Homecoming (A Boys of Fall Novel) (13 page)

He let the sentence trail off, shaking his head. It still felt unnatural to him to talk about his relationship with his mother, and it was painful, too. Plus, he didn’t want to scare the boy. The situations were different and as long as Bill Dodge stayed clean and had the patience to let his son work through his emotions, they had a chance at being happy again.

“I hope you and your mom work things out,” Cody said. “And if you do, maybe you’ll stick around instead of going back to Texas, right?”

Sam shook his head in sheer reflex. “I could never live here again. There’s too much baggage. Too many memories.”

Cody frowned. “That sucks. I gotta go get ready for work, but thanks for talking to me, Coach.”

Sam smiled, knowing he’d probably said almost those exact same words to Coach McDonnell back in the day. “Anytime, Cody. And you can always talk to Jen—uh, Miss Cooper—about this, you know.”

“I will, but I wanted to talk to somebody who understood, you know?”

“I know.” Sam clapped him on the shoulder. “Keep me in the loop, okay?”

“I will.” Cody opened the door, and then paused. “Thanks again, dude.”

“No problem, dude,” Sam said, just to be funny. Cody scowled before slowly shaking his head. “What? You say it constantly.”

“Yeah, but I’m like . . . not old.”

“Get out,” Sam said, and then he laughed. “Being so not old, I guess you won’t mind some extra laps at next practice.”

“Gotta go!” He pulled the door closed behind him before Sam could say anything else.

His amusement faded and Sam dropped onto the couch, utterly exhausted. He had a hard enough time coping with his own emotional roller coaster. Riding one with a teenage boy? Not really in his wheelhouse.

But he thought he’d done okay. It was tempting to call Jen and recount the conversation so she could judge whether or not he’d handled it correctly, but he didn’t. Mostly because he didn’t want to betray Cody’s confidence since there was no real threat to the boy.

And after spending the night in Jen’s bed and then talking with Cody—including dragging some of his own emotional monsters out from under the bed—he felt vulnerable. And the last thing he could do was allow himself to be around Jen when he felt that way. She’d already accused him once of using her as some kind of comfort object.

But mostly it scared him, the way being with Jen made him feel . . . okay. It was as if being around her made life better in general, and that scared the hell out of him. He needed to fortify his defenses before he talked to her again so he could smile and keep it light. Fun. Sexy.

Temporary.

I could never live here again. There’s too much baggage. Too many memories.
Somehow that baggage didn’t feel as heavy as it once had, though. Instead of lugging it around or tripping over it constantly, it was starting to feel like the baggage was in the basement. Taking up space, but not interfering with living his life. And the memories that popped first into his head now weren’t from his childhood. He saw Jen laughing. His mom’s smile. Breakfast with Coach and Mrs. McDonnell. A line of young men sitting on a bench, looking to him for leadership.

Not only was he unsure if he
could
fortify his crumbling defenses, but at this point, he wasn’t sure if he should even try.

—

W
hen Sam left, Jen watched him go until his truck was out of sight, and then took her coffee into the living room. She grabbed her phone before sitting on the couch and turning on the television.

Kelly had been right. Sex with Sam when they had time and privacy had been even more amazing than sex on the hood of her car. It was everything she had hoped it would be, and now she didn’t know what to do about that.

She hadn’t known what to do about Sam from the second his cell phone had awakened her, so she’d buried her head in the covers and put off facing him for as long as she could. Maybe it would have been easier if he’d pulled on his clothes and snuck out without even leaving a note, because then she could have at least told herself she was mad at him.

Instead, he’d made her coffee and kissed her good-bye. And the sight of him sitting across the table, drinking from one of her favorite coffee mugs, had triggered some seriously warm and fuzzy feelings about him. It was nice to have somebody to wake up and face the day with. She could too easily imagine them drinking coffee and making breakfast together before heading off to work. Then talking about their day while they made dinner, before curling up in front of the television for a while. Then they would go to bed and make love before falling asleep together like they had last night.

Until he went back to Texas.

