Page 4 of A Season of Second Chances
He puts his hand on the small of my back as he escorts me out of the room. It's a measure of familiarity I haven't had with anyone since him. Maybe the fact of the matter is, I haven't let anyone else get this close in all the years since I left. I've been so focused on my career, and keeping myself from getting hurt, that I haven't opened myself up to anyone else. Obvious of the silence between us, I glance back at him, a smile on my face. "I can't believe what you've done to this place. If anyone had asked me, I don't think I ever would've thought you'd be running Cedar Lodge."
"Yeah." He shakes his head, reaching back to scratch his neck. "I didn't think so either, but it's funny how life works. Sometimes opportunities fall into your lap, and you have to take them."
We finish the trip downstairs in relative silence, but it's comfortable, I don't feel the anxiousness and anxiety I feel with others when we stop talking.
Carol is waiting for us, her hip propping a door open. "I set a table in the dining room," she says, smiling as we enter.
"You didn't have to do this, but thank you." I'm amazed that someone took time out of their night to do this when sometimes in Indianapolis I can't even get people to smile as we walk down the street.
"It's no problem. Winter, are you going to take any home to Alana?"
I stiffen as I hear the name of a woman. Of course he has a girlfriend, or a wife. I can't have expected him to remain single for the rest of his life. Hell, I haven't been single since I left Pine Ridge, although I am now.
"No, she's asleep. I checked in with her babysitter before I headed into town."
Babysitter? Could it be a child, or a pet? I do my best not to make eye contact, because I'm not sure if I want the truth or not. Inhaling a calming breath, I smile over at Carol. "Thank you again, so much for doing this."
"It's really no problem," she says, motioning for us to take seats. "I'll have the food here in a few minutes."
Winter and I sit across from one another, and when we do, I take a moment to look at this man. He's definitely a man, not the boy I left. He's got a beard covering his face, crinkles at the corners of his eyes, and weathered skin along his nose. "Are you sure you don't have to go home?" I ask him, not knowing how to bring up Alana.
"I don't have to go home." he folds his hands in front of him on the table. "But before you ask, because I can tell you're wondering, Alana is my five-year-old daughter. Her mother isn't in the picture, and she's at home with her nanny."
My eyes must be as big as saucers, because he continues.
"I know it's a lot to take in, especially when you weren't expecting this."
I hold up my hands in front of me. "You don't owe me any explanations. We haven't talked to each other in ten years. It would be stupid to think either one of us haven't moved on with our lives, right?"
He nods, coughing. "Yeah, ten years is a long time to be stuck in limbo. I was," he whispers. "For a while after you left. I didn't want to move on, I kept wondering if my life was over before it began."
As he trails off, I want to tell him I understand all of that. As teenagers, things were so serious for us. Both of us had begun talking about a future, but it was one that I don't think either one of us could see clearly. It was the idea that we needed to have everything figured out when we graduated from high school. Which now, is absurd, but back then everyone looked at us and saw the future. Maybe we took that onto ourselves a lot more than we realized. "I get it," I admit softly. "Because the night before I left, that's what I was thinking when I looked at the life that was already laid out before me. I was eighteen," I shrug, trying to explain.
"No, I get it now. Back then I didn't. I was banking on you and our future to save me," he says roughly. "I didn't have enough confidence to save myself. I was just a guy from the wrong side of the tracks, who lucked up with the town sweetheart..."
"Stop," I say, tears coming to my eyes the way they always had when he'd talk about himself like that. "I may have been the town sweetheart, but you know why I wanted to be with you. You showed me love and compassion that my parents never did. Which is why I haven't been back, and why they don't know that I was driving through tonight. You were my reason for staying."
"Until I wasn't..." he finishes.
It's all so complicated, and seemed way more complicated back that night I left. "Winter, I can't change what I did."
"No you can't, but maybe we can hang out while you're here, and you can see the man I became. I'm a lot different than the boy you left. This storm will have you here for a few days at least."
What's the harm? I ask myself. Getting to see someone who once meant so much to me. To see what he's made of himself. The other part of my brain taunts me. To see what you left behind in your bid to be something else entirely. But maybe I need to see what I lost. I haven't gained anything other than a career for the last ten years. It's a career I thought I would be further in at this point, and over the last year and a half it hasn't been serving me the way it once did. Would it be so bad if I found out things about myself? "I'd love to see what the life you've built is like," I find myself saying.
"I'd love to show you."
Although I know I still have work to do, I realize nothing in my life has ever happened just because. If I get stranded here, it's for a reason. Why not find out what that reason is? As Carol brings us plates of food, I give him a grin. "Then I'd love to see it."
Four
Winter
Eating dinner with Joy had been like old times. It's as if we picked up that ten years apart, and we pushed it to the side. We talked about our day-to-day lives, finished our dinner, and then I let her go up to her room.
"You're probably tired," I tell her as I walk her to the stairs.
"Yeah, I started this day at three am. I'm going on almost twenty-four hours." A yawn splits her mouth as she puts a hand up to cover it.
