by Pamela Morsi
Eli was waiting for her at the door to the room. Mazy offered one last wave before he turned off the lights.
Then, standing in the doorway, silhouetted in full view of his father, Eli pulled her into his arms. His mouth came down on hers, the warmth of it unexpected and evoking both sensitivity and sensuality.
“Let’s go home, Mazy,” he whispered. “I really want to make love to you.”
28
A couple of nights later, as Mazy was setting the table for dinner, Tru burst through the kitchen door. He was beaming with enthusiasm.
“Hey, Gram. Do you think we could get through dinner a little quicker tonight?”
“I suspect we could.”
“I’m going to the basketball game.”
“You’re going to the basketball game?” Mazy repeated with surprise.
“Yeah, you, too,” he answered. “And Gram if she wants to go.”
The two women shared a speculative glance.
“Eli is taking us.”
Mazy couldn’t stop the smile that spread across her face. “Is he?” she asked. “And your gram and I are included in the invitation?”
“Absolutely. He asked me to ask you.”
“I’ll stay home and watch my shows, thank you,” Beth Ann said. “But I think it’s nice that you kids go out and have fun.”
Tru chuckled at having Mazy included as one of the “kids.”
After the meal, Beth Ann insisted that Mazy leave the cleanup and get ready for her outing.
It was an outing in more ways than one. It would be the first time that she and Eli had been seen together in public. Of course, Tru would be with them. She didn’t know if that would make it seem more serious or less.
She didn’t have any clothes that Eli hadn’t already seen. She assured herself that it didn’t make any difference. She also wished that she’d chosen to save just one pair of fashionable jeans over the “mom” ones. But it was way too late for that now.
Still, looking in her mirror, she thought she probably looked as good as any woman her age in town. She turned and peered over her shoulder, trying to get a better look at her backside.
Was her butt really big?
“No!” she admonished herself aloud. “You look fine.”
All those years, all those guys, it had undermined her self-esteem. She was forgetting what the shrink had told her to do with negative talk.
Nobody can unhear what people say. But they can rephrase it and repurpose it. She’d forgotten to do that, because it was Eli. She knew he would never hurt her, so she’d let her guard down. She could never control other people’s words, she could only control her reaction to them.
“Rephrase. Pardon me, I couldn’t help but notice your ass.” She laughed to herself as she recalled the old joke: “It’s big and white and follows me everywhere.”
“Okay, repurpose...” That took her a second. “If he’s not averting his eyes from it, then he must like the way it looks. And he certainly can’t keep his hands off it. So there.”
She nodded at her reflection. “I can live with that.”
“Who are you talking to?” her mother called out from the kitchen.
“The mirror,” she answered.
Eli showed up a few minutes later, wearing striped black and gold.
“Oh, my God, you still have a Bee sweater!”
He laughed. “Everybody has a Bee sweater.”
It was true. The home team section, known as the Swarm, was where all the black-and-gold-striped sweaters of the world went to die.
Eli had found one—once belonging to a younger, slimmer Clark—for Tru to wear. Amid the crowd, only Mazy stood out like a sore thumb. Or maybe like a thumb with a stinger in it.
Although she saw a number of people she knew, they weren’t the people that would step up to say hello. A few greeted Eli like a long-lost friend. Apparently he did not attend that many community events.
“And who is this pretty lady you’ve brought with you?” came in several different versions of the question.
Eli would introduce her, and then the greeter’s eyes would grow wary and, after minimal politeness, he’d scurry away.
If Eli noticed anything, he didn’t comment.
The building was a new, larger version of what they’d had when Mazy was still in school. It was modern and well lit, with a very shiny, unscuffed floor. But the bleachers weren’t any more comfortable than she remembered. The murals of Buzz on the walls weren’t any more artistic. And the three championship banners from years gone by still fluttered slightly from the pull of the exhaust fan.
The place filled up fast. Even the first section on the other side of the court was beginning to have a splattering of Bee sweaters.
She was seated between Tru and Eli. The latter entertained her by pointing out people they both had known back in the day, and updating her on any foibles or fiascos she might have missed.
“Those are my nieces,” he said. “There on the front row.”
Mazy followed his gaze to see two little blonde girls, both dressed in tiny black-and-gold outfits that perfectly matched the uniforms of the current high school cheerleaders.
Mazy almost moaned aloud. “Uh, are they official mascots or something?”
“Nope,” Eli said. “Sheila dresses them that way so that they’ll always feel like they are part of the action until they are old enough to take their rightful place on the squad.”
Mazy looked him straight in the eye. “You realize that your sister-in-law is a nutbar.”
“More aware than you could ever know,” he told her. “I love my brother, but his priorities are all screwed up, too. They truly are perfect for each other.”
They shared a laugh. It felt so good to look at him. To talk to him. To laugh with him. Mazy thought that a woman could put up with a lot of grief in the world if she had this man to share a smile with her from time to time.
