Scrimmage Gone South (Crimson Romance) (19 page)

“Where is Lucy?” Tolly asked.

“I hope decaf is okay,” Lanie said as she filled their cups with creamy steaming latte.

“Sure.”

“Lucy had to go to Mobile,” Lanie said with a frown. “Something about a silver tea service for Sophie Ann McGowan.”

“That was sudden. And it’s a long way to go for a teapot,” Tolly said.

“That’s what I thought. But apparently just any teapot won’t do.”

“She’s going to miss Homecoming?”

Lanie nodded. “I guess so. She said she’d be back Sunday.” Lanie gestured to the tea tray. “Help yourself. Besides the sweet stuff, there are cheese straws, smoked salmon tarts, and chicken salad sandwiches.”

Tolly reached for a tart and a sandwich. “Since when did you start selling savories?”

“I didn’t. Luke’s mother brought it for us.”

“Oh, right. I heard the senator was here. I guess all the old grads are piling into town.”

“Including Brantley. He’ll be here in the morning, Missy says.”

“Is he bringing Rita May with him?”

“I doubt it. He’s working in Vermont right now. Restoring a one room schoolhouse. He’s flying from there.”

“Wow. He must really want to come to Homecoming.”

Lanie laughed. “Missy really wants him to come, more like. She has become fixated on the fear that she is going to fall tomorrow night when she goes on that field to crown the queen. It seems Brantley escorted her the night she was crowned so she’s making him come back to walk her out there.”

“Why didn’t she just have Harris do it?”

“If she does that, it will look like she needs help. If she has a football player of yesteryear, it will just be nostalgic.”

“Is she making him wear a uniform?”

“She might try. I expect there is a limit to what Brantley will do, even to shut her up.”

“Nathan put a stop to players escorting the Homecoming attendants,” Tolly said. “Their fathers are doing it this year. He said his players didn’t have time for halftime foolishness. Let them escort Homecoming queens today, next thing somebody will want them in the band. And he’s not having it. He needs them in the locker room.” Recounting what he’d said lifted her sad heavy heart a little. They’d been snuggled under a blanket on her sofa when he’d told her that.

Lanie laughed. “Sounds just like him. He is focused.”

“And may the Lord help anyone who doesn’t share his vision.” Tolly bit her lip. “Lanie, can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“Why didn’t things develop between you and Nathan? I mean back when y’all went out for real, before you started pretending to be in a relationship?”

“Oh, Tolly, I don’t know. We only went on a couple of real dates. And there just wasn’t anything there. I wasn’t looking. He wasn’t looking. We liked each other, but not that way.”

“Did you find him difficult to deal with?”

“Nathan? Difficult?” Lanie laughed. “He is about the least difficult man I’ve ever known. Now if you want difficult, let me tell you about Luke!”

“Hmm.” Tolly took a sip of her coffee.

Lanie’s smile faded. “Tolly? Do
you
find Nathan difficult?”

“Something is difficult. I don’t know if it’s him or me. Or maybe the circumstances.”

“Do you think it will improve when football season is over?”

“Football season is never over. Not really, not for a coach. And besides, I don’t think football has anything to do with it. I just don’t — ” She stopped because if she said it out loud that would make it real.

“What, Tolly?” Lanie said gently and laid a hand on her arm.

Might as well make it real. “I just don’t think this can work out, Lanie.”

“Do you want to tell me what happened?”

She did want to tell her, so much. Maybe Lanie could help her figure it out. But that would mean starting with what happened thirteen years ago and she could never tell that — not even to her best friend.

“I’m not even sure there’s anything to tell. He’s having a hard time with some things right now.”

“Daryl Grayson?”

“Partly. And try as I might, I can’t help him. I just keep doing the wrong thing. Sometimes I think I am his biggest problem.”

“Time and learning each other can take care of that.”

“Maybe.” Tolly reached for a piece of toffee and almost put it in her mouth. Then she laid it on her plate. She’d eat it later. Maybe. “I just know this. I am unhappy more than I am happy these days and so is he.”

“I think that’s fairly typical. I know it was true for Luke and me in the beginning.” She laughed a little under her breath. “And maybe in the middle too. The question is, will it be worth it in the end?” Lanie laid her hand on her baby bump and her already glowing face lit up like a firefly on a summer night. There was no question whether it had been worth it for her.

