“Hey, Ems,” Nick said, drawing a deep breath as I set my food on top of the roof and pulled my keys out of my pocket. “I guess this is goodbye until I get there.”
I swallowed, nodding. “Guess so.”
He cleared his throat, eyes scanning the glassy lake across the lot. “I just wanted to say thank you. For staying true to yourself and for making me realize there’s a lot more to life than baseball. It’s been amazing up here. And, I think I’m understanding more about the whole God thing. Anyway, I never would’ve come if it wasn’t for you. Even though it wasn’t under the best terms, I’m still glad I did.”
I released a shaky breath, nodding. “I’m glad you did, too. And, don’t overlook the God part. He’s real, Nick.”
He nodded, green eyes sparking. “I know He is.”
It didn’t cross my mind at all until then, but maybe this was exactly why God sent me up here. So Nick would find Him again. If that was true, I was happy I came, even if it was only for three weeks. Even if it messed with my head more than I was ready for.
“Take care, Ems.” A smart aleck glint shone in his eyes. “Break a leg out there.”
I frowned.
He laughed. “What? I had to.”
“I hate when you say that.”
He nodded, shrugging. “Not about to break tradition now.”
“I should get going.” I unlocked the door and pulled the handle.
He stepped back and nodded, waving once before he walked away.
I slid my food onto the passenger seat and pulled up my favorite playlist, searching the parking lot, hoping just a little bit Tucker would show, but no one else was standing around.
Maybe just five more minutes would be enough . . .
It wasn’t.
-Tucker-
Walker came pounding on the door about half an hour after he left for Emery’s surprise send off. I wavered back and forth on going, but if I went, I wouldn’t be able to keep up the act and I needed her to be free.
“She’s on her way out to her car right now! Last chance if you changed your mind.”
The temptation was there. Worse than any temptation I’d faced before, but I couldn’t. She needed to do this. For herself. It stung, but doing the right thing usually did. “Sorry, bro. It’s over.”
He narrowed his eyes and dug his fingers into his hair, nodding. “Alright, man. But, you’re gonna regret it.”
I knew I was. That wasn’t the point.
“I have to do my laundry. Do you need anything washed?”
“You’re a joke, Tucker,” he said, before he pivoted toward the road and stormed down the hill.
I swallowed and blew a deep breath, closing my eyes. “Please help me, God. I need you now more than ever. I don’t want Emery to leave, but I won’t get in her way. I don’t have the know-how to help these boys unless you’re in it. Please show me what to do.”
Call home.
Chills coated my skin and I cleared my throat, opening my eyes, frowning because no one would be there to pick up.
Call home.
It came again, like a whisper in my heart. I knew that voice, and I knew what ignoring it led to. If I could control it, I’d never ignore Him again.
The phone rang seventeen times. I hung up and cleared my throat, trying to figure out how you tell God I told-you-so without getting struck by lightning.
Call home, Tucker.
I didn’t get why I kept feeling like He was telling me to call when I already tried.
Mom was in rehab for another two weeks. Dad was gone. The boys were with me. No one was there to pick up.
Then it hit me.
Home wasn’t the apartment me and the boys had been living in with Mom. Home was the three-bedroom two-story Mom and Dad bought together when I was four. The same place I saw Walker for the first time. Where Kyler took his first steps. Home wasn’t the house, but the family that lived there. He wanted me to call Dad.
I swallowed, gritting my teeth.
You can’t ask me that, God.
“Hi Tucker!” I heard from a distance, looking up to see Kyler waving to me from the Boathouse.
I waved back and nodded, chills pricking again.
If you’re really asking, I’ll do it, but I’m nowhere near ready for this.
I lifted the receiver and dialed a number I hadn’t dialed in almost a year, bracing myself for a voice I’d tried to erase from my memory since he left.
Two rings was all it took.
“Hello?”
It felt like the whole world stopped when his deep, booming voice hit my ears. It was just me at that phone, and the lake, smooth as glass, reflecting the clear blue sky, and then the voice that made up the memories from my whole life.
“Hello? Who’s this?”
Call home.
I swallowed, taking a deep breath, my fingers trembling like I’d had too much caffeine, except I didn’t have any.
“Hello?”
“It’s Tucker.”
A long silence followed. I wasn’t sure if he hung up. I didn’t want to ask, in case he did. Hearing his voice sent a split through my armor I wasn’t ready for, and I didn’t want to remember what it was like living without him. Just for one minute.
“Tucker?” he said, all choked up.
My eyes stung and my throat tightened as I clenched the receiver. “It’s me, Dad.”
“I didn’t think I’d ever hear your voice again. Are you good, son? Are you all right?”
I nodded, pressing my tongue against the roof of my mouth to keep myself from losing it. “I’m good, Dad. Me and the boys are good.”
He let out a heavy sigh. “I’m so glad.”
I didn’t know what I was supposed to say. Where were we supposed to go from here? “Mom’s not doing so good,” I added. He needed to know that much.
