With a hard, sharp shake of his head, he cranked the key and the truck rumbled to life. He said, as he backed out of the driveway so he wouldn’t have to look at her, “I don’t know what this is.”
Jen settled deeper into the seat. “I thought I heard someone pull in here last night.”
“Yeah, I was out of town until late.” And then I saw you, half-naked. God help me, I can’t get it out of my mind. Change the subject. “So how much do you remember about the games?”
“Oh, gosh,” she said to the window as she watched the rounded hills and thick trees of Gleann pass by. “Bits and pieces. Nothing about the organization or anything, nothing that I need to know now, of course. But I remember the pipes and drums, that sound echoing everywhere. I remember the pretend sword fights and sneaking beers with you after sophomore year. I remember people in lawn chairs watching little girls in tartan dancing on a stage. But most of all I remember sitting at your dad’s feet watching the heavy athletics. He explained all the events to me. I wish I remembered all the details.”
Leith nodded and found it difficult for the tightness in his chest.
“I’m scared to ask, but . . . your dad?”
He cleared his throat. “Died. Three years ago. The old guy held on five years more than they gave him.”
“I’m so sorry.”
He was so glad he was driving so he wouldn’t have to see her face. Wouldn’t have to witness what would surely be the kind of pity that made him want to gouge out his own eyes.
“I’ve gone through all the stages,” he told the road with a practiced and perfected shrug. “Anger, denial, all that jazz.”
The truth was, if Gleann reminded Leith of Jen, Gleann was Da. The fact that Da wasn’t here anymore gave Leith perhaps the biggest reason to get the hell out, but it also packed him with some pretty terrifying guilt for up and leaving a place that had embraced him so completely. A place that Da had chosen to love as much as his homeland.
“Okay,” Jen said. “That’s good. He was such an amazing man. I remember that everyone loved him.”
He blew out a breath and turned into the fairgrounds, which were nothing more than a large, undulating field butting up against Loughlin’s cattle pasture. A row of barns, also owned by Loughlin—because what in Gleann didn’t the old farmer own?—lined the back side of the grounds, and it was there that Leith aimed his truck, gritting his teeth at every hole in the field his big white baby found.
“How have the games changed since I’ve been here?” Jen asked in such a sunny manner he knew she was trying to turn the tide of the conversation away from his father. For some reason it made him feel worse, so he flashed her a smile and draped one forearm over the top of the wheel.
“Couldn’t really tell you,” he said over the rattle of the truck. “Haven’t been in a couple of years. I mean, I heard stuff, but I don’t compete anymore.”
“Aha,” she said in a way that told him she already knew that. “Why not?”
“No time, once my business took off. Summer is the busy season.” He parked by the largest barn, which the city rented from Loughlin to store everything for the games.
“You look like you work out, like you could still throw.”
He turned to her sharply and her gaze skittered away from his arms.
“Maybe,” he said with an amused quirk to his mouth, not indicating which statement he was addressing.
She blushed, and at first he didn’t recognize it, since it was so unusual for her. “Aimee said you won the overall three years in a row while I was at college.”
His eyes flicked up to the rearview mirror, to the expanse of field spreading within that small rectangle. He could still hear everything Jen had described in her memories, but underneath that, even stronger in his senses, came the sound of the laughter and ball-busting between competitors, his longtime throwing buddies. He could still feel the power and exhilaration as his muscles worked and threw the various heavy implements. And if he turned his head just so, he could still see Da, sitting on the edge of the athletic field border, Jen at his ankles.
“I did,” he said, then he parked and got out of the truck.
Jen slid out after a second or two, having to use the running board to step down. “Let me ask you, did you ever throw at the bigger games across the state?”
“For a couple of years. Much tougher competition, took me away from work too much. The AD’s a good friend of mine.”
“AD?”
“Athletic Director. Handles all the heavy events at each games.”
“Ah.” She hoisted that giant purse higher up on her shoulder and turned in a circle, her lips together, assessing.
Not for the first time, he saw what she was seeing: an oddly shaped patch of semiflat land, riddled with holes and dirt patches and weeds, dotted with outbuildings that maybe at one time might have been handsome stables for 4-H livestock shows or other events that might have drawn crowds from all over New England. Now they tilted to one side or another, their wood walls weathered, creeping vines covering any sort of character.
He pointed to the biggest barn. “This is where they keep all the stuff for the games. The tents and tables, the big castle and stuff.”
She turned to him, eyebrow lifted. “I’m sorry. Castle?”
He wiped at the corner of his mouth and glanced away. “Eight or nine years ago DeeDee made this huge fake castle. It looked like a kid’s art project. I think it was supposed to give authenticity or something.”
Jen looked horrified, covering her mouth with a hand, then recovered quickly. “Did the attendees like it?”
“Maybe the first year.”
“And then?”
“Then it turned into a cartoon, and the non-local attendees all but ran across state.”
“See? You did know how it’s changed.”
“Maybe a bit.”
She dug into her bag, her whole arm disappearing, and pulled out a small key ring. “Let’s go take a look.”
After it was unlocked, he lugged open the barn door on dry and screeching rails. She set down her expensive-looking purse right there in the dirt and edged deeper into the barn. Leith followed, popping open a stubborn crate or moving the bigger ones when she couldn’t do it herself and asked for his help.
She was talking to herself, as he’d spied her doing last night through the kitchen window. She was utterly absorbed, her hands moving like she was conversing with a colleague. There was something endearing about it, but something also equally frustrating, because she wasn’t back in some office in New York. She was in a barn. In Gleann. With him. And though he wasn’t expecting a laughfest or the immediate comfort they’d had ten years ago, he didn’t think he’d be on her pay-no-mind list.
She was perusing the back corner when she made a sound of surprise.
“What is it?” he called.
“Come take a look.”
He wove around disorganized piles of, well, crap to join her in the corner. There, tucked between some crates, was a dirty blanket, filthy pillow, a red baseball cap with a partially unraveled potato chip logo, and an empty pack of cigarettes.
“Homeless person?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Maybe.” The valley did have a few.
She wandered back to her purse and pulled out a slim, light laptop, plopping it down on a nearby crate. He liked the way she curled her hair behind her ear and tilted her head so it wouldn’t hang in her face. He liked how the movement exposed her neck. He even liked her animated expressions as her fingers flew across the keyboard.
Singularly focused, that was Jen. And right now, her focus wasn’t anywhere near him. Not that he’d expected it to be.