The Journey Collection (4 page)

Chapter Four

Confrontations

Travis shuffled downstairs the next morning, feeling grumpy and tired. He’d spent most of the night staring at the ceiling or flipping through his high school yearbooks while trying to come to terms with the events from the day before. How was it possible that he could have had a son that he’d never known about? Why hadn’t Penelope told him? Of all people, she knew just how much losing his mother had crushed him. As the sun started to rise over the eastern horizon, Travis gave up on the idea of getting any sleep. After a quick shower, he redressed in the clothes from the day before and headed down to the kitchen, hoping that Russ was either still in bed or had already left for the day.

Once again, luck wasn’t on his side. When Travis walked into the room, he found Russ sitting at the small, butcher-block table. Travis shook his head, grabbed a clean mug out of the cabinet, and poured himself some coffee, adding a spoonful of sugar. That table had been another of Russ’s ‘projects’ that he’d just had to build while Loralie was left alone to die. In the seventeen years since his mother’s death, Travis had never once sat there. He couldn’t betray her like his father had.

“I didn’t think you drank coffee anymore,” Russ commented, tossing the paper he’d been reading on the table. “Bad for your health, isn’t that what you told me?”

“Yep,” Travis replied. He turned and looked at his father. “You should have told me that she lived here. And you really should have told me that she had a kid.”

“Why?” Russ lifted an eyebrow. “You made yourself pretty clear, boy. You weren’t ever coming back here, and nothing I said was going to change your mind. Or is that just one more part of your life here that you forgot about?”

“No, I didn’t,” Travis grumbled. “But if I’d known . . .”

“Damn it, boy.” Russ huffed and stood up. “Would you have come back if she’d told you? If I’d even mentioned my suspicions that Max was yours?”

“Yes,” Travis groused, knowing the moment the simple word tumbled out that he wasn’t telling the truth. He couldn’t say for sure what he would have done. Never in the years since he’d left Clarendon had he considered returning, not even for holidays. His excuse was always the same: his career came first.

“You can’t lie for shit, Travis,” Russ scoffed. “Now, maybe you believe that load of hogwash, but I know you better than that.”

“No, you don’t.” Travis poured out the last of his coffee and left his cup in the sink. “You’ve never known me, Dad, and that’s always been the problem. No matter what I did or didn’t do, it was wrong. I worked my ass off to get my scholarship. And once I was there, I had to prove that I deserved to be there to guys three times my size that came from schools ten times as big as Clarendon. Never in the four years I spent there did you come watch me play or even acknowledge any of it.”

Travis pushed away from the counter and headed toward the back door. Pausing, he looked back at Russ. “I’d already lost Mom, and with one decision, I lost you, too. I’m sorry that I can’t be the son you want me to be, Dad, but you certainly aren’t the father I needed, either.”

Though it was hard, Travis pushed open the back door and stumbled outside, leaving his father standing in the middle of the room with a look of pure, unadulterated pain on his face. He wanted to turn around and beg Russ to let him take back his words, but he couldn’t. Instead, he ran over to Bertha and climbed in behind the wheel. Speeding down the gravel driveway, he left a cloud of dirt in his wake and headed into town.

~*~*~*~

For the second day in a row, Travis found himself parked outside the football field. He climbed out of his car and headed down to the asphalt track and began to stretch. His body was wound tight, his muscles aching from being so tense. What Travis needed was either a nice, stiff drink or a good, hard run. He opted for the latter.

There was a freedom with running, one that Travis had always enjoyed. It had been his escape when life got too hectic; the one way he could control the feelings that welled up inside him. As a kid, he’d run along the creek bed; then as he got older, he’d started coming to the track. He was on his tenth lap when he saw Max sitting in the bleachers, his football in his hands and a wide, innocent smile on his face. Slowing to a stop, Travis went to join him, taking his time so that he could catch his breath and figure out what to say to the boy. Did Max know that Travis might be his father?

By the time Travis reached him, Max had stood up and was almost bouncing on the metal bleachers. “How far did you run?”

