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“I don’t know, being labeled as white trash is pretty dire at any age.”
“You aren’t white trash!” her mother said, aghast.
Ivy chuckled. “Are you sure? She’s called me Thrift Shop since seventh grade.”
Sarah frowned. “Girls are so cruel to each other. Maybe I should call her mother.”
“Ugh, Mom. No. Just let me deal with her myself.”
“Okay,” Sarah agreed reluctantly. “Just try not to make a scene.”
Ivy didn’t answer, putting a bite of chicken in her mouth instead. She’d certainly try, but she wasn’t promising anything.
Blake was supposed to have dinner with his family, but he made an excuse not to go. He wasn’t interested in sitting at the dining room table while the whole Chamberlain clan playfully ribbed him about Ivy’s return. Instead, he drove to the high school and left his cell phone in his truck.
Slinging his bag of footballs over his shoulder, he headed out to the field. It certainly didn’t look like the field he’d played on more than seven years ago. The tornado had not only leveled the gym but damaged the football stadium as well. Half the bleachers had been ripped from their anchors and left in a mangled ball of aluminum. One of the goalposts was found across the street in the used car lot.
The goalpost had been reset, and they had temporary collapsible bleachers set up for the season. The school could only seat about 60 percent of the fans it could normally accommodate, a problem that only compounded the school’s cash flow problems. In the South, high school football was a way of life. Hopefully the fund-raiser would earn the money needed to rebuild.
Today, neither the bleachers nor the goalposts were necessary. He was just out here to throw some footballs and blow off steam. He’d walked out of Woody’s last night angry and turned on, but he couldn’t do anything about it. Being ugly to Ivy wasn’t helping. Neither was thinking about her in that bikini. It was better that he walk away and stay away.
But that left him restless and irritable. His standby had always been running to relieve tension. He would run until his muscles burned and his lungs ached and whatever pissed him off was a distant memory. But he couldn’t run anymore.
Just one more thing he’d lost because of Ivy.
Logically, he knew that wasn’t entirely accurate, but it felt true. That song had put things in motion and before too long, his life had fallen apart. His senior season was ruined. His unstable record ruined his draft chances. He was drafted as a second-string quarterback by the Houston Texans—a team with no playoff chances and a weak offensive line. When the starting quarterback got hurt, Blake finally got a chance to play. Things started looking up; his team started winning. It was his chance to shine and make up for what he’d lost. Then the offensive line failed to protect him and his career was over in a flash.
Perhaps crunch was a better word. He had a shattered knee and fractures in his tibia, fibula, and femur. That earned him a shiny new artificial knee, twenty-three screws, and two titanium rods in his leg. No amount of physical therapy would allow him to play again. Or run again. At least not at the level of a professional athlete. The dream he’d had since peewee football was over.
Football was a dangerous sport, and he knew that going in. He hadn’t expected to play forever. But he certainly didn’t think he’d be permanently benched at twenty-four.
Blake dropped the bag onto the grass and pulled out the first ball. He stretched his arms, rotating his shoulder to loosen up, and then picked a target in the distance. He stepped back and fired the ball like a missile, hitting his target with unerring accuracy.
“Nice throw.”
Blake spun around, stepping awkwardly on his bad leg and groaning as a spike of pain shot up his thigh. He clutched it, massaging it until the worst of the pain subsided. “Dammit, Grant. Don’t sneak up on me like that.”
“Sorry. Are you okay?”
Blake gritted his teeth together and nodded. If there was one thing he hated more than the pain, it was people coddling him about it. He’d gone through months of people looking at him with pity in their eyes. Poor Blake, losing his dream. Poor Blake, limping like that. Like he wasn’t already struggling to find a new purpose in his life without other people reminding him how far it had gone off course.
“Why are you here?”
“Missed you at the house. Mom said that you had a ‘prior commitment.’ When I called and you didn’t answer, I figured that meant you were either fishing or out here throwing footballs again.”
“I’ve been busy and haven’t gotten to throw much lately. And,” he added reluctantly, “I didn’t feel like listening to everyone’s opinion about Ivy and what happened last night.”
“Actually, we didn’t even mention her name. I know it might seem like a big deal to have her back in town, but she’s only here for two weeks. Make it through that, and then everything will go back to normal.”
Normal? Blake had been back in Rosewood for nearly a year and a half, and he still didn’t know what that meant anymore. “Yep. I’ll just stay away from her and everything will be fine.”
He said the words, but even as they left his lips, he knew it wasn’t true. Instead, he bent down, picked up another football, and changed the subject. “Go long.”
Grant smiled and took off running. Blake waited until just the right moment and passed the ball down the field. His brother turned and reached for it, but botched the catch. Grant fell backward into the grass as the ball fell to the ground.
Blake tried not to be jealous as Grant popped up and ran back the way he used to be able to. “Try me again. I’ll get it this time.”
“You’re too tense and worried about catching it,” Blake noted. “Shake it out. When you turn, keep your eye on the ball and let it come to you. Just reach for it and pull it into your chest.”
