Kicking Eternity (20 page)

“I’m sure.” His voice was quiet, but inside his heart
exploded
. Why didn’t God tell Sam to marry him?

“You haven’t dated anyone else either. How can you be sure?”

He debated telling her about the day she was sitting on the picnic table studying history. “I just know.” He
stopped fiddling with the change in his pocket and
tossed a
quarter
into the
water. The sun caught it as it sunk to the bottom.
He could hear the air move in and out through his nose. He looked at her. “Sam, I love you.” It was only the second time he’d told her. He’d wanted to give her time to catch up. But she hadn’t.

“I’ve thought about that every day since you first told me. But I don’t have an answer.”

“Has someone asked you out?”

Her cheeks
tinged with pink under her tan.

A
nger boiled through his veins.

“We could still go out… just see other people.” Her voice was thin and pleading.

He shook his head. “I can’t do it. It’s just too hard. You’re going to have to make your choice.” He stared at the water gurgling under the bridge. His jaw clenched waiting for her answer. A dragonfly skimmed the water
,
buzzing his nerves. Still, he didn’t look at her. Was he afraid to see the rejection in her eyes or was it his anger he didn’t want her to read?

One lithe jump and she
stood, looking down on
him. “Good bye, Drew. I’m sorry.” There was a catch in her voice, the closest to tears he’d ever heard her. By the time
the shock wore off
, she
had stepped
off the
dock
and
crossed the street into Old Fort Park.
 

He walked
that dock
a dozen times before second semester began
,
trying to exorcize the pain. Was God testing his faith? God told Abraham he would have a child, but Isaac wasn’t born for another twenty-five years. He didn’t like it, but if Sam needed to date other guys, he’d have to wait it out till she came back to him.

But second semester was hell. He sulked, and Sam always seemed to have a guy hanging around her.

He’d finished his biology final and was heading across campus when he looked up.

Sam strode toward him.

She stopped in the middle of the quad. “Hi, Drew. It’s been a while.”

“I haven’t gone anywhere.”

“I got a scholarship to star
t on the Flagler College volley
ball team. I’m taking it. I know you’ve been holding out for us to get back together. It’s not going to happen. There’s some awesome girl out there for you. But it’s not me.”

“You’re wrong.”

She
sighed, long and heavy
. “I’m sorry I hurt you.” She kiss
ed him on the cheek. “Good bye.”

And the imprint of that kiss was still on his life today. He looked at Rainey. She
rested with her elbows on the step behind her,
the yellow light of the dining hall backlighting her.

She sat up. “So, you’ve always felt like you needed to leave the door propped open for Sam to walk back into your life, like you didn’t have the right to close it and move on.”

“Pretty much.” He shrugged. “It was easier not seeing Sam anymore, but the whole thing sort of fossilized inside. Kurt kept telling me I had a personality change after Sam dumped me. I was an extrovert before Sam.
Afterward, I pretty much hung with Kurt or Kurt and his friends.
One of the reasons Kurt left was to force me to get a life.

“Are you?” He could feel Rainey’s gaze boring into him even though he couldn’t see her eyes.

“I’m thinking about a job change.” He reached up and tousled her hair. “I’ve made some good friends like you and Jesse.” He
thought about kissing
someone besides Sam.

“But?”

“But, what if God
did
tell me to marry Sam?”

“Then you better do more than look up her Facebook.”

In the morning Aly woke up by degrees. First, she felt throbbing in her ankle, then sunlight blazing through her eyelids. She opened her eyes and saw a glass of water and a prescription bottle with a note in Cal’s blunt printing, “Take two for pain anytime after four a.m.” There was a tiny drawing of a girl on crutches with a heavily wrapped foot. She took the pills and clumped down the hall to the bathroom.

“Aly!” Her mom came flying around the corner with an English muffin in her hand. “How are you, honey?” She was still in her pink flowered nursing scrubs.

Aly held up a hand and rushed into the bathroom. Her mother spoke through the door. “I gave Cal a key and told him to bring you here. I found him sacked out on your bedroom floor this morning. I didn’t mean he had to stay. It was only a sprained ankle. You would have been fine till I got off
at seven
. Anyway…”

Cal slept on her bedroom floor! How could
a girl
not love a guy like him? Why didn’t she realize he was interested in her back in high school? Why? How could she have been so stupid? Her hand went up to touch the eyebrow Cal had kissed last night. And now he was in love with Raine.

#

Raine sat on the back steps of the Canteen facing the parking lot.
M
orning sun toasted her shoulder and the side of her face. She should go get something to eat, but she’d sunk down here
to sort out her thoughts
after Drew went into breakfast.

Drew’s spilling his history with Sam last night hadn’t affected their friendship. This morning on the beach she’d agreed to help him with elementary camp on a regular basis. They talked about the camp volleyball tournament and how expensive her shots for Africa were going to be. Nothing had changed.

Then, why did the knowledge
Drew was still in love with Sam
weigh five hundred pounds.
Maybe she was sad for him, that he’d lived so many years loving a woman who didn’t love him in return.

Drew should marry. What a waste it would be for Drew to stay single—a waste of good looks, of  a guy who was obviously able to love a woman passionately, one who would be a great dad.

Lord, would You do something about this?

The camp van screeched around the end of the hedge and slammed into park.

Cal jumped out. “Raine! You’re the person I wanted to see.”

