So many questions, but I’ve got some of my own. As mad as he is, as scared as I should be by that, this conversation has been a long time coming and I’m not backing down. I shouldn’t have given up so easily back then, should’ve told him off and gotten it all of my chest no matter how hard it was. But I’d been young and hurt, inexperienced with how to talk about my feelings. Now, I think finally getting all this out in the open might even be therapeutic. Finally, a closure to a chapter that defined me.
“How could you? Nikki and Naomi were thick as thieves, and when Nikki called me and told me what was happening, I couldn’t believe it. But she knew. You even talked about Naomi once, something about a test coming up and you both studying hard. Do you know how much that hurt me? You talked about your side bitch with me like it was nothing. Like I was nothing.”
The anger is giving way to sadness, the tears coming fast and hard. I let them run down my cheeks, not bothering to even wipe them away. I’m not one of those pretty girl criers either. Nope, I can feel my eyes puffing up, my nose getting snotty, and my face turning red.
“Holy fuck, Al.” Bruce curses and yanks his bandana from the bag at his feet. Guess there’s no place in his workout shorts for one, I think randomly. He scrubs at my cheeks, and for some unknown reason, I let him take care of me even though he’s the one who destroyed me so long ago and this is an echo reaction to those old hurts.
“Are you talking about Nikki Rigston?” I snort and nod. “If she weren’t already dead, may she rest in peace, I’d kill her myself.”
I look up from beneath the bandana, where I’ve taken over wiping my own face. “What? Nikki’s dead?”
Bruce sighs and looks at the sky like he could rip a hole in it, rummage around to find Nikki, and then yell at her good and loud. “Car accident, years ago.”
I silently say a prayer for the girl who saved me from being a fool, nothing more than small-town gossip fodder.
“Let’s sit down so I can get this straight.” Bruce has his hands on his hips, preparing for battle, but I think I need this, so I sit willingly. He follows me to the ground, stretching out beside me with his arms resting on his bent knees. I cross my legs and mindlessly play with the grass beneath my fingers.
“So, back then, Nikki called you and told you I was hanging out with Naomi? She told you I was cheating on you? And you believed her? Is that what you’re telling me?” he grits out like even the words pain him. But he’s the one who did it. He had to know I would eventually find out.
“She told me everything. Or well, at least as much as I wanted to hear. I didn’t want to believe her, even told her that she had to be mistaken and that there was a good explanation. But then I started thinking about it, and I knew. I knew that as soon as I was gone and you were the big man on campus, girls were going to be all over you. It was inevitable. We were just kids.” All the things I’ve told myself over the years, especially back then, come out of my mouth robotically.
“That fucking bitch,” he spits out, not giving me any clues about who he’s talking about. Nikki? Naomi? I’m ninety-nine percent sure he doesn’t mean me, but my brows drift up anyway. “Nikki knew that Naomi was tutoring me. Yeah, Naomi had a crush on me, but I shut that shit down fast. We never dated, never did anything other than talk. But I needed a tutor because I was going to do anything to get into State. To be with you.”
Confusion swirls through my brain, seeds of hope wanting what he’s saying to be true. But there’s no way. Nikki said, and Bruce even admitted, that he was studying with her.
Studying?
Oh, my God. Could I have been this stupid?
“Tutoring. Not dating? Not going to parties with her? Not kissing her, fucking her, falling in love with her?” I need clarity, a big dose of it, from Bruce right the fuck now.
“Tutoring. That’s it. She might’ve been at some of the parties, I don’t know. We weren’t even friends, didn’t run in the same circles. I never kissed her, certainly sure as hell never fucked her, and I’ve only loved three women in my life. Mom, Shay, and you. Naomi? Just tutoring.”
The foundational axis of my world shifts helter-skelter, making me nauseous. I press my hands to my belly, trying to stop the rolling. “What the fuck? Why would Nikki . . .? Why didn’t you tell me all that? I would’ve believed you!”
