And maybe he’d come up against Rebecca and the Comets in the playoffs.
23
Rebecca willed the bus to move faster. They’d already had a late start thanks to one of the kids grabbing the wrong equipment bag, and she’d had to call the other head coach and let him know they’d be cutting it close to the scheduled start time. Not usually a big deal in the grand scheme of things, except this wasn’t just any baseball game.
This was the championship game. The biggest stage for their athletes to compete on.
Her team of superstars had pulled off a miracle in the semis against a much stronger team, and the whole town had been buzzing ever since. The Kendal High Knuckleballers, as they were affectionately known, drew big crowds at every home game and even some road games, too.
“Are we there yet, Coach?”
She spun around in her seat to the sound of laughter. “Harrison, if you ask me again, you’re on the bench.” All sounds of amusement ceased. At least for the next five minutes.
Ben Armstrong, her assistant coach, was busy handling the batting order and other pre-game paperwork, so she alternated between watching the boys, the road, and the time.
And ignoring the butterflies that tap-danced in her stomach at the remote possibility that Will might be there, too.
She hadn’t seen or spoken to him since that fateful day in December. Four long months ago. But she’d thought about him almost daily. Typed and deleted too many texts to count. Some days she wondered if she’d been unfair to him. He’d been in a dark place that night, and she worried about him. Hoped he’d found a way to work through his grief. Other days, she wondered if they could’ve made things work regardless of whether or not he stayed at Kendal High. But she just couldn’t seem to shake the fact that he’d made his choice before that night at the hospital. He knew where he was going, and he hadn’t included her in the equation.
Crestwood might as well have been a world away.
The bus rattled as it veered around a corner and pulled into the home of the Titans. Jamal and the other boys in the back erupted in cheers and applause. When they finally came to a stop, Ben led the way outside, and she stayed back to ensure all the boys exited safely and in an orderly fashion.
“Hit the field right away for a warm-up, okay, guys?” she said. “We’ve got, like, zero time, so hustle!”
Ryan was the last of the guys to exit. “This is our game, Miss L. This is to make up for the basketball trophy we missed out on.”
“You sure you’re okay to play, Purnsey? Ankle’s good?”
“Ankle’s great.”
She patted him on the shoulder. “All right, bud, let’s do this!”
They jogged over to the immaculately manicured diamond. The Titans were stretching on the sidelines to allow her boys the field to warm up their throwing arms, and the stands were filled with fans, most wearing Crestwood’s colors. Her Knuckleballers looked fantastic in the jerseys they’d splurged on . . . thanks to a certain person’s father. Just as the thought crossed her mind, her eyes flashed to the opposing dugout. Will stood inside it, his gaze fixed on her. Blood rushed to her face, and her pulse thundered in her ears.
He wore a Titans ballcap with sunglasses perched on the top. Even from a distance, those blue eyes shone with so much familiarity she ached. He took a step toward her, then froze when the ump called in the captains. Better that they didn’t speak before the game. There was too much on the line. Pride, loyalty . . . love.
The boys dashed in from the field, and she read out the batting order. “Let’s hit hard and hit early, guys! Get those bats swinging!”
Everyone put their hands in the middle, and Ryan gave the count. “One, two, three . . .”
“Knuckleballers!” the team yelled.
Play ball.
Will paced back and forth along the third base coach’s box. The teams were neck and neck, and the score was tied at 5-5 through six innings. Crestwood was up to bat at the bottom of the seventh.
When he’d heard last week that Kendal had pulled off an upset against St. Augustine, he’d been thrilled. And borderline terrified. That meant Rebecca was coming. Here. To Crestwood. That meant they were rivals.
But when he’d seen her looking at him from the other dugout, every competitive bone in his body turned to rubber. He couldn’t fight this woman. He didn’t want to be her enemy.
He wanted to be her equal. Her partner.
His mind rolled back to their first date, when he’d held her close in the cage as they’d swung the bat together and made magic happen. Them against the world, not against each other.
He kept glancing around the field at the boys, many of whom he’d taught in his classes. They were playing with everything they had, and he couldn’t have been prouder. His shirt may have been the Crestwood green and white, but his heart pumped Kendal red and gold.
And Ryan. They’d made eye contact a few times but hadn’t had a chance to speak. Just to see him back on his feet again, healthy and active, was the greatest gift he could have imagined.
“That’s it, McCann!” he heard Rebecca call from the dugout after the teen tagged a runner heading to second. She looked adorable in her ballcap and team jersey. He longed to tell her that. “One more out!” she cried.
That “one more out” was Crestwood’s heaviest hitter, Jonah Kaplan. With runners on first and third, a solid hit would put Crestwood in the lead. Kaplan crushed the ball out of the park.
And the hits kept on coming. By the time the seventh inning ended, they were up by six runs. At the bottom of the eighth, they’d extended their lead by three more. He bet the crowd had given up on Kendal. Maybe the Titans had, too. But he knew these boys better than they did. Nothing came easy in their lives. They were used to fighting through. These kids wouldn’t quit when things got tough.
Like he’d quit on all of them.
