by JoAnn Ross
“It happens with kids,” Jake said. “I was a hell-raiser myself before I went into the corps right out of high school.”
“And look at you now,” the mayor said. “Business owner, chamber of commerce member—”
“And damn good cook,” Dillon added. Jake’s Crab Shack, among the other restaurants in Shelter Bay, had kept him well fed over the past months.
“Ms. Templeton assured me that Matthew knows what he did was wrong and that it won’t happen again,” Ginger said.
“That’s the mom speaking.” Dillon knew that his own mom, whom he’d given hell for a time himself after his dad’s death in an oil-rig fire, would’ve always been the first to leap to his defense. “I want to talk to him directly.”
“Of course,” everyone at the table agreed in unison.
Okay. If the kid was smart enough to keep up his grades throughout a season encompassing more than twenty games during a tough personal time, he shouldn’t have any trouble picking up a new system.
If he was willing to give up his starring role.
Which remained to be seen.
4
Matt hated everything about Oregon. He hated the winter rain that was always drizzling on the hood of the stupid Gor-Tex jacket his mother had made him buy during the move. He hated the so-called beach with its stringy green kelp and piles of driftwood logs, and he especially hated the water that was so ice-cold that if he even tried to surf, his balls would probably go up into his throat and stay there for the next fifty years.
And making things worse was having his mom drive him to school like some little kid. He still had six more months before he’d be old enough to drive without her riding shotgun. If he had a car, he’d head straight back to California. Where he belonged.
She tried to make conversation, but he wasn’t in any mood to talk, especially since if she cared about what he had to say, she wouldn’t have dragged him to this lame, nowhere place.
A cold gray fog surrounded the car as they sat waiting for the bridge to open up to let a fishing boat pass from the harbor on the way out to the ocean.
“I just thought of another positive thing about playing for the Dolphins that you might not have considered,” she tried again.
Not wanting to talk about the stupid team that would kill his dream of getting to the pros, Matt folded his arms and looked out the passenger window, pretending interest in the blue boat barely visible through the fog.
“President Obama’s brother-in-law is the Oregon State basketball coach.”
“Duh.” Even people who didn’t care squat about basketball probably knew that.
“Which means that the team probably draws more press attention than some others.”
“So? I wouldn’t be playing for the Beavers.” In Matt’s opinion, that was an even stupider name than Dolphins. But at least it was better than OSU’s rival Oregon Ducks.
“I’d guess it also draws more NBA scouts,” she said, as if not hearing him.
“In case you didn’t notice, Mom, I’m not old enough for college. Or the NBA draft.”
“Having given birth to you, I’m well aware of your age, Matthew.” There was a snarky edge to her voice he wasn’t used to hearing from her. “My point, and I do have one, is that since those reporters and scouts are already here in Oregon, don’t you think they might possibly be interested in taking a side trip to the coast to check out how the number one prep player from California is doing? Especially since you’re bound to receive a great deal of local press?”
As much as he hated to admit it, she might have a point.
“How many high school players are there in California?” she asked.
“I don’t know. A bunch just in the SoCal CIF.” Matt guessed that the Southern California Collegiate Interscholastic Federation, in which he’d played, was probably the largest in the state.
“Which put you in competition with a lot of players.”
He turned away from the window toward her. “Who weren’t as good as me.”
“Well, that goes without saying.”
Her smile made him realize how long it had been since he’d seen her face lit up that way. It also reminded him how pretty she was and how much younger she was than most of his friends’ mothers. Hell, she’d only been three years older than he was now when she’d gotten pregnant with him.
Which, having lost his own dream, made him wonder for the first time whether she ever resented him, since if she hadn’t dropped out of school, she’d probably be really famous.
“But with all those schools scattered all over the state, it’s unlikely that individual players, even one as good as you, can garner that much press attention,” she said. “Especially with all the big college and pro teams stealing the spotlight.
“But here”—she waved her hand toward the bridge, which was lowering now that the boat had passed through—“although I hate to stoop to clichés, you’ll be the proverbial big fish in a smaller pond.”
“More like a damn puddle,” he muttered even as he considered that prospect.
“Well, then, you’ll just have to help grow the program, won’t you?”
Because he hadn’t even considered that situation until she’d brought it up, Matt didn’t answer. Deep in thought about possibilities, he didn’t notice they were driving through town until she cut the engine in the school parking lot. Instead of the sprawling, Spanish-style red-tile-roof building he’d left behind, this had a cedar roof and four two-story wings that fanned out from a center square. Fir trees dripping with rain stood where the tennis courts had been back at his old high school.
“You sure you don’t want me to come in?” she asked.
“I’m fine.”
“Better than fine.” She reached to tousle his hair, the way she’d done when he was a little kid, then, apparently realizing he’d hate that, pulled her hand back at the last minute. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to my life, Matt.”
If he was all that important, why the hell had she uprooted him and ruined his life?