He stands up, pacing and running his fingers through his dark hair, making it stand up wildly. “Because I was fucking embarrassed, Al. You were so damn smart, with all these big dreams. Meanwhile, for all I could do on the football field, I was barely making it in the classroom. And I didn’t want to hold you back, didn’t want to be the dumb jock who couldn’t even carry on a conversation with your smart-ass friends. I didn’t want you to know that I was failing English so badly, I had to get a tutor just so I could pass and play. Because football was my only way out, my only way to become something besides a farmer, my only way to keep you.”
I stand up too, pointing at him accusingly. “You are a stupid son of a bitch, you know that?” His lips curl. “Not because of some damn English class but because I was never embarrassed by you. Damn it, I loved you!”
I push at his chest, but he doesn’t move in the slightest.
“I would’ve loved you as a football player, as a farmer, as a fucking frog in a swampy pond. Don’t put your own insecurities on me. You pushed me away, made me doubt you. And you have no idea how much that hurt me . . . no idea what you did.”
It was a pivotal moment for me.
The loss of everything I thought I was going to have, going to do, with Bruce by my side. Breaking up with him had been an attempt at self-preservation, but it’d been a one-eighty turn that sent things on a roller coaster ride that routinely went off track. It had utterly destroyed me, and I wasn’t the one who picked up my shattered pieces. No, that’d been Jeremy. He’d picked up the Humpty Dumpty mess of me and glued me together in a Frankenstein I couldn’t even recognize anymore.
Hateful indignation makes him sneer at me, hostile and ugly. “Yeah, you seemed really torn up about it when I came to see you.” He dismisses me with a wave of his thick-fingered hand.
“You didn’t come to see me!” I argue, working to keep my voice down. We’re getting louder the madder we get, our hurt and pain amping up our heart rates and volume. But I don’t want the boys to hear any of this. I glance toward the pond where they’re playing, happily oblivious to the turmoil going on so nearby.
Bruce follows my gaze and steps closer to me, keeping his voice low and gravelly. “I came to see you at school, thought maybe I could do some stupid grand gesture to get you back. It was Bobby’s idea, but when I got there, you were sitting with another guy, Allyson. Pressed up against him from knee to hip, his arm around you playing with your hair, and you were holding his hand. You looked at him like you looked at me back then, like he was your everything.”
“Jeremy,” I breathe out, the name sticking in my throat. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I knew what I was seeing, Allyson. You broke up with me and you were falling in love with him. I didn’t want to get in your way, never wanted to hold you back. I wanted you to be happy, even if it wasn’t me, even if it was some asshole in fucking . . . khakis.”
He says khakis like it’s the world’s worst curse, his breathing jagged and rough. It killed him to feel that way back then and still hurt him to say it even now.
“I wish you had said something—” I start, but he interrupts me.
“So you could cut me down in front of your fancy-schmancy new guy? Fuck that.”
He turns away, grabbing his bag. I want to stop him. I want to tell him everything. But he’s not listening, too caught up in his feelings and what he thinks he saw so long ago. Just like I was when Nikki told me all that stuff. All those lies.
Goddamn it, how did things get so fucked up?
“Boys! Let’s go,” I yell across the field. In the faint light, I can see them scramble up and start running this way. Runnin
g . . . that’s what I want to do too.
But I won’t. Not yet.
I throw one last nuclear bomb at Bruce. “I wish you’d said something because one word from you—hell, even just seeing you there and explaining all of this—would’ve saved me. Saved me from a hell you have no idea about. But don’t worry, Brutal. I saved myself.”
I rarely call him by his nickname, never did. He was always Bruce to me because I could see the man behind the football field monster. But I need that distance right now. Because what he did, going home with his tail between his legs, was brutal . . . to us both.
The boys fly past, beelining for the car, and I take the cover of their presence, following them.
I hear Bruce call out from behind me. “Save you from what, Al?”
I shake my head, glancing over my shoulder. His back is to the moon, so he’s in silhouette and I can’t see his face, but I can imagine the feral look. He’s the predator, I’m the prey. But not anymore.
“It doesn’t matter now.”
