Page 44 of The Cadence

I clutched my stomach, suddenly feeling like I’d eaten a greasy cheeseburger after too much Tennessee whiskey.

No, I wouldn’t be able to watch that happen, and the woman wouldn’t want me hanging around his house, of course.

She would probably be able to see straight through me and read my feelings for him just like Annie Whitaker-Gassman had.

That thought reminded me that I needed to talk to Annie’s business partner Remy regarding a new doorbell for the main house and several other issues, too.

I also had a job to do, and all that distracted me from the scary idea that Will might find another girlfriend and the equally scary idea of opening my heart to him.

“Uh, Calla…I think you’re a sweet girl. I like you a lot, a real lot,” he might say again.

But he just didn’t love me. How would I handle that?

I was working an earlier shift than usual, because I had a game to attend.

I rushed home from the grocery store and quickly changed into my Bodine jersey, and then I spent more time on my hair.

Annie had suggested a salon and, although I’d almost gone into shock when I’d seen their prices, I had to admit that I’d never gotten a better cut.

I also took a while to do my makeup, for which I had watched a new tutorial and also gotten some tips from Kirsten the last time I’d seen her at her grandma’s house.

“You have beautiful eyes,” she had told me as she discussed liner, and then she’d carefully scrutinized my face. “You know, you have the funniest features.”

“Kirsten!” Miss Sloane had said severely.

“I mean that you look like an elf,” she’d explained, which made her grandma even madder. “I mean that in a good way! Like she’s not human.”

Miss Sloane had been extremely angry and had sermonized for a while on thinking before you spoke, but I had understood what Kirsten meant.

They’d both assured me that I was very pretty, but I accepted that I did look a little like I’d wandered out from behind a tree in the forest. I’d always thought so.

My hazel eyes were big and I definitely had a pointed chin—less so now, since I wasn’t underweight anymore.

I remembered my grandma looking at my angular face and my towering height, so completely opposite to her round cheeks and tiny stature.

Then her gaze had gone to my red hair, and she’d hugged me.

“That color is so special!” she’d said. “It reminds me a little of a ladybug and I love them. They’re good luck. It’s my good luck that you’re here, Calla.”

Will was working hard with his therapist but he still needed to do things to ease his anxiety, which he never called anxiety.

One of those was sending me a schedule for game days so that I got safely into my seat at the stadium.

Now, I ran out of the house so that I could follow the chronology he’d typed up (he was ok with texting rather than printing it, and I called that progress).

I made it there right on schedule and also right on schedule, he came through the tunnel and onto the field with a roar from the Woodsmen fans who were assembling in the orange rows.

“Hello, Calla,” he said as I ran down to lean over the railing. He reached up and took my hands, and he grinned at me.

“Hi, Will. How are you feeling?” He’d had a little cold, which Miss Mozella attributed to the temperature change. She’d directed me to give him garlic and elderberry syrup, and also to wrap him in the biggest blanket I could find.

“I’m good,” he answered and he certainly did look good. He was thinking along the same lines about me. “You’re beautiful,” he told me. “You always dress up for these games.”

“Just in case,” I said.

“In case anyone takes pictures and writes something rude about you? You’re not reading that crap anymore, are you?”

I shook my head. No, I wasn’t, because I didn’t have to stoop to that dumb level and care what know-nothing strangers said. But I wanted to reflect well on Will, because everyone around here thought we were together. Everyone did, except for the two of us.

Pretty soon, he had to go off with the teammates who claimed so much of his time, and I stood and watched him jog away before returning to my seat.

I was back in the middle of the other Woodsmen families and yeah, they all had the same thoughts about our relationship.

I didn’t want to talk about it, and I headed off a lot of questions by asking them about their own lives.

They had news to report about jobs and careers, kids, new babies, weddings, engagements, and other fun stuff, but eventually, they did work around to me and Will.

“I heard from Annie that she’s redoing your house,” Meredith told me. “I used to be her nanny and we talk a lot. She said it’s going to be gorgeous.”

I should have been used to everyone being connected, because this wasn’t a huge place.