“I know it doesn’t seem like it now,” she said, “but if I didn’t truly believe this was the best thing for you, I never would’ve moved up here.”
She was wrong. But since he wasn’t going to change her mind in the next two minutes, Matt decided not to start another argument.
“Whatever. I’ve got to get in,” he said.
“Of course. You don’t want to be late on your very first day.” This time her smile was a little crooked. And it could’ve been a trick of the light, what with the rain and all, but he thought her eyes looked a little wet. Damn. He might hate what she’d done to their life, but he so couldn’t deal with making her cry.
Pulling herself together, she reached out and, thank you, God, instead of hugging him in public, she patted his leg. “Have a great day.”
Suddenly, for some stupid reason that didn’t make any sense, Matt felt his own eyes burning.
Not trusting his voice, he grabbed his book bag from the backseat, pulled up the hood of his new jacket, and escaped out the door before he risked making a fool of himself in front of every high school kid in Hickstown.
5
Since the beginning of this first semester of teaching, Dillon had established a routine of getting to school at least an hour before the students arrived. It gave him time to settle in, grab some coffee in the teachers’ lounge, read the paper, then get his mind into teaching mode. Which still, after all his years in the military, was sometimes a challenge.
Not that he didn’t enjoy his job. He loved the kids, the challenge to find ways to engage them, and he especially loved that every day was nothing like the previous one, which was good because he’d chosen EOD partly because he was easily bored. And, after having run a summer camp for the players from last year’s team, he was pretty sure, if he could keep the boosters at bay, he’d enjoy coaching, too.
The one thing that was way different from his previous gig was that teenagers weren
’t all that inclined to take orders, which was forcing him to find unique ways to motivate them.
This morning the booster meeting had lasted longer than he’d expected, so he arrived at the same time as the kids, who were pouring off buses and out of cars, with the underclassmen climbing out of their parents’ cars, while juniors and seniors, even in less-than-wealthy Shelter Bay, tended to have their own vehicles.
As he crossed the parking lot, he paused for a moment, enjoying the view of the battalion of fir trees spearing like shaggy arrows into the pewter sky. He’d grown up in the West Texas oil patch, then spent the past several years in the deserts of Iraq and the desolate landscape of Afghanistan, so the sight of the magnificent Douglas firs draped in silvery moss never ceased to amaze and awe him.
A black Lexus RX caught his attention. First, because you didn’t tend to see that many luxury SUVs in the school parking lot. Even more unlikely was to see one with California plates.
Since Templeton wasn’t old enough to drive, it didn’t take the deductive skills that had saved Dillon’s life on more than one occasion to figure out this was the kid’s mom. He was debating whether to stop and chat when he noticed that her forehead was on the steering wheel.
Concerned that she might be sick, he went over and tapped on the window. When she lifted her head to look at him, he noticed what seemed to be tears swimming in her eyes and wished he’d just kept walking.
There was a buzz as she rolled down the window. “I’m sorry,” she said before he could introduce himself. “I know I don’t have a parking sticker, but—”
“I’m not campus police.” Actually, the school didn’t have a police officer assigned to it, but since she’d come from Southern California, where crime was probably a lot more common—even in Beverly Hills—he wasn’t sure she’d find the lack of security good news. “I’m Dillon Slater. I teach physical science, physics, and—”
“You’re the basketball coach.”
“That would be me. And I think, for the record, this is where I assure you that I didn’t have anything to do with that booster phone call to your son. In fact, I didn’t even know about it until a couple hours ago.”
“That’s good to hear.”
She skimmed her left fingers beneath eyes the same soft green as her necklace, as if checking for tears. With his eye for detail, Dillon noticed that her ring finger was bare, confirming what Ken had said about Matthew Templeton’s father being out of their lives.
“I usually don’t let him deal with boosters,” she said. “I’m not suggesting that the man who called him—”
“That’d be Ken Curtis. He owns the hardware store and has been head of the boosters for pretty much forever.”
“Curtis?” Her brow furrowed. “Would he happen to be married to Marcy Curtis, by any chance?”
“Got it in one.”
Her eyes turned cool. “Isn’t that a coincidence,” she murmured, giving him the idea that she might share his earlier suspicions as to how she ended up living in the Shelter Bay school district.
He shrugged. “Shelter Bay’s a small town. Some places might have six degrees of separation, but here you’d be hard pressed to find two or three.”
“Well.” She looked out the rain-spotted windshield as she considered that idea. “That makes sense. It’s also, quite honestly, why I chose to move here. Every time I’d come to town to visit the Dancing Deer Two after sales trips to Portland and Eugene, I’d find myself relaxing…
“And getting back to my point, I’m not suggesting Mr. Curtis called to make an illegal or unethical offer, but unfortunately there have been some who tried.”
“Not under my watch,” he assured her. “If your son decides to try out and if he makes the team, you can trust that everything will be not just legal and aboveboard, but ethical.”
“I appreciate that. But if you stopped to ask my opinion, I’ve no idea what he’s going to decide. About anything.”
