About the Boy (14 page)

He’d promised himself he’d never let anyone get past his emotional guard again. He couldn’t afford to. Once burned, twice shy, his dad always used to tell him.

But right now, with his heart at peace, his emotions content, and a beautiful woman puttering around the kitchen, making popcorn for the son she adored—and he had to admit, he adored as well—Lucas realized that at the moment, he couldn’t think of any place he’d rather be right now, then with Katie and Rusty.

And at the moment, he was feeling much too peaceful to be frightened by it.

Chapter Eight

I
t wasn’t until the next afternoon, several hours after Rusty’s friends had gone home from the sleepover that Katie realized Rusty was acting weird. Well, weird for him, anyway.

Dressed in comfortable weekend sweats, with her hair pulled up in a ponytail, she was in the back bedroom—the one she’d turned into a makeshift home office—trying to get through the ad copy for the Halloween issue when she glanced up and saw her son standing in the doorway staring at her.

And that in itself was odd. Rusty was very rarely still. He was always in perpetual motion, so having him stand perfectly still, doing nothing and just watching her was odd.

And immediately set off motherly alarm bells.

He was supposed to be cleaning his room, Katie thought, and doing all the usual Saturday chores.

Her own legion of weekend chores—going to the market, the bank, the cleaners, the butcher’s and all the other places she had to do on the weekends simply because there was no time during the week—had been put on temporary hold. She had only two weeks until the Halloween festival, and only this weekend and next to get all the edits done, so something had to be postponed and her chores were it.

So when she spotted Rusty just hanging around the doorway of her office, she immediately knew something was on his mind.

“What’s up, honey?” she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and conversational as she glanced up at him.

“Uh…nothing,” he said with a shrug of his shoulder, shifting from foot to foot.

“How’s your room coming?” she asked and he made a face.

“I’m almost done with it,” he admitted, clearly not pleased with the task.

“Did you enjoy your sleepover in the clubhouse?”

Pleasure swept over his face and he grinned. “Yeah, it was so awesome. Can I have another sleepover? Soon?”

Katie chuckled. “Aren’t you staying at Sean’s tonight?”

“Yeah, so I guess that’s a sleepover, huh?”

“Have you got something else on your mind, honey?”

“Nah….” He shifted, glanced down at his battered tennis shoes, then up at her. “Well, maybe.” He hesitated a moment. “Can I…uh…ask you a question, Ma?”

“You can ask me anything, honey, you know that.” She smiled at him. “I can’t guarantee I’ll always know the answer, but I’ll always tell you the truth.”

Shifting his weight again, he glanced down at his shoes then shoved his hands in the pockets of his ragged jeans. “Do you…uh…think…I mean…you…uh…think…Lucas is nice, isn’t he?” he asked, daring a glance at her from under his lashes.

Warning bells began to hum inside her head but she tried not to show them, wondering where this question was coming from, and more importantly, why Rusty was asking it.

“Yes, honey,” she said carefully. “Lucas is a very nice man. I think you’re very lucky to have him for a buddy, don’t you?” she asked, watching her son’s face carefully.

His grin flashed as he slouched against the door-jamb. “Yeah, real lucky,” he said with a laugh that brightened his green eyes. “All the guys are kinda like jealous, I think just because Lucas is so awesome.” His grin widened. “And he’s
my
buddy,” he said proudly, staking proprietary ownership over Lucas.

“So you think Lucas is awesome,” Katie repeated in relief, nodding at Rusty.

“Yeah. He’s just so cool,” Rusty went on quickly, excitement animating his words. “He knows about all kinds of stuff, Ma. He knows about fishing, and about building stuff like the clubhouse. And he never, like, yells or loses his patience or gets mad when I do something wrong like Sean’s dad.”

“Sean’s dad yells?” Katie asked in surprise and Rusty snorted.

“He’s a champion yeller, Ma,” he admitted with a crooked grin. “But he doesn’t mean it. Sometimes we think he does it just to be funny.” His shoulders moved restlessly again. “Sean’s ma says he just like hearing his own voice.”

Katie smothered a smile. “Yeah, well, maybe you’d better keep that tidbit of information to yourself, honey.” Relieved, she rested her chin on her hand. “So does this mean you like having Lucas as your buddy?”

“Yeah, sure,” Rusty said with another shrug, trying to appear nonchalant, but she was heartily afraid her son had a very bad case of hero worship. Katie sighed. She knew the feeling.

“So then you want Lucas to keep being your buddy? Or would you rather have someone else, honey?”

