Forgiving the Football Player

by Emma St Clair

  “Should we see if they still sell jerky?” Cilla grinned.

  Pax made a gagging sound. “Definitely not.”

  “I don’t know. Might make a good stocking stuffer.”

  Pax began to laugh, and the sound set her heart soaring. Even back when they were young, Pax rarely laughed. Cilla was one of the rare people who could make him laugh or ever got to hear it. Too bad for everyone else, because it was a beautiful sound.

  Part of it was probably his home life and how he grew up. Not a lot of joy or laughter in his household. But the other part was his personality. The definition for strong, silent type should have had his picture next to it. So, whenever he did laugh, especially when she made him laugh, it filled Cilla with an unparalleled sense of pride and happiness.

  She giggled. “How about your teammates? Have they been naughty or nice?”

  Pax laughed harder, and as they approached the wide gravel drive, he gestured for her to pull over. Right out front was a hand painted wooden sign that read EMU JERKY. Cilla pulled up to the house and Pax hopped out, still chucking.

  “Be right back,” he said.

  Cilla watched him jog up to the front door of the house, admiring his broad back and the way he strode with such confidence. Maybe she also checked out his backside too. It was hard not to when he filled out a pair of jeans the way he did. And then he turned and smirked, as though he knew she would be checking him out. Totally busted. Cilla bit her lip and Pax winked. It was suddenly like they had been transported back in time.

  When Cilla first caught sight of Pax in the hallway of Katy High School, there had been an instant spark. The kind that Hallmark movies and clichés are made of. Knowing that did not diminish the connection one little bit. Their eyes met, and all her nerves seemed to zing to life at once, like a Christmas tree lighting at the moment they flip the switch.

  Of course, being a practical, maybe even cynical, girl, she had dismissed it. It was hard to do, given the way he looked at her, reflecting back that same look—somewhere between a deer in the headlights and a wolf seeing a rabbit. Though she knew who Pax was, that moment marked the start of something. Or maybe of everything. It wouldn’t be too much to say it was the beginning of the rest of her life.

  Cilla didn’t seek him out, but also started going to more football parties and games. A few more times, their gazes locked from a distance and it happened all over again. But he never approached, and she never did either. A tiny part of her felt miffed. She knew she didn’t imagine the heat in his gaze and what almost looked like adoration. As though he already considered her his queen.

  Was he waiting for her to make the first move? Never gonna happen, buddy. Bold as she was, chasing a guy wasn’t her thing.

  She was getting close to caving and approaching him to demand why he didn’t just ask her out when they finally had their meet-cute. Or, meet-not-so-cute, as it were. She was leaving school late after cross-country practice. Trying to move up to varsity track as a sophomore meant extra time with the hurdles. She stayed long after everyone else had cleared the field, even the football team that practiced nearby. As she walked to her car, big bag slung over her shoulder, she heard a sound in the woods next to the school lot.

  It had been October, and an unusually cool day. She remembered pausing on the sidewalk, her breath pulsing out of her mouth in tiny clouds as she tilted her head to listen. Was that an animal? She told herself to keep walking. Girls going into the woods alone at dusk may not come out. But curiosity drew her, and she left her bag on the sidewalk to investigate.

  A few yards into the dense forest, she saw him. Pax was standing in front of an oak tree, pummeling it with his fists. Each punch was accompanied by a grunt. That’s what she had heard: his grunts, mixed with the cracking of bark coming off the tree.

  Cilla simply stood for a moment, watching Pax beat the heck out of that tree. The bark chipped and fell to the ground in pieces. She could see the blood on his knuckles, even from a distance. If she had felt an instant attraction when she first locked eyes with him, she experienced an immediate lurch of her heart seeing him channel some unknown emotions into his fists.

  “Hey, what’d that tree ever do to you?” she had asked.

  When he spun around, she immediately regretted her playful tone. His face had been streaming with tears. Not from the pain in his knuckles, which were bleeding freely. No, this was deeper. Cilla hadn’t ever felt that level of pain—not yet—but recognized it on a soul level. His tears poured straight from some fresh break to his heart.

