The Comeback Season

by Jennifer E. Smith

  “I guess I could probably keep an eye on him,” Ryan says, and Mom points to the Cubs pennant taped to the door.

  “Just don’t get him hooked too early,” she says. “No need to crush the poor kid right away.”

  Ryan’s desperate to get out of the house and Nick’s eager to avoid unpacking, and so on the day he returns home, they agree to meet at the beach. When she pulls her bike up along the path that follows the water, Ryan sees him standing with his back to her, a flock of kids building sand castles near his feet.

  It occurs to her now that despite weeks of overthinking it, she hadn’t settled on just what to say once he came back. And despite her rush to get here, she now takes her time locking up her bike, her heart quickening at the thought of this uncertain reunion.

  But when Nick turns and sees her, his face breaking into a smile, Ryan forgets everything else. He’s sunburned and freckled, and his hair is lighter. He jogs over, weaving through beach towels and picnic baskets, and when they’re close enough, he bends to give her a hug.

  “I missed you,” Ryan finds herself saying before she has a chance to weigh the pros and cons of such a statement. But it’s the truest thing she can think to say. She’d missed him even more than she expected she would.

  Nick leans back, still half-hugging her, and Ryan can tell from the look on his face that he’s about to kiss her. She feels suddenly and swiftly happy—happier than she has in ages—leaning against him with the sun on her back and her feet sunk low in the hot sand. She stands on her tiptoes and kisses him back, managing until the last moment to avoid grinning. Nick pulls away, laughing, and Ryan smiles into his neck.

  “I missed you, too,” he says, stretching an arm around her shoulders and steering her toward the ledge where the sidewalk meets the beach. “It felt like a lot longer than a month.”

  Ryan bows her head, suddenly shy. “For me too,” she says, and then as if they’d already agreed to it, neither says anything more about the past weeks, the long days behind them, which no longer seem important now that they’re here together. It is this way too, with all that had been said about Nick’s past. They sit with their feet dangling in the glinting sand, burying it all: the surgery, the chemo, the threat of what could still come. In this—this hesitant march forward—Ryan has found a traveling companion.

  “So, our boys are rallying pretty hard,” Nick says. “When should we go down for another game?”

  “Tickets are impossible to get now,” Ryan tells him. “It doesn’t take much to get people excited around here.”

  “Then it’s a lucky thing we don’t require tickets.”

  “That’s true,” she says, sliding off the ledge. Nick follows her down the beach, and Ryan hops from one foot to the other, yelping at the temperature of the sand.

  “Put your shoes on,” Nick says, laughing, but she ignores him and sprints down to the water ahead of him. By the time he catches up, she’s already up to her knees in the lake, her arms prickling with goose bumps. Nick loiters a few feet away, backpedaling each time a wave rushes at him, and he manages to duck away when Ryan kicks some water in his direction.

  “Hey!” he shouts. “What gives?”

  She raises one eyebrow at him. “You’ll sit outside during the biggest storm of the summer, but you’re afraid of a little lake water?”

  He rolls his eyes, but inches out a bit farther. There are a few sailboats in the distance, their white sails glowing in the midday sun, and the water is riddled with inner tubes and floaties. Ryan is standing knee-deep in her shorts and tank top, curling her toes against the sandy bottom when she feels the heaviness of two hands on her shoulders, and her feet give out beneath her. When she comes up again, spitting water and clawing away the wet hair from her face, Nick is doubled over, laughing.

  “You’re toast,” she says, lunging at him. He tries running back toward the beach, but his legs move in slow motion in the water, and Ryan manages to pull him under too. He bobs back up a moment later, blinking indignantly, but now that they’re both soaked, they linger out there, floating on their backs until they drift too far and have to paddle back. When they finally decide to swim to shore, they collapse onto the sand, their arms spread wide as they dry out in the sun. Impossibly happy, Ryan closes her eyes and listens to Nick breathing beside her.

  “Want to come over for dinner tonight?” he asks, and she rolls her head to look at him. “I’m the world’s best barbecuer.”

  “And modest, too,” she jokes.

  “It’s hard to be modest when you can grill as well as I can.”

