“Oh, that beat-up Saturn? It was, like, five colors. Rust, gray, green, red, and I think a little black.”
His first car, bought with the small salary he’d earned at the nursery. It had cost him more in repairs than what he’d paid for it, but it had gotten him around during college. That car had definitely not been one that had impressed any girls. “Remember how it broke down on Route 5 that night we were coming back from that concert?”
“That was a great night. We had those awful seats—”
“At the very back of the stadium, with a pole right in front of us.” Their memories braided together, as if they were there again, in the dark stadium with thousands of other people, anticipating the moment their favorite band hit the stage. Trent had saved for weeks to buy the tickets as a surprise for Kate’s birthday. “I really thought partially obstructed view meant a tall guy in front of us or something.”
“The view was fine, really, if you kind of craned your neck.” She did just that, and the exaggerated gawking made Trent laugh. “The music was fabulous either way. Oh, and remember how I spilled my soda and popcorn on the floor during the first song? My shoes were sticky and crunchy for, like, a week.”
They’d had a fabulous night, despite the bad seats and the ruined snack. Trent had wanted to do so much more for her birthday—a fancy dinner, maybe a limo to and from the concert—but in those days, his budget had been drive-thru fast food and partially obstructed seats. “It was fun until my car broke down, a mile from our exit.”
“Those things happen. I was more impressed that you walked all the way to the gas station to get a tow truck,” she said softly. “It was dark, and you left the only flashlight you had with me.”
“I didn’t want you to be scared.” He shrugged, as if it had been no big deal to leave her in the car while he’d gone to get help on that cold winter night, in a too-thin jacket that had barely kept him warm. They’d been out in the middle of nowhere, far from any kind of cell tower, so he’d had to run for help. He’d never told Kate about the dozens of horror film plots that had made him take that mile at a run pace, just so he’d get back even sooner. “I’m just glad it was only a mile. I was worried about you the whole time.”
“You were worried? That’s so sweet.” A smile curved across her face. “I mean, yeah, it was dark and cold, and my cell phone couldn’t get a signal. I had that little cheap flip phone that barely worked. But I wasn’t really scared.”
He glanced over at her. Every time he thought he knew Kate, she surprised him. He liked that. A lot. “You weren’t? Why?”
She averted her gaze and smoothed her hand over the lined paper in her lap. “I knew you’d take care of me, Trent. I…well, I trusted you.”
She’d trusted him, and then he’d broken her heart a month later by ending their relationship. At the time, he’d thought they were too different to be happy together. Right now, he was having trouble seeing what those differences were. “I’m sorry, Kate.”
“Don’t apologize. It was still the best birthday present I ever got.”
He scoffed. “We had terrible seats, and we broke down on the way home.”
“But it was fun, Trent. An adventure.”
A tractor trailer truck passed them, the wind tunnel effect making the Vette shimmy a little. “I thought you hated adventures.”
“I don’t hate them. I just…” She turned to look out the window at the passing landscape of houses and businesses as they rode through a small town on their way north. Kate was quiet for a moment. “I don’t like doing things I’m not good at.”
“The only way to get good at them is to do them, you know.”
“I know, but…it’s never been that simple for me.” He didn’t speak, just waited for her to continue. He could see the words on the tip of her tongue, the story waiting to be shared. So he kept driving, giving Kate time and space.
“My parents worked a lot when I was a kid, you know?” she finally said.
He remembered Kate sharing a little about her family when they’d been dating. By the time Kate had gone to college, her parents had relocated to new jobs in California until they’d retired. As a twenty-something, he hadn’t thought about how tough it would be navigating the world without that support system nearby. “I can’t imagine that. It seems like I was always around my family.”
“I had my grandmother, thank goodness. And it’s not that my parents didn’t love me. It was as if…” She thought a second. “As if they were gone so much that when the three of us were home together, which was very rare, they were so tired or so behind on housework and things like that, we hardly had fun together.”
He merged into the center lane as a pickup truck with a horse trailer moved to pass them. “What do you mean?”
“My dad loved basketball when I was a kid. The one thing we would do together on Sundays was watch the basketball game. He knew every player, every team, and it was the one thing we had in common.” Her face lit up with the memory, and for a second, Trent could imagine a much-younger Kate’s joy at the weekend tradition. “Because my dad was gone all the time at work, I thought I’d join a basketball team at school. And, well, since we both know I’m not coordinated enough to operate anything more complicated than a pencil, it was a disaster.”
Trent vowed that if he ever became a father—and that was a big if, considering he wasn’t even thinking about settling down yet—he would be there for his kids all the time. “Your dad get to see you play?”
“He took time off to come to our first game. I was so excited. I thought I’d make him proud and really do well. Instead, when the ball was passed to me…” She cringed. “I ducked, and it went straight into the other team’s hands.”
Trent bit back a laugh. “Oh, Kate. That’s awful.”
“I was so embarrassed. My dad was cool about it, and he said he’d work with me and help me practice, but he worked so much, and we only had those Sundays. Suffice to say, I never got any better. I stuck to things I couldn’t fail at, like reading and writing, instead.”
“You must have tried other sports?”
She shook her head. “I’m not exactly super coordinated anyway, and that basketball experience made me even more skittish. I was awful in gym and couldn’t stand that class.”
He chuckled. “That’s where we differ. I would have been happy to have six periods of gym and none of math and English.”
“When I was in high school, I tried out for the color guard. It was like that basketball team all over again. I twirled the baton at that first halftime show, and it came down and bonked me on the head.” She shrugged and smoothed her jeans. “After that, it became easier and safer to just…read or write. That was part of why I didn’t want to try any of those things with you. I was so afraid I’d mess up and you’d…well, you wouldn’t want to take me with you again.”