The Rebound

by Winter Renshaw

  There’s a twinge of sadness in my gut, but I let it go. James was a good man who always treated me fairly, and he would’ve been a good father-in-law. Sure, he had his selfish moments, but for a couple years, I thought of him as a father figure since my dad was long gone. James was the one who first took me fishing and showed me how to change the oil in my truck.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I say.

  “Anyway, Rosamund and the girls run a little tailor shop on the square,” Mom says. “The Sew Shop.”

  “The girls good for you today?” I change the subject.

  “I think they do okay for themselves,” she prattles on, ignoring my question.

  “Mom.”

  “What?” Her nose wrinkles.

  “The girls. Were they good?” I ask.

  “What kind of question is that? Of course they were good. Sweet angels. Both of them. Always.” She swats me away as she heads to the fridge. “Essie’s napping right now and Lennon’s watching Frozen for the second time today.”

  Sounds about right.

  Peeking into the family room, I watch my oldest daughter giggle at a singing snowman. Hopping over the back of the couch a moment later, I loop my arm around her, pull her close, and kiss the top of her head.

  “Daddy …” Lennon pretends to be annoyed, fighting the wide smile claiming her face. “I’m watching my show.”

  Her hair smells like peaches and her clothes smell like Downy and her silky dark hair falls in her eyes just the way her mother’s did, and all of this makes me the happiest and the saddest man who ever lived, all at once.

  I think about waking Essie, just so I can hold both of my girls in my arms, right where they belong. If I’m holding them, nothing bad can happen. Nothing can hurt them. But I let her sleep because it shouldn’t be about what I want. Everything I do from now on is for them. Every move, every decision. Big or small.

  Lennon and Essie and no one else.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  It’s Worse Than I Thought

  Yardley

  I’ve been sitting in my living room chair, in the dark silence, for the better part of an hour when my sister walks in. She drops her keys in the bowl on the console before realizing I’m there.

  “Omigod, you scared the hell out of me.” Her DIY-manicured hand splays across her chest. “What are you doing? Why are you sitting in the dark?”

  Bryony clicks a lamp on before kicking off her flats.

  “I saw him today.” It’s the first thing I’ve said since I left Shoppe Smart.

  “Who?”

  “Whom,” I correct her. “And it was Nevada. I saw Nevada.”

  She plops onto the sofa, reaching toward the coffee table to switch on another lamp. “Okay, so did you say hi? Did you smile? Did you two talk at all?”

  “I smiled,” I say. “He looked right through me.”

  “Maybe he didn’t see you?”

  “No, no, no. He saw me. He was mayyybe six feet away from me. We shared a check-out lane. The lady in front of me was talking about him and then she bugged him for an autograph. He turned toward me and he saw me.” I give her the play-by-play—the same one I’ve been rewinding and re-watching in my mind since the moment I left the store.

  “What’d he do when you smiled?”

  “Nothing.” My voice raises. “I told you. He looked through me.”

  “I don’t even know what that means,” my sister says, expression crinkled. “You’re not made out of glass. How can someone see through you?”

  I exhale. “It’s an expression. I don’t know. He just … looked past me. Like I wasn’t there. Like I was a ghost and he couldn’t see me.”

  More like he refused to see me …

  “There’s this customer who comes in. You know the one … Crazy Dave. And he’s the same way. He just can’t make eye contact with people for some reason,” she says.

  “Not the same thing.” I roll my eyes.

  “Anyway, continue.” She waves her hand in my direction before settling into the cushions and resting her chin in her palm.

  “That’s … it. There’s nothing else to it.”

  Bryony leans back as if I’ve disappointed her, and she lets her shoulders droop. “Huh. Guess it’s worse than I thought. He really does hate you.”

  “No shit.”

  “I always thought people were exaggerating when they said that.”

  I’d always hoped the same thing.

  “Maybe he’ll come around?” She shrugs. “Or maybe he’s still mourning his wife and not ready to associate with an ex-girlfriend yet? I don’t know. People get weird about that kind of stuff.”

  Years ago, I decided to be happy for him, that he moved on and found happiness. He was in a good place, at least it seemed that way from afar, through news articles and press conferences and interviews. And he deserved all of it.

  The day I heard about his wife passing, I cried.

  I cried for her. I cried for their children. But mostly, I cried for Nevada.

  I just wish I could tell him how sorry I am.

  For everything.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  I’m Not That Cruel

  Nevada

  “Nevada Kane?”

  I’m standing in line at the DMV’s courthouse location when someone from behind calls my name. Turning, I find a familiar face by the name of Tate Hofstetter who, at almost thirty years old, is sporting a mangy beard, a gold wedding band, and an extra forty pounds. Once upon a time, we were tight. Best friends. He was the power forward on our basketball team, but we lost touch after I left Lambs Grove and he left to attend some technical school in Alabama.

  “Holy shit. I can’t believe it’s you,” Tate is grinning like an idiot, and he tries to clasp my bicep with his right hand, but his spread is too small. “Look at you, all fucking jacked.”