“No! I don’t want any other buddy, Ma, I only want Lucas for my buddy.”

“Okay, okay,” she said carefully, wondering where all this emotion was coming from. “I was just wondering, honey. I wasn’t certain how well you and Lucas had been getting along. I know it seems like you get along great…” Her voice trailed off and she shrugged. “But sometimes looks can be deceiving.”

“We do get along great, Ma. Honest,” Rusty insisted. “And I don’t want no one else for my buddy. Ever,” Rusty said, crossing his arms across his chest defiantly.

“So you like Lucas, then?” Katie asked carefully.

“Yeah, a lot.” He hesitated, scuffing the toe of his tennis shoe on the floor for a moment before looking up at her, his eyes swimming with some emotion she wasn’t sure she recognized. “Do you…uh…like him, Ma?” His gaze met hers and she realized for some reason this seemed important to him as well.

“Well, Rusty, I don’t think it really matters if I like Lucas or not. He’s your buddy, remember?”

“Yeah, but…I mean you don’t…like…dislike him or anything do you?” he asked with a confused frown.

She laughed, unwilling to admit to her son her feelings for Lucas were at the opposite spectrum of dislike. She was still trying to figure them out for herself. “Yes, honey, I like Lucas,” she admitted. “I think he’s been a very good buddy to you, and he’s also become a friend to me.”

“A friend,” Rusty repeated, trying to keep the disgust out of his voice. Even he knew that if a girl wanted to be your friend it wasn’t good. Sean had said that was like the kiss of death or something. Cow cakes!

“Are you sure nothing is wrong, honey?”

“Nah, it’s just…could I ask you another question?”

“Sure, honey.” Apparently he was taking lessons from her mother and aunt, and was going to get to this in his own good time.

“Well…uh…” His face flushed pink and he went back to staring at his shoes. “The other night…I…uh…kinda…saw…you…uh…kiss Lucas. I wasn’t spying or nuthin’,” he added quickly. “But I…uh…was just…wondering…” His voice trailed off and he shrugged, clearly embarrassed and uncomfortable and not wanting to look at her.

“Oh honey, I’m sorry.” Her heart was knocking again, like a piston this time as the sticky fingers of guilt squeezed at her heart. So that’s what all this was about. She should have known, and been more sensitive.

It had been just her and him for so long that the idea of seeing her with another man—kissing a man—had probably brought up a whole host of emotions Rusty had no idea how to cope with. Maybe he’d been jealous, or confused, or worse, scared. The guilt squeezed harder and Katie cursed herself for not being more sensitive and aware of her son’s feelings.

“Did it upset you to see me kissing Lucas?” she asked softly.

“Nah…it didn’t like…upset me…or nothing,” he admitted, then shrugged again. “Sean’s mom and dad are always kissing,” he revealed with another snort. “It’s like really disgusting and gross.” He made an appropriate face to indicate his displeasure. “But I was just wondering…like, how come you…uh…kissed Lucas?” He lifted his chin and looked at her.

“Well, honey, remember I told you Lucas was my friend,” she began slowly, and he nodded. “Well, honey, sometimes friends kiss.”

“Yuck,” he said, swiping a hand across his mouth in horror.

She laughed. “Yeah, I know honey, but I promise you when you get a little bit older you’re going to meet a girl and you and her are going to become friends, and maybe one day you’re going to want to kiss her.”

“Kiss a girl?” he repeated, his eyes going wide in utter horror. “I’d rather kiss a rabid rat,” he said, clutching his stomach and making gagging sounds. Katie laughed.

“I promise one day you’ll change your mind,” she assured him and he shook his head furiously.

“Uh-uh, I’m never kissing a girl and I don’t want any girls for friends, either.” He paused for a moment and she knew he was thinking. “So, Ma, kissing Lucas was kind of just like when you used to kiss Mr. Riley?”

“Mr. Riley?” Katie repeated, confused, then it dawned on her. “Oh, you mean the maintenance man who always came to fix stuff when we lived in Madison?”

“Yeah, that Mr. Riley.”

Katie smiled. Mr. Riley was sixty if he was a day, and a sweetheart. He was the maintenance man at the university, but did side jobs to supplement his Social Security income. Except no matter what he fixed for her, he refused to take any money. Katie had adored him and kissed him on the cheek every time he fixed something for her.

“Yeah, honey, I guess you could say it was kind of like when I kissed Mr. Riley. He was my friend, too.” It wasn’t quite the same thing, she realized, but if this answer would ease Rusty’s concerns, it would have to do for the moment.