  Without even giving it a thought, Cilla had crossed the woods and wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to his chest. He froze, and for a terrifying moment, she thought he might push her away. She couldn’t say why it mattered so much that he didn’t, but Cilla didn’t think she could take the rejection. And then his arms wound around her, warm and strong and solid, like they had been doing so for years.

  That’s how it felt: like a key sliding into the right lock. They fit.

  “I’m sorry,” she had said, finally. “Whatever it is, I’m sorry. You can talk to me about it, or not. But I’m here.”

  He didn’t talk about it. Not that day. They had stood out there for almost an hour, first hugging while he sobbed into her hair, then as she wrapped up his hands with a First Aid kit she kept in her track bag.

  As she watched Pax now, handing over a stack of bills to the man on the front porch of the emu farm, she realized that she had been wrong when she said they never broke up. In truth, he had never asked her out. From that afternoon on, they were simply together. He didn’t even tell her about his family and why he’d been crying for another few months. She had known somehow, like the way she knew he was it for her, that he would eventually tell her.

  The cynic in her had really always been looking for the ending of their relationship, she realized. It had seemed too good to be true. No one falls in love instantly. Few find true love in high school. So, that morning in the hospital, hearing that Pax had left, she mourned the way you do for someone who dies of cancer. You have tons of preparation, but the moment still kills you.

  She felt that same pain now and struggled to catch her breath. The force of it radiated through her as Pax jogged back to the car with a big paper bag and a mischievous grin.

  What they had back then had been real. Not a fairytale, but real nonetheless. And then he just walked away without a word, leaving her to face the darkest moment of her life alone.

  How could he?

  She wanted to toss that question to him as soon as he reached the car, but she couldn’t. Cilla didn’t know if she ever could ask. Before he reached the car, she wiped the stray tears from her cheeks, hoping he wouldn’t notice. It hurt to be so close to him, to not have him, but really, not much had changed. She could see their end in sight. What would she do with the time she had with him this week?

  Enjoy it. That’s what she would do. Even if she knew that a second heartbreak waited for her.

  He opened the door and waggled his eyebrows. “Start making your naughty list now.”

  “Did you buy out the farm?” she asked, eyeing the bag in his hands.

  “Basically,” he said. “This is five pounds of emu jerky.”

  Cilla threw her head back and laughed. “Please give some to my parents.”

  “They can’t hate me more, I guess,” he said. “How many emus do you think it takes to get five pounds of jerky?”

  “They’re huge,” Cilla said as she put the car in gear. “So, maybe like half an emu? A third?”

  Pax shook his head, opening the paper bag. “Nah. They’re all feathers. I bet they don’t weigh that much.”

  “Should we go back and ask?”

  “Nope. This was the last batch ever, they told me.”

  She snorted. “Let me guess: not a big enough market for emu products?”

  “Nah. They’re selling the farm. Hoping to make a bunch of money for a planned community.”

&nb
sp; This thought pierced her. It shouldn’t matter, but right now, every little thing felt like a sign. “Don’t we have enough planned communities?”

  “Apparently not.”

  They were quiet again until Cilla pulled over to a little gravel parking area just down the road. It was just a tiny gravel lot with room for one car, probably created as a turnaround for people who had driven down this narrow road accidentally. There was nothing much out here and not a lot of driveways to go back if you ended up here by accident. It wasn’t far past the emu farm and might even be part of their property. Pax grinned at her.

  “Now, this I simply cannot believe is still here.”

  She couldn’t either. In a year or two, it probably wouldn’t be. This had been one of their places for making out or talking. Cilla had kept coming out here for years, just sitting in silence, remembering. Longing. Missing Pax.

  Just past the edge of the gravel, the ground dropped away into a little creek. It barely moved, the surface almost flat like a pond. Only after rain did it really rush, engorging the creek and flowing over the road.

