He lifts an eyebrow at me. “Elyse?”
“Can we not?”
“You been divorced from Daniel for three years. About time you moved on, sweetheart. Aiden needs a father.”
I suck in a sharp breath. “He’s got you.”
“I ain’t gonna be around forever.” Dad’s firm, unforgiving hazel eyes fix on mine. “And I’m his grandpa. I love that boy somethin’ fierce, but I can’t ever be his dad. Daniel made it clear he don’t give a hoot, which means there’s got to be someone else.” He gestures at Jamie. “That fella down there seems interested in the job.”
“He sure does,” Mom agrees.
“Neither of you know him,” I argue.
“So? Don’t need to meet him to be able to tell he cares about Aiden,” Dad says. “That’s about all anybody can ask for, from where I’m standing.”
I shoot to my feet. “I—I need some coffee.”
I leave the bleachers and head for the concession stand. Mom and Dad both know I never drink coffee past noon, so this is an obvious gambit to escape the conversation. Fine. I’m avoiding the topic. I just…I can’t do it.
I want to, but I can’t.
I just can’t.
I have a visceral memory of signing the divorce papers.
Of watching Daniel’s car drive away for the last time.
Of Aiden sitting in our living room, his overnight backpack packed and resting on his back, ready to spend the night with Dad…who never showed up.
Of Aiden sitting with my cell phone in his little hands, on his birthday, waiting for his dad to call and at least wish him a happy birthday—he didn’t even care that Daniel didn’t send so much as a card, he just wanted a call. And he got nothing.
I know, rationally, that Jamie is a drastically different sort of person. But I just cannot and will not risk putting Aiden through all that. Bottom line is that Daniel didn’t fight for me, and he didn’t fight for Aiden.
So how I can begin to trust that Jamie would? Or that Jamie would choose to fight for a woman he barely knows, a single mother, a closed-off woman who has rejected him so many times, and who continues to push him away.
Why would he fight for that? What is there for him to even fight for?
I’m tapped out, emotionally drained, and I spend several minutes alone, watching the game from the concession stand.
“Moping, are you?” I hear Cora say.
I don’t turn to look at her; I just bump her with my hip. “Jamie gave me a look from the sidelines when Aiden scored, and Mom caught it, and now Mom and Dad are putting pressure on me to…” I break off with a hissing sigh. “Tomove on, like it’s this easy thing to do.”
Cora takes my coffee from me and sips at it, knowing I won’t actually drink it. “They love you and they want to see you happy, and they know how things were with Daniel and, they can see, even from a distance, what the rest of us see when Jamie looks at you.”
I groan. “CAN WENOT?!”
Jess, a classmate of Cora’s and mine, and the mother of Carter, the quarterback, is inside the concession booth, scooping popcorn into bags—she has, up till now, been pretending she can’t hear our conversation. “Oh man, he really does look at you in…ahem…a certain way,” she says to me.
I sigh. “Oh, no. Not you, too.”
Jess is a volunteer at the school, working the lunchroom and the pickup line—she’s one ofthosemoms, the “involved ineverythingat the school” type. She just rolls her eyes. “If you haven’t seen the looks he gives you, you’re blind, Elyse Thomas.” She leans over the counter. “There are rumors about the two of you, you know.” Jess is a fledgling member of the Busybody Society—she’s not as gossipy as Cora or Yvonne, but she’ll talk your ear off if you let her.
I push away from the concession stand. “And onthatnote, I’m going back to the bleachers.”
“I’m coming too!” Cora says.
“You missed his touchdown kickoff return,” I scold as we clomp across the noisy bleachers to where Mom and Dad are sitting.