The game ended in favor of the Titans. While his side celebrated, he noticed the boys from Kendal laughing and joking with each other. Some of them stayed on the field and soaked up their moment in the spotlight for as long as possible. Their love of the game—any game—overshadowed the final score.
Players lined up to shake hands, and he fell in the back next to the other Crestwood coaches—six of them in total. His stomach rolled in nervous anticipation of how he’d be received by the opposition, but all the boys shook his hand. Except for one. Ryan pulled him in for a hug. Will’s wide eyes found Rebecca’s, and they shared a tentative smile. He patted Ryan on the back and promised they’d catch up shortly, once he completed his way through the line. Only the coaches remained. He and Ben Armstrong congratulated each other and spoke briefly.
And then there were two.
When their palms collided, heat radiated through his chest. They held on for three seconds, maybe four. But his fingers still tingled for minutes after they let go.
“Congratulations,” she said.
“Thanks. You guys played a hell of a game. We just got lucky in the last few innings.” He shuffled his feet. Sucked in a breath. “Listen, I screwed up—”
She opened her mouth to reply but was cut off by a noisy band of teenagers inserting themselves between them. Harrison, McCann, Jacobs, Purnsey . . . all the guys he’d coached and taught. The mocking jabs came, as expected, but so did memories from semester one and anecdotes from semester two. Rebecca stood by and watched the whole thing, their gazes occasionally meeting.
“Boys, let’s go! The bus is leaving!” Ben shouted from a distance.
Some playful punches, pats, and handshakes later, the boys took off. Rebecca became his sole focus again.
“You did,” she finally responded. “You screwed up big.”
“I get it now,” he told her. “Making a difference.” There was no greater proof that he’d touched their lives as much as they’d touched his. Time didn’t erase the impact they’d had on each other, nor did their jersey colors. But God help him, he wanted to be on that bus with them.
&nbs
p; She nodded and swallowed hard. “It was great to see you,” she said, her smile wistful.
What more could he say? “Yeah. It was great to see you, too.”
Will stood rooted to his spot as the Kendal bus drove off. One of the boys called to him that the Titans were assembling for team pictures, and he had to remind himself which side he was on.
Once the post-victory celebrations had ceased, Will walked to his car and slipped behind the wheel. He caught his reflection in the rearview mirror. A flash of gold drew his gaze to the medal hanging from his neck, and his mind drifted back more than a decade to Aly’s third-grade spelling bee. Will had been in his final year of high school, and Joey was off at college. The event hadn’t really been any more special than the Christmas pageant or the talent show or the other third-grade rites of passage. Except, in their case, for the first time ever, the entire Whitney family attended.
He suspected his parents’ attendance had more to do with keeping up appearances than a true desire to sit through two hours of phonetics, but nevertheless, their cleared schedules enabled them to witness sweet Aly win a bronze medal for her efforts. “Third grade, third place, that means three scoops of ice cream!” his father had declared on their way out of the auditorium. The five of them had driven to a parlor not far from the school and ate triple-decker ice cream cones. For dinner. Another first.
With Aly at the forefront of his thoughts, he pulled his phone from his pocket and dialed the Whitney household.
Isabelle answered after one ring. “Well, to what do I owe the honor of a phone call from my youngest son?”
Will smiled. “Do you remember Aly’s third-grade spelling bee?”
There was a slight pause on the other end of the line. “I do.”
He went on to recount the memory, which left his mother sniffling by the end of it. “I think we all had a stomach ache that night from the amount of ice cream we ate,” she said, her voice breaking on the last word. “Oh, I’d endure a thousand more if I could have my girl back.” She excused herself to blow her nose. Will heard a commotion, followed by his father’s voice.
“Isabelle, have you seen my—Why are you crying? Who are you speaking with?”
“It’s Will,” she explained. “He was sharing a memory of Aly.”
Edward cleared his throat. “Oh.”
Will expected that would be the end of his father’s contribution to the conversation, but Edward surprisingly got on the line as well. “Hello, son.”
Isabelle chimed in again before Will had a chance to respond. “Sorry, Will. Your father just got in from his golf game.”
“No, it’s fine,” Will said, drumming his free hand against the steering wheel. “I’m actually glad you’re both on. There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.
“Go ahead, dear,” his mother said. “We’re listening.”
Hours of reading and research stollen between his practicum teaching and college courses had brought him to this point. He’d been trying to find the right moment to propose his idea, and his gut told him now was the time. He didn’t have anything more to lose, and absolutely everything to gain. “Teaching has been a revelation to me in a lot of ways. It’s opened my eyes to the fact that there are so many kids like Aly out there. Kids who fly under the radar, who might appear to be fine on the surface, but deep down there’s a lot more going on than you realize.” He thought of Ryan then, and how, little by little, he was able to break through to him.
“Just before Christmas, we nearly lost one of our kids at Kendal High. He OD’d. They took him to the same hospital Aly . . .”
“Oh, Will,” his mother sympathized. “Is he okay?”
He took a shuddering breath. “Yeah. He’s got one hell of a support system there. That’s, um, that’s sort of a perfect segue to my proposal.” Will removed his ballcap and ran a hand through his hair. “I mean, it scared me to death being in that hospital again, as you can imagine, but then I thought about other families being there, seeing it as a last resort and not a part of the bigger support system . . . so I want to start a program there.”