How could she explain her relationship with Lucas and her feelings when she wasn’t certain she understood it herself?

“Yeah, okay,” Rusty said, suddenly looking dejected. “I’m gonna go finish my room,” he said, turning from the doorway and leaving Katie feeling as if she’d somehow gotten all the answers on a big test wrong.

“Rusty?”

He turned back. “Yeah?”

“Is there anything else that’s bothering you?”

He thought about it for a minute. “Do I got a tie?”

“A tie?” Katie repeated, blinking at him in confusion. “You mean a tie like you wear when you wear a white shirt?”

“Yeah.”

“Sure you do, honey. It’s in the bottom drawer in your dresser, right hand side. Why?”

He shrugged. “Sean’s ma said she’d take us to the pancake breakfast tomorrow morning, but she says we gotta wear stupid, dorky ties to church.”

“Sounds like a good idea to me,” she said, earning a face from her son. “Okay, you go finish your room while I try to finish these edits.” She glanced at her watch. “I have to be at the seniors’ dance around five thirty, so I’ll drop you off at Sean’s on the way, okay?”

He shrugged. “Yeah, sure.”

“And Rusty?”

“Yeah?”

“I love you, honey.”

“Love you, too,” he mumbled as he bolted toward his room, leaving Katie staring after him.

Boys and men should come with a handbook, Katie thought with a weary sigh. It would certainly make a woman’s life simpler.

“Did you ask her?” Sean demanded of Rusty later that afternoon. “Huh? Did you?” Huddled together on the floor of Sean’s bedroom, they’d shut the door to make certain they had privacy so they could discuss their latest project.

“I asked her,” Rusty admitted dejectedly, slumping back against Sean’s unmade bed. There were two twin beds in the room, both unmade, separated by a small nightstand with a lamp. The twin beds came in handy for sleepovers and for piling things on when Sean didn’t feel like cleaning his room—which was often.

“So what did she say?”

“She said Lucas is just…a friend,” Rusty admitted, trying not to scowl.

“A friend? She said that?” he asked in disbelief. “That Lucas was just…a
friend?
”

Rusty nodded dismally.

“Bummer,” Sean slumped back against the spare bed before turning to his friend. “Did you ask her about kissing him?”

Rusty nodded, then shrugged. “Yeah. My ma said that sometimes friends…kiss friends.”

Sean’s eyes went wide in disbelief. “Get outta here, really?”

Rusty nodded dismally. “Really.”

“Well, I ain’t never kissing any of my friends,” Sean said, making a face as he shook his head feverishly. “That’s just gross.”

Rusty sighed. “I know.”

“So what are we going to do?”

Rusty shook his head, then shrugged. “Dunno.”

Crossing his arms across his chest, Sean stared hard at his friend. “Well, we gotta do something if you want Lucas to be your dad, because it doesn’t look so good right now. If your ma likes him just as a friend, maybe she just…you know…needs to spend more time with him or something.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Rusty said with a scowl.

“Hey, I got an idea,” Sean said, brightening. “A really good idea, and it’ll probably even work.” He frowned. “Maybe.”

“Really?” Rusty said hopefully.

“Yeah.” Sean grinned, revealing several missing front teeth. “Really.” He motioned Rusty closer so they wouldn’t be overheard, then bent to whisper in Rusty’s ear. “Here’s what we gotta do.”

Cooper’s Cove had an active and vital seniors’ club that participated in a great many of the town’s activities while hosting quite a few of their own.

In spite of their numerous activities, most of which were primarily fund-raisers for a seniors’ center, the seniors held most of their functions in the gymnasium of the grammar school or the basement of the church until enough funds could be raised or secured to build their own center.

After dropping Rusty off at Sean’s, Katie headed over to the dance. By the time she found a parking space, grabbed her notepad and headed into the school, the dance was already underway.

At the door right outside the gymnasium, Francis Cushing, the longtime treasurer of the seniors’ club, sat taking tickets. A retired concert violinist with six grown children, at eighty-five Francis was still active, and still played in a quartet of musicians every week. For as long as Katie could remember, Francis had been giving free music lessons to any child who wanted them.

Unfortunately, Katie’s own musical aspirations had lasted less than a week before Francis kindly and gently told her mother that Katie couldn’t carry a tune even if she had an empty suitcase.

So much for her budding musical career, Katie mused, but she’d been secretly thrilled because it freed her up after school so she could spend more time at the newspaper office—her real love.

“Evening, Katherine,” Francis said with a smile. “Now you know you don’t have to pay admission, not while you’re working the dance for the newspaper.”