by Jillian Hart
A few powerful kicks and she was floating in the middle of the Olympic-sized pool. A few more and she was nearly across, working to keep the ropes tangle free and straightening out. At the far end of the pool she latched them up, working quickly as the clock stroked to 5:27.
At the front door there was a rattle that ricocheted like a bullet through the high rafters—and it kept coming.
Who was that impatient? Her regulars knew one knock would bring her running if she were a little behind, like this morning. But someone was very persistent. Okay, so she was now a minute later. She set up the last two lane ropes, climbed out of the pool and, dripping wet, yanked open the front door.
There, illuminated by the bold strokes of the rising sun, stood a solid six feet of man. Right away, she noticed the military short black hair and linebacker’s shoulders. This impatient morning swimmer leaned on a pair of crutches and his handsome, rugged features twisted from impatience to what could only be described as dismay as he recognized her.
Ben? Her heart gave a sudden jump and took off racing. What was he doing here? For some inexplicable reason her tongue had stopped working and she could only stare at him, the way he was staring at her. She couldn’t focus on anything or anyone else, even though she was vaguely aware the benches along the walkway were occupied.
The early-morning regulars began to move closer. She distantly recognized the two gray-haired men who were faithful lap swimmers—per orders from their doctors. Fit and quick, they were the next to reach the double doors.
“Morning, Cadence. We started to worry, since it’s not like you to be more than a few minutes late, on the rare occasions that you are.” Arnold Mays was the first to the door. “Is everything all right?”
“Y-yes, thank you.” She had more problems with her sister, but that was nothing to trouble these fine people with. As for Ben…
Chester Harrison halted beside Arnold, his best friend for over sixty years, and nodded once in the direction of Ben McKaslin. “He’s an eager one. Son, you’re doing pretty good with those crutches.”
“I try not to let anything get in my way.” Ben stood straight and strong despite his injuries.
The men moved inside, talking about sports as they went.
In the clear light of day he seemed very different from the boy she remembered. He looked like an entirely different man, someone made of unbowed steel. He shrugged away his injuries as if they were nothing.
Her gaze slid to his cast; it was a lightweight removable one. His leg was injured, but it must be healing, she figured, remembering how he’d managed to walk on it. Of course, he’d come to swim—one of the best rehabilitation methods for injured limbs.
He was a customer, no more. This wasn’t personal. She held the door wide and tried to avoid his gaze. “C’mon in.”
Ben remained where he stood, off to the side of the doorway, the wind ruffling his short dark hair like freshly mown grass. This morning he wore cutoffs and an old wash-worn tank top that bore some fading military insignia.
A small duffel hung from his shoulder, barely visible, since he’d shoved it behind him so he could use his crutches. His big feet were hidden in a pair of ratty sneakers. Ben was never one for putting much stock in appearance, and after all this time she finally understood.
It was the man and not the clothes she wondered about while she greeted Harriet Oleson, who sprinted along the walkway from the parking lot. Spry at ninety-three, the ever-young Mrs. Oleson praised the beautiful morning as she dashed by, eager to start her laps.
Alone with Ben. The breeze carried with it the faint scent of smoke—either from the fields burning off or the wildfire in the nearby national forest that had started during the night somewhere south of town.
Cadence waited while a muscle ticked along Ben’s iron jaw. “Are you coming in or not? I’ve got to be on deck.”
“This is the lap swim, right? Open to anyone?”
“Well, theoretically. I suppose that includes you. Or maybe it’s the lifeguard you have a problem with.”
“No.” He hooked his crutches more firmly beneath his arms and strode through the door, moving with the determination of a marathon runner sighting the finish line. He left her holding the door, watching his back.
He was so…calm. That was a change from the boy she remembered. He walked straight and strong, as if nothing could diminish him.
“‘Mornin’, Cadence.” Jessie, another regular and a young mom in a hurry, had news of the approaching wildfire. They spoke for a few seconds as Ben disappeared. Jessie soon raced off to get changed, and Cadence was needed poolside.