Jen sighed and picked up her phone. The last thing she needed to be doing was spinning fantasies about blissful domesticity with a guy who was probably going to lay rubber leaving town as soon as Coach McDonnell could take his whistle back. He wasn’t her type and he wasn’t sticking around. She forced herself to remember how it had felt when he left town in July without even saying good-bye, and then drank some more of her coffee. Last night had been fun, but she needed to focus more on the orgasms and less on the warm and fuzzy feelings.

After tossing the remote control on the coffee table and brewing herself a second cup of coffee, Jen settled onto the couch and pulled up the never-ending group text with Kelly and Gretchen. Then, smiling because she couldn’t help it, she sent a text message consisting only of the emoji of the little monkey covering his mouth.

OMG!
Gretchen texted back, followed by a string of happy faces, party horns, cocktail glasses and more happy faces.

Then Kelly chimed in.
High five! Was it worth all the drama?

Jen rolled her eyes at her screen. There hadn’t been that much drama.
Yes.

A snoring happy face emoji followed by a big red question mark came through, followed by another text from Kelly.
Use your words, Gretchen.

You’re no fun. Did you sleep together? Like sleep sleep?

Yes.

His place or yours?
That was from Kelly.

Mine. More private, not that anything is a secret in this town.

At least Gram didn’t tell everybody Sam bought condoms, like she did to Chase
, Kelly typed.

Jen laughed at the memory of Gretchen’s grandmother sharing that little bit of gossip with them.
True. Maybe he brought them with him from Texas.

Is he still there?
Gretchen asked.

No. He had to meet one of the football players this morning, so he left after coffee. Which he made for me.

KEEPER!

That was from Gretchen and made Jen wince.
No. No keeping. Just having fun before he goes back to Texas.

That sounds familiar.
She could almost hear the laughter behind Kelly’s text. She’d been having fun with Chase before he went back to New Jersey, too. Until they fell in love.

His baggage was a lot lighter than Sam’s. Seriously. Do NOT let me fall for this guy.

Gretchen responded first.
No
.
Then a big heart emoji.
Got
it.

Jen hoped so, because she was going to need her friends to keep her on track. And she saw the irony of asking the two women who were marrying Sam’s best friends to keep her from bringing it full circle by falling in love with him. But when push came to shove, they’d realize he wasn’t a good forever prospect for her and keep her focused on the fun.

At least she hoped they would, because she might not be able to do it herself. The first time Sam had returned to Stewart Mills, he’d had a chip on his shoulder and it hadn’t surprised her when he ran the minute the festivities were over. And when they’d dragged him back to town a second time, she’d anticipated more of the same.

But he’d changed. Jen had watched him settle into Stewart Mills and, not only was he working on laying the ghosts of his past to rest and reconnecting with his mother, but she’d seen him with the boys on the team. He was a really great guy and the more time she spent with him, especially after homecoming and the night they’d spent together, the more she realized he wasn’t such a bad catch, after all.

Another text from Kelly came through.
Dinner tonight? Chase has to leave midafternoon.

Sunday dinners with Kelly weren’t exactly a tradition, but one or both of her friends were usually available to keep her company when Chase had to go back to New Jersey. She did a lot better with the separation than Jen thought she would, but the first few hours after he left were usually lonely ones for her, so if Kelly wasn’t on duty, she’d reach out to her friends.

Gretchen responded first.
Sounds good. Gram and Alex can fend for themselves. I want to hear more about your monkey business.

Jen texted the monkey with his hands over his mouth again before returning to words.
Dinner sounds good. I think I’ll take a nap first, though. Didn’t sleep much last night.

About damn time
, Kelly texted, and then Gretchen wrapped it up with a smirking face and a thumbs-up.

Usually on Sundays, Jen would do some housekeeping or get her grocery shopping for the week out of the way, but she couldn’t muster the ambition to get up and get in the shower. Instead, she put her feet up on the coffee table and started flipping through channels.

She hadn’t been lying about the possibility of taking a nap. Sam had kept her up a lot later than her bedtime, not
that she was complaining. And she was surprised she’d slept so well with him in her bed. Very seldom did she ever have overnight company, since there hadn’t been many men she’d come to trust enough to bring them into her home. But her tiredness today came from the late hour, not restless sleep.