  “Okay, then,” she says. “But just know that my expectations are high.”

  When they’ve had enough sun and have nearly dried out again, they wheel their bikes up the path that curls out from the beach. Ryan reaches over to swat the back of Nick’s shirt, and he whirls around.

  “You’re still covered in sand,” she tells him.

  “You too,” he grins. “But you don’t see me beating up on you.”

  They’re almost out of the parking lot, past the snack bar and the showers, when they pass Lucy and Sydney, sitting in what look like matching bikinis and surveying the crowd. Ryan quickens her pace, hoping to avoid them altogether, but Lucy calls Nick’s name and waves them over.

  “I know, I know,” he says when Ryan gives him a look, and she wonders whether he’s also thinking about the dance last spring. Neither one of them has seen Lucy since school ended, and Ryan can’t imagine she’s not still angry about what had happened that night.

  But when they’re still a few feet away, Lucy points her Popsicle at Nick. “You’re coming to the party tonight, right?”

  Surprised, Nick glances at Ryan, then back at the other girls. “What party?”

  “Sydney’s parents are coming back into town tomorrow,” Lucy says, looking almost embarrassed for them. “Last big party of the summer.”

  Ryan catches Sydney’s eye, but she looks quickly away.

  “You in or out?” Lucy asks.

  “We actually have dinner plans,” Nick says, and Ryan can’t help feeling the tiniest bit satisfied by the rare display of surprise on Lucy’s face.

  But she rights herself quickly. “Well, she can come too,” Lucy says, then turns to Ryan. “You’re into sports, right? There’ll be all sorts of drinking games. So even you might have fun.”

  It seems beside the point to mention that she doesn’t drink, so Ryan just folds her arms and glances over at Nick.

  “Maybe we’ll stop by later,” he offers, and Sydney nods ambivalently.

  Lucy claps her hands. “You should. It’s going to be the best party of the summer.”

  Once they’re far enough away, across the parking lot and heading toward home, Ryan shakes her head. “What do you think that was all about?” she asks Nick.

  “It sounds like it’s just going to be a good party.”

  “Yeah,” Ryan says. “Caught that.”

  Nick laughs. “Maybe she’s had a change of heart.”

  “Or maybe she has sunstroke,” she suggests. “We’re not really going, are we?”

  “Why not?” He shrugs. “The rest of the guys will probably be there, and I haven’t seen them all summer. Besides, it could be fun.”

  “Doubt it.”

  “You said you’ve been bored too,” Nick points out.

  “Not that bored.”

  “Come on,” he says. “What else do you have to do?”

  She sighs. “Okay, but if it’s awful, I’m not staying.”

  “If we go together,” he says, “it won’t be awful.”

  Hard as she tries, Ryan’s unable to argue with the logic in that.

  Chapter Eighteen

  * * *

  BY THE TIME THEY ARRIVE AT THE PARTY, THE POOL IS already littered with red and blue plastic cups, lit from below by the wavery lights so that they look menacing as jellyfish. Someone had managed to order a keg, and a small group is huddled around the giant garbage can that holds it, thru
sting their empty cups blindly toward the guy at the tap. There’s a foamy, beery smell to the yard, as if the grass itself has been soaked through, and the song on the stereo—more rhythm than melody—quivers out across the crowded yard and into the neighborhood beyond. Ryan’s fairly certain that this is not what Sydney had in mind when she’d agreed to the party. Even the sprinklers have been switched on, creating a trail of muddy footprints in and out of the back door to the kitchen, where she and Kate used to come over after school to bake cookies.

  Ryan and Nick exchange a look from where they stand at the top of the driveway on tiptoes, surveying the scene beyond the latched gate. There’s a loud cry from just past where they can see, and a moment later, Will O’Malley hurtles himself off the edge of the diving board—a full cup of beer in hand—and attempts a flip into the pool. It ends in a belly flop, and he emerges from the water laughing, then heads straight back to the keg. Ryan hears a few scattered warnings of silence—shh, the neighbors!—but this is followed by loud laughter.

  She turns to Nick. “We could still go back to your house.”