“No. Aunty Ellen called me. I’m going down to see her as soon as she can have visitors. It’s my fault, Tucker. I should’ve got help for her when I saw her slipping, but I couldn’t take it, and I snapped. I was selfish, and I went looking for an escape. What I did was wrong, son.”
He sniffed, and the phone muffled, and I swore I heard him sobbing.
Man, I couldn’t take much more of this.
I swallowed, shaking my head, a fire burning in my chest I couldn’t explain. Seeing him again would ruin her completely. Someone had to protect her. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to visit her. Not unless you’re ready to come home, Dad.”
“I’m ready, Tucker,” he said through sobs.
I couldn’t figure out what was going on, and I was about ready to pass out from the battle waging between my mind and my soul. “Listen. I have to go.” I shook my head, trying to shake the urge to believe him. “I don’t think seeing you would be good for her. She’s barely hanging on.”
He went quiet again.
I watched Kyler go out on a paddle board with another boy his age, laughing as they dug their paddles in to splash each other. Things weren’t perfect the way they were, but we were better like this than how we were when he was around.
“Listen. I want to come talk with you and the boys before I see her. I have a lot I need to say, and I don’t want to do it over the phone. If that’s all right with you guys.”
I closed my eyes.
Why now, God? I’m alone, and broken, and I just sacrificed the world to do what’s right for Emery. Don’t ask me to do this, too.
“Is that all right with you, son?”
I rubbed my temple where a slow pulsing pain was growing and blew a deep breath, everything I’d told Emery about coming to Bridgeport that very first time hurling back through my memory. How broken I was when God found me. How capable He was to fix me. This wasn’t beyond his power, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to trust Dad wanted to be fixed.
“I don’t know. Things are just starting to mellow out up here.”
“Please, Tucker. God’s doing something big, and I gotta find a way to make us wh
ole again.”
Dang.
So this is why you had me call home.
“Let me think about it, all right?” I said, still watching Kyler out in a splash battle with his friend, completely unaware of the vortex I was in. “I’ll call you back tonight.”
“I can take that.”
The line cut out and I wavered between bitterness and hope the whole rest of the day. He didn’t deserve a second chance after what he did to us.
But, that wasn’t the way things worked when God was involved. I couldn’t make myself call him that night, but Sunday after church, I picked up the phone and dialed.
THIRTY
-Emery-
Two months had passed since I’d left Bridgeport and the summer was coming to a close. Every ounce of my heart was back to beating for the game. Well, not every ounce. But in my time away from Bridgeport, I’d learned how to cope with the part that still wondered if basketball was really all there was to life.
I knew there had to be more, and every time it plagued me, Walker’s face surfaced in my mind. The look in his eyes when he told me he was going out for the team. The way just one person having his back was all he needed to feel like he could do it.
“Hustle back, Hudson!” coach yelled, during shooting drills at practice the day before our first preseason game.
I pushed myself to the max, my whole body on fire from the physical torment of it all, but it didn’t matter. It couldn’t. We’d spent the last five weeks prepping for this game. I had one job here. Go all-out, die on the court, revive myself, and do it again. Every single day. For the next four years.
I used to live for the dying, but lately it felt a lot more like torture.
My new teammate, and roommate, Waverlee, stuck out a hand for a high-five as I joined the end of her line. “Nice,” she said, panting, her dark brown eyes shining as coach blew the whistle to end practice.
“Be ready tomorrow ladies,” he said. “Point Loma runs their opponents into the ground, and we’re not going down like that. Bring it in for a big Eagles.”
We circled up and shouted on three, then we headed back to our summer dorms, all blood, sweat, and Eagle tears.
After we were showered and changed, Waverlee swept her thick mass of black curls into a bun and leaned over the sink to do her makeup, dressed for a night out to a movie. “Sure you don’t want to come tonight?” she asked, peeking her head around the corner of the wall to look at me. She wiggled her brows. “Darius was asking about you again.”
Her cousin wouldn’t quit when it came to asking me out. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with him. He was a 6’3” beautiful wing on the guys’ team. But, there was something in his swagger that reminded me of Tucker, and I couldn’t get past it.
Eyes glued to the Bridgeport frame on my wall, I lifted a shoulder and blew a soft breath. “You can tell Darius the same thing you told him last time.”
“He’s a really good guy, Emery. You should give him a chance.”
I nodded, leaned back on my bed, and flicked the basketball toward the ceiling, practicing my shooting form. “Maybe, someday. But, I’m flying solo right now.”
As much as I wanted that to be my only reason for rejecting him, it wasn’t the whole truth, and the whole truth was too painful to admit to anyone other than God.
My heart was still set on a 6’3” beautiful jock back at Bridgeport. And until I could forget him completely, I wouldn’t be going out with anyone at all.
“Have a good time,” I told her, as I opened my laptop and clicked around on the Bridgeport site.
What was it about that place that wouldn’t let me go? I hunted for the answer, but nothing popped out at me, except the bird’s-eye view of the basketball courts. But, I was already here, living the basketball dream.
Why did it feel so empty?
-Tucker-
I wasn’t expecting Dad to get on his knees in front of us when he came to visit, but he did, tears streaming down his face, beating his chest, asking us to forgive him. I thought I was wrecked after Emery left . . . but, seeing him like that destroyed me completely.
