The Newcomer (Thunder Point #2)(6)

“Let me guess, there’s someone at State you’ve started dating a little?” she asked acidly.

“Come on, hey. I’m all the way up here, only see Ash a couple of weekends a month at the most. It got kind of old, sitting around my room alone twenty-six days of the month. She should be getting out more, too. It’s not that big a deal. We just need to lighten up a little, y’know?”

“Why didn’t you tell her this before she drove all the way to Corvallis to find out what’s going on?”

“I didn’t want to say it over the phone! I wanted to be decent about it!”

And he hung up on her.

It was just as well. She was going to have to kill him, anyway. Downy was eighteen. His behavior was hardly odd for a boy his age. Still...

Gina looked at her mother. “I would not have let her drive all the way to Corvallis alone. Driving home alone. At night.”

“I know. But she’ll be okay,” Carrie said. “She’s a bright girl. There’s no rain tonight. She knows the way as well as you do.”

“God, I hope she’s okay,” Gina said.

There was a knock at the door. “Mac!”

Carrie got up from the table and let him in. “Hey, Mac,” she said.

“Hey, Carrie. What do we know?”

Carrie just inclined her head toward Gina.

“She drove to Corvallis to talk to Downy, who, I gather, dumped her and sent her back home.”

Mac lowered his gaze and shook his head.

“She’ll be home in a couple of hours,” Gina said. “But what if she’s so upset she’s not safe and something happens?”

Mac walked into the kitchen, slipped a strong arm around Gina’s waist and pulled her against him just briefly. He put a finger under her chin and looked into her eyes. “Never a good idea to drive when upset, but try to be realistic—if teenagers who just had a breakup had accidents, the accident rate would be too shocking to imagine. The road is good, the weather is good, she’ll get here. And she’ll need some comforting, I imagine.” He lifted one of her hands, which was trembling. “I think the wine is a good idea. Just calm down and be ready to be wise and understanding.”

“What if I have to go get her or something?”

“I’ll do it. Or Carrie will. Gina, honey, stuff like this happens. It’s not deadly.”

“It sure feels that way,” she said in a small voice.

* * *

Gina and her mom sat at the kitchen table together talking quietly, waiting for Ashley to arrive, while Gina sipped on a glass of wine. They were two women who knew how deeply a girl of sixteen would feel the trauma of a breakup. Leaving the two of them to talk, Mac stepped away, into the living room, where he used his phone.

When Ashley started dating Downy, Gina was brutally honest with her about the possible consequences of too much love too fast. She tried to discourage the dating, but there was little she could do—they saw each other at school every day and it was a match made in heaven. Gina had worried about what would happen when Downy moved on to college, leaving Ashley—who was two years younger—behind. But they had managed to make it work. Downy was back in Thunder Point most weekends, especially during football season and for holidays, and they talked and texted every day, many times a day.

And then, in the peak of spring, with love all around, suddenly and without warning, Ashley said, “Something is wrong. Downy sends me right to voice mail and he doesn’t call me back. Mom, something is wrong.”

Gina had said, “He’s probably overwhelmed. He’s got baseball and, academically, he sometimes struggles. Try to be patient.” Downy was a jock, but not a strong student, which presented problems for some college athletes.

“It never happened like this before,” Ashley wailed. “He’s said about ten words to me in a week. He’s busy, he says. He’s studying, he says. He doesn’t call me back because he doesn’t have time. He doesn’t answer my texts. He always texted more than me—right during class. I think he might be with someone new.”

“Did you ask him?”

“Of course! He said no! But he’s lying. I can tell he’s lying. And he’s never lied to me before!”

“Ash, he’s only eighteen. You’re only sixteen. Let’s try not to go crazy here. Maybe this is a little adjustment of some—”

“He said he loved me! What am I going to do?”

The poor darling, Gina thought. Shattered and helpless. She took another sip of wine. Glancing at her glass she said to her mom, “Good suggestion.”

“It’s always more dramatic when it’s your daughter. It cuts deeper,” Carrie said.

“I don’t want her to ever hurt.” Gina whispered.

“I know,” Carrie said. “Believe me, I know.”

Gina hadn’t taken Ashley’s pout over Downy too seriously. After all, he was the scholarship kid with the atomic arm, gone to State to play ball and it was spring—baseball was the game of the day and Downy, a freshman, was starting pitcher. He was busy with practices and games, maybe too busy now to text and call Ashley all day. But Gina’s attention was definitely snagged by Ashley’s flight to Corvallis and Downy’s explanation that, stated simply, he was done with her. There was not a woman on the planet who didn’t know how much getting dumped could hurt. And as for mothers? It hurt more when your little girl suffered than when you suffered yourself.