Once the game started, attention focused on the court. It was a conference game with a solid rival. The teams were so evenly matched that every play mattered.
But as Mazy watched, she got the distinct feeling that someone was staring at her. She shrugged it off. In her years in Brandt Mountain, she’d been more infamous than popular. And her position at the bank was not making her a town favorite.
Also, it was her first time in public with Eli. There were bound to be people who were more than a little interested. It might not even be about her. Eli had obviously not been a monk in the years she was gone. He might have jealous old girlfriends all over the gym.
She tried to shrug it off, but it persisted. It was almost as if she could feel the eyes boring into her. Finally, she couldn’t stand it another minute and turned for a quick peek.
Across an expanse of cheering crowd, her eyes met Tad Driscoll. Her jaw dropped.
He quickly looked away and she did, too.
Tad? Why would Tad be staring?
She waited a minute, feigning total engrossment in the game, and then glanced back in that direction. Caught him again.
That was completely weird. What interest could Tad have in her? Why would he care if she was out with Eli?
Right then one of the Brandt Mountain players made a nice block and Tru nudged her.
“That guy is in my physics class.”
Mazy nodded absently before the obvious dawned on her.
Tad is not looking at you, he’s looking at Tru.
A wave of nostalgia swept over her that was so bitter her eyes filled with tears. A million times in her life, a million musings, she had hoped, dreamed, imagined, the moment when Tad saw his son for the first time. Never among those expectations did the scene include crowded bleachers at a basketball game.
From the days before Tru was
even born, she’d fantasized about Tad seeing him, wanting him, loving him. And wanting her, loving her, by extension. She remembered secretly believing that he would show up at the hospital while she labored. When he’d not even acknowledged the birth, she’d phoned every day for months on end, begging, pleading, for a visit. She’d had friends and family try to talk him into meeting his child. She had threatened and cajoled to no avail.
Even then she hadn’t given up. She’d plotted a hundred times to “accidentally” run into him. Every time she came home, she tried to show up where she thought he might be. She’d often taken Tru to the little playground near the Driscolls’ home. They’d gone on toddler walks along Tad’s favorite hiking trail in hopes of confronting him. But it had never happened. Tad had deliberately, determinedly steered clear.
At last the moment was here. It was now. And it no longer meant anything to her. It meant even less to Tru. Tears stung her eyes. It had been a terrible, stupid waste of her youth, of her heart.
Suddenly a hand clasped hers. She looked up to see Eli’s face full of concern.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” she told him, shaking her head. “Just a sad moment.”
The explanation didn’t smooth the wrinkle in his brow. But they did turn back to the game. Eli never let go of her hand. And that kept the bleakness at bay. Yes, her past was full of mistakes. But she had taken a stand for herself and the present was better. With Eli at her side, even the future seemed to brighten.
At halftime Tru was invited to sit with a group of other classmates, most of them girls, Mazy noted. All around them people began heading down to the restrooms or the concession stand.
Eli stood up. “Would you like a Coke or something?” he asked.
“Sure, I could go for a soda.”
Eli made a move and then hesitated. He glanced at her again, made a big display of stretching, and then sat down. “Get me one, too, won’t ya?”
“Oh, okay.”
Mazy rattled through a moment of confusion before she grabbed her purse and headed down the steps.
By the time she was down the aisle she began to rethink what had just happened. Hadn’t he offered her something? Or had she said something first? Maybe they had simply been chatting? But by the time she was in the line for drinks, she was clear that a giant mistake had been made. She didn’t even have to open her wallet to know she was carrying $3.36. All the money that she had until payday on Friday. She had been hoarding that money like a miser, in case an emergency came up. Although she had to admit that it wouldn’t be much of an emergency if three bucks could fix it.
Still, it went against her principles to spend her very last bit of cash for something as discretionary as soft drinks. But Eli had paid for their tickets to the game. It made perfect sense that she should buy the refreshments. Perfect sense if she were not as hard up for cash as she currently happened to be.
She was the next person up at the window. If she were going to walk away, now was the moment to do it.
“Hi.”
She looked up to see Tad suddenly standing beside her. His blue eyes were bright and he was smiling at her in that way she remembered from her teens.
“Let me get this―what are you having?”
“Oh, I can’t let you buy.”
Tad leaned closer with a flirty whisper. “Hey, you’re letting me cut in line. Now what will you have?”
“Two Cokes, please.”
“Make that three,” he told the volunteer at the window as he peeled a ten off the wad of bills in his hand.
Mazy stood there next to him feeling distinctly uncomfortable. Her presence here with Eli might cause a little swirl of gossip, being seen with Tad might reenergize a storm that had never truly blown over.
“Thanks,” she said simply as she took her drinks. She had hoped to move away entirely, but Tad followed.
After a quick consideration, Mazy halted, believing it was better to be seen conversing with Tad in a crowd than standing alone with him in an open part of the floor.
He hesitated, as if his preference was more privacy rather than less. But he apparently decided to accept what was available.