I nodded and said that she was doing an amazing job.

Meredith asked me about my painted furniture, too, and said that she was interested in ordering custom pieces from me.

That led to other people asking to see my work and then saying they were also interested in making purchases.

Several of them wondered if they could post my stuff, like for advertising.

“Yeah, thank you!” I said.

“Will should post, too,” another woman pointed out. “He has a large female audience and they may be more of your clientele.”

“How do you know that he has a female audience?” I asked.

“Most of these guys attract attention from girls,” she said. “I can’t blame anyone for wanting to see the pictures of their workouts or when they’re at the beach…don’t get jealous!” she laughed. I had been frowning. “You have the actual person, but they only have what’s on the screen.”

That was what they all thought: I had the actual guy.

I sighed and nodded a little. Thankfully, the game started soon, but that was also rough.

The score was so close that I had to fan my face despite the chilly air and by the end, I was hoarse from screaming.

Their stupid opponents had gotten a lot closer than comfortable for me, and I hated when Will had to lose.

It was bad for the other Woodsmen too, and it put a pall over most people in this area, but I was specifically concerned about him.

He took it in stride a lot better than I did.

“It’s part of life,” he had told me before. “Doesn’t that sound mature? I don’t want to lose and I’ll do everything I can to prevent it, but I’ve played sports for a long time. You can’t always come out ahead.”

I still wanted him to. I stood up from my orange chair and screamed for him (and for the other players, as a sidenote) to make sure he knew that I was there and I would always be there.

I would always be on his side, always wanting the best for him.

So I yelled myself hoarse, and by the time he came out of the locker room, I was rubbing my throat.

“Did you catch my cold?” he asked immediately.

“No,” I rasped. “I was loud during the game.”

“I thought that was you,” he said, and smiled. “Are you giving me a visual check?”

Well, I had been. I’d been looking him up and down and watching him walk, in case he might have had an injury. He was good at disguising them but I had gotten better at ferreting them out. “You still look good,” I answered huskily.

“Let’s go home and get you some of that elderberry syrup.” We walked out together, his arm around me, but first he stopped to chat with the fans before we went to the car. Part of my game-day routine was getting a rideshare so that we could go home together, with me behind the wheel.

“I’ll do it.” Will walked to the driver’s side. “It’s ok.”

“All right,” I answered, and stopped myself from asking if he was sure. He was or he wouldn’t have said it, so I quietly got into the passenger side.

“Thanks for trusting me.”

“Of course I do!” I said, pretty shocked.

“I haven’t always come through for you. A lot of people haven’t in your life, and I don’t want to be on that list anymore.” He carefully drove between the remaining cars as security guards dressed in bright orange ushered us along.

“Yeah, certain people weren’t great, but you are,” I answered. “Here I am in Michigan, living the dream.”

“If your dream includes a sore throat.”

“It does,” I assured him. “It includes screaming at football games until I almost throw up.”

He laughed. “Good, and my dream includes being a person who stands up for you. I’m not a man like my father, or like yours.”

“Well.” I stopped, and rubbed my throat for a moment. “Well, we can’t blame him too much.”

“Why not? He never paid a dime of child support and he allowed you to live in what I’m betting was squalor. He let you grow up without schooling or doctor visits, too, but at least he finally put you together with his mother.”

“Well,” I repeated, and stopped again. “This is a hard one. I really can’t blame him for any of that.”

“Why? Was your mom that adept at hiding you? How hard did he try to fix things?”

“It wasn’t really his responsibility. I wasn’t his responsibility, because he wasn’t really my father.”

The car swerved a little and Will forgot to accelerate until I reminded him, and when we got to the red traffic light at the end of the long Woodsmen Stadium drive, he turned to stare at me. “What do you mean that he’s not your father?”

“I knew the truth when I saw my grandma. We didn’t look anything alike and I don’t look like my mother, either. She was the same type as Kirsten, little, blonde, and curvy. And I’m a red-haired beanpole—”

“No,” he said firmly. “You’re beautiful.”