It’s the truth. Too much time, too much heartache, too many misunderstandings . . . it’s all too much. I want a happy, healthy life on an even keel, not drama and tension. Not this standoff with Bruce where I’m always waiting for him to flip . . . hot or cold today? I lived like that for far too long, excused it away, but I’m not willing to do that again.
Not even for Bruce Tannen.
Chapter 15
Bruce
Everyone pushes back from the table with full and happy bellies after another one of Mama Louise’s delicious dinners. I’m not sure how she does it, but she feeds us all three times every day and does it with a smile.
I couldn’t do it, that’s for damn sure. Without Shay to feed us before and Mama Louise to feed us now, I’d probably subsist on piled high sandwiches and vegetables raw from the field. Hell, even now, some days I think I’d prefer that because it’d be easier and put me in the safe zone.
Because I’m definitely not safe tonight.
Mama Louise has been eyeballing me the whole meal, and I know there’s something coming, I’m just not sure what. She’s keen and perceptive and wants to be all up in our Tannen business where she’s not wanted. But when she shoves her way in, Brody, my brother who lost the most with this transition, melts and damn near invites her on in. I know it’s a reprieve for him to not be the leader all the time, and I’m sure he thinks that sometimes Mama Louise’s unique perspective is needed. But it still makes me want to walk away from all of this.
But I don’t.
I sit right here at the table and help with cleanup when we’re done, just like every night. We all, except for Sophie, who’s holding Cindy Lou, do a dance around the kitchen—trash in the can, leftovers in containers for the fridge, edibles for the goats, and dishes in the sink. It couldn’t be quicker if we choreographed it.
I try to make a run for it, not because I’m scared of the pint-sized woman watching me like a hawk but because I don’t have any need for her to pick around in the messed-up maze of my mind.
“Brutal?”
I freeze with my hand on the screen door, so close to freedom. So close to escape. I don’t even turn around, eyeing the black night just beyond my reach and wishing I could disappear into it. “Yeah?”
“Can you help me for a second?” Mama Louise asks, but she’s not, if you know her.
Mark grabs Katelyn’s hand and shoves by me with a grunt while Luke and Shayanne quickly say their good nights and follow. Sophie and James take a second to gather up Cindy Lou’s things and then they disappear out the front door. Brody and Bobby give me careful, guarded looks—Bobby’s asking if I’m okay, Brody’s telling me not to fuck this good thing up. All told, they scatter like damn roaches, leaving me alone with Mama Louise in a matter of seconds.
Mama Louise smiles like she’s already gotten her way. I guess she has.
“Whatcha need?” I ask warily.
“Dishes first, and then, I might have made a batch of my special sweet tea,” she replies with a devious tilt to her smile. I’ve had her special sweet tea, and it’s definitely evil. So syrupy sweet you could drink it by the gallons, but the sugar hides the bottle of bourbon she adds. It’ll sneak up on you faster than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking competition.
Stuck, I dutifully go over to the sink. Next to me, she sticks her hands in the soapy water, scrubbing a plate in silence before handing it to me for rinsing and drying. Neither of us says a word for several long minutes, though I can hear her humming softly under her breath. The tune sounds vaguely familiar, but it takes me a while to figure it out.
“Are you humming Bobby’s song?”
She smiles, the kind sweetness as obvious as the lines on her face. “Yes sir, he played it for me the other day. That boy is touched by God, working miracles with his hands and his mouth.”
I snort, not remotely interested in doing the ‘that’s what she said’ joke Mama Louise just unintentionally set me up for, but it runs through my mind anyway. I clear my throat instead. “Bobby’s good, for sure.”
The demon in my head still giggles like a twelve-year-old boy.
“How about you? You doing as well as he is?” She says it lazily, like I didn’t just mosey right into the trap she set for me.
I lift a brow in warning, glaring at her so she knows that I’m well aware she’s trying to figure me out. Thing is, I’m simple as fuck. I don’t need much, don’t want much, either. Just my family all together and maybe a little slice of happiness for myself.
