The Rebound

by Winter Renshaw

  That’s putting it mildly.

  Lying to my mother isn’t at the top of the list of things I’m proud of, but if I tell her more about Yardley, she might want to meet her and have her over, and I’m not ready for that.

  Yardley lives in a giant house in the good part of town. She’s got one of those families where everyone is nice and loving and functional, where they sit around a table for dinner by six o’clock sharp every night, where everyone has their own bedroom, and they play board games and go antiquing on the weekends.

  She’s asked to meet my family a couple of different times over the last few months—always casually. I think she senses my hesitation, so she’s never pressed. I know eventually I’m going to have to bring her around, but everything is still so new.

  I don’t want to tarnish it just yet.

  I don’t want to see that look in her eyes when she realizes I’m just a kid from a trailer park, eating free lunches and picking up odd jobs around town just to be able to afford gas in his truck and the occasional bouquet of red roses.

  Right now, she thinks I’ve hung the moon, that I’m everything and more. And I want to keep it that way.

  “What’s her name, Nev?” Mom asks. She hasn’t taken her eyes off me, her hands buried in murky dishwater. I didn’t expect her to be this interested. She’s never much cared to dig this deep into my social life before.

  “Yardley,” I answer.

  Mom nods. “That’s an interesting name.”

  “Says the woman who named her son after a state,” I say.

  My mother chuckles. “I was twenty-one. There was this show on TV at the time, Hopeless Falls, and there was this—”

  “—character on the show named Dr. Nevada Richmond,” I finish her story, the one I’ve heard a thousand times. “I know, I know.”

  “Anyway, when can I meet this girl?” Mom is relentless. I’m shocked. I didn’t expect this.

  Eden lifts her brows as if to tell me I won’t be able to skirt this for long. Once our mom wants something, she doesn’t let up until she gets it. Single motherhood has made her tough, persistent.

  “I’ll bring her around one of these days,” I say, hoping it’s good enough to appease her for now.

  “All right.” Mom exhales and returns her attention toward a dinner plate covered in tuna casserole remnants. “Take the trash out then.”

  I take a few steps across our tiny, u-shaped kitchen and grab the trash can from the side of the peninsula.

  “And Nev?” Mom asks.

  “Yeah?”

  “Just don’t get too caught up in … this girl,” she says, back still toward me. “I’d hate to see you lose your focus on basketball, because a scholarship is the only way you’re ever going to go to college.”

  “I know.” I’m not sure what she’s so worried about. I can play basketball and have a girlfriend at the same time. It’s not like those two things are mutually exclusive. Plenty of guys do it all the time.

  “He skipped practice last week,” Hunter blurts.

  I could fucking kill him. He’s lucky I don’t shove this bag of garbage at him and clock him across his smug little face.

  “Nevada, that true?” Mom whips around, eyes small and focused.

  “It was a onetime thing.” I lift my palms in the air, a silent sign of regret.

  Yardley was having the worst day. Some girls at school were making fun of her “Californian accent” and she’d hidden in the bathroom most of third period. I’d run into her in the hallway between classes.

  That look in her eyes, so wrecked and defeated … I had to make it go away.

  So I skipped practice.

  I told Coach I had a family emergency, and I took Yardley and we drove a couple of hours to Kansas City where we spent the rest of the afternoon walking around Country Club Plaza. We finished with a steak dinner and a movie, damn near clearing out my savings account, but it was worth it just to put that smile back on her face again.

  Her happiness is my happiness.

  My grandmother once told me that was the definition of love but it never made sense to me until that night. Now I get it.

  “Don’t do it again.” Mom turns away from me, her voice chilled. She means well, I know that. And she’s worried about my future. But she doesn’t understand how much Yardley means to me.

  One day, she will.

  Chapter Five

  We’re Forever, You and Me

  Yardley, age 17

  Nine Months Later

  “Happy birthday.” Nev pulls me into his lap in the middle of our place in the cornfields.

  It’s snowing out and we can see the twinkle of the city’s courthouse Christmas display in the distance. His truck idles, the heat filling the cab, and I wiggle out of my bulky winter coat.

  This is my first official winter, and I’ve yet to get used to walking around in layers upon layers of clothes coupled with scarves and hats and mittens that are impossible to keep track of. I hate leaving the house feeling like I could just roll anywhere I wanted to go, like a giant, fluffy marshmallow, but the alternative is frost bite, so … yeah.

  My boyfriend cups the side of my face, bringing his lips against mine. He tastes like wintergreen gum and the peppermint lip balm he stole from me.

  “For a few months, we’re both seventeen,” I say.

  My smile fades when I think about how we’re smack dab in the middle of his senior year. He’ll be eighteen soon. And a year from now he won’t be in Lambs Grove at all—assuming he gets a basketball scholarship, which Coach Stevens thinks he will.

  His birthday is February fourteenth, which I think is a sign, and I plan to make our second Valentine’s Day together even more special than the first. I’m going to save all my Christmas money this year and put it toward a trip to St Louis where I can take him shopping and out to a nice dinner and spoil him rotten.