  I grab a number, as does he, and we take a seat in the corner.

  “We should catch up,” he says immediately. “I’ve been following you over the years, you know, on ESPN and shit, but I’ve always wondered how you were doing. Sorry about your wife, man.”

  He just can’t shut up, can he?

  “Everyone’s going to be so stoked that you’re back in town. You just visiting?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “Bought a house.”

  His beady eyes widen and he adjusts his ball cap. “No fucking way? You serious?”

  I nod, resting my elbows on my knees and rubbing my hands together as I glance around. The DMV is sparsely staffed today, but there are only a couple people waiting ahead of us. I just want to get in, get out, and get on with my day.

  “So you’re sticking around LG, then?” he asks. “I mean, I saw you announced your retirement, but I never thought you’d retire here of all places.”

  “Me neither.” I huff, leaning back in my chair and crossing my arms. I tried to get my mom to leave this place a hundred times. I bribed her with money and mansions and anything I could think of … but my sister, Eden, and her husband and their four kids are here. And my brother, Hunter. And my grandparents. And all my mother’s siblings.

  She flat out refused to so much as consider stepping foot outside Lambs Grove in any kind of permanent fashion.

  I believe she even said, “Not for all the money in the world, Nevada.”

  And she meant it. Doreen Kane always means what she says.

  “Guess your family’s still around here,” he says, scratching his beard. “Makes sense.”

  The TV screen mounted on the wall flashes the next number a few minutes later, which happens to be mine, and I thank the good Lord for perfect timing.

  “This is me.” I stand.

  “All right, man,” Tate says as I get up. “Oh, hey. You should come out and say ‘hi’ to everyone this weekend. We go to the Leaderboard on Friday nights. Lots of people there you’d remember. They’d love to see you.”

  It’s not like I can say no. These people are going to see me around town from her
e on out, and I’d rather not spend the next however-many-years known for being the most resented, bougie asshole in town.

  Despite my “success” and contrary to popular belief, I haven’t let it go to my head.

  “Yeah, sounds good. I’ll join you guys sometime,” I say before heading up to the counter and slapping my North Carolina license in front of me. The guy slides me a clipboard with a form to sign and hands me a pen before validating my information. When he’s finished, he shreds my old card and prints me a temporary Missouri version.

  The irony is not lost on me.

  By the time I leave, the sidewalk outside the courthouse is covered in splotches of rain and the sky is nothing but thick, dark clouds. Living in the Carolinas for the past decade, I’d forgotten how tumultuous and random Missouri weather can be in the springtime.

  Water pellets begin to fall harder, faster, and I break into a light jog as I cross the street. I had to park a couple blocks away because the Rotary Club was having breakfast at one of the cafes on the square and all the good parking spots were taken.

  I jog another block, my shirt becoming soaked by the second, and I round the corner, passing the Cleverly and Piedmont Law Office with the same signature green awning and red brick front it’s always had.

  Only it just so happens, at the exact same moment, someone else is rounding that same corner.

  We don’t see each other until it’s too late, and while she catches herself before she smacks onto the wet pavement, her purse doesn’t fare so well. Lip glosses, lotions, keys, receipts, loose change, and sunglasses scatter around our feet, and I’m seconds from helping the girl gather her belongings when I realize who it is.

  I don’t stick around.

  I don’t apologize.

  I push past her, leaving her crouched on the damp cement, shoving things into her bag.

  It’s a dick move, I know. But I saw the way she was looking at me at the Shoppe Smart, and sticking around to help her would give her hope. And that’s the last thing I should be giving her.

  I’m not that cruel.

  Chapter Thirty

  He Wanted To Marry Me

  Yardley

  I slam on my brakes.

  My ancient Volvo skids a couple of feet before coming to a hard stop. The gate to the Conrad estate’s front drive is wide open and the house is lit like Christmas from the inside, chandeliers all aglow. Through a second-story window above the front door, I spot a shirtless, paint roller-wielding Nevada Kane.

  Rain beads across my windshield, my wipers screeching across the glass every few seconds.

  This man has every right to be angry with me, and if he wants to hate me, so be it. That’s his prerogative.

  But he doesn’t get to treat me the way he did today.

  He doesn’t get to bowl into me on a rainy sidewalk, knock my bag out of my hand, and then walk on past without so much as an apology.

  It’s basic human decency, and maybe I don’t deserve much from him, but I at least deserve that.

  Pulling into his driveway, I park beside a concrete lion sculpture with one lifted paw, and I kill my engine. The wipers stop halfway across the glass. Listening to the soft pad of rain on the roof of my car, I drag in a deep breath of damp air and contemplate whether or not I really want to do this.

  Worst-case scenario, he doesn’t answer his door and I catch him some other time. I’m bound to run into him around town again.

  Best case? He lets me say what I came here to say and we move forward like the two mature adults that we’re supposed to be at this point in our lives … and then maybe he finally lets me explain what happened all those years ago.