  “I see what you’re doing,” he says. “You’re looking for seconds on the burgers.”

  Ryan rolls her eyes. When Nick moves to unlatch the gate leading to the backyard, she puts a hand on his arm. “Seriously,” she says. “What’s the point?”

  “We’re already here,” he says. “We may as well go in.”

  They pick their way among discarded cups and strewn sandals to where a group of Nick’s friends are standing around the barbecue. Ryan automatically hangs back, an instinct she can’t seem to shake. She’s grown used to being invisible. But now, after they greet Nick with slaps on the back and a few good-natured barbs at his absence this summer, they lift their chins to Ryan, too. A few months ago, she would have never thought this possible. A few months ago, she would have been home in bed right now.

  Nick hooks an arm around her shoulders casually—so casually, in fact, that it takes Ryan a moment to realize it’s happened at all. She struggles to keep a straight face, doing her best not to smile. She wonders if it’s possible to jinx something simply by taking too much joy in it.

  Nick spots a deck of cards, sticky with beer, on a picnic table off to one side of the patio. He motions to Will and a few other guys, and minutes later, Ryan finds herself sitting with them at the table. Her eyes stray toward the pool, where Sydney and Lucy are perched on the edge, their legs tracing circles in the too-blue water. Neither looks happy that such an important component of the party has drifted away. Ryan hadn’t been to any of Sydney’s other parties this summer, but she’s pretty sure this isn’t how they had planned things to work out.

  “You in or out?” one of the guys asks Ryan, and she hesitates. Nick watches her with amusement as he shuffles the cards.

  “What are we playing?” she asks.

  “How about bullshit?” Lucy suggests as she walks over to the table, positioning herself directly behind Ryan. “That’s always interesting.”

  Will shrugs, and Nick cuts the deck. Ryan notices Sydney and Kate and a handful of other girls forming a circle around the table. Nick nudges her shoulder.

  “You in?” he asks, beginning to deal. Ryan swallows hard and nods.

  When she’s been dealt all her cards, she tries to look at each one without fanning them out. Lucy stands behind her making little noises of approval, and Ryan resists the urge to jab her with her elbow.

  Will goes first. “I’ve got one two,” he says, tossing a card face down into the middle of the table. He looks stone-faced at each person, daring anyone to challenge him. Ryan swats at a bug near her face. When enough time has passed, the next player, a tall guy whose name Ryan has forgotten, throws in three cards.

  During Nick’s turn, Ryan’s almost certain he’s lying. But by the time she musters up the nerve to call him on it, Will slaps a hand down on the pile of cards.

  “Bullshit,” he says.

  Nick waves a hand lazily in the air. “Go ahead,” he says. “Try me.”

  Ryan doesn’t watch Will as he reveals the card. She’s too busy studying Nick’s face, trying to see past the mask of indifference, beyond the tactics of the game. She’s nearly positive that he’s bluffing, but when Will flips the cards at the center, Nick lets out a loud laugh.

  “Pick ’em up,” he tells Will, who groans as he collects the discard pile.

  Nick grins at Ryan’s expression. “It’s a lot easier to just tell the truth.”

  “But that’s not the game,” Lucy points out. “That’s not how you win.”

  Nick seems unconcerned. “There are all sorts of ways to win,” he says, still looking at Ryan. She eyes the cards in her hand, running her thumb over the glossy surface. Behind her, Lucy juts out her hip and sighs, but Ryan isn’t paying any attention. She shuffles her cards, flipping them from one hand to the other, staring at them as if a five might somehow materialize. Finally, and with no other choice, she slides a six from beneath her thumb and lays it face down in the center of the table.

  “One five,” she lies.

  “Oh, please,” says Lucy.

  The guys all look to Nick, as if it were his responsibility to challenge her. He rubs his chin and regards her quietly. After a long moment, he nods at the guy sitting to Ryan’s other side.

  “You’re up,” Nick says, and everyone at the table exchanges a look. But then the next player tosses in a couple of cards, and the attention shifts in his direction.

  Nick moves closer to Ryan. “You’re an awful liar,” he says, his breath tickling her ear.