  He’s always working so hard, shoveling driveways in the winter and mowing yards in the summer. Everyone around here calls him to do their odd jobs and he saves every penny he makes, except for the ones he spends on me … and the ones he uses to buy his own jeans and sneakers.

  His mom, Doreen, works two jobs and barely makes ends meet. It took him months before he let me meet her. I think he was embarrassed? Or he thought I wouldn’t look at him the same if I saw where he came from? But it only makes me love him more. He isn’t some silver-spooned, entitled asshole.

  I like that he drives a rusty truck.

  I like that the only shirts he wears are left over from sports camps and intramural organizations.

  I like that he’s humble and kind, that he doesn’t need to be flashy or prove anything.

  “I got something for you.” He reaches into the pocket of his faded wool coat, retrieving a navy-blue velvet box.

  I swat his chest. “I told you no gifts.”

  “I saw this and I couldn’t resist,” he says, handing it to me. “Open it.”

  Fighting a smirk, I prop the box open and feast my eyes on a diamond necklace in the shape of a circle.

  “Diamonds, Nev? Seriously? This must have cost you a fortune.”

  He shakes his head. Nev hates talking about money. “Put it on.”

  I take the chain gently between my fingers, unclasp the hook, and fix it around my neck, tracing my fingertips around the small circle of glimmering stones.

  “I love it,” I say, leaning closer and pressing my mouth against his. “Thank you.”

  Nev holds the pendant between his fingers, staring at me. “I chose the circle because circles have no end. They go on forever. They’re infinite. And that’s us, Yardley. We’re forever. You and me.”

  I blink away the happy tears that fill my eyes and nod, my heart bathed in warmth and my body tingling the way it does every time I look at him.

  “Someday, when we’re older,” he says, brushing his fingers through my hair before tucking a strand behind my ear, “I’m going to get you a ring. But for now, this is my promise to you
. My love for you will never end.”

  Chapter Six

  The Scholarship and The Girl

  Nevada

  Two Months Later

  “Who was that?” James Devereaux places his phone in his pocket outside the locker room Saturday morning. We just crushed the undefeated Montross Tigers, with yours truly scoring the winning three-pointer in the final four seconds of overtime. I’m still coasting on an adrenaline high, and I can’t count how many teammates and strangers have hugged or high-fived me in the last twenty minutes, but it has to be in the hundreds.

  “Where’s Yardley?” I ask.

  He points down the hall. “The girls are headed to the car.”

  It’s become tradition lately. After each game, James takes us out to eat—my mother included—to celebrate, win or loss.

  “That was, uh, a scout,” I say, lips pressed as I zip my jacket.

  James’s hand hooks on top of my shoulder as we walk toward the parking lot. “What’d he say?”

  For whatever reason, James has taken it upon himself to be a sort of surrogate father to me. I know he means well and I know he probably thinks he’s doing the right thing, but sometimes the prying gets to be a bit much.

  “He was with Grove State University,” I say. “Sounds like they’re pretty serious about me. He wants me to give him a call later today so we can go somewhere and meet.”

  Grove State won the national college basketball tournament last March, putting that North Carolina school on the map for the first time in decades.

  Now everyone wants to go there—including me.

  And to be honest, I figured I’d get picked up by some tiny private school in the Bible Belt that no one’s ever heard of … but to have GSU interested in me is literally a dream come true.

  “Grove State, eh?” James asks, dragging his thumb and forefinger down the sides of his mouth as he stares into the distance. “That’s pretty big.”

  “I know.”

  “You think you’ll go?” he asks, directing his attention to me.

  “Pretty sure my mom would kill me if I turned it down,” I say.

  Would I rather stay here, waiting for Yardley to finish school? Absolutely. But walking away from an opportunity like this would be pure idiocy.

  There’s got to be a way to have them both … the scholarship and the girl.

  “You know,” James says, stopping halfway down the hall. His voice is low. “I’m not trying to tell you what to do, but I just wanted to let you know, I’d be happy to put you through technical school and give you a job at the factory. I bet within five years, you’d be senior management, sitting next to me at every upper level meeting.”

  Dragging my hand along my jaw, I find it difficult to look him in the eyes. I know he’s trying to protect his daughter. He knows how much she loves me, how devastated she would be to lose me, but he doesn’t understand, even if I’m a thousand miles away, I’m not going anywhere. I’m still going to be hers wholly and completely.

  I would never hurt her, ever.

  “I appreciate the offer, Mr. Deveraux,” I say.

  He studies me, mouth turned down at the sides. If I’ve learned anything in the past year, it’s that Yardley’s father rarely takes ‘no’ for an answer. He’s used to getting his way.

  “Think about it at least?” he asks.

  He stops walking. I stop alongside of him.

  Exhaling, I nod. Sure. I’ll think about it. Doesn’t mean I’ll take him up on it. I could give his daughter a much better life if I could attend a quality school, get a four-year degree in computer engineering like I planned, and give her the life she’s always dreamed of whether it’s somewhere here, close to her family, or back in Del Mar, California.

  Besides, we’ve had this conversation a hundred times.

  She knows I have a plan for us.

  She knows I’ll stop at nothing to give her the life she deserves and she knows I’m going to spend the rest of my life with her no matter what happens in the next few years.