And she had a feeling she’d be doing a little tossing and turning tonight. She knew she’d be thinking about Sam and about sex and wishing he was there. Then she’d curse herself for wishing that because emotions couldn’t have a place in their relationship. And since Sam hadn’t mentioned being in touch when he’d left, she figured she’d see him again for the first time at school, and she’d spend some time worrying about how awkward that would be.

But right now she yawned and stretched, delighting in the sweet tenderness of her body after a night of delicious sex. As long as she could keep those warm and fuzzy fantasies at bay, her plan to have some fun with Sam while he was in town was off to a good
start.

B
y the time Sam left for the high school on Monday afternoon, his stomach was a tight knot of nerves.

He’d screwed up and not texted Jen after Cody left his apartment the day before. Then his mother had called, her voice small and tentative, to see how he was doing. He’d known it wasn’t easy for her to make the telephone call, so he’d talked to her about the football team and her job until the conversation became less stilted and more natural.

With each passing hour he didn’t contact Jen, he became more convinced he shouldn’t contact her right away. He’d kissed her good-bye and he was afraid calling or texting her too soon would make it appear as if he was pursuing a relationship. Like a
real
one.

Then he’d decided he was being an idiot. They were in a small town. They shared friends. They worked in the same
building with the same group of kids. Communication between them was going to be an ongoing thing until Coach was back on the sideline, so there would be putting no distance between them.

He’d finally pulled out his phone and come up with a compromise that didn’t make him panic at the idea of trying to guess how she might interpret his text. Letting her know, in broad terms, how things had gone with Cody was contact, but not overly personal.

Just wanted to let you know Cody’s doing okay. He’ll probably talk to you soon, but it’s nothing bad.
Then he waited.

Her response didn’t take long.
I’m glad to hear it. And I’m glad you could be there for him.

Of course.
But he couldn’t let it go at that.
Are you busy right now?

I’m at Kelly’s with Gretchen. We’re waiting for pizza. Do you need to talk?

Nope.
He didn’t even want to think about what she might be telling her best friends about their night together.
I’ll probably see you around the school tomorrow.

There was a long pause before she typed in,
Probably.

He’d cursed himself for opening with Cody. While it had seemed like a natural way to break the post-morning-after communication awkwardness, the text message had kicked her into guidance counselor mode. She hadn’t asked him if he wanted to get together. She’d asked if he needed to talk to her. Maybe it was a subtle difference, but it mattered to him.

After a restless night, he decided a good O’Rourke’s
breakfast was what he needed to get through the day. But Chase was back in New Jersey and Alex was on his way to a community college to talk to them about teaching a photography course. Deck was too busy to close the garage for an hour, and he didn’t want to ask Coach. That man could read his face too well and he didn’t want deep conversation. Just an omelet and some football talk.

Instead, he ate a bowl of cereal standing at the counter and killed time with a run to the Laundromat until it was time to head to the high school.

He had Coach’s keys to the doors, so he could have entered the school by the gymnasium. Once the final morning bell rang, all of the doors locked and visitors had to be buzzed in through the main entrance. But he needed to stop by the office and see if there was any mail for Coach McDonnell in his box. He got buzzed in and said hello to the administrative staff and, after dumping some flyers into the recycling bucket thoughtfully placed under the row of mailboxes, ended up with a few envelopes he’d drop by the coach’s house later.

He did glance down the hallway that led to the guidance office. He couldn’t help himself. But there was no sign of Jen.

“Hi, Coach.”

He turned, realizing as he did that he was starting to answer to the word now, instead of looking around for Coach McDonnell. It was Miss Jordan, whose first name he couldn’t remember. She was new, teaching social sciences, and he smiled. “Hey, how are you doing today?”

“Awesome. There’s still some coffee cake left in the break room, and it’s pretty good. Just so you know.”

She was an attractive woman and when he’d first started at the school, he’d seen some interest in her expression. But
hooking up with Jen was one thing. She knew who he was and where he came from. And she knew where he was going
back
to when Coach got the all clear to return to work. Miss Jordan knew none of that. And she was too young for him by more than a few years, he’d guess.

