The Homecoming

He looked at her with patience. Or maybe it was tolerance. “I believe we’ve already done that, too.”

“Oh! I take back what I said about you being a gentleman!”

They weren’t going to talk about the elephant standing right between them, he thought. They dated, she cheated, they made up, dated some more, she cheated some more. And she had married one of the guys she’d cheated with—Robbie Delaney. Robbie, who had once been Seth’s close friend and teammate, though they’d been competitive. He hadn’t known, until coming home, that Robbie had won.

And Seth had dodged a bullet.

“I apologize if I was rude in any way, Sue. Thank you for the invitation. I’m afraid I have to decline the offer. I do wish you the best in everything. Really.”

Against all good sense, she reached out and gave his biceps a gentle stroke. “I guess I’ll have to be patient. It will take time for you to realize I’m just not the same girl.”

He stopped himself from saying, I think we’ve done that before, too. Instead he said, “I guess none of us are the same. A lot of stuff happened between then and now.”

She flashed him a brilliant smile and then turned away. Those jeans of hers couldn’t possibly have gotten any tighter. And he wondered if she found boots with platform soles and four-inch spike heels inconvenient on the dirt track or in the bleachers, but so far she was maneuvering very well.

He turned to look up at where he’d last seen Iris and met her eyes instantly. She’d been watching. She didn’t look very happy. And he smiled.

* * *

This was the problem with never getting over what you were determined to get over. Iris saw Sassy approach Seth and her brain went into rewind, remembering every detail of her senior year. Sassy in her short skirt with her pom-poms, her blond hair flouncing, her blue eyes shining at every male within a twenty-mile radius, her big straddle jumps that showed off her itty-bitty panties. Sassy had been a cheerleader since about the sixth grade while Iris couldn’t even dance, much less leap into the air. She’d probably kill herself trying.

“God, are you into him?” Troy asked.

“What?” she replied, turning to look at Troy.

“The new deputy. He seems to have your complete attention. Crush time?”

“No! I grew up next door to him, you know that. I’ve known him all my life! We’re barely even friends now—just acquaintances. We’ve hardly seen each other in years. But that woman is Rachel’s mother.”

Troy squinted toward the track where Seth stood and watched as Sue departed. “Looks like she could be Rachel’s sister.”

“She’s our age. Up close you can tell she’s not a teenager. Even if she dresses like one. Apparently she’s into him—Seth.”

“You were watching her?” Troy asked.

“Shh,” she warned. “Let’s not talk about this in a public place.”

Of course she’d been watching Seth, but Iris had managed to remain circumspect until she’d seen Sassy saunter over to him. And even though they were quite far away, it looked as if she’d stared up at him with adoring eyes as he’d looked down at her with a sweet smile. And then she’d affectionately rubbed his muscled arm. I’ve been here before, she thought dismally. And she wasn’t entirely surprised to note that it bothered her just as much.

It was another win for Thunder Point and when the game was over, Iris, Troy and Grace headed out of the stands. “Let’s get something to eat,” Troy said.

“You had two hot dogs!” Iris reminded him.

“I’m a growing boy and you girls are starving, I can tell.”

“I’m getting out of here,” Grace informed them. “Saturday is a work day for me. I have a wedding tomorrow—I’ll be up to my eyeballs in flowers by nine and the wedding is in Coos Bay. See you later.”

Grace bolted for the parking lot but Iris and Troy were sidetracked by students and teachers who stopped to say hello and talk about the game a little. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw Seth walking away from the field and noted that he didn’t have much of a limp. She frowned. Maybe he wore that lift in regular shoes but not in his running shoes? Then he keyed his radio and jogged away toward the parking lot.

“Come on, Iris, let’s get something to eat. How about pizza?” Troy said.

“Do you know what that place is going to be like after the game? It’ll be all night before we get one.”

“I’ll take you to Cliff’s. We’ll get something light—oysters or crab cakes or something. Come on.”

She stopped dead in her tracks. Seth and one of the other deputies had a trio of boys with their hands braced against the police SUV. Seth was on his phone while the deputy was patting them down. “Are those our boys?” she asked.

Troy squinted toward them. “I don’t recognize anyone. Maybe there was some trouble from the other school.”

Iris strode purposefully toward the scene and when she got closer she nearly bumped into the assistant principal, also checking this out. “What’s going on, Phil?”

“Just a little scuffle,” he said. “Except two of those boys are from Canton and one of them is ours. Looks like two on one.”

“What’s going to happen to them?”

“Seth is taking the two Canton boys to his office, Charlie will bring in our boy. They’ll sort it out from there.”

“But if our boy wasn’t doing anything wrong...”

“If he wasn’t, and I think he wasn’t, then he’ll make out fine.” He nodded. “I’m sure Seth and Charlie know what they’re doing.”

“I’m sure,” she said. But she watched while the boys were loaded into two different Sheriff’s Department SUVs. She had great math skills—that would leave only the high school security guard at the stadium while it was being emptied of football players, cheerleaders, band members and fans, and one on-duty deputy to keep an eye on the town tonight. But then, Seth wouldn’t leave Thunder Point until he was comfortable that everything was under control.

She turned and bumped right into Troy. “Oops, sorry. I think maybe you’re right—we should get a pizza.”

“We could be standing around for a long time,” he said. “Unless you want to drive over to Bandon...”

“No, I thought maybe it would be a good idea to hang around Thunder Point tonight in case there are other kids from Canton who aren’t happy about the results of the game.”

He smiled, shook his head and chuckled. “What are you going to do, Iris? Bust up fights?”

“Hey, you’ve never seen my right hook.”

“A testament to my good manners. I’ll meet you over there.”

* * *

There had been no trouble in town after the game, but hanging around the pizza place made for a late night. Troy was a very popular history teacher—and surfer, skier, scuba diver, white-water kayaker—a young legend with some of the students with similar interests. He tended to draw teenagers like a magnet. Iris was popular in her own right. Though her title was guidance counselor, she liked to think of herself as a social worker assigned to a high school. The result of Troy and Iris hanging out in town after a big game was typical—they were surrounded by a crowd. Everyone wanted to know who was being taken away in the police cars, or wanted to talk about the game, or wanted to gossip about teachers, students, townsfolk. And of course the girls always questioned Iris. “Are you dating Mr. Headly? He’s so hot.”

The evening even ended in a fairly typical way, with Troy following her home and jumping out of his car to catch her before she got inside her house. He grabbed her hand and pulled her close. “The whole high school wants us to be dating again.”

“They don’t know we were dating before,” she reminded him. They had mutually decided it wasn’t a good policy unless they were serious. If they turned serious the staff at least deserved full disclosure.

Troy had been serious. Iris had decided, after giving it a great deal of thought, that they weren’t really right for each other. Not that there was a single thing wrong with Troy. For her, there just weren’t any bells.

“Kiss me good-night and see if you suddenly change your mind,” he begged.

She laughed and touched his lips with a finger. “You’re just about my favorite teacher in the world. There’s not another at the high school I have more respect for. And you’re fun! I want to hang out, do fun stuff, be your friend, but that’s all I’ve got. Troy, if you don’t hear me on this, then we can’t even be friends.”