The office wasn’t empty as she passed through, stopping to grab her cup of tea. She greeted the assistant guard, a college girl named Melody, who must have come in the back door. She looked exhausted from what had to be another late night of studying. Melody resumed counting out change in the cash register’s till.
As she did every morning, Cadence unlocked the locker-room doors, the gentlemen first because she knew Chester and Arnold would be showered down and waiting. And they were, pushing out the door and hurrying to pick their lane. Their bare feet slapped along the deck to the shallow end.
Ben was still on her mind as she paced the length of the pool to unlock the women’s rooms. She exchanged words with Harriet, who was good to go as she slipped on her swimming cap and made her way to her favorite lane.
This was the rhythm to Cadence’s morning routine, a comforting sameness that seemed to start a day out right. Above the splashes and quiet talk of the swimmers, she slipped her shorts over her wet suit, climbed up on her chair and let the warm spicy tea soothe her.
There had been times in her past when she’d never believed she could be this content. The little girl with big dreams and ambition hadn’t grown up to live an important life in sports broadcasting. That little girl she’d been had nearly lost every dream.
But Ben McKaslin? What about the rebellious renegade boy with long hair and a mile-wide self-destructive bent? What had become of his dreams?
There he was, coming from the locker rooms on his crutches, his skin bronzed as if he’d spent most of the year in the sun. He appeared so well muscled she thought that he must put in serious workout time every day.
Wearing long navy blue trunks that looked like military issue, he leaned his crutches against the wall, out of the way. He limped to one of the nearby benches and sat, then ripped off the Velcro tabs of the cast as if there was nothing wrong with his leg whatsoever. Intent on his task, he didn’t look her way.
He’s the past, she reminded herself, and continued to scan the diligent swimmers. They were already hard at work, with their heads down and skimming through the water. Ben slipped into the pool, choosing an empty lane, reached out with his strong arms and took off, favoring his injured leg as he swam a perfect, fast, efficient crawl stroke.
She couldn’t watch him and not remember the too-fierce, too-energetic and larger-than-life McKaslin boy who had made chaos out of nothing.
Trouble still followed him like a shadow, if last night was a clue. He seemed so remote. He seemed so bitter. She hadn’t been able to get him out of her mind through the night, making sleep nearly impossible. And now here he was in her pool, more distant and silent than he’d been at the gas station.
Why does seeing him make me hurt, Lord? It was as if she saw her past when she looked at him. Not just the sweet way she’d loved him, in the most idealistic sense, but more. Seeing him made her assess her life and the years gone by.
She was no longer the girl who believed in gold medals and honorable people and that if she worked hard, lived faithfully and did the right thing, then only good things would come her way.
For a long while she’d been disillusioned. She’d felt as if God had betrayed her by letting her chase dreams that would only bring her sorrow. But then she saw it was simply part of growing up. Of putting away childish things, and a child’s dreamy view of the world. Of a world that was not f
air, not kind and not safe, and learning to do right in that world.
I’m no longer in love with you, Ben McKaslin. When she should have felt relieved, she felt only more jumbled inside. More confused—and how could that be possible? Because the old Ben, the young boy, was gone, too.
He’d always had a noble spirit, and as a young idealistic girl she’d seen the best in him—when he had been trying to find the worst in himself. Had he succeeded in that sad endeavor? Or, instead, had he found the best?
She took another sip of tea and put away the questions. Ben McKaslin’s life wasn’t her business, and maybe that was for the best.
She closed the door to the past and concentrated on the moment. On the contented splish and rush of the swimmers in the water, of the gurgle of the pump sucking water through the filter, and of the bobbins on the rope slapping against the tile on the far end of the pool.
This moment. This is what mattered. She purposely kept herself from noticing how he soared through the water like a dolphin.
He’s not special to me anymore…he’s a stranger.