And then there was the fact he couldn’t muster up any attraction to her when his body was busy being a radar antenna, waiting to catch a glimpse of Jen.

“Thanks,” he said. “I just ate, but I’ll keep it in mind.”

“How’s everything going with football?”

“Good. Everything’s good, thanks.” Movement caught his eye and he turned his head to see Jen through the floor-to-ceiling windows. She was at the far end of the hall, walking toward the office while taking a bite out of an apple and reading.

His body seemed to tighten in response to the sight of her, and he was grateful he wasn’t a teenage boy anymore and could control what would have been an embarrassing reaction to have in the middle of the office. The envelopes in his hand weren’t exactly math-book-sized.

“I need to get back to grading papers,” Miss Jordan said, dragging his attention away from Jen. “See you around.”

“Yeah. Have a good afternoon.” After offering a small wave to the women behind the tall counter, he followed the social sciences teacher out into the hall, but slowed when she took a left turn.

Jen looked up from the paper as she neared the intersection of hallways in front of the office, as if she’d worked there for so long she had some kind of radar system that allowed her to read, walk and navigate all at the same time.

She paused when she saw him, but only for a second, and then she smiled. “Hi, Sam.”

“Hey. I came to grab the mail for Coach. Heading to my glorified closet now.”

That made her laugh, and the sound echoed against the cement walls of the empty hallway. “It
is
small. And you’re bigger than Coach McDonnell, so it must feel like pretty tight quarters.”

“I usually take the playbook and whatever else I need into the gym and sit on the bleachers. The gym teacher doesn’t seem to mind and the kids mostly ignore me.” Something about the way she nodded and her body language said she didn’t really have time to stand around in the hallway and talk, so he mentally braced himself. “Are you doing anything later tonight?”

“I have some evening meetings, and I need to catch up on some work for the financial aid fair.”

At least she hadn’t told him she was washing her hair. “I should probably watch some game tapes, anyway. Maybe I can talk PJ into watching them with me. He’s quite the strategist, that one.”

She laughed. “Thankfully he uses his powers for good.”

“So far, anyway. I guess I’ll let you get back to what you were doing.”

“Yeah.” She smiled and started to turn, but then stopped. “What about Wednesday?”

He tried not to show how much he liked those three little words, just in case she didn’t mean what he thought she did. “What about Wednesday?”

She shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t know. I thought
maybe if you weren’t doing anything, you could stop by after practice. I could feed you and we could . . . hang out.”

He wanted very much to . . . hang out. “I’d like that.”

Her smile was a lot warmer this time. “Great. I’ll see you then, if I don’t run into you before that.”

He was about to say
can’t wait
, but he didn’t want to seem too eager. “Sounds good.”

When she walked by him to open the office door, Sam forced himself to start walking. Going to her place for dinner and whatever hanging out meant to her sounded better than good. Even if hanging out just meant sitting on the couch with her, watching television. He’d take it.

And the realization that watching TV shows with Jen sounded like a wonderful evening to him, even if they didn’t end up in her bedroom, was enough to make Sam take a right turn at the break room, in search of coffee cake.

—

B
y Wednesday afternoon, Jen had worked herself up to the point she was afraid she’d explode if something startled her.

It wasn’t like her at all, to be the one who pushed for a second date. Or a second whatever it was. She didn’t know what the rules were for fun flings, but she knew Sam well enough to know he might not put himself out there.

After having a meeting with a freshman whose grades had plummeted since she started at the high school, Jen sighed and rubbed her temples. She strongly suspected the girl was smoking marijuana, which, according to the grapevine, was readily available in her home. And for her grades to be dropping so badly, she not only was overdoing it, but there were
probably underlying issues, as well. She was going to have to talk to the administration and Kelly and decide if they wanted to involve DCYF. She didn’t know the girl’s parents well enough to make an educated guess as to whether talking directly to them would make the situation better or worse for the student, but Kelly might.

She needed some sugar. She’d had more than enough caffeine, and she could really use food to settle her stomach and sop up some of the coffee sloshing around. After finishing up her notes on the meeting, Jen locked the file away in the cabinet and then headed for the break room, hoping there would be something sweet and home baked on the counter.

