only had that one perfect moment with Skylar Rae so many years ago. If life had gone differently, would she be with me now? Or would she have always been with someone else? A woman like that didn’t stay single in a small town like Nickel Bay. She would have been scooped up and wooed to the altar by the first available man who had any sense to him.
A girl like that don’t stay lonely for long…
4
Max
Turns out physical therapy for an hour was harder than the four-hour practices back in the minor leagues when everyone was showing off and hoping to get bumped to the majors. After my sweat session with Rae—to forever be known as Devil Rae in my head from now on—I’d passed out on my old bed, only waking when Mom yelled up the stairs saying dinner was on the table.
Which meant I didn’t get a chance to go house hunting with Dad like we planned. Instead, he was going to meet me at Pacific Sunrise, the name of that bakery I’d been eyeing yesterday before my PT session. Apparently, they had the best croissants known to man and their coffee was above average as well.
The sun had risen on another beautiful spring day in Nickel Bay, casting the entire town in a parade of colors before settling on a bright sunny yellow without a single cloud in the sky. Except I wished for cloud cover. Anything to make me a little less conspicuous in my truck, parked across from the bakery. Dad already parked and went inside two minutes ago and yet here I sat, hiding, hunkered down like a little kid seeing their principal walk by.
Why?
Because Anna Mulholland was standing on the wood sidewalk chatting it up with none other than my torturer, Skylar Rae. Anna hadn’t changed much in the last twelve years. Maybe a few more gray hairs and a pound or two, but despite the heartache I knew she’d been through, she withstood the test of time like a trooper.
I rolled my eyes at comparing me and her. She’d beat me in a foot race with this damn brace on my knee. There she was, pushing late sixties and I, the professional athlete, was in worse shape.
My stomach clenched and I was forced to face the facts. I could hide all I wanted, but that didn’t change the fact that I had an unhealthy dose of shame eating away at my stomach lining. Guilt for not being here when Emerson got sick. Guilt for not standing up like a man at the front of the church during his funeral and being there emotionally for his family. I’d hid, just like I was doing now, running back to baseball the minute the preacher said amen. Anything to avoid that punch to the gut each time I thought about never seeing Emerson again.
Looking at real estate in Nickel Bay seemed like the stupidest idea I’d had yet. Right up there with coming home for an extended period of time while I recuperated from surgery. I’d spend half my day just trying to avoid Emerson’s family.
I startled so badly I hit my head on the side of the truck when Dad knocked on the passenger window. He stood there like a giant flashing sign, attracting all sorts of attention as he waved at me, pantomiming who knew what. I avoided looking left like I had blinders on, hoping Anna had already taken off in her late model sports car. I gave Dad my index finger, asking for another minute like I was busy on my phone and that’s why I was in my truck for so long.
When I finally made a big show of putting my phone in my pocket and climbing out of the truck, Anna and Rae were nowhere to be found. I sucked in a deep chestful of oxygen, trying to push the shame and embarrassment down, and faced Dad.
“Never thought you’d get out of the darn truck, son. I ate a croissant already and almost started on yours. Figured you’d eventually quit hiding and come on in.”
My jaw dropped. Dad spun on his heel and went back into the bakery, leaving me flummoxed at his insightfulness. Dad usually had his nose in a book and epitomized the distracted professor stereotype. What I kept forgetting was professors could also be very good at observing.
I hurried after him, sitting down at the small table he’d chosen inside and stuffing my mouth with fluffy bakery goods to prevent having to converse. Better to have carbs in the system before spilling your guts to the man you looked up to your whole life.
“Is that you, Max?” A paper-thin voice came from directly behind me.
Swallowing quickly, I spun, seeing Mrs Cuthbertson stooped over, that same loving smile she’d had as my fifth-grade teacher despite the aging everywhere else. I hopped up and pulled her into a gentle hug.
“Oh, look at you now, all grown and handsome as all get-out,” she crooned.
“Nice to see you, Mrs. Cuthbertson.”
She pulled back and patted my arm. “Shame about your knee. I wrote a letter to that Slider boy. Told him what a nincompoop he was for taking you out like that.”
My eyebrows flew into my hairline.
“He wrote me back, gotta give him credit. Even sent a Slider baseball hat as an apology, but what am I going to do with a useless piece of garbage like that?”
She shook her perfectly curled white hair, her eyebrows mashed together. That look was familiar too. She’d given that exact look to Emerson and me on more than one occasion. I felt particularly grown up to know it wasn’t directed at me any longer.
“I’m sorry to hear that, but that was a nice gesture. You know if you need some kindling for a fire one brisk evening, I’ve heard those hats go up like dry brush.”
Her face morphed into a grin and she reached up as high as she could to pat me on the shoulder. “You’re a good boy, Max. Glad to have you back.” Then she marched off at the pace of a herd of turtles and grabbed her bag of pastries off the counter and left.
Dad was laughing silently into his coffee. “Ready to go look at some houses, good little boy?”