“I want to ask you a hypothetical question.”

“All right.”

“Do you think it’s possible to let old hurts go without talking them out?”

“No,” Lanie said quickly and with confidence. “I think unresolved issues lead to mistrust. And trust is
the
most important element of a relationship. Without it, there can be no love, no chance of any kind of a future. That was the whole key with Luke and me. As much as he loved Carrie, I never question that I am now the love of his life. And he trusts that I will never doubt that love or ask him to deny what he had with Carrie before she died.”

Trust
. That was it. Nathan didn’t trust her and never would.

“That said,” Lanie continued, “I don’t see how any of that could apply to you and Nathan. You don’t have enough history for that kind of baggage.”

If only that was true.

The first sounds of marching band music rang out.

“You’re right,” Tolly said. “I’m just worn out. You know, my yard has been rolled every night this week.”

“Proof that Kirby is popular.”

“That’s what they tell me. Look!” She pointed and was glad for the distraction. “It’s the first float.”

Grand Marshall Lamon Coal was waving and smiling. The band was playing. The debate club was throwing candy. Somewhere down the line Kirby would be riding a fire truck with the rest of the team.

The only thing wrong with this picture was her. If only she had some relationship film to watch, maybe she could analyze it like Nathan analyzed game film. Maybe then she’d know what to do.

No amount of crepe paper and glitter would ever make a gym smell like anything except a basketball game. Nathan swore he could even smell the popcorn.

“Nice win, Coach,” Patsy Lambert, the geometry teacher, said.

“Thanks, Patsy,” he said but the fact was this was probably the only football game Pasty had been to all year and she wouldn’t know a nice win from a nasty one and this one had been nasty and hard fought. Still, he was prouder of that 6-3 score than he’d been of some of the ones with much wider margins.

The Samson High Bulldogs were a big physical team and they’d left their mark. There was hardly a Merritt Bobcat who wasn’t bruised, sprained, or strained. Chandler Callahan had a twisted ankle, but he’d be all right. Thankfully, Kirby hadn’t gotten too banged up to play. Keith Grayson could have possibly gotten the job done, but that wasn’t an option — though Nathan had allowed him to dress out. Sore and cranky they might be, but his boys were winners and they had given as good as they got. Most important, it had been a clean game with good sports on both sides.

It was his kind of game — football at its best.

And this dance was a dance at its worst, though he couldn’t pinpoint exactly what was bad about it. Between his own school years and time spent chaperoning, he had put in plenty of time at high school dances and this one was no different. DJ music. Streamers. Girls with mum corsages the size of bowling balls. Glittery ghost cutouts hanging from the ceiling. Couples getting their pictures taken in front of a haunted house backdrop. The theme must be some kind of monster or Halloween situation.

He wasn’t chaperoning tonight. He was here of his own accord to make sure his boys were here like he’d told them to be. He surveyed the crowd and ticked them off in his head. He’d excused Chandler because of his ankle and the Samson twins for religious reasons, but he’d spotted almost everyone else. Once he had accounted for them all, he could go.

It was a little surreal to watch the kids dance. There were the upper-class types who moved with perfect precision because they’d been taught in cotillion class. Some of them were good dancers in spite of that. There were some who couldn’t dance a lick but liked to try. He loved them for it. Then there were the ones who danced easily and thought no more about it than they would of stepping off a curb. That’s the kind of dancer he’d been. He never remembered learning, like he never remembered learning to swim, or catch a ball. It just always was.

He leaned on a support beam and watched. Townshend was straight across the gym from him behind the punch bowl. He had a good view of her from the side. She had changed from her game shirt into a sleeveless dress just about the color of her cheeks when she blushed — apricot like. He wondered if she was cold. The dress was some sort of shiny fabric, but not too shiny. The skirt flared a little and ended right at the top of her pretty little knees. The neck of a dress ended in a v underneath the pearls she almost always wore, but she wasn’t showing any cleavage. That was more than you could say for half the girls on the dance floor. She looked classy and elegant and she had on a pair of shoes that wouldn’t take her where she needed to go. He studied her legs. It was a pleasurable lesson.