“About two and half miles,” Travis replied, brushing his hair out of his face with a swipe of his hand. “What are you doing here? It’s barely eight. Shouldn’t you be sleeping until noon or something?”

Max shrugged his shoulders. “I was bored.”

“Does your mom know you’re here?”

“Yeah, but she doesn’t care,” Max replied. “I come here all the time. Sometimes the football team will let me watch the game tapes with them, but they had a cross country meet in Borger this morning.”

“And your mom is okay with you hanging out with them?” Travis asked.

Max smiled. “She says there are worse places I could be and that if I love football enough, my dreams can come true. Just like yours.”

“Is that what she says?” Travis murmured, sitting down. Max dropped onto the bench next to him.

“Yep, she said that if you can do it, then so can I.” Max twirled the ball between his hands. “She talks about you a lot.”

“What does she say?” Travis inwardly cursed himself for voicing his question. The answer wouldn’t be reassuring, whether it was good or bad.

Max shrugged his shoulders again. “It depends. When we watch you play, she yells at you to extend your arm more when you throw the ball or to get your feet moving so they don’t tackle you so much. She gets red in the face, and sometimes she has to leave the room.”

Travis laughed.

“You think I’m kidding, but she really does,” Max snickered.

“Oh, I believe you, little man.” Travis smiled. “She always chewed my a . . . butt out for that.”

“You were going to say a bad word,” Max teased. “Mom would make you put a dollar in the swear jar if she heard that.”

“Would she, now?” Travis scoffed.

He nodded. “Yep, she says that using language like that makes a person sound idiotic. Her word, not mine.”

“Hmm, I guess so.” He leaned down toward Max. “But you know what?”

“What?” Max’s mocha-colored eyes sparkled with excitement.

“I know for a fact that your mom used to cuss like a solider.”

“No way,” Max chortled. Travis nodded. “Hmm, how do you know that?”

“Oh, um, well, she and I used to know each other,” Travis explained, wishing he’d kept his mouth shut.

“Huh, I wonder why she never told me that,” Max mused.

“You and me both, little man.” Travis stood up. “I’ve gotta go. Be careful out here by yourself, alright?”

Max huffed. “Yeah, okay.”

Travis left Max sitting there, though he couldn’t explain why the ache in his chest increased with each step he took. He didn’t know this kid — not really — but he found himself struggling to walk away. Shaking his head, Travis climbed into his car. It wasn’t possible that he’d gotten attached to him. That was silly, right? For all he knew, Max wasn’t even his son.

“Yeah, keep telling yourself that, asshole,” Travis muttered to himself before starting the car.

Ten minutes later, Travis found himself parked in the cemetery. He climbed out of his car and walked the ten feet to his mother’s gravesite, falling to his knees and wrapping his arms around himself. Travis wanted to scream and cry, to rant and rave. He wanted to curl up in a ball and go back to a time when he hadn’t doubted every decision he’d ever made. But he couldn’t, and he knew that. Instead, he knelt on the ground and poured his heart to his mother.

“Sorry I haven’t been here in so long,” he began, sniffing back the tears that threatened to fall. “I’m sure you’re pissed with me, too. Probably sitting in Heaven right now and tapping your foot in annoyance.”

Shifting back, Travis sat on the ground with his legs bent up in front of him.

“I’ve messed things up pretty bad, Mom. Dad’s pissed with me as usual, and my career is most likely over. Now, I find out that Penelope and I might have a kid together?” He sighed. “What do I do? Hmm? Everything is out of control, and I just don’t know what to do.”

“Are you expecting a reply?” The sound of a soft, tinkling voice behind him had his entire body tensing. He stood up and looked back, unsurprised to find Penelope standing there. He’d been so lost in his wallowing that he hadn’t heard her car pull up. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt, but I figured this was where you’d be.”

“How?” Travis asked, wondering how much of his blubbering she’d heard.

Penelope smiled. “Because this is where you always came when you were confused.”

“Guess so.” He nodded, huffing. “Penelope . . .”

