The Husband Hour(29)
She turned, jogging in place.
It had been barely twelve hours since she had watched Rory Kincaid win the game against Radnor, and now he was in front of her.
He was dressed in an Aces sweatshirt and white Champion running shorts, and he had an iPod strapped to one arm, the earbuds in his ears. His cheeks were ruddy, his dark eyes flashing. She, unfortunately, was wearing baggy sweats and a Britney Spears Baby One More Time concert tour T-shirt that she’d slept in.
“Oh. Hey.” She was amazed at how casual it came out.
“What are you doing around here? I know this isn’t exactly your neighborhood.”
The way he said it made her feel embarrassed. Not exactly her neighborhood; no, that was true. In her neighborhood, the houses were about three times the size, spaced some distance apart, with wide backyards and manicured hedgerows. She ran on private, winding back roads that invited very little vehicular traffic because most of them ended in cul-de-sacs.
“I slept at my friend’s house last night. You live around here?”
He nodded over his shoulder. “Yeah. On Conway.”
Silence.
“Good game last night,” she said. They had beaten Radnor, 3 to 0. Rory had scored every goal.
“You finished your article?”
She nodded. Almost finished. It took a lot of effort to craft the article so it was more about the team and not a profile of Rory Kincaid. And the truth was, it probably wasn’t going to make the cut anyway.
“Look, I have to tell you—it might not even get published.”
“Why wouldn’t it get published?” He seemed genuinely outraged.
Great. Now it looked like she’d wasted his time.
“I mean, that’s just how it is at the Merionite. A lot of articles get submitted and the editors decide which ones make it into the paper. And I’m just a sophomore. Most sophomores don’t even get to submit.”
“So you’re special.”
She turned red. “No, I’m just saying, there’s a good chance that it won’t—”
“How much do you have left of your run?”
“My run? Oh, a few more laps.”
“Good deal. Let’s go—if you can keep up with me.” Typical alpha-male competitive bullshit. Of course she could keep up with him. But running laps was not the world’s most attractive pastime. Was it too late to say that, actually, she was finished running?
They started out at a moderate pace, passing the basketball court. He picked up speed and she matched his stride. Two, three, four…seven laps around, and he showed no signs of stopping. Lauren wasn’t going to be the one to quit.
She’d lost count of their mileage when he looked over at her and said, “You’ve got some stamina.”
“I run track,” she said.
He laughed, then stopped running, leaned over, and braced himself with his hands on his thighs. “I actually knew that. I knew it, and I forgot.” He straightened, and she looked up at him. It was like staring at the sun.
Lauren reached the Green Gable, hoping no one was home. When she got upstairs, she called out, “Mom? Steph?”
With the coast clear, she headed up to the attic with a pair of scissors.
Lauren found her boxes sequestered in their own corner.
After Rory’s death, her mother had offered to shut them up in storage. But ultimately, it didn’t sit right with her; locking away the remnants of her life with Rory felt disloyal. Now the best thing for her to do was to move the boxes into her bedroom until the house was sold. She still couldn’t quite believe that was happening.
The first box, marked House/Stuff, was secured with so many layers of packing tape, it would be a project just to get it open. The smallest box, the one that would be easiest to move, was marked with her name and the years 2002 to 2006. All of her high-school things were packed inside, but it was difficult to remember exactly what she’d saved. She wondered if she still had that issue of the Merionite. Should she…
Before she could second-guess herself, she found an X-Acto knife and sliced through the taped center of the box.
The pile of old newspapers was on top. She hadn’t packed them in plastic or anything to keep them preserved, so the edges were yellowed. She had, however, been careful enough to store them in reverse chronological order, so the top edition of the Merionite was the final issue she edited her senior year, and the bottom of the stack was the issue with her first article: “LM Hockey Skates to the Finish Line—State Title Is Within Reach.”
She pulled it out gingerly. Sometimes, it seemed like she had imagined a lot of the things that had led up to her falling in love with Rory. It had taken on a fairy-tale quality in her mind. But touching the faded newsprint in her lap, she thought, It was real, it was real, it was real…
She remembered how proud she’d felt seeing her byline for the first time. It was the lead article in the sports section. And just when she thought she couldn’t be any happier, a text came from Rory: Congrats.
She hadn’t responded right away. She wasn’t trying to be coy; she really just couldn’t think of an adequate reply. Thanks seemed too curt. I hope you liked it, too needy. Great quote from you, kissing ass. Maybe it was her silence or maybe he would have suggested it anyway, but an hour later a second text vibrated in her book bag. We should hang sometime.