She twisted the little thin gold and pearl ring she wore on the middle finger of her right hand. It was too dark and she was too far away for him to actually see it, of course, but he knew that ring. It was the only one he’d ever seen her wear. It looked old and the pearls were so small you could barely see them. It was certainly nothing special, nothing like the ring he’d picked out for her the week between the night she spent with him in Tuscaloosa and the day he’d learned the truth and got hurt.

In what had to be sappiest days of his life, he’d spent hours pursuing Tiffany.com, smug in the knowledge that in a few short months there would be nothing on that website or in that store that he couldn’t get for Townshend. Hell, he could fly them to New York and buy out the store for her, and he just might. Looking back, he realized the ring he’d chosen was something she would not have wanted. It was too big and vulgar for her classy little hand. While searching for other gifts for Townshend, he’d accidently run across baby stuff — silver spoons, cups, little hairbrushes, and the like. He’d thought, considering what good care she’d taken of him when he was sick, that Townshend would be a great mother.

Ah, she was pouring punch now, handing it to a gaggle of kids who’d gathered around her. She smiled, gave out hugs, and stroked dresses. Apparently, she’d become quite popular during her Homecoming week duties. Every once in a while, someone handed her a phone and she took pictures that would, no doubt, turn up on Facebook in the next thirty seconds.

She looked happy, but she wasn’t. She was sad; he’d made her sad.

“Hello, Coach Scott,” a little voice purred.

Damn. What now? He pulled out his game face and turned around. More damn. Jamie Fisher. And she was wearing a crown on her head.

She giggled and pointed. “I’m Homecoming queen.”

Oh. That had happened at halftime and he hadn’t heard, hadn’t wondered. They had been trailing 0-3 and royalty of any sort had been the last thing on his mind. Princess Diana could have been right there in the locker room and he wouldn’t have cared. And that was saying a lot, since she was dead. But it
was
the day before Halloween. Princess Diana could be around. Probably not in the locker room of the Merritt High Bobcats, but there were worse places to spook around. Come to think of it, that dress Townshend was wearing might be something Princess Diana would have worn. He stole another look at her.

She was cupping the cheek of an awkward tenth grade girl. What was her name? She was on the annual staff. Cassandra Taylor. Yeah. She was Charlie Taylor’s girl. He knew Charlie from Rotary. Townshend was clearly telling Cassandra she looked beautiful. She didn’t but she probably would next year. A lot happened between fifteen and sixteen.

Townshend probably couldn’t have pulled that trick on him at fifteen.

“This is just the best thing that has ever happened to me!”

What? Oh, Jamie was gushing. He’d forgotten about her for a second.

“Congratulations.” He couldn’t think of anything else to say but she stood there looking at him expectedly. “Isn’t that thing kind of heavy?” He pointed to the crown.

“Oh, it’s worth it! I am never taking it off!”

“Well. It will build up your neck muscles for sure.”

She smiled at him. “Coach, would you dance with me? To celebrate?”

Oh, good God. “I don’t dance, Jamie. Bum knee, you know.” She looked crestfallen and her lower lip protruded.

“Now, I am sure you’ve got a date around here somewhere. He shouldn’t leave you on your own. It’s not one of my boys, is it?”

“My date was Chandler Callahan. He hurt his ankle in the game. I don’t have anybody to dance with.” She looked pitiful.

That, he could fix that. And it would also make her go away. He looked around. There was a huddle of his players in the corner, the ones who didn’t have dates — mostly tenth and eleventh graders.

He spotted Tyler Boyles. How perfect was that? He played second string left tackle behind Chandler and he’d done himself proud tonight after Chandler got hurt. He deserved to dance with the Homecoming queen. Plus, he was Chandler’s backup on the field. Why not off?

“Well, we can’t have a queen who doesn’t get to dance, can we?” he said to Jamie, feeling pleased with himself.

She looked pleased too — eager.

“Ty!” he called out. “Come here.”

The boy trotted over like he was coming off the field. “Yes, sir?”

“I want you to go dance with Jamie, here.”

The boy looked stricken.

“Don’t worry about it. She’ll show you what to do. And I bet she could use a ride home too, couldn’t you, Jamie? Tyler will take care of that too.”