Return to Destiny, page 16
“I think we are us again, like it or not.”
“That’s what I was trying to avoid, you know?”
He gave her a long look before finally saying, “To be fair, you’re the one who came here at Halloween. I was backing off before that, remember?”
She nodded. “Don’t worry—I totally accept some responsibility for where we are now. I’m just not sure I feel good about it, like…safe, I mean. It’s just old losses coming back to haunt me.”
They stayed quiet again for a long moment, until he told her, “I know I’m not allowed to say stuff like this, but you know…if I ever left again, if any job ever led me away from here, I would ask you to come with me. Everything would be different.”
She blew out a long breath of her own. “I do know that.” She’d thought through different scenarios, though, and she always came back to the same answer. “But the thing is, Tyler, I wouldn’t go. Once upon a time, that seemed like a perfect plan to me, but now—I have a life here. A job. Circumstances have forced me to be far too independent to just…stop, to just give up a life I’ve come to value. The community of Destiny is the one thing I’ve always been able to depend on, the one thing that’s never let me down.”
“And I have let you down,” he said, quietly finishing the unspoken thought.
“I know you can’t go back and change that,” she told him, “but my gut still remembers. My gut tells me what feels safe to me. This town feels safe.”
He tilted his head, reaching out to touch her ankle through the blanket. “What about when you’re here with me, like this? I hope that feels safe to you, too. Because it is. I promise.”
She sucked in her breath. And kept being honest. “It does feel safe. I’m just not ready to trust it yet.”
“Yet,” he repeated, appearing a little revived by the word. “I’ll take that as…hope.”
She tried not to smile at him, but he made it so hard, and a hint of a grin snuck out. “Take it as whatever you want,” she said kindly, “but I need to get going.”
“You’re not staying tonight?”
This was their new pattern the last few weeks—no firm plans, and sometimes they spent the night together, and other times she was tired and had work in the morning and insisted on sleeping apart. “I have a ton of parent/teacher meetings to schedule tomorrow, and a guy coming to give me a bid on repairing the leak in the library ceiling. Plus a pep rally to emcee tomorrow afternoon. And you, Coach TyGuy, have a big game tomorrow night.”
“We don’t have to fool around,” he told her easily in response. “I just like sleeping next to you.”
Her heart constricted in her chest. She liked that, too. Just the warmth of his body against hers, and waking up to see his handsome face next to hers on the pillow, his hair rumpled, his smile sleepy, his good morning kiss a perfect way to start the day.
That was when he reached for Pumpkin, holding him up in front of his face to speak in a silly pretend kitten voice. “Please stay, Cara. We don’t want you to go.”
“Oh my God, stop.” She tried to act like he was being totally goofy, but in reality it tugged sweetly at her heart.
“If we do,” he said, still pretending Pumpkin could talk, “will you stay and keep us warm in bed tonight?”
She rolled her eyes, still melting inside at all the cuteness. “Yes. Just stop.”
He turned the kitten around to face him then, and said, back to his regular, deeper voice, “Good work, Pumpkin. Give me five.” After which he used his free hand to high five the cat’s little paw, making her even crazier about him, if that was possible.
Just then, his phone buzzed, so he reached for it on the coffee table, and after studying the screen for a moment, he smiled.
“Good news?” she asked.
“Yeah.” He shifted his gaze to hers. “I didn’t want to tell you about this until I was sure it would happen. But something you said the first time you came out here gave me an idea.”
That seemed so long ago now. “Oh?” She had no idea what he could be talking about.
“Remember when you told me I should do something good with the money I have?”
The truth was, they’d been so wrapped up in football and sex and life that she’d forgotten all about that particular statement. “That was actually none of my business,” she said now.
“But you were right. So I called the Salvation Army to see if they could help me orchestrate a way to supply Thanksgiving dinners for people in need, in a way that went beyond just donating money. I thought the team could join me on the Saturday before Thanksgiving somewhere, handing out turkeys and other food, that it would be a good thing for them to experience. And the guy from the Salvation Army just got back to me with some logistics—so it’s happening.” Another smile unfurled across his face.
And another arrow struck her heart, making her defenses even weaker where he was concerned. “Tyler, that’s amazing,” she told him. “And I know people will get such a kick out of meeting you—it’ll really lift their spirits.”
“If so, then that’s a great perk,” he replied. “I just mainly want to do what you said—put something good into the world. And this is just a start, with much bigger things to come.”
In response, she wriggled out from beneath her end of the cover and crawled down the couch to cuddle up with him and Pumpkin. It was official. Tyler Fleet had stolen her heart all over again, as completely and surely as he had when she was sixteen years old.
And whenever this ended, she would fall to pieces.
Unless…it really didn’t end. Like he kept hinting. Okay, more than hinting—pretty much outright saying.
Unless…she could begin to believe in that, focusing less on loss and more on what there was to gain.
It still didn’t feel safe, like a sure, certain thing.
But…what if she could somehow start being more like him, just having faith, trusting things to work out, trusting herself to capably handle whatever happened? What if she gave herself permission to follow her heart and be happy?
What if…?