“I know you’re mad at me,” she blurted out, interrupting him and putting her hand up. “And I don’t blame you, Travis, but I never meant to hurt you.”

“Hurt me?” He snorted. “What about Max?”

Penelope flinched.

“You should have told me. I deserved to know,” Travis added.

“You’re right,” she admitted. “But you weren’t here, and I couldn’t let you throw away your chance at your dream.” Penelope dragged her hand over her face and through her silky, blond hair. “Not for me, and certainly not because of my son.”

“Our son,” Travis groused. She lifted her eyes to his. “He is mine, right?”

Penelope stumbled back like someone had just sucker punched her. “I can’t believe you’d even ask me that.”

“Um, hello!’ Travis snarled, throwing both arms up. “I just found out yesterday that I even have a son. Pretty damn sure that I’m allowed to question if he’s mine or not.”

“You’re right,” she replied, quickly. “I’m sorry. Guess I just wasn’t expecting you to ask.”

“Yeah, well, we’re both getting more than we expected lately,” Travis muttered.

“Suppose I deserve that, too.” Penelope walked over and knelt in front of the black granite headstone. Lifting her hand up, she ran her fingers over Loralie’s name etched into the stone. “Every year on Max’s birthday, I come out here and tell her everything he’s done.”

“You should have been telling me,” he said.

Penelope sighed and stood up. She turned and faced him, brushing the tears off her ivory skin. The sorrow in her dark, soulful, brown eyes made Travis ache to hold her in his arms. He had missed her touch.

“Every day for the last decade, I’ve picked up the phone to call. But I couldn’t. I just . . .” She shook her head, dislodging a few more droplets from her eyes. “I didn’t know I was pregnant when you left. I swear I didn’t. Two months had passed before I found out. When I realized, I didn’t know what to do. Daddy was fuming mad, and Momma threatened to castrate you.”

Travis scoffed. Her parents never had liked him. Of course, the fact that he’d abandoned her and their child probably hadn’t helped. Sighing, he grabbed the back of his neck, trying to work out some of the tension. “You still could have called. Hell, Penelope, you could have come down and told me.”

“I did,” she wept. “It took me all night, but I drove down to Austin. Damn it, Travis, I was terrified. All I could think about was you and the way things had ended. You’d made it clear. Staying here — with me — wasn’t a part of your plans. Don’t you remember? We should see other people so that the temptation to cheat wasn’t there. That’s what you said the night before you left me. You broke my heart, but I still was gonna tell you.”

Travis winced. “Why didn’t you?”

Penelope frowned. “Because you’d already moved on from me.”

“What?” Travis asked.

“I got to the campus just after eight in the morning. I found your dorm easy enough, but before I could go inside, I saw you come out with a group of guys. Figured they were your teammates. You were laughing and so happy.” Penelope brought her hand up to her chest. “That was when it really sank in. You were never going to come back; not for me, not for your daddy. Not even for our child. Seeing the smile on your face, I just couldn’t bring myself to ruin that for you. That was the life you wanted, Travis. The one you’d been working for every day. I wasn’t going to be the one to rob you of it, so I left.”

“Rob me of my life?” Travis tried to keep the tremor out of his voice, but he knew he’d failed. “You didn’t even give me the choice.”

“No, you made that choice on your own,” Penelope mumbled. “You left town and never looked back. Not for me, anyway. As much as I love you, I couldn’t take your dream from you — not after how hard you worked to get to where you are.”

“Love or loved?” Travis swallowed against the lump in his throat while looking her straight in the eyes. “You said you love me, present tense. Do you still love me?”

Shaking her head, Penelope wrapped her arms around her torso and tried to walk past him. However, Travis grabbed her, forcing her to stop. “Answer me!”

“I — I can’t,” she cried, struggling to break his iron grip on her arms. “Travis, please!”

“Do you still love me, Penelope?” This time when he asked, the harsh, unforgiving tone was gone. Travis slid his arms around her waist, nestling her against his chest. “Have you moved on? Is there someone else in your life? A husband or a boyfriend? Baby, tell me.”