Her sigh was soft and, he thought, a little sad. She also looked too young to be the mother of a high school sophomore.
“That’s not why I stopped to talk with you,” Dillon said. “I just wanted to make sure you were feeling okay. I’m still on civilian time and haven’t entered into teaching/coach mode yet.”
“I’m fine.” Which was obviously a lie, but he wasn’t going to call her on it. This time she ran her hand through her straight fall of hair, which, even with the low clouds hanging over them, appeared woven with golden sunlight. “I’m just not exactly the most popular person on the planet right now.”
From the moment Ken had called, Dillon’s thoughts had been focused on the Templeton kid. It belatedly occurred to him that he hadn’t given any thought to the mother, other than a niggling concern about the possibility of her complaining about undue pressure being put on her son.
“Join the club. Being the guy who hands out homework and springs pop quizzes, I’m familiar with how that feels. Want to check out the gym?” he asked in a not very subtle attempt to change the subject. “Just in case your son does decide he wants to play?”
It took her a moment to consider. “I’d like that,” she said.
Dillon could hear the hesitation in her tone. “But?”
“It’s almost time for school to start. Don’t you have a class?”
“My first hour’s open,” he assured her. “I was planning to spend it watching game films from last year. Which, believe me, is not the most fun part of my job.”
“Having seen the team’s record, I can imagine.”
A little silence fell over them.
“There’s something else,” he guessed as he sensed a battle going on inside her.
“I’ve already managed to humiliate Matt by driving him here today. If he sees me walking down a hall and thinks I’m checking up on him…”
“You don’t have to worry. As it happens, fire regulations require an exit door on the gym. We’ll go in that way.”
Dillon told himself that the reason he was inviting her to see the gym was not because whatever shampoo or lotion she was wearing had her smelling like a tropical vacation—although, along with the sunshine in her hair, the pleasant scent did a lot to brighten a gray coastal day—but because he wanted to delve a bit more into whatever problems her son had been going through.
The kid could shoot like Larry Bird and dunk like Michael Jordan, but if he was going to cause conflict, Dillon didn’t want him on his team.
“Thank you.”
The rain was no longer hammering on the roof of the SUV, but it was definitely more than a mist. As he opened the door for her, she picked up a small umbrella from the backseat floor.
The tide of students had already flowed into the building, leaving Claire and Dillon mostly alone as they walked toward the sidewalk. A few kids, in danger of being late, raced by, calling out greetings.
“It appears you’ve exaggerated your unpopularity,” she observed.
“That’s because the season hasn’t started yet. Let’s see how they feel when I fail to provide them with a championship season the first year.”
“Surely no one’s expecting that quick a turnaround of the program.”
“In a logical world you’d be right. But there’s nothing logical about small-town high school athletics. From what I’ve been able to tell, most folks are expecting me to provide a miracle season. The kind they write books and make movies about.”
“Miracles do happen. Which, I suppose, is why those movies like Hoosiers get made. People want to believe in them, which isn’t such a bad thing. And Matt could make your miracle more likely.”
“I’m not going to lie. He probably could. However—and I’m not putting your son down in any way—I’m not sure he’s the savior the boosters believe he is.”
They’d been walking side by side across the asphalt parking lot, which glistened like black obsidian from the rain, the scarlet umbrella keeping them a bit apart. At his words, Claire stopped and turned toward him.
“Why would you say that?” A blond brow winged up. Her eyes frosted, chilly enough to freeze Shelter Bay. “As you undoubtedly know, he was the number one freshman prep player in his state division last year. Every game BHHS won was due to his talent.”
“That was all too clear from watching the videos I found. Maybe it’s because of all my years in the Army, but I tend to look more at the team picture. When everyone has an assigned role, everyone gets to enjoy the victory.”
“Even if you lose?”
“This team hasn’t had a winning season for twelve years. The only way I can figure out how to put a few games in the win column is to have all the players feel responsible for the outcome. If I let any single player do it all, the others would be more likely to slack off. Which wouldn’t be good for the team or your son.
“Especially since at this level, sports are every bit as much about character building as they are wins. So we’ll play the games my way, and if we lose more than we win, well, parents, boosters, and hometown fans are just going to have to suck it up and deal with it.”
“That’s an admirable attitude,” she allowed. She began walking again. “And one that could possibly get you fired.”
“If you’re worried about Matt having to deal with a coaching change down the road, that’s not going to happen. I came here through Troops to Teachers, a program that puts vets into classrooms. When Shelter Bay’s school district requested a teacher, part of the deal was that I’d put in three years.”
“That sounds a bit like the military.”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I thought, when I first heard of it while I was still deployed. But hey, it works for me, and the good thing for your son, if he does end up playing, is that the same way I can’t quit, the school can’t fire me. Unless I do something illegal, which isn’t going to happen.”
As they reached the sidewalk, he put a hand on the back of her coat. Not in any sexual way, Dillon assured himself, but to guide her around the back of the building to the gym door.