“I’m fine, Mama Louise.” It should be the end of it. Not many people stand up to a big motherfucker like me when I make declarations. Hell, I could walk into Hank’s on any given day and proclaim it two-dollar draft night, and even Hank would probably go along with me. He might threaten me with his Louisville Slugger at the end of the night, but he wouldn’t be too quick at arguing with me.
Mama Louise has no such compunction. She’s a pro at this game from years with her own boys. She touched the boundary line, I defended, so she backs up and comes from another angle. “I’m glad to hear it. How about those boys on your team? Are they all fine?”
Halle-fucking-lujah! A safe zone. I can talk about the kids all day.
So I do, telling her about the plays they’re running, the progress they’re making, and the fun we’re all having. She’s got a mind like a steel trap, and I predict she’ll know each and every boy by name and by story within moments of meeting them. “You still planning to come to the games?”
She bumps me with her shoulder, but it hits somewhere barely north of my elbow. “High winds and rainstorms couldn’t keep me away!” She chuckles. “Well, I guess the game would be cancelled in that case, but you know what I mean.”
I do. She’s solid for the games, gonna be sitting right there on the sidelines with the rest of the crew cheering the Wildcats on. Cheering me on.
“Thanks, I appreciate that.” It’s the polite and proper thing to say, but I actually mean it, and she nods like she knows it.
We finish with the dishes, and though it’s on the tip of my tongue to decline her offer of sweet tea, it’s not an often-extended invitation and I can’t be rude to the woman who’s taken us in. We’re not exactly orphans since we’re all full-grown, but even big guys like Brody, Bobby, and I can use a mother’s love every once in a while, even if we don’t admit it. And Shay is blooming like a damn sunflower under Mama Louise’s watchful care. I don’t want to fuck that up.
So I grab two glasses from the cabinet and she smiles like I just gave her a gift. She pulls the pitcher of tea from the refrigerator and pours us each a healthy dose of the brown liquid. “Let’s go on the back porch. I’ve been cooped up inside all day.”
I lead the way, opening the back door for her, and we settle in the wooden chairs on the porch. I think they’re called Adirondack chairs, and they usually make me think of the beach. Tonight, they feel comfortable and perfect, though, and I relax into my drink, my chair, and the
night.
And pray that the team was all she wanted to talk about.
“So, what’s got you irritated as a racoon with no trash?” she asks conversationally and then takes a sip of tea. No such luck, I guess.
I sputter on my own drink, even though the bourbon is smooth as honey. “Nothing. I ain’t riled up over anything, ain’t irritated in the least.”
Her face says ‘doubt it’ loud and clear. “How’s Mike?”
I swear to God, butter would not melt in this woman’s mouth and a pit bull would lose his bone to her determination.
“Fine. Working third shift and can’t coach anymore, which you apparently already know. One of the moms took over as head coach.” My voice gives nothing away, and my hand is steady as I take another sip.
“How’s your Allyson handling that? How’re you doing with it?” She’s looking at the sky so hard she could probably count the stars, but I feel like her real attention is all on me.
How does she even know Allyson’s name? I sure as shit didn’t tell her. It’s then I remember Bobby’s dinner ‘oops’. That boy couldn’t keep his mouth shut even with duct tape. I’m guessing he’s the one who told her Allyson is my co-coach too.
“First off, she ain’t my Allyson, not my anything,” I spit out with more venom than I intend. “And we’re doing just fine.”
Even I don’t believe that, not after yesterday.
Practice went so well, or mostly so, other than the hiccup with the tackle, and even afterward, we’d flirted and talked like . . . old friends. It’d been comfortable. I liked her giving me shit, loved her body so close to mine that I could smell the blend of her floral perfume and sweet sweat. And then that’d all gone to hell in a handbasket again.
Cheat on her? Goddamn, that girl had me spun around her finger so tight I didn’t know my ass from my elbow. I never would’ve cheated on her. I was doing everything I could to be worthy of her.
I realize too late that I’ve been silent too long. Mama Louise can see right through me or maybe even hear my thoughts with how loudly I’m thinking them.
Rough Love Page 14