Travis lifted up both hands, like a busted perp. "Willow, come on. I was just running my mouth." His face was red.
Willow knew she was being ridiculous. She had no reason to defend Dane, and Travis had only been good to her. "I'm sorry," she said quickly.
"I'd better get back," Travis sighed. "I'll see you around." He hopped into his truck and started the engine.
She slid behind the steering wheel of the truck, her misery closing in around her.
* * *
Willow and Callie dined together the next day on hospital cafeteria fare. "So, now I have an appointment for an adoption counselor and a baby-care class on the same afternoon. And ten days to decide which appointments to keep."
"I bet that doesn't happen often," Callie said.
"Actually, I bet it does," Willow said. "I can't be the only person who has teetered this long on the fence."
Callie put down her sandwich. "You're right, of course. I didn't mean to be flip."
"It's all right. I know I have to decide soon."
"You're really considering every option, aren't you?"
"Every last one," Willow said.
They were silent a moment, and Callie finished half her sandwich. She brushed the crumbs off her fingers. "Can I ask you a psych question?"
"Sure."
"Suppose there's a prisoner, and he's serving life with no chance for parole." Callie fiddled with the straw in her drink.
"No, you should not get involved with him," Willow laughed.
Callie rolled her eyes. "Very funny. But listen, okay? So, this prisoner has already served a decade, maybe two. Then one day, the warden walks in and says, ‘Whoops. We made a big mistake, you're free to go.' My question is this: how does the guy react?"
Willow swallowed a bite of salad. "Well, in the movies, he kisses his lawyer and dances out of prison, to the sound of trumpets and violins," Willow said. "But in real life, probably the opposite would happen."
"What does the opposite look like?" Callie asked.
"People are ruled by their expectations. And if the unexpected happens, even good things, we find it hard to adapt. In real life, the prisoner probably has a total breakdown. He'd punch his lawyer, scream at his mom. Drink himself into a stupor. He might never get over it."
"That's what I was afraid you'd say." The look on her face was far away.
"Callie? Are you letting someone out of prison?"
Her friend looked thoughtful. "Probably not," she said. "But of course, I can't really talk about it." She picked up the other half of her sandwich.
Twenty-one
Dane had never felt so trapped and alone.
Coach was always nearby, of course. He went to junior races in Vermont and New Hampshire on the weekend, looking at the up-and-comers. But Dane led an impossibly claustrophobic life in the apartment. Save the occasional follow-up doctor's appointment, there was nowhere to go. He and Coach had tried going out to eat a few times, but it was such a hassle getting in and out of the Jeep, pushing the passenger seat as far back as it would go. And then sitting there in the restaurant feeling like a man with a black cloud hanging over him.
The only thing that brought Dane any pleasure at all was the thing that was causing him so much pain. In the afternoons, after she came home from work, Willow would always visit with her chickens. From one of the two windows in Coach's little living room, he could see an oblique slice of Willow's yard, including the barn door. Dane would stand there waiting, leaning on his crutches until she came out, swinging her egg basket, heading for the door.
If it was a sunny day, the barn would already be open. The chickens always came running like a pack of puppies, swarming Willow's ankles. She always set the basket down and scooped one of them up. The chicken would sit in the crook of her arm while Willow stroked its back. Then she would invariably pull some raisins out of her pocket, and the girls would flap themselves into a frenzy while she doled out these treats, talking to them.
He watched because of the look on her face, which was always peaceful. There was no way to imagine that she wasn't having a really hard time right now. Callie had said as much. But at the same time, at least for the moments when he spied her out the window, she wasn't totally broken. Not yet, anyway.
That made one of them.
* * *
After dark was when Dane had the most trouble. It made the apartment-and his life-feel impossibly small, with nothing to see out the window except for his own ugly reflection looking back at him. On this particular evening-barely distinguishable from all the others-Dane had been channel surfing for half an hour, nothing holding his attention for more than a few minutes.
Coach was beginning to fidget in his chair. "So what's the deal with Willow?" he said.
"What do you mean?" Dane kept his eyes on the screen.
"What do you mean, what do I mean? What's the goddamned problem?" Coached grabbed the remote out of Dane's hand and turned the power off. "I see you watching for her in the backyard. I can only guess why you do that. But when she brings the mail to our door, you won't even glance in her direction. There are twelve-year-old boys with more game than you."
Dane began the difficult chore of getting off the couch. Leaving his legs propped onto the chair, he crab-walked his upper body onto the floor. "I know you're bored, Coach. A few more weeks and we'll be out of here. You can go find some teenage prodigy to do you proud in case I blow up again before the Olympics." With his hips suspended in the air, Dane pressed up on his fingertips and began a series of dips, working his chest and arms.
Coach looked into his beer bottle. "You're acting like a sorry asshole, Dane. Even for you, this is extreme. I just want to know-what did that nice girl do to you?"
Dane finished a set of thirty before resting his butt on the floor. "You wouldn't be asking if you didn't mean it the other way around. What did I do to her?"
Coach leaned on his elbows and looked Dane in the eye. "Fine. What did you do to her?"
"If you want to know so bad, I got her pregnant."
"Fuck." Coach put his head in his hands. "You poor kids."
"Why do you feel sorry for me? She's the one who's knocked up."
The look on Coach's face was the hardest one he'd ever seen there. "Don't ever talk to me like I'm stupid, Dane. Just because you don't talk about your problems doesn't mean I don't know what they are."
"You don't know what they are."
Coach's stare was unrelenting. "If that's the line you want to take, fine."
"Leave me alone, Coach."
"I leave you alone too much. If you won't talk to me, I think you need to get some help."
Dane snorted. He lifted his hips off the floor again and began another set.
"I have one question, and if you answer it, I won't bring it up again."
Dane lifted his eyes.
"When you look out that window at Willow, what do you see?"
Dane's tightened his abs and decided to press the set to forty reps. "I see someone who punched me in the gut," he ground out.
"That's what love feels like, kid."
Dane adjusted his balance so that he could dip himself with only one arm. Then he reached up and lunged for the remote, snatching it out of Coach's hand. "If you're so wise, what are you doing sitting alone in this shit hole with me?"
Twenty-two
Callie was disappointed to see Willow's truck in the garage when she pulled up the farmhouse driveway. Her friend came smiling to the kitchen door when she opened her car door.
"Callie?" Willow called. "This is a pleasant surprise."
Callie took care to bring both her purse and the calmest face she could muster from the car. "Willow, how come you're not at yoga?"
Willow shrugged. "Didn't feel like it. And you said you couldn't be there."
Callie flinched. "Willow, I need to talk to Dane. But I don't want you to come."
"Why?" she whispered.
"Doctor-patient privilege," Callie whispered.
Willow's mouth fell open. "You're scaring me, Callie."
"Don't be afraid," she said. "No matter what, you are going to be fine. Stay here, and put on a kettle for tea?"
"All right," Willow said, her face reluctant.
Callie squeezed her friend's hand, and then forced herself to turn away from Willow's frightened eyes. She continued toward the apartment door, feeling around in her purse for the things she'd brought with her.