“What sort of program?” his father asked.
Will sat up straighter, imagining his father at the other end of an imaginary negotiation table. “An education program for families of adolescents who are going through eating disorders. There’d be a practical component that teaches them about the different types of eating disorders and what they entail, possible medical complications, nutritional recovery, and treatment plans.” He became more animated as he spoke, excited by the prospect of bringing his idea to life. “But the main focus would be on how the families—parents, guardians, siblings, etcetera—can support the patient. They’ll get the information and tools they need to be part of the healing process.”
“Sounds like a worthy endeavor,” Edward said.
“I’ve done a lot of research, Dad. There are similar programs like this at other hospitals in the city that are incredibly successful, but none are quite so targeted on the family side of things. I really think this is where we can do some good.”
His father hummed in acknowledgement. “I suppose you’d need a sizable sum of money to invest in such a program.”
Will tried to keep his tone even, knowing his father was a businessman first and foremost, and if he was going to be investing in anything, he wanted a solid plan in place. “I’ve arranged for a meeting with the hospital programs director next week to discuss my proposal, which I’ll send to you via email. I’d love for you to be there with me—both of you.”
Nothing but static echoed across the line for several seconds, then his mother spoke again. “I haven’t heard you this excited about something in a long time, Will.”
“Well, perhaps some of his excitement might be related to the baseball championship,” Edward said. “Paul Hackett was in my foursome on the course today. He got a text from the head coach that Crestwood came out on top. Paul also mentioned that you’ve been offered a position for the fall . . .”
The smile slipped from Will’s face. Paul was a former vice principal at Crestwood and still obviously had close ties to the school. Earlier that week, Will had been approached by the principal who’d indicated there would be a position becoming available in the Phys. Ed. department, and it was as good as his if he was interested. “Right, yeah,” he finally said. “I’m still thinking on it. Anyway, I’m glad we were able to talk. I’ll send that email to you, and we’ll get things rolling.”
Edward started to speak, no doubt intending to probe deeper into his hesitation about the job opportunity, but Isabelle cut him off. “Sounds great, dear. We look forward to hearing from you. Thanks so much for the call.”
He clicked his phone off, dropping it on the passenger seat. They hadn’t shut him down; they’d heard him out. And he had a good feeling that, once they saw his vision, they’d believe in the potential of the program.
But there was someone else he wanted to be a part of his vision, too. He just prayed she’d be open to it.
24
Rebecca trudged into the PE office, threw off her whistle, and collapsed into her chair. The mid-May mayhem was in full swing. School would be out for summer in a mere four weeks, and the teenagers already had one foot out the door. She was just as eager for summer break to begin. To put this roller-coaster of a school year behind her and start fresh again. She planned on devoting more time to herself during her two months of freedom. Maybe she’d learn a new language, take up painting, try horseback riding, train for a marathon . . .
“I declare this the summer of Rebecca!” she cried to the ceiling.
Margaret entered the office in the same moment, applauding her dramatics. “Hallelujah, amen!”
Had anyone else entered instead, she might have felt a bit self-conscious, but her darling colleague and mentor had a gift for putting others at ease. The specks of paint on her arms, hands, and cheeks only added to the comfort level. “Paint explosion in the drama classroom?�
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The older woman chuckled. “Something like that. I’ve actually been doing some spring cleaning in there.” She walked further into the office and took a seat at Berg’s desk.
Rebecca frowned. Margaret never usually started her spring cleaning until the last week of school. “Why so early?”
“Oh, you know”—she waved her hand dismissively—“Imightberetiringsoonerthanexpected.” The words spilled from her mouth in one long string that took Rebecca several seconds to decipher.
Her jaw dropped when their meaning registered. “What? Why?” She stood up from her chair, too rattled by the revelation to sit any longer. “Where is this coming from? You were supposed to stay for one more year—at least! And then I planned on chaining you to your desk, or chaining myself to your desk in protest if you ever decided to leave.”
Margaret fiddled with her paint-spattered hands, failing to meet Rebecca’s gaze. “Budget cuts, honey. You know the drill. The arts are always the first to go. Patrick’s hands are tied.”
“That’s absolutely ridiculous! It’s not fair. You’ve worked too hard to keep that program going for him to just take it away from you. I won’t stand for it!” She headed for the door, ready to give Patrick and any other powers that be a piece of her mind, but Margaret grabbed her arm to stop her.
“Ledgey, you know as well as I do that Patrick has no control over this.” Her sad eyes met Rebecca’s. “He offered me an extra section of Phys. Ed. and science, but the drama program is my greatest passion. You know that, too.”
A rogue tear slipped down Rebecca’s cheek, and she batted it away.
Margaret stood and pulled her into a hug. “Hey,” she said once they let go, “I’ve had an amazing run. I don’t want to leave an incredible career with a bitter taste in my mouth. But you better believe I’ll be working my tail off organizing community events to get this school the arts funding it needs. It’s just a matter of refocusing my energy.”
Learning to Love Page 23