Julia Spencer-Fleming - One Was a Soldier

“What are you doing here?”

He frowned. “Coach Bain needed an assistant. I’m helping him out.”

“You’re not a parent. Why on earth would you be hanging around a bunch of dopy middle school kids?”

“You don’t need to be a parent to volunteer.” His face stiffened. “Wait a minute. Wait just a goddamn minute. Are you trying to imply something?”

“Yes. I want to know if you volunteered because my kid is on the team.”

“What?” He stared at her a moment, then snorted a half-laugh. He scrubbed his hand over his face. “Shit. Okay. I thought you were accusing me of being a pedophile.”

“Euww! No!”

“Well, euww, no, I didn’t sign up for this gig because Hudson is on the team. I didn’t know the roster until I got to the first practice. I volunteered because I used to run for Coach Bain, and because none of the parents stepped up to the plate.”

“I’m busy!”

“Then you ought to be grateful that somebody who has a little more time stepped in to take up the slack.”

“Is that what this is about? Me being grateful?”

“Oh, for God’s sake-” He blew out a breath. “Look, I gotta meet up with the team and see them off. Will you be here?”

“Of course. Are they going to-” He was already loping toward the throng of kids at the middle of the field, giving her a nice view of the arch of his thigh and the spring of his calf. Stop that . Most of the trouble in her life began with the fall of a guy’s hair over his eye or the edge of his narrow hip bones peeking out from the low-slung waist of his jeans. She’d start out thinking he’s hot and end up cosigning a loan for the loser.

The starting gun cracked, and an uneven line of boys surged toward the forest. She could see blue and white shorts and singlets, but she couldn’t make out Hudson as the runners quickly closed into a pack and disappeared into the trees. Then there was Flynn, walking back toward her, oblivious to the appreciative glances from a couple of well-groomed moms who must have been twice his age, for God’s sake. He held the tape up with his forearm and ducked under it. His hands were filled with two sweating water bottles. He gave her one.

“Thanks.” There. She could be gracious.

“Did you bring a chair?”

“I brought a windbreaker.” She gestured toward the crumpled nylon, weighted down with her purse. He collapsed onto the grass next to it in a tangle of long, pale limbs. As she sat-with a lot more care and a lot less athleticism-she caught a glimpse of the chino-and-gold-bangle crowd checking them out. That’s right, bitches, she wanted to say. You may have the goods, but I have the young stud.

Oh, God, what was wrong with her? They probably thought Hadley was his aunt or something. Big sister. She popped open the bottle’s flip-top and swallowed half the contents in one go.

“So, not to put too fine a point on it, do you want to tell me why you have a hair up your ass about me helping Coach Bain?”

She spluttered water and swiped the back of her hand over her mouth. “Look. I’m sorry. I was surprised to see you, and I leaped to a not very nice conclusion.”

“That I did it because I knew Hudson was on the team?” He shook his head. “Hadley, I see you every day at the shop. It’s not like I have to manufacture reasons to bump into you.”

“I know that. It’s just…” She could feel her cheeks heating up.

“Just what? Just you can’t imagine me volunteering with no ulterior motive?”

“No! Of course not.” She drew her legs up again and stared intently at the spot on her knee where the denim had worn threadbare and white. “Look. Before you left on TDY, you were all up in my face with ‘I love you’ and ‘Let’s be together.’ Now you’re back. I guess I’m waiting for it to start again.”

“You told me to stop. Several times.”

She looked at him, then. “Yeah. But you didn’t.”

His eyes shifted away from hers. He examined the tips of his running shoes. “I’m sorry. That was wrong of me.” He took a breath. “When I was in Syracuse, I worked a stalking case. This couple, they had dated for a while, then she broke it off, but he wouldn’t let go. He started hanging around the mall where she worked, and when security chased him off, he did drive-bys of her town house. Took pictures of her and e-mailed them to her. Left her flowers and stuffed animals everywhere-her gym, her hairdresser’s, her parents’ house. We pulled him in. She had a restraining order, and he violated. He kept saying-God, he was so delusional. He kept saying how much they were in love. To him, all this shit was romantic. In his mind, he was courting her. He didn’t see, he couldn’t see, that she was terrified. And the whole time we were talking to him”-he tipped his face up to the wide blue sky-“I kept thinking that was me.”

“No.” She touched his arm. “Flynn. Really. No. You never scared me. You just mistook one night for a relationship.”

He shook his head. “It’s not that. I didn’t fool myself into thinking you felt what I felt. It’s that I didn’t listen to you. No means no and stop means stop and I didn’t hear you, I didn’t respect you when you said that and I’m sorry.” The last of his sentence came out in a husky rush.

She thought for a moment. “Are you saying this so I’ll drop my defenses and maybe sleep with you again?”

His whole body jerked. “God! No!” He looked at her, appalled. “Is that what you think of me? That I’d manipulate you like that?”

She took a deep breath. Reminded herself that there were a few good men out there. “No. I don’t.” She picked up her water bottle. “I think you’re a nice guy who actually learns from his experiences and uses them to become a better person. Which makes you a rarity, in my book.” She took a drink of water. “Apology accepted. Don’t worry about it anymore.”

He nodded. Picked up his water bottle and studied the label. “Thanks. It’s been kind of eating at me since I came home, but bringing it up at the station seemed…” He looked at her. “Thanks.”

She toasted him with her bottle. “Friends?”

He looked up from the label. His eyes were almost gray, she realized. Like mist and clouds over an autumn sky. “Yeah. Friends. That would be… that would be good.” He sounded so relieved, she felt a flash of annoyance. So much for her fatal allure.

He looked past her shoulder toward the woods. “Here they come.” He unfolded from the ground. “I have to be at the finish gate and get the times.” He sprinted toward the far end of the course. Hadley got to her feet and made her way to the edge of the track. She could see them now, one kid, then another, then another, popping out of the forest trail and pelting down the grassy slope toward the cinder track. The sight of the end must have juiced them, because she swore she could see them pick up speed. A kid in Millers Kill colors pulled even with and then ahead of the front-runner, a lanky boy from Argyle Central. The crowd was screaming, she was screaming, and she saw it was Jake McCrea and she screamed even louder.

Then Jake glanced behind him, looking for the kid in maroon and white, and that was all it took. His leading foot slipped in the grass, skidded, and he flipped, tumbled, head, shoulders, tailbone, through the air, landing with a thud Hadley could swear she heard from where she stood.

The crowd’s scream became a collective indrawn breath. The other runners kept on course, racing past Jake toward the finish, but Hadley lost sight of them as she waited, two seconds, four, six, for Jake to get up and run or walk to the edge of the field. He did neither.

“Shit.” She ducked beneath the tape.