  She turns, just slightly, so that their faces are only inches away. “How do you know I wasn’t telling the truth?”

  “I can just tell,” he says.

  “Can you?”

  He nods. “Your eyes give you away.”

  Ryan blinks. They sit watching each other, and the smile slips from her face. She feels suddenly too visible, as if he can see straight through her. Her stomach does a tiny flip, and she looks down at her lap, no longer in the mood to joke. The space around the table feels choked with people, the temperature suddenly too warm. She rises from her seat abruptly, bumping her knee on the bench and half-falling into Lucy, who is standing behind her.

  Ryan hears the soft splash of the beer before she realizes what happened.

  When she turns, Lucy’s staring down at her shoes, a pair of delicate sandals Ryan hadn’t noticed before—and probably never would have, were they not now drenched in beer, a deeper color pink spreading along the thin straps. Lucy picks up one foot then the other, examining the bottoms of her jeans, now stained a dark blue, and Ryan can almost feel the collective intake of breath from the table behind her.

  There is no shriek, no scream, not even a whimper from Lucy. Instead, she looks up at Ryan with eyes hard and angry. “My dad just bought these for me.”

  “I’m really sorry,” Ryan mumbles. “I didn’t mean—”

  “What?” Lucy snaps. “To barrel into me?”

  Nick is up now too. “It was just an accident.”

  Kate appears with a roll of paper towels, and Ryan flashes her a grateful smile then stands waiting for something to happen. The party behind them has come to a rapid halt, and the yard is quiet except for the soft hiss of the barbecue. Lucy stoops to mop at her ruined shoes with a paper towel, and Ryan wonders whether she should help her.

  “I’ll pay you back for them,” she hears herself say, then immediately regrets it.

  Lucy rises slowly, wiping her hands. “They were a gift from my father,” she says accusingly, as if Ryan had suggested replacing a family heirloom.

  Ryan wishes everyone would stop looking at her. She considers just walking away, but isn’t sure how to begin so bold a course of action. Lucy’s still glaring at her, but by now, she’s beginning to lose center stage. Someone has turned the music back on, and behind her, the guys have resumed their card game. Sydney disappears behind the sliding door and emerges a moment later with
another stack of cups. Will follows her over to the keg.

  Unsure what to do, Ryan remains where she’s standing and studies her feet. She puffs out her cheeks. “I’m sorry,” she says again.

  “Sorry doesn’t really do much for my shoes.”

  “I said I’d pay—”

  Lucy cuts her off. “You don’t have to pay for them.” She smirks, then she leans in close to Ryan, her tone deliberately light. “Isn’t that what dads are for?”

  Ryan takes a step back as if she’s been struck, nearly stumbling again. Nick reaches out an arm to steady her, but she doesn’t notice. Her eyes are locked on Lucy’s, and she’s doing her best to hide whatever hurt might be mixed in with all the anger. She balls her hands into two tight fists, trembling all over and fighting the urge to shoot back at her with something equally spiteful.

  But by the time she collects herself, Lucy’s already gone, stalking inside to rinse out her designer sandals. Ryan feels nearly dizzy with resentment, with pure outrage at her comment. Nick takes her by the elbow, and she follows him blindly, the music fading behind them, until they’re out in the shadowy light of the driveway.

  Ryan takes a deep, gulping breath. “I can’t believe …”

  “That was a cheap shot,” Nick says quietly. She hasn’t ever spoken to him about her dad, and she can tell now by the way he’s looking at her that he’s unsure of the proper etiquette for this sort of situation.

  But Ryan’s too preoccupied to care. “I should’ve dumped another beer on her,” she says, still shaking. “I should’ve done something.”

  “What could you have done?” Nick asks, pacing the driveway in uncertain circles around her. Ryan watches his shadow lengthen and recede in the pools of light from the garage. “You’re better off just walking away.”

  “I always just walk away,” she says with a frown. She rests her hands on top of her head and then leaves them there, as if having forgotten to reclaim them. A few fireflies blink yellow in the night, and Ryan watches them until they disappear again. She lowers her eyes. “I hate that I always walk away.”