Chapter Fourteen
The turkey was in the oven and the dining room table set for ten—once Cara added the leaf and pushed a square folding table up to one end. As she did every Thanksgiving, she used her mother’s good white dishes with the gold rims, an autumn gold tablecloth underneath. An old-fashioned cornucopia served as the centerpiece, another holdover from their childhood. Her family hadn’t had much, so her mother had treasured the good dishes and was fond of the cornucopia, and it always made Cara feel like she was still there with them in a way.
All three of her sisters had arrived, with their families, on a day Cara looked forward to every year. It felt like old times as the sisters all bustled around the small kitchen. Shawna, the eldest at forty, was busy whipping up mashed potatoes, while Laura, thirty-eight, made corn pudding and sweet potato pie. Cara worked on a green bean casserole and stuffing, and had picked up pumpkin and pecan pies from Dolly’s, while Erica, at thirty-five—more of a career woman than a cook—had grabbed a can of cranberry sauce from the grocery before leaving Cincinnati and was officially in charge of things like stirring the gravy and putting the rolls in the bread basket.
Shawna and Laura’s husbands were out in the backyard, throwing a football around with their kids, and the sound of their laughter echoing through the closed windows made Cara happy. As did the clanging of dishes and the aromas that suddenly filled the house. Even as content as she’d learned to be with her life, she missed having family around.
Once the turkey was carved and the food on the table, everyone dug in, and conversation, as always, was about catching up on one another’s lives. Shawna wanted to know about Erica’s new position at work. Laura’s husband, Jim, asked Shawna’s two boys how their basketball season was going so far.
“And how about those Bulldogs?” said Brian, Shawna’s husband.
“Vying for the state championship next week,” Cara shared with a note of pride in her voice.
“The town seems like it’s going wild—Bulldogs signs everywhere as we drove through,” Shawna added, carefully tipping the gravy boat to dribble gravy over her plate.
Laura shook her head in disbelief. “I never thought that would happen again.”
“I don’t think anyone did,” Cara replied. “It’s been a lot of fun, and yeah, the whole community is excited.” Then she asked one of her nephews to pass the rolls.
“Apparently, it took Tyler coming back to town,” Laura went on.
And the whole table went quiet with shared awkwardness, forks and knives paused in mid-air. They all remembered what had happened ten years ago—at least the adults. But even a couple of the kids had been old enough to recall Tyler being around.
Well, it was time to show her family that Tyler’s name was no longer a dirty word in the Collins house. So she merrily responded with, “He’s done an awesome job with the team. Thank goodness he agreed to step in.”
That’s when all her sisters started exchanging sideways glances.
And she decided to just go ahead and address the elephant in the room. She smiled and said, “Okay, go ahead and just ask me whatever it is you want to know since clearly you’ve all been whispering and speculating behind my back.”
It was Erica, to whom she was closest, who cautiously began, “Okay, I heard through the grapevine that you’ve been seen around town with him a lot the last few weeks.” Erica still had friends in Destiny who she kept in touch with. “So are you, like, back together?”
“Yeah, what exactly haven’t you told us?” Laura asked, eyes narrowed.
Cara tilted her head. “First of all, it’s not exactly like I talk to you guys all the time.” It wasn’t an accusation or anything—just a fact.
Even so, Shawna gave her head a doubtful tilt. “We’ve been texting about today for weeks. You certainly had every opportunity to mention you were seeing your old boyfriend.”
“Yeah, true. Only…I didn’t want to make a big deal of it. I’ve been trying to keep it casual. But…”
Eyebrows around the table rose. “But what?” her teenage niece asked when no one else seemed to dare.
“But…we see a lot of each other. And I guess it’s fair to say we are back together. He seems committed to proving himself to me, and to want…a real relationship.”
“I would be wary about trusting him again,” Erica said, quick and pointed, as she stabbed her fork into a bite of turkey. “I know it was a long time ago, but I can’t forget how badly he hurt you.”
“Look, you’re preaching to the choir,” Cara assured her sister. “The good part of the whole thing is that we…still hit it off. We get along great and have fun together. It’s very…easy to be with him. The bad is that, yeah, it’s hard to put my trust in someone who walked away without blinking when we were practically engaged.”
All the sisters nodded in agreement, and Shawna said, “Good for you. Fool you once, shame on him, fool you twice—well, you know the drill.”
That was when Brian put forth, “He always seemed like a nice guy, though. So maybe it’s best to leave the past in the past, wipe the slate clean and start fresh.”
Laura pinned her brother-in-law in place with a look. “No,” she said. “Just no. Don’t even suggest that it’s as easy as wiping a slate clean.”
And fair enough—her sisters had seen and felt her heartbreak in a way her brother-in-laws couldn’t fathom.
But that didn’t stop Jim from saying, “I read online that he handed out turkeys to needy families last weekend in Crestview.”
Cara nodded. “Yeah, and he took the team with him. I went, too, and found it a powerful thing to be a part of. To see how much it meant to people, and how grateful they were—and so many of them were excited to meet Tyler. It made us all feel grateful, I think, in different ways. I could see how much the boys felt it. And next month he’s going to team up with the Salvation Army again to buy Christmas gifts for needy families and take the team to deliver them personally.”