The stretch of his faded Ron Jon T-shirt across the contour of muscle on his chest and arms almost made her miss something different about him—the dab of awe in his expression. She searched his eyes till the rhythm of her heart beat in her ears.

“What?” He looked at her quizzically.

“Something’s different about you.”

He smiled a little. “Maybe that’s because God’s been talking to me.”

Joy burbled up
like water from the porcelain drinking fountain on the backstop fence. “How?”

“I was sitting
on my board in the waves and,
like you said, I felt God’s caress in the sunset—I really felt it. The sun sat in the branches of the pines like someone had tossed it there. For maybe thirty seconds, the ocean turned to orangeade. I sketched it out last night, and I’m getting it down in paint today.”

Tears pooled in her eyes.

“While you were telling the lost sheep story, verses kept pouring into my head I hadn’t remembered in years.” He grabbed her hand. “God told me He loves me the way I am!”

Wonder was almost a scent between them.

Cal started to say something. He stopped. “You’re crying.”

The wetness that had collected in her lower lids spilled over. “Happy tears.”

He pushed her hair back behind her ear. “You’re so beautiful.” He wiped her tears away with the pads of his fingers.

Her insides quivered like violin strings under a frenzied bow. Part of her mind took in a woodpecker hammering a tree trunk, the sparkle of the sun on the dew coating the scraggly grass beside the Canteen steps. Maybe God didn’t take her crush away because He meant for them to be together.

Cal moved closer. His gaze drifted to her lips.

God?

Wait.
The answer came to Raine before the question had fully formed.

The violin strings stilled. She squeezed Cal’s hand. “I’m so happy for you.”

“Raine—”

What could she say?
Cal, God said—

Jillian sprinted around the corner of the Canteen as though God sent her. “Uncle Cal! Swing me! Swing me!”

Thanks, but I wanted the kiss.

#

Aly looked through the dining hall screen at Gar. His white blond hair was parted on the side,
buzz
ed close around the ears. When she touched it, it slipped through her fingers like silken threads. Now, his head was bent toward Carina
, the assistant camp dietician
. He
smiled
at something she said. He rubbed the baby-fine fuzz on his chin like he did when he was nervous.

He was
her
boyfriend. What was he doing twittering around Carina?
I
ntelligent people made Gar nervous, at least people he perceived as more intelligent than he was. She’d caught him rubbing his chin whenever their conversations veered into topics he didn’t quite grasp.

Gar was wearing those clear-glass glasses again—the ones he said made him look smarter. Well, they sure weren’t helping him see Aly needed his help. She readjusted her crutches.

Carina was working on her masters and 
an M.R.S. degree
—neither of which would please Gar.
Go ahead and flirt with her, Gar.
It would serve him right if he fell in love with Carina and got dumped on his head.

Cal jogged up the steps onto the porch behind her. “Hey, Al.” He followed her gaze through the screen.

Carina said something, and Gar threw his head back and laughed.

“Chump,” was all Cal said.

A second ticked by, and Aly thought how much comfort packed into that one word. 

“How’s the foot?”

“A little better.” She pushed her long bangs out of her face. “Thanks for sleeping on my floor after the hospital. My mom laughed. She said it was only a sprain.”

“Your mom spends too much time in intensive care.”

“You were sweet. And I kept your note with the mini-me on it.”

Cal grinned. “It looks like you kept every doodle I ever gave you.”

Aly remembered too late how her room was papered in Cal’s cast off drawings. “They’ll be worth something when you’re famous. Jesse says I have a good head for business.”

Cal jutted his chin in Gar’s direction. “Too smart for him.”

“Seems to me, if you’re not asking me out, you can’t diss the guy who is.” What was the use of dropping hints on Cal when he was in love with Raine?

He held his hands up. “Point taken.” They moved toward the door and Cal held it for her. “Go get a seat and I’ll get your food.”

She scanned the crowded dining hall. The only empty seats were at Gar’s table or at Kallie, Jesse, and Jillian’s. Just her luck. She hobbled over and sat down next to Jillian, avoiding eye contact with Kallie.

“Hi, Auntie Aly! Did you know Mommy has my little brother in her tummy and he’s going to come out soon and play with me?”

Cal set her food down and scraped a chair around for her to rest her injured foot on.

“You’re pampering me.”

He glanced in Gar’s direction across the dining hall and bent close to her ear. “Looks like you could use some pampering today.” He ruffled Jillian’s curls and walked away to get his own food.

“Mommy and Daddy said it might be a sister, but Uncle Cal says it’s a brother” Jillian jabbered. 

Kallie shot her a look over Jillian’s head like she wanted to make up. “Does it hurt?”

“It feels like I should sign up for
Dancing With the Stars.”
Duh.

“Really?” Jillian piped up. “You can dance with me, Auntie Aly.”

“Not today, sugar.”

Kallie tried again. “Was Mom her usual ‘short on sympathy’ self?”

Aly almost bit, but at the last moment she shrugged one shoulder.
See how it feels, Kal.
She watched Cal sit down next to Gar. Maybe God had a sense of humor after all.

Kallie sent Jillian with Jesse. “I’ll wait for Aly to finish eating. We’ll
come
over to the office in a couple of minutes.”

Oh, great.
She could feel the bite of tuna salad sandwich expand in her throat. So much for lunch.