She took another sip of tea, climbed down from her chair and paced the long way around the pool, taking her time, so that when she came around to him, he was exactly in the middle of his lane.
Think of him as just another swimmer.
She took refuge in the corner, where she kept a sharp eye on everything, even on this quiet morning where it seemed nothing could go wrong.
She’d learned the hard way that’s when devastation happened—when you least expected it.
His leg was killing him, but would he show weakness? No way. Not in front of anyone, especially Cadence. Clutching the wall, he paused long enough to catch his breath and watched her out of his peripheral vision.
Every fiber of his being seemed aware of the way she moved like sunlight around the huge Olympic-sized pool. Her uniform, a lifeguard’s nylon windbreaker and matching shorts over her swimsuit, made the moment loop oddly back in time. They had both spent a lot of time in this pool as teenaged kids.
We’ve both traveled long, divergent roads since.
As he kicked away from the wall, feeling the water slide over his skin, he stretched out into a steady breaststroke so he could keep his eyes barely above water level and watch Cadence as she circled the pool.
How weird was it that she was working here? Working. As a lifeguard. What had happened to her big plans to get out of this backwater place? What about the fame and riches of her diving career? Why wasn’t she in broadcast sports?
Good questions. He remembered what the doc had told him—the one he’d nearly blown a gasket at because he hadn’t liked the diagnosis. You can’t always get what you want, hotshot. The M.D.’s words haunted him as he touched the wall and began another lap. Had the same thing happened to Cadence?
It troubled him all through his laps. When white-hot pain was shooting through his calf and he was clenching his jaw so tight he couldn’t breathe correctly between strokes, he had to call it a day. Done.
And after only a quarter of a mile, too. He swallowed the disappointment as he climbed out of the pool, ignoring the stabbing pain and the throbbing burn of injured muscles and tendons. He hadn’t pushed as hard as he’d wanted to, and he was beat. Recovery might not be as quick as he’d hoped.
You have to be tougher, that’s all.
Ben ignored the way his leg was shaking so hard, it wouldn’t support any weight. He was glad Cadence was at the far end of the pool—he’d timed it that way. She stood by the diving pool, separated by a concrete bridge from the regular pool. The diving boards towered behind her, the springboard and platforms empty and still.
For an instant the image of Cadence on TV accepting her medal was superimposed on her standing poolside in her jacket and suit, with her silver whistle hanging around her neck.
He still couldn’t reconcile the two images as she moved on ordinary, discount-store flip-flops along the deck, squatting down with the grace of a gymnast to speak with the elderly lady who’d passed him about six times in the next lane.
Whatever happened to Cadence is none of your business, man.
Ben snatched his crutches and settled them into place. The deck was aggregate concrete, which provided decent traction for his crutches, but it was slightly wet in places from folks dripping on their way from the showers to the pool. He went slowly.
More devoted swimmers were arriving—it looked as if he’d stopped at just the right time. He’d been all right swimming slowly and steadily, but he’d been in a lane by himself. If he’d stayed in the pool longer, he wouldn’t have been able to keep pace.
His pride burned as he headed to the locker-room door on his crutches. He’d remember to be here the same time—when they opened—tomorrow. And Cadence, would she be on duty?
Keeping his face down, he risked glancing upward through his lashes to watch her. What had happened to Cadence to bring her here, when she’d had everything she’d ever wanted? While he turned the corner and moved into the showers, he remembered her teenaged voice, soft and sweet. I can’t wait to get out of this boringville. I’m getting out and I’m never coming back.
Never was one of those ominous words, Ben had learned. Because we weren’t as in control of our lives as we liked to think. God was, and Ben had no clue why the Lord had brought him back here to the central Montana country where he’d been born and raised.
He was lucky—he had nothing to complain about. His primary duty in the military was rescuing and patching up pilots and soldiers wounded in action, wherever they were, on the front lines or in hostile enemy territory. He’d seen enough wounded men and women to know that for whatever reason, the angels had been keeping him safe on his last mission, but he couldn’t help feeling defeated.