  “The girls are probably waiting …” I say, eyeing the end of the hall.

  “Right.” He forces a breath through his nostrils before turning to leave, only now he’s walking a couple of steps ahead of me.

  I’ve pissed him off.

  But to be fair, I’m pissed too.

  I’d been idolizing this man so much in the past year that I hadn’t realized how selfish and controlling he truly is.

  Chapter Seven

  I’m Scared

  Yardley

  One Month Later

  The letter that’s about to change the trajectory of our lives is clutched tight in his hand. He hasn’t let it out of his sight since he checked the mail this afternoon, reading it over and over, folding it and unfolding it, biting the inside of his lip, staring into the distance, lost in thought.

  We knew this was going to happen. I have no right to be shocked at any of this. In fact, we were so sure this day would come that we’d talked about it dozens of times, crafting a plan of action, and reassuring each other that it changed nothing in regards to the way we feel about each other.

  I told him I was happy for him earlier, as I fought back the wave of gut-twisting nausea with a smile plastered on my face, but only because it was the right thing to do.

  It’s what you do when something good happens to someone you love.

  You force yourself to be happy for them, even if it kills you.

  A tranquil sea of stars rests above us in a clear night sky, an ironic contradiction to the steady beats of two very frightened hearts.

  “You know I don’t want to …” Nevada begins to say, his voice almost breaking as his stare weighed heavy on me. “I don’t want to leave y—”

  “—this is your future.” I cut him off. We made a plan. We both agreed to it. Now that it’s real … I can tell he’s having second thoughts and I won’t allow it. “You have to go, Nev.”

  My throat strains as I swallow the words I’ll never say. I refuse to soil this moment with reminders that my father offered to pay his way through the local community college if he agreed to work for him.

  Nev deserves so much more than being a department manager at a cotton factory for the rest of his life.

  I could never do that to him, not when he has other options.

  I love him too much to rob him of the bright future he’s worked so hard for.

  When he told me about my father’s proposition, I cut him off mid-sentence and told him if he so much as thought about considering it, I would never forgive him.

  “It’s just four years,” he says, though I wonder which one of us he’s trying to comfort more. “It’ll be over before we know it and then we can be together again, just like this. We’ll pick up exactly where we left off.”

  He rolls to his side in the bed of his truck, the flannel-lined sleeping bag we just christened bunched beneath his arm.

  He’s looking at me, but I can’t bring myself to return his gaze without tears filling my eyes. Facing him means facing our harsh reality: in three months, he’ll be gone.

  Gone as in, halfway across the country.

  Gone as in, meeting new friends and leaving this life behind.

  Gone as in, someday all we’re going to have is a bunch of memories and quiet ponders of what might have been.

  “I’ll be home for Christmas,” he says. “And summer break. And we can email and text and talk on the phone every day. As much as you want.”

  My eyes burn again, so I close them and bring myself to offer a wince of a smile. I might be all of seventeen, but I’m not naïve. He’s going to college on a full basketball scholarship. He’s gorgeous and kind and intelligent, the kind of guy who lights up the darkest of rooms, the guy who’s never met a stranger.

  The ultimate catch.

  I’m lucky that he loved me first, but it’s unrealistic to believe he’ll be the one to love me last.

  People make promises every day without thinking about the real
ity of keeping them. And when it all boils down to it, we’re just a couple of kids in love, blissfully unaware of the future that awaits them. I want to be optimistic, but it’s impossible to silence that realist voice in my head telling me not to get my hopes up.

  “I bet there are a lot of pretty girls at Kenwood,” I say, voice trailing into quietude.

  “Jesus, Yardley.” He drags his hand through his thick, dark hair. “I know what you’re getting at, and you need to stop.” Reaching for my face, he cups my chin and directs my sullen gaze to him. “You’re the only girl I ever want to be with, do you understand that?”

  I don’t nod. It’s as though I physically can’t.

  This isn’t me. At all. But it’s like someone opened the floodgates of self-doubt and I have no idea how to close them.

  “And that’s never going to change,” he adds. “I’ll be saying it with my last dying breath.”

  “I’m scared, Nev,” I say, releasing my words with a heavy breath. “I believe you. And I know how I feel. And we knew this was coming. But it doesn’t make this any easier.”

  “Please. Don’t be scared.” He kisses me.

  Nevada is a good man with a pure heart. He’d never intentionally hurt anyone, least of all me. But he’s never set foot outside the tiny, picturesque bubble that is Lambs Grove.

  He’s never played basketball in front of tens of thousands of screaming fans with gorgeous cheerleaders winking at him from across a multi-million-dollar basketball court.

  He’s never strutted across a campus where everyone treats him like some celebrity, where alcohol flows freely and beautiful girls throw themselves at him in droves.

  I don’t even want to think about the rest …

  “Yardley,” he says as he takes his mouth off of mine. His palm grazes my cheek as our eyes catch. “Believe me.”

  “I want to,” I answer. “But things change. People change. You are going to change. I am going to change.”

  Nevada sits, drawing his knees in and resting his elbows on them as he stares into the vacant cornfield.