Kelsey Jordan was sitting on the love seat under the window with her shoes kicked off and her legs tucked under her. A stack of papers were on the arm of the love seat and when Jen walked in, she was marking the top sheet with a red pen.

“More papers to correct?” Jen asked when Kelsey looked up.

“Always. And between the fact I teach social sciences and we have to work on writing skills to up our standardized testing scores, it’s not just correcting papers. It’s wading through some of the worst handwriting I’ve ever seen in my life. If I didn’t know better, I’d think every member of the sophomore class is going to be a doctor.”

Jen laughed, even though she knew she wouldn’t find it funny if she was the one who had to read all the papers. A lot of schools in the southern part of the state had moved to small, cheap laptops hooked virtually to clouds accessible by the students and the staff. Their work was online and, more importantly maybe, it was typed.

But Stewart Mills High had yet to be awarded a grant that would cover a computer for every high school student, and Jen had resisted previous attempts at teachers requesting homework assignments be done on a computer and printed. Besides limited Internet options in the area, there were too many households in Stewart Mills that had either no computer or none that could handle the most up-to-date software, and she wasn’t in favor of anything that widened the gap between students who came from financial security and those who didn’t.

Hopefully, nobody had told Kelsey that Jen was the one who’d fought for the kids to handwrite their papers until the school provided every student with a computer before she started working there. The young teacher might throw the red pen at her.

“Attack of the munchies?”

Jen nodded. “I’ve had so much coffee today my stomach’s in knots. Is there anything good?”

“There are scones.”

Ouch. Jen wasn’t surprised Kelsey didn’t actually answer the question she’d asked, since the wife of their assistant principal thought she was a lot better at making scones than she actually was. But if she was lucky, one of the scones would absorb some of the coffee in her stomach and help settle it. After setting one on a napkin and recovering the plate, she sat at the table.

As she took the first bite, she noticed Kelsey staring at her in a speculative way. Since her mouth was full and would be for a while thanks to the scone’s density, she raised an eyebrow.

“So you and Coach Leavitt are finally a thing, huh?”

She almost inhaled the scone, which would have been bad because if she got a lump of that white cement lodged in her throat, it would probably take drain cleaner to dissolve it fast enough to save her. But she managed to finish chewing it and swallowed.

“What?”

The younger woman rolled her eyes. “Come on. I was at the homecoming bonfire. And the dance. And I saw him looking at you Monday, when you were coming to the office and hadn’t seen him yet. You guys are totally a thing.”

Her first instinct was to deny it, but Kelsey wasn’t stupid and neither were a lot of other people in Stewart Mills. A denial would only make everybody more determined to be right. The gossip was already going around. She knew that, since she also wasn’t stupid. But maybe she could control it and, at the very least, not deal with anybody feeling sorry for her when Sam left town again.

“Kind of a thing,” Jen admitted. “It’s casual. It’s not serious or anything.”

Kelsey nodded. “A fling with the hometown hero while he’s around?”

Jen tried to imagine Sam’s reaction to being called a hometown hero and it made her chuckle. “Something like that.”

“Good for you.” Kelsey sighed, but it was exaggerated and she smiled. “Even though you said you didn’t have dibs on the coach, I was pretty sure you guys would hook up. I’m glad I didn’t believe you and end up in something messy.”

“Yeah, me, too.” She didn’t like the visual she got of Sam and Kelsey together, so she stuffed another chunk of scone in her mouth.

Kelsey turned her attention back to a paper, sighing again, though this one was genuine. Jen finished her scone and then, after saying good-bye to the teacher, went back to her office and tried to put the conversation out of her mind.

It wasn’t easy. She wasn’t sure how Sam would feel about her telling somebody outright they were an item, but she honestly felt it was the best way to handle it. Yes, they were a thing. A fun, temporary thing not even worth talking about. And no hugs or sympathetic glances when he got in his truck and blew out of town.

But for now she had to focus on her to-do list, which was staggering. She wanted to get home with enough time to check on the roast in the slow cooker and jump in the shower before football practice was over. If she knew one thing for certain, it was that hanging out didn’t mean they were going to sit around and play gin rummy.