  Fumbling with her seatbelt, she took a breath. Asking for help hadn’t been easy when she had two working legs. Her pride made it even harder now, yet she needed more help than she ever had before.

  She couldn’t look at Pax when she asked but stared down at her hands in her lap instead. “Would you mind carrying me to the hood? I don’t want to get my chair out or anything.”

  She had no sooner asked than Pax was out of the car and had her door open. Feeling more self-conscious than she had around him this week, she scooted over and let him lift her from the car. Being cradled in his arms almost brought her to tears again. He had a way of making her feel so small, yet so significant at the same time, like she was his whole world.

  Correction: like she had been his whole world. Now she was his regret. His guilt. His past.

  He closed the door with his hip. Cilla closed her eyes and breathed in that woodsy scent that she’d grown used to this week. It was different than whatever cheap cologne he used in high school. She loved that too, but the scent that was simply Pax bled through, making a delightful combination.

  Pax lifted her onto the hood of the car. Though Cilla generally hated asking to be carried, she relished his touch, an excuse to be so close to him. His strength somehow didn’t make her feel weak. Instead, she felt cherished as he helped position her so that her back leaned against the windshield. He let her pull her legs where she wanted them, as though he could sense her need to do so.

  A minute later, he hopped up on the hood next to her. She giggled as the car dipped, pressing her palms flat on the hood to stabilize herself.

  Pax flashed her a grin that made her heart float away through the clouds like a helium balloon. He held out his hand. In it was a strip of jerky.

  “Oh no. Heck no,” Cilla said. “Nuh uh.”

  He gave her a pleading look, his brown eyes like a honeyed tea, warm and sweet. “Please? For old times’ sake.”

  “You said these were for people on the naughty list.”

  His look turned from pleading to challenging. “Are you really going to tell me that you’re on the nice list?”

  “Why, Paxton. You don’t think I’m nice?” Cilla let her voice lean into its Southern twang.

  He grinned, shaking his head. “That’s a loaded question. I plead the fifth. Take the jerky. We’ll try it together. Unless you’ve changed into the kind of woman who backs down from a challenge.”

  Oh, he went there. Rolling her eyes, Cilla took it. “Fine.”

  He touched his strip of jerky to hers. “Cheers.”

  She paused, mouth suddenly dry. “Do we need to make a wish or something?”

  His gaze fell, as though her words had somehow been a weight, tugging him down. He pulled slightly away from her, resting his back on the windshield. “Nah. It’s just a toast.”

  Feeling like she had somehow killed the friendly moment between them, Cilla leaned back too. It was almost silent out here, unlike the summer nights when the sound of cicadas and tree frogs rose like a chorus in the air, the sound so thick you could almost cut through it. It was unseasonably warm this week, but no insects stirred. There was just the rustle of leafless branches together and the soft gurgle of the stream.

  Taking a small bite of the jerky, Cilla chewed. And chewed. And chewed. She thought she’d never be able to swallow. It wasn’t terrible, but somehow gamier than regular beef jerky. Definitely tougher.

  “So,” she said, hoping to break the tension she had caused. “Is it as bad as you remembered?”

  He spoke around the jerky he was still chewing. “Yes. Maybe worse.”

  “I bet the twins would appreciate a thank-you gift for putting you up this week.”

  “I bet they would. And you really want me to give it to your parents?”

  “No. You give it to me, and I’ll give it to them for Christmas. Wrapped and under the tree.” Cilla tossed the rest of her strip into the creek.

  “Hey, that’s limited-edition jerky.” But Pax followed suit and she imagined them sinking to the bottom together among the weeds, mud, and crawdads. Hopefully it wouldn’t kill any woodland creatures.

  “You still smoke cigars?” Cilla asked, giving him a sidelong glance.

  He—and half the football team—had gone through a cigar period their senior year. They were legal to buy at eighteen, and coach had been so strict on drinking that most of the team fell in line. That’s how badly they wanted to go to state. Cigars became the it thing instead of alcohol. Cilla had always refused to kiss Pax for at least a day after he smoked, so his infatuation with them faded quickly.