He told us his plan to help mom get through rehab and then he was going to do whatever it took to win her back. I was still a little skeptical, but my heart wanted to believe. The boys would stay with me through the rest of summer.
I called Mom every day, and on the third week of her second month in rehab, she finally called me back.
“Tucker, baby. I’m so sorry for what I did to you boys.”
“I forgive you, Mom,” I said, my eyes welling. “Are you okay?”
“I’m better than ever, Mijo. You wouldn’t believe the people I’ve met here. Their faith is just solid. I know it was all so bad, but I honestly believe I was supposed to come here.”
“I’m happy for you,” I said, taking a deep breath. “Have you talked to Dad?”
She chuckled. “He’s sittin’ right here.”
I closed my eyes against the burn inside. “Are you good with that?”
“Your Daddy and I are on a new path. We start counseling this week. And I’m moving back home tomorrow. We’re gonna work it out together. As a family.”
My throat tightened so much I couldn’t get a word out. Family. It’s what I’d been wanting with every fiber of my being for so long, and I never thought it would happen.
“So, you can go back to the fire academy soon as you’re home.”
I swallowed, blinking against the blur in my eyes. “Yeah. Uh. About that,” I said, past the strain. “I’m staying on year-round at Bridgeport for a while. I got promoted to a management position. But, me and the boys will come see you this next weekend.”
“Wow, son! Congratulations! I’ll make you your flautas when you come home, okay?”
I nodded, wiping my eyes again, silently offering my thanks. A beep sounded the one-minute warning. “Hey, my time’s running out. I love you, Mom.”
“I love you with all my heart.”
“I’ll see you soon.”
“Okay. Bye, son.”
THIRTY-ONE
-Emery-
Game day came. We dressed in our black and red jerseys and warmed up, shoes squeaking on the polished gym floor, the bleachers filling up fast as the clock counted down. This was it. My first night in the college lineup, and I felt the excitement from it in my bones.
I’d worked my whole life for this night.
Mom and Dad waved to me from the front row of the bleachers, Aiden, Tyler, and Ethan right behind them, faces painted, holding a big GO EMERY sign.
“Yeah, Emery!” they shouted, in unison, doing a ridiculous wave.
My cheeks flamed, but I grinned anyway, because they were my people. There for me through thick and thin, and I wouldn’t be where I was without them. I took my spot on the bench as coach walked by, eyeing us all.
“Number twenty-three’s the one to look out for, guards. She’s fast and she can handle the ball like a pro. Pierre, she’s your man.”
Waverlee bit down on her mouth guard, running her hands across the souls of her shoes, standing to bounce on her toes as she narrowed her eyes, and set her sights on twenty-three. I felt bad for the chick. She had no idea what she had coming.
Coach went down his list, calling three more girls’ names before he locked eyes with me. “Hudson. You’re on thirty-one.”
I glanced over at the girl with cornrows and a set of arms like my brother Ethan’s, and nodded. “Got her.”
He called us in for a huddle and we went over our plays.
“Ready girls?” he asked, when the buzzer sounded. “Eagles on three!”
-Tucker-
The day came to go home, and all three of us loaded up in my truck, the boys packed and ready to stay.
“Do you really buy it, Tucker?” Walker asked from the passenger seat, Kyler clicking around on my phone between them. “Think Dad’s really changed?”
“Not sure, but no one’s beyond a second chance, right?”
He sighed, pulling his phone out of his pocket as soon as we had reception. “What? No way!”
I frowned. “What?”
“Ah. Nothin’. Emery just sent me a message on Insta.”
Something pricked in my heart, and it felt like someone re-opened an old wound. I tried all summer to forget about her. More time had passed than we spent together in the first place, so, bleeding over her didn’t make any sense anyway. But when Dad showed up at camp, and when Kyler found out he’d won the kids’ talent show for a poem he wrote about family, and when Walker told me he was definitely going out for the team, she was the first person I wanted to tell.
But I couldn’t. It killed me.
“What kind of message?” I heard myself asking, as I signaled and moved into the turn lane for the freeway onramp. I stopped at the light and he showed me his screen.
Her profile picture took my breath away. She was in her usual t-shirt, jeans, and Chucks, but it was her.
He cleared his throat. “Just checking in. She’s wondering if I started working out with the team, or not.”
“Huh.” I cleared my throat, trying to clear the tightness in my chest, but it didn’t work.
“Her first preseason game’s tonight.”
I leaned forward over the steering wheel to stretch my back. “Nice.”
“Yeah. You’re still an idiot, bro.”
“Walker, you’re so mean,” Kyler cut in.
I grinned, nudging him with my elbow. “Good looking out, kid.”
He returned my grin and went back to his game.
Walker wasn’t wrong. But I sent her away so she’d do what she was doing. That was good enough for me.
“Oh, hey. She sent a link so I can watch.”
Awesome. That put a weight in my gut I wasn’t expecting. It was one thing, ignoring what we had when I didn’t have to see her. But seeing her in her element would probably destroy me.
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