“I saw Truman,” he said. “He’s...he’s a good-looking kid.”
Instead of an inconsequential “Thank you,” Mazy rolled her eyes. “You mean, he looks like you.”
Tad actually chuckled as if it were funny. “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking, but it sounded pretty conceited to say it aloud.”
His self-deprecating words were deliberately funny. He could be so charming when he wanted to be.
“If other people notice,” she said. “That can’t be helped and it can’t be part of our agreement. Tru can’t hide out just because his likeness to you might be inconvenient.”
“No, of course not,” Tad said. His brow was deeply furrowed and his expression suggested he was wounded by her words. “I want all good things for him, just like I do my girls. He’s an innocent kid. Our mistakes only belong to us.”
It was strange wording, but she nodded.
“Agreed.”
“Mazy, I know you never expected to hear this from me,” Tad continued, “but I’m sorry that things worked out the way they did.”
The shock must have shown on her face.
“I know that’s not how I behaved when you showed up in my office,” he said. “Honestly, you caught me off guard. And then I was so surprised about...about your recent problem. Your solution was unexpected. I reacted to what felt like a threat.”
He shook his head. His eyes, those beautiful blue eyes that she loved in the face of her own son, gazed at her in a way that simply had to be sincere. “We just kind of got restarted on the wrong foot,” he said.
“I think we must always have been on the wrong foot,” Mazy replied.
Tad shrugged. “You’re probably right about that. I know it’s all ancient history, but I need to set the record straight. I cared a lot about you, but I was in love with Genna. I should never have allowed my feelings for you to go as far as they did.”
Mazy was slightly stunned at his revelation. She’d been convinced for some time now that he’d never had any feelings for her. She’d been convinced, because that was what he’d told her. She’d been a convenience for him. She’d been a lonely, lovesick girl who would put out for him when his steady girlfriend wouldn’t.
“I know that what happened was one hundred percent my fault,” he said.
Mazy felt a sudden shock of guilt surge through her. “No, of course it wasn’t one hundred percent your fault.”
Mazy was fairly certain that it wasn’t even fifty percent his fault. Her sessions with Dr. Reese had taught her to take responsibility for her own mistakes. There was no use in beating herself up about them. Only by owning them and living them would she succeed in not repeating them.
She was owning them, she was taking responsibility for them, but did that mean she should confess them? The secret that she’d kept so guarded, so close to the vest for so long, weighed on her. But she wasn’t even tempted to share it.
“What happened between us simply happened,” she lied. “We were young, stupid kids.”
He smiled at her. It wasn’t the toothy, confident smile that made women sigh and men eager to be his friend. It was a smaller, softer smile that seemed somehow infinitely more private.
“Thank you, Mazy,” he said. “Thank you and don’t worry about anything with me. It has never been, nor will it ever be, my intention to cause trouble for you or your son.”
She was amazed at how freeing that statement made her feel. She hadn’t even realized that the low-level worry had been there until it was removed. She took a deep breath because it was suddenly easier to breathe.
The safety of the crowd around them had disappeared. The
game was about to start and most people had taken their seats. Tad and Mazy might as well have been in the middle of the court with a spotlight on them, everyone in the building saw everything.
“Look,” he said. “Why don’t we talk again, someplace a little more private? Maybe... Well, dinner is way too scary, right? Why don’t we try to do lunch together? Do you think we could do that? Sometime?”
Lunch with Tad Driscoll?
Warning alerts went off all over Mazy’s brain. Her frontal lobe kept repeating, It’s just lunch, but deeper, less straightforward and logical recesses were flashing Danger in bright red lights.
“No,” she said. “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
He accepted her refusal amicably. “Perhaps you’re right. It’s a small town and we have a lot of history.” He glanced up into the stands. “You’re here with Latham. Are you two...?”
“We’ve started seeing each other,” Mazy answered.
Tad nodded. “He’s a good guy, Mazy.”
“Yes, he is,” she agreed.
The game had recommenced as she made her way up the steps to the seat where she’d left Eli.
She scooted in beside him and handed him his soda.
“Was Driscoll bothering you?”
“No,” she answered. “Of course not. We were just talking.”
“You shouldn’t have to even acknowledge his existence,” Eli said. “He has a lot of gall talking to you.”
“Well, he thinks you’re a nice guy,” Mazy told him. “And these drinks, by the way, are on him.”
29
With a big win, it was traditional to show up at Brandt Burger for a celebratory meal. Eli didn’t ask Mazy if she wanted to go. The thought occurred to him, but he’d already passed his good-guy quota. This evening he was back into bad-boyfriend mode and bad boyfriends do what they want to do. Their girlfriends go along to get along. So, without so much as a “Why don’t we...” he drove them directly from the school parking lot to the hive of school spirit “after-gloat” out on the highway.
Tru was obviously delighted, as well as hungry. Eli found an amazing parking spot very near the door, with a great vantage point on all the activity. He put down the tailgate to form their personal dining area and left Mazy there while he and Tru went for food.