  “Ugh. No.”

  “Glad you finally realized how gross it was.”

  “It’s disgusting. You were right on that.”

  “Just on that one thing?”

  “Only that one,” he said, smiling. “How are the stars out here these days?”

  Cilla made a face. “Harder to see. Light pollution. Katy’s gotten a whole lot bigger, as you could probably tell.”

  “I noticed. Everything’s changed.”

  “Some things stayed the same.” Cilla picked at the pocket of her pants, feeling the thick stitches at the seams. She pushed a finger into her thigh. Still nothing.

  The soft sounds of the creek and the wind filled the silence between them. In the distance, she heard a cow lowing. Smiling, she let nostalgia warm her. This place would soon be paved over for a neighborhood or a strip center.

  I have to stop doing this, she realized. No more seeing a dismal end to things before they happen. Not everything ends in disaster.

  Cilla didn’t want to live like this anymore. She didn’t want to be trapped inside herself, stuck with only bitterness, regret, and shame for company. That vine of guilt that had wrapped around her heart was a parasite, sucking her dry of good things she could have. Things … or people.

  Was having Pax still a possibility? His kiss aside, it had been hard to read him, maybe because she could only see him through the weight of her own desire.

  Without giving herself away, she tried to watch him. He had gotten lost in thought, his long, thick legs crossed at the ankle, almost hanging off the front of her car.

  She glanced down and saw that his hand was flat against the car, very close to hers. Their pinkies almost touched. Drawing in a breath, Cilla shifted the weight of her upper body slightly in his direction. He didn’t move. Did he not notice? Or was he pretending not to? She inched her hand toward his, biting her lip.

  What if she touched him? Would he pull away?

  When her pinky was so close that she imagined she could feel his body heat, she paused. Her heart beat a staccato rhythm in her chest. She was so close but as much as she longed to, she couldn’t make herself close the distance.

  Suddenly, his pinky hooked over hers, pulling her hand slightly closer to the warmth of his thigh. Cilla couldn’t imagine a more chaste touch, yet it woke her
body. It woke her soul. There was no tingling in her toes, not anymore, but she felt it acutely everywhere she could, most especially those at the edges of where she lost feeling. It had been years since she felt any kind of attraction like this. It was different than what she’d been able to feel Before. But not having sensation in her lower half didn’t mean she didn’t feel desire. It had become a river of fire in her belly. She relished the sensation, even as it made terror streak up and down her spine.

  What were they doing?

  She could not look at Pax. He didn’t look at her either, as though acknowledging the touch would break the spell. As dusk fell around them, they sat on the hood of her car, that one touch like a bridge between them, like a promise of something great.

  Even great things started small, didn’t they?

  Cilla pushed aside her cynicism. She had to believe, at least in this instance, that they did.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Cilla’s silence on the drive to her parents’ house filled Pax with worry. While the hour or so they spent at their old spot was meant to be a buffer between the home visits, it did nothing to calm Pax’s heightened emotions. Reliving their past, talking about old memories, and then holding Cilla’s pinky—all of that pushed him toward the edge of a cliff. One he had probably been standing on since he first saw Cilla. For sure after that kiss.

  He didn’t know what would happen if he moved another inch, but he couldn’t see how he would survive the fall.

  He wanted to laugh. If any of the guys on his team knew that the chaste kiss and holding one of Cilla’s fingers in his own had such an effect on him, they’d laugh him out of the league.

  But it meant something. A tiny step toward something bigger. He hadn’t so much as kissed another woman since Cilla. Doing so today had woken up feelings that had long been sleeping. But it didn’t seem to have the same effect on Cilla.

  As he’d carried her back to the driver’s seat, she had sighed against him, resting her palm on his chest over his heart. Which of course made it speed up. Had she forgiven him? Did she want to try again?