Sarah looked up to see a young girl hovering in the doorway of the gym. Long brown hair, soft brown eyes, and a secretive smile—all directed toward the young man on the bench.
As Billy’s attention flitted from the girl with her clingy jeans and cropped jacket, to Sarah, guilt splashed all over his red face.
And suddenly things fell into place.
“He’ll be with you in a moment, okay?” Sarah flashed the girl a quick smile.
Billy nodded, and the girl waggled her fingers at him, then left.
Sarah waited until she presumed she was out of earshot. “So. Is she part of the problem?”
“We’re just friends.”
“That line doesn’t work for movie stars, and it’s not playing too well with me, either.”
Billy didn’t confirm or deny. Instead, his desperate gaze locked on hers. “Don’t tell Logan, okay? He’ll throw a fit.” Billy’s pleading look, the surprising note of vulnerability in his voice, gave Sarah pause.
And it hearkened back to another high school student pleading with another adult about another relationship.
Only then it had been her, pleading with her uncle Morris after he came upon her and Logan kissing in the gym after a practice. Logan had just issued her an ultimatum. He was getting tired of hiding and skulking. He wanted everyone to know they were dating, that they were serious.
They had fought and Sarah had pleaded with him to stick to their plan. To keep things quiet until they were both attending college. She wasn’t strong enough to brave her father’s anger if he found out about them. Then, away from Millars Crossing and her father, they could do what they wanted. But Uncle Morris had found them and, out of respect for her father, told Frank.
Sarah took her foot off the bench and sat down beside Billy. She had learned the hard way that secrets will come out and the longer they were held down, the more potent they became. “Why does this matter so much? Why can’t you tell him?”
Billy shook his head. “I can’t tell him. I’ve got my reasons.”
Sarah leaned her elbows on her knees, staring at the opposite wall. Banners denoting various championship teams hung in tidy rows. Her name was on a number of them. Three zone championships and a number of regional championships. Basketball was supposed to have been her ticket out of Millars Crossing, but the day of the game when the scouts were to be there, she had sprained her ankle and hadn’t played. So she didn’t get a scholarship for that first year of college.
And she remembered too well, the feeling of powerlessness as her father opportunistically made his ultimatum—break up with Logan or he wasn’t going to pay for her first year of college.
Her father’s plot only worked because of Sarah’s injury. But Sarah had her own plans. She was going to lay low, follow the curfew he imposed as a result, let her father think he won, then, as soon as her father thought all was well, she was going to see Logan and explain what had happened. Tell him that she loved him. Only him. Surely he would understand. He would know that she did what she did only to fool her father into thinking she was, in fact, an obedient daughter. She could have sent him a message but she was afraid of any misunderstanding. She wanted to explain to him face-to-face.
But they never had the chance to meet him face-to-face.
Because Marilee, who had always gotten everything she ever wanted, plus many of the things that Sarah desired, had left a note on Sarah’s bed telling her that she was meeting up with Logan that night.
A man she used to date. A man who was now single.
And that night, Marilee had died.
She pulled her thoughts away from that horrible time. Settling herself into the present and the problems of now.
“You’re a big boy, Billy. If Logan doesn’t want you to have a girlfriend, that’s his problem. Not yours.”
“He thinks if I get a girlfriend here, I won’t focus on college.” Billy bounced the ball again. “I’m not so sure I want to go to school.”
“What else could you do?”
Billy shrugged. “My friend Newt knows a guy who’s a welder. He needs an apprentice.”
“That’s your decision then. But you also need to tell Logan that you want to make your own decisions about your life. I know we didn’t have that chance.”
“What do you mean we?”
Sarah shot him a puzzled glance.
“You said we didn’t have that chance.”
She caught herself. “I meant, he. He didn’t have that chance.”
“But you said we. I know what I heard.” Billy leaned back against the wall, tossing the basketball from hand to hand, watching her. “You and my brother used to go out, didn’t you?”
Though she wasn’t going to answer him, Sarah couldn’t stop the flush of self-consciousness migrating up her neck.
“Whoa. Look at Miss Westerveld,” Billy crowed, jumping to the right conclusion.
“We were talking about you…”
“I used to sneak downstairs to listen to him talking to you on the phone. His voice always got all mushy when he did.”
Sarah ignored him, trying to hold her ground emotionally. In Halifax it had been much easier to distill the grand emotions she felt with Logan to a simple high school crush. A sentimental memory. Her first serious, head-over-heels love, the one you always remember but always get over.
But since coming back here, since seeing Logan again, it was as if the eight years away hadn’t even happened.
She didn’t want to remember a time when his voice on the phone had stolen her breath completely.
“So who broke it up?”
“I did. Just before Christmas. Eight years ago.”
“Aha.” Billy drew out the two syllables, as if something finally clicked for him. “That’s why he was such a grouch.”
Curiosity trumped privacy. “What do you mean?”
“Was a long time ago, but I still remember. All of January that year he was miserable and snapping at us. I thought it was because Dad was sick, but thinking back I suspect it was thanks to you.”
She didn’t dare believe him. Logan had gone out with Marilee only days after she had broken up with him. “There were other things going on at the time. And he wasn’t dating me. He was dating my sister.”
Billy frowned at her. “What was her name?”
“Marilee.”
He shook his head. “Don’t remember him talking to her on the phone. Ever.”
Sarah waited a beat. Waited to extinguish the faint flicker of hope that she had read Marilee’s note wrong.
Marilee had been so clear. She was going to be with Logan.
Could she have gotten it wrong?
Sarah picked up her clipboard and fussed with the papers attached to it, trying to regain her equilibrium. “I want to get back to you. Your choices. Do you want to quit the team?”
“Are you kidding? Logan would shoot me.”
“In that case, you are still my responsibility. And this is the deal. You want to play? Then play. If you do your best and give your team and yourself the chance to play—and play to your full potential—in front of those college scouts, you will have one more choice, one more opportunity. So while you’re out there, I want you to give your full attention and energy to the game. If you don’t, you’re off the team.” Sarah let this settle, bracing herself for his response.