“Given how involved it sounds like you two are,” Laura said, clearly reaching for more information on that, “I’m surprised he didn’t invite you to have Thanksgiving dinner with his family.”
“He did,” Cara confirmed after a bite of corn pudding. Raybourne had even made a point of tracking them down at Dolly’s the other night to ensure she knew she’d be welcome. “But I explained that the whole family was coming here and that it’s one of the two times a year we’re all together.”
“You could have blown us off,” Erica pointed out.
“Or invited them here to join us,” Shawna suggested.
But Cara just laughed. “One minute you guys are telling me not to trust him and the next you’re pushing us together. Like I said, I’m trying to keep things a little casual, you know?”
“And how’s that going?” Erica stilled her knife and fork to ask with a pointed look. “Because your eyes don’t say casual at all. In fact, they practically have little hearts in them when you talk about him.”
Cara blew out a sigh. Here she was, trying to have a nice family dinner, trying to take a break from eating, breathing, and sleeping Tyler Fleet—and her family, even while warning her not to put faith in him, wouldn’t let her. “Like I said, he and I still…click. But I’ve gone into this with my eyes wide open. And I’ll just leave it at that.”
Thankfully, other conversation took over then—the kids talking about their sports and school activities, the husbands complimenting the food, Erica sharing that next week she was meeting a guy she’d connected with on a dating app. To which Laura replied, “Terrible idea.”
“Dating apps?” Erica asked. “Because you have no idea what it’s like out there these days. People just don’t connect the old-fashioned way anymore.”
“No,” Laura said. “It’s a terrible idea to start seeing someone at Christmastime. If you see him more than a couple of times, it gets into that whole am-I-supposed-to-get-him-a-present? thing, and from what I recall, the other person always makes the opposite decision and it’s all awkward and weird.”
Erica sneered her agreement. “Ugh—you’re right. Maybe I’ll find a way to postpone until the new year.”
Cara didn’t add anything, but just took in the conversation as it went on—and the togetherness. That’s better. More what I wanted from my day. And maybe the family had caught on to that, because no one brought up Tyler again, not through the rest of the meal, not through the board games afterward, not through the cutting of the pies once they all had room to shovel in some dessert.
Darkness had long since fallen, and Cara was enjoying a slice of pumpkin pie with whipped cream on top, watching her nieces and nephews battle it out at Ticket to Ride, when the doorbell rang.
“Who could that be?” Shawna murmured, busy working on cleanup in the kitchen even though Cara had insisted it could wait.
“No idea,” Cara said, then lowered her pie plate to the table and went to answer.
She opened the door to find Tyler standing on her front porch, looking…well, good enough to eat. He wore a thick, cozy, cable-knit sweater with jeans, hands stuffed in his pockets. She wanted to say, What are you doing here? Or chastise him for not wearing a coat since it was cold out, or for interrupting this time with her family. But the truth was, he stayed in the back of her mind now, always, pretty much around the clock, and the very sight of him made her skin tingle. So all she got out was a quiet, “Hi.”
“Happy Thanksgiving.” His voice came soft but deep, giving her a smile that warmed her up from the inside out far more than a holiday wish should.
“Same to you.”
“Hope I’m not interrupting.”
She shook her head. “We were just having pie and playing games.” She almost invited him in, but stopped. Mostly because she feared her sisters might make him feel unwelcome, though—not because she didn’t want him there. Since just now she realized that she did. That he would have been the perfect addition to her family meal, maybe even the perfect addition to…her family.
“I need to get back to Mom and Dad’s, spend some time with my grandparents and cousins, but…it didn’t seem right to let the day pass without seeing you.”
Her voice came out softer than intended. “It didn’t?”
He shook his handsome head. “Because what I’m thankful for this year is…you. And being back in your life. And how you’ve led me back to things that matter, helped me see what counts, and that maybe I’m not so washed up at twenty-eight, after all.” He ended with a grin, apparently now having the clarity to realize what a silly notion that was, and he reached out a hand, drawing her out onto the front porch with him.
And she was still taking in his words, wondering if she should confess that she was thankful for him, too—when he lifted both hands to her face and kissed her.
Like every kiss from Tyler, it moved all through her, slow and sweet, like the flow of country molasses. And she realized that was another thing she felt thankful for—having Tyler’s kisses back, whether they were covering her whole body or just her mouth, heating her up even on a cold November night. It brought back memories of kisses on this same porch many years ago, her mother flicking the outside light off and on, silently telling her to say goodnight already and come inside. One more thing that hadn’t changed—saying goodbye when they parted ways was getting harder and harder.
Even when the kiss ended, their bodies stayed close, the electricity between them making it so she didn’t even feel the cold through her sweater, and he reached up to brush a lock of hair from her face as he said, “CareBear, I promise you I know what I want now.”
But before he could go on, she reached up, quieting him by pressing a finger to his lips. “Don’t, Tyler,” she softly admonished him. “We have no idea what the future holds, or your career, or anything else.”
“Yes we do. I want to keep coaching at DHS. And I want to be with you—”
