Panting now, Sarah paused, then took a long shot from a third of the way down the court. The ball soared through the air, seemed to hover over the net, then dropped through, creating a perfect, whispering swish.
The ball bounced off the floor a few times and rolled away.
“Good shot.”
The deep voice sent her heart into her throat and she spun around to see Logan loitering in the doorway. Just as he used to when she was in high school.
His dark eyes were on her and she couldn’t look away.
Sarah snatched herself back from the brink of memories and turned away, breaking the fragile connection.
“Billy should be done,” she said, walking over to retrieve the ball.
“He said he was going to a friend’s place.”
His little girlfriend? Sarah wondered.
“So did you come to talk to me about quitting again?” Catching her breath, she bent over, scooped up one of the balls, walked toward the basketball cart beside the player’s bench and tossed it in. “Because I’m not.”
Logan pushed himself away from the doorway and once again was walking toward her. Only this time he stopped at the player’s bench and sat down.
“I’m just wondering why you pulled Billy.” He straightened the books, aligning them, then pushed them a few feet over.
Sarah lifted her shoulder to her cheek and wiped away a trickle of perspiration. “I should have done it earlier in the game.”
Logan sat back, his long legs stretched out in front of him, his feet crossed at the ankles. “So what’s the problem? He was doing okay.”
“Okay isn’t good enough. Not if he wants to get to college like you want him to. He’s holding back, and I think you know it.”
“Why would he do that?”
Sarah thought of the little brunette that made Billy smile. Unfortunately, that wasn’t her secret to tell. Billy had to make up his mind what he wanted, just as Sarah had told him that same afternoon. She wasn’t going to tell tales. “Have you asked him?”
“He’s been avoiding me.”
Sarah sat down on her end of the bench, keeping her distance from Logan. The past few days he’d been on her mind and she preferred not to think about him.
“Something tells me you know a bit more than you’re letting on,” Logan said.
“If Billy doesn’t want to tell you, I can’t.”
“But something is going on, isn’t it?”
“Well, for one thing, he’s having trouble keeping his marks up.”
“Billy’s marks are okay.” Logan’s tone was defensive.
“Not according to Uncle Morris.”
“That stinker.”
“Uncle Morris, or Billy?”
Logan even laughed. “I mean Billy.”
Sarah relaxed, pleased that she had sent Logan off on another scent. She leaned back against the wall as the weariness she’d been fighting off slowly made itself known. She wished she were home now, relaxing, perhaps reading a magazine that regaled her with the antics of people with whom she had zero emotional connection.
Wished she was sitting in Francine’s house, holding her little baby. Wished she was at Aunt Dot’s turning down yet another cookie or piece of cake.
But here she was.
Logan laid his head back against the wall. He seemed tired, as well. “You looked upset when you came in for the game. Everything okay with your dad?”
For a split second she wanted to lay her head on his shoulder and tell him everything. To put it all on someone else.
As she used to when she was young.
She looked away. Eight years had elapsed since she had been that girl. How does one go back? So much had changed. They had each created their own lives.
And yet
“No,” she finally whispered.
“What happened?” he pressed on.
Sarah sighed, fully aware of him sitting at the end of the bench, similar to when they had sat side by side in church. The soft note of caring in his voice hearkened back to another time…
The moment lengthened and, as they sat in the quiet, separated by three feet of bench, Sarah felt a gentle peace suffuse her.
“I’ve had some personal trouble with him…” she said finally.
“What kind of trouble?”
“When I left, he wrote me…he wrote me a note saying that he needed to talk to me.” She stopped there and bounced the basketball once. “Every month he sent me a check and that was all. No note, no letter. Except at Christmas and even then it was dry information about the family. Nothing personal.”
“Did he at least phone?”
“On my birthday. It was often short and awkward. But he did his duty by me.”
Logan shook his head. “Your dad has a perverse sense of duty and a twisted sense of right and wrong.”
Sarah chose to ignore the harsh note in Logan’s voice. “And he saw his duty as that monthly check. Even though after the first year I always ripped up the check, I would still open the envelope with some small piece of hope that this time he would send something personal. I got letters from the rest of the family, but never him. Then my aunts started telling me how he had stopped going to church. How he seemed so distraught. Of course he wouldn’t tell them or confide in them. He has his pride.”
Sarah shook her head. “Then, one day, I got a note with my check. And all he had written on there was, ‘Come home. I need to talk to you.’ This was such a radical thing for my dad, after eight years of simply sending money. He caught me at a bad time.” She didn’t tell him that she had been struggling with loneliness. That no matter how many dates she went on, she couldn’t connect with anyone who she thought she might want to share her life with.
She wanted to come back anyway.
“Anyhow, I put that together with my aunts’ and uncles’ concern, figured now would be a good time to come back and connect with him and the rest of the family. I packed up and drove home here.”
“So that’s what brought you back?”
“Yeah. That tiny piece of paper with those few words. And my family. It was the first time since I was young that I ever got the sense that he needed me.”
“And…”
“And then I came home and the last and only things I hear him say are angry words directed at you.” She couldn’t talk about her father’s misplaced forgiveness.
“I’m not surprised.” His eyes searched hers. “Nor should you be. Your father has never liked me or my family.”
“I wish I knew the reason,” Sarah said softly.
Awareness arced between them, as tangible as a touch.
“Do you know?” she asked. “Do you know why my dad has harbored this strong anger toward your family?”
Logan didn’t reply, but a gentle sigh sifted out of him as he reached across the bench, spanning the distance to touch her hand. His fingers lingered for just a few seconds. Then abruptly, he pushed himself away from the bench. “I gotta go.”
Sarah experienced a moment of confusion at his unexpected departure.
And as he left the gym, she felt as if a part of her left with him.
She waited a moment, trying to sort out her feelings, unsure of what to put where. Then, shaking the emotions loose from her fuzzy mind, she got up and walked over to the end of the bench where Logan had been sitting.