  My hands grip the worn leather of my steering wheel, palms sweaty. The sound of my heartbeat whooshing in my ear follows next, drowning out my thoughts. Maybe it’s my body’s way of refusing to let me talk myself out of this?

  Climbing out of my car, I make my way toward the sweeping two-story portico entrance, stepping out of the rain and lingering in front of two arched double doors. From far away, this place always looked glamorous. Up close, it looks like it could swallow me up. Ominous almost.

  I need to gather my thoughts one last time, rehearse what I’m going to say.

  In some ways, it feels like a lifetime ago that we were carefree and completely in the moment, inseparable and hopelessly, irreversibly in love. But mostly it feels like yesterday, every memory so fresh and vibrant, so tangible I can almost reach out and touch it.

  It kills me not knowing what might have been had I never made the decision to break my promise. So many nights, I’ve lain awake in bed, dreaming up what our wedding would’ve been like. I always wanted to marry him at Bedford Park in the summertime, under a canopy of weeping willows, flowers in my hair and grass between my toes. Nevada never cared about the details. He’d just interlace his fingers in mine and tell me to tell him the time and place and he’d be there, waiting to marry me.

  Nevada told me that constantly … that he wanted to marry me.

  And he meant it.

  And he was going to.

  And I took that away from him.

  I took the only thing he wanted, and I gave it to someone else because I thought it was the right thing to do at the time. I justified it every way I could. And I might not regret what I did, but I do regret hurting him.

  It was a complicated situation.

  And it’s something I have to live with the rest of my life.

  I made the decision to shatter the promise I made to Nevada. It’s no one’s fault but my own.

  Clearing my throat, I step closer to the door and reach for the silver-plated knocker.

  I think I’m going to pass out.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Don’t Think, Just Do

  Nevada

  Melted Ice Cream.

  Estella chose this color for the baby’s nursery based on the name alone. She thought it was fun, whimsical, unpretentious.

  “Colors shouldn’t take themselves so seriously,” she’d said with a wink, rubbing her swollen belly. “And it’s the perfect pink.”

  She was right. It was.

  Pink but not too pink. Light but not too light. We were standing in the middle of the hardware store as she held a dozen different paint swatches in her hands. After what felt like forever, she finally settled on this one, saying she didn’t know why but it made her heart happy.

  That was the thing about Estella—she was always making decisions from the heart, never from the mind. She said emotions got in the way of happiness and she was always razzing me for getting lost in thought.

  “You think too much, Nev,” she told me at least once a day. “Don’t think, just do.”

  Standing in the middle of Essie’s new room and surrounded by pale pink walls the color of melted strawberry ice cream, I place my paint roller aside and take a minute to stretch, massaging away the tension in my lower back when I’m finished.

  I could easily hire this work out and pay someone else to break their back, but I need to stay busy.

  It keeps me sane.

  Bending to finish rolling the last spot on the south wall, I stop when I catch three hard knocks on my front door. They echo through this empty house, and just like that, I’m no longer alone.

  Much to my dismay.

  Checking my phone, I make sure it’s not my mom or my brother or the Realtor. And when I glance out Essie’s future window, I realize I left the front gate to the driveway wide open.

  The rain and moonless sky make it difficult to see, but I’m able to make out the silhouette of a boxy gray sedan parked in front of my door.

  I’m not sure who the fuck thinks it’s appropriate to pound on someone’s door at nine o’clock on a Wednesday night, but I wipe my hands on a damp rag and trudge downstairs.

  “This house has everything,” the listing agent said.

  Bull fucking shit.

  Where’s the peephole?

  I suppose with this house being a million y
ears old and these doors being imported from some fifteenth century church in France, they probably felt it would’ve been detrimental to the integrity of the wood to drill holes in them.

  With one hand on my hip and an ache in my shoulder, I exhale. I don’t have time for this shit.

  Pulling the door open, I’m taken aback by the sight of a soaking wet Yardley Devereaux standing at my doorstep.

  My lips press and my jaw flexes, and I have half a mind to slam the door in her face, but before I get the opportunity, she barges into my house.

  “I need to talk to you,” she says. Her body shivers in my cold foyer and her stormy blue eyes pierce through me.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Her trembling hand splays across her chest, rising and falling with each trapped breath, and little trickles of rain fall down her forehead.

  “I get that you hate me,” she says, chin lowered. “But you have to stop this.”

  I frown, crossing my arms and keeping my distance. “Stop what?”

  Standing this close to her and being forced to interact sends a catch to my throat that doesn’t belong. I swore her off years ago. I forced myself to pretend she was fucking dead. And she is dead—at least the version of her I once loved. That girl, the one with stars in her eyes and promises on her tongue … no longer exists.

  “Now that you’re back in town, we’re going to run into each other,” she says. “We don’t have to be friends. We don’t have to talk. But you can at least treat me like a goddamned human being.”

  I drag my palm across my tensed jaw before exhaling. This is about earlier.

  “Who just … plows into someone and knocks everything out of their arms and keeps going?” she asks, stepping closer to me. “Where’s your decency?”