Jackson was up and moving around, already much improved than when they’d first arrived.
Lauren sat quietly, but her demeanor had changed—softened, lightened—even since last night when they were here the first time. He held on to a foolish hope that he was winning her over.
Never mind that he had no idea what he would do if he did.
After dessert—Joe’s homemade pineapple upside down cake, Lauren helped Rosa clear the table, walking the dishes into the kitchen while Joe, Will and Jackson continued their conversation about baseball.
To Lauren, Rosa was an amazing wife, an overly concerned mother—and an even better cook. And while Lauren may never be any of those three, she appreciated it. Admired it.
This is what a family is supposed to be like. She shoved aside the hollowness that had carved a space in her belly.
Rosa filled the sink with water and soap and smiled over at Lauren. “You don’t have to help me with this. You’re our guest.”
“I don’t mind,” Lauren said. “It sure beats talking about baseball.”
Rosa laughed. “Coach Will hasn’t given you his ‘why baseball is the best sport on the planet’ speech?”
Lauren’s eyes widened in horror. “No, thank God, and I hope he never does.”
Rosa was quiet for a long beat. She washed a plate and handed it to Lauren to dry. “Your Will is a really special man.”
“He’s not my Will, remember?” Lauren smiled over at her.
“Oh, right,” Rosa said. “Though the two of you seem so good together.”
As Lauren wiped her towel in circles on a wet dish, she replayed moments over the past several days. But Rosa didn’t let her mind linger there.
“It means a lot that Will is so open with Jackson,” the older woman said, pulling Lauren back to earth. “It can’t be easy for him to watch one of his players repeating his own mistakes.”
Lauren’s ears perked up at this. Rosa was assuming Lauren knew more than she did.
“How so?” she asked lightly.
Rosa looked at her. “Coach doesn’t want Jackson to lose his scholarship, to lose baseball, the way he did.” She studied Lauren for a moment, then looked ashamed. “He never said this was a secret! Ah! Dios mío, should I not have said anything?”
“No, no,” Lauren shook her head quickly as she took another wet dish from Rosa’s dripping hands. “It’s okay, Will and my brother are best friends. I know a lot about his history.”
But not this chapter, apparently.
After that one fateful night during her freshman year of college, the night that split her young existence into ‘before it happened’ and ‘after it happened,’ she’d purposely distanced herself from anything having to do with Will Sinclair. It was surprisingly easy to stop tracking his every move once she’d made up her mind to do it.
After all, Lauren had distanced herself from her own family. She had a lot of practice.
“Oh good,” Rosa sighed relief. “He said he took it so hard when he lost baseball. Did you know him then?”
Lauren glanced into the next room, where the men were engaged in some sort of wild debate about whether the Cubs were ‘retooling’ or ‘rebuilding’， and she nodded. “I’ve known him since I was eleven.”
Rosa gasped. “And you haven’t fallen in love with him yet?”
Lauren dried—then re-dried—the dish in her hand, avoiding the older woman’s eyes.
“Oh,” Rosa said quietly. “You have. Does he know?”
Lauren frowned. “Know what?”
“How you feel?”
“Felt,” Lauren corrected. “I outgrew my crush on Will Sinclair a long time ago.”
Rosa responded by raising her eyebrows and looking at her hands in the soapy water.
“I did,” she said, desperately trying to convince both women in the room.
“Why?” Rosa asked. “Did something happen?”
Lauren did not want to be transported back to that night, nor the days following. It was a floodgate being held back by only a small piece of masking tape. She shrugged off both Rosa’s question and her feelings and picked up a plate that had been drip-drying in the sink. “He broke my heart is all.” She sighed. “And between you and me, I don’t think he even remembers.”
“Are you two solving the world’s problems in here?” Will’s voice yanked Lauren’s attention to the doorway. Seeing him standing there while mired in the memory of his poor choices knocked her off-kilter.