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His once thick arms, corded with strong muscles that used to strain against the sleeves of his shirts, now looked more like thin tree branches poking out of the cuffs of his retro tee. He had on a baggy pair of crisp and new-looking dark-wash jeans, the left pant leg of which had been rolled up over a Trenton blue midthigh-to-ankle cast.
He worked at a slow pace, as if he were a robot teaching itself how to move.
A blue-and-gold jersey hit the floor while he tossed a plain white T-shirt onto the duffel bag that sat on the bench behind him.
Isobel’s gaze traveled down the length of his shrunken form, stopping to take in the thick cast coating his leg. There were no squiggly lines of black Sharpie where friends or teammates might have signed their names. Only clean, hardened bandages molded to the shape of his thigh, knee, and calf.
He stood with his weight on his right leg, his crutches propped against a pair of lockers at his side.
Whenever he began to teeter one way or the other, he would stop and place a hand against the wall of metal doors to catch himself.
Isobel fidgeted. She opened her mouth, then let it shut again. It felt wrong to stand and gawk without saying something, but what could she say?
She hesitated, then cleared her throat.
The sound made him pause, though he didn’t startle. Not until he turned his head.
When their eyes met, his body jarred as though shocked by a jolt of electricity. He stumbled backward, the lockers banging and clattering as he tumbled into them.
Isobel took a step toward him. “Sorry! I—”
“No!” He threw up a hand, palm out, fingers splayed.
His fear made her pull back.
“I—I didn’t mean to,” she stuttered, aiming a thumb over her shoulder. “I mean, I saw you—but I wasn’t—I just thought I’d—”
She realized she was babbling, so she stopped and took in a deep breath.
With no more meaningless words pouring out of her, Isobel found herself with nothing left to do but gape.
His face, drawn, worn, and full of fright, seemed so altered from the face she remembered. His features, now gaunt and haunted-looking, no longer held their sharp and chiseled all-American boyishness. His eyes, too, had lost that piercing blue-diamond luster that could cut as much as convince. Along with the former beach-tan hue of his skin, their color had since faded, dulled to a slate-metal tone that reminded Isobel of steel bars.
Isobel watched as he struggled to right himself. He fumbled for his crutches, using them to maneuver his way out of the corner she seemed to have driven him into.
“Wait,” Isobel said.
To her surprise, he stopped when he reached the open walkway between the locker-room entrance and the door that led to the showers. He stood stock-still with his back to her, his head down.
For the first time, Isobel noticed the streak of white at his temple, showing up like a patch of frost against his otherwise coppery curls.
He trembled where he stood and kept his face turned away from the mirror, his eyes rolling in her direction, pupils expanding. Tiny beads of sweat began to form on his upper lip.
“Aren’t you supposed to be in practice right now?” he asked her in a shaky whisper.
Isobel swallowed. “I got out . . . early.”
“What do you want?”
“To talk,” she said. “Just to talk.” She reached a hand toward him but pulled back when he cringed and angled away from her.
“You’re going to ask me what happened,” he said. “Just like everybody else. Aren’t you?”
Isobel didn’t answer.
“Except,” he continued, “unlike everybody else, Izo, you know what happened. In fact, you’re the only one who knows what happened. You were there. I saw you.”
She watched as he hobbled back to the bench. Bracing his crutches against the lockers again, he lowered himself next to his duffel, extracting from it a black trash bag. Bad leg extended, he leaned forward at the waist and began to stuff the things lying on the floor into the bag.