I can’t do any good to anyone here, Father. He was impatient and he knew it, and he believed that this, too, was part of God’s plan for him, but he was impatient anyway. Duty called. He’d had to turn off the radio again this morning on the drive here because there had been an update about soldiers being shot and injured in Iraq.
Pararescue had been Ben’s purpose for all of his adult life. He was just irritable, being stuck here. Irritable waiting to get his leg back into shape.
Whatever had happened to bring Cadence back couldn’t have been too traumatic, he decided as he showered and limped to the lockers. She’d looked great—more relaxed, her smile easy and wide, and her cornflower-blue eyes sparkling as she’d talked with her morning regulars.
Whatever happened, he’d be seeing her again. But they were strangers now. There was no going back to their high school days when they’d been practically inseparable. When he’d loved her with the whole of his heart. When he’d believed they were soul mates.
No such things as soul mates, he told himself as he pulled his T-shirt over his head. Failure became a tight vise in his chest until it hurt to breathe. He’d failed at every major relationship he’d ever started, and he knew he’d failed Cadence the most.
Just go chase your gold, he’d said to her selfishly, hoping to hurt her, in the way that only an eighteen-year-old boy could.
Seeing her brought back too much pain. There were other times, aside from early mornings, set aside at the pool for lap swims. Maybe he’d start coming in the evening.
Chapter Four
“Ben!” His sister Amy saw him first, since she was ringing up a ticket behind the front counter. She handed Mr. Brisbane his change and came around the corner with both arms outstretched. “I heard a rumor you were in town. Oh, give me a hug, mister!”
“Do I have to?” He groaned, but he was only faking it, and they both knew it. His baby sister was all grown up—and happy, judging by the glow on her cheeks and her wide smile.
Wow. Since when did Amy smile like that? He snuggled her to him and gave her a raspberry on the side of her head, something he’d done since she was a baby toddling around. And his chest warmed when she laughed, the sound making him feel as if he were
finally home.
“Look how healthy you look!” Amy swatted him in the chest with the flat of her hand, a playful swipe.
So many emotions swarmed within him, seeing her so happy and grown up and centered, as if she’d come into her place in the world.
She stepped back to get a good look at him. “You scared us all to death. Missing in action. Then a casualty.”
He could see she was prepared to go on, but he held up his hand. “I’ve already gotten the lecture from Rachel. I promise, no more getting shot on duty.”
“Ben.” Mr. Brisbane had pocketed his wallet, and offered his hand. “It’s good to see you back in one piece, son. Hoo-yah.”
“Thank you, sir.” Ben saluted the former soldier, who’d fought in the Pacific and been wounded on Iwo Jima. “It’s good to see you again.”
With a nod as if to say, “You’ll do, Ben McKaslin,” Ed Brisbane moved on, and behind him was another veteran. Clyde Winkler had braved the beaches at Normandy.
“You make us proud, son.” Clyde clapped Ben on the shoulder as he passed, as if unable to say more.
Proud? No, Ben figured he’d been passable as a soldier, but when he looked up, leaning on his crutches to follow Amy down the aisle to the closest empty booth, everyone in the diner was on their feet.
And clapping.
They weren’t applauding him specifically, he knew, but just that he was the nearest soldier from the Iraqi conflict. The Middle East was so far away, where so many men and women served—soldiers who’d left their homes, families and lives behind to serve and protect. Ben thought of the soldiers he hadn’t been able to save. Of the men and women who’d given their lives for their country.
He blushed and felt inadequate. “Don’t clap because I didn’t dodge a bullet. That’s not the kind of behavior you want to reward.”
A ripple of laughter rolled through the diner. Grateful he didn’t have to walk a step farther, he collapsed on the seat and let Amy steal his crutches.
“Coffee.” She returned to pour him a cup. Her diamond engagement ring glittered in the cheerful sunlight slanting through the window.