Bending Under Pressure (25 page)

K
eelan woke me up at five this morning to take me home. I promptly fell back asleep until eleven. Then, I rushed to get ready for a day with my dad. First, we’re going out for lunch and then to play tennis together, just like old times. Mom still seems wary whenever Dad is mentioned and I can’t blame her. I’m the same, but I’ve been trying to ignore it. At least, Walter is his usual calm, optimistic self.

My stomach is in knots though because Dad is coming
here
to pick me up. He insisted. I bolt off the couch when I hear the knocking on the front door. Walter chuckles, and it oddly helps with my nerves. I swing the door open. Relief tumbles through me because he showed. I’m still worried he won’t keep his word, but he did.

“Hey, Dad. Ready? I just have to grab my racquet from my room.” I
knew
I was forgetting something. Maybe that’s why Walter chuckled because he knew it, too.

“Can I see it?”

I frown. “My racquet?” I mean, I know it’s new, but he saw me use it when he showed up unannounced at my game.

Dad laughs. “No, your room.”

“Oh.” I glance over my shoulder, seeing Mom on her recliner. She nods that it’s okay. “Sure. Come on.”

He steps into the house. Before following me, he pauses to say, “Hey, Rita. Walter.”

They respond with a hello, and I grab his hand to tug him forward. It’s awkward enough having him in the house; I don’t want him chit-chatting with them. Should it be awkward to have him here? Will it get easier?

“You’ve grown a bookcase,” Dad comments as I grab my things from the bed.

“Yep. Walter said he might turn that wall into a bookcase since I have them lining the wall anyway. I would probably have more room that way, too.”

Dad laughs. Not because I’m funny, but because he obviously can’t picture Walter doing something like that. “Walter can do that himself?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t tell me how he was going to do it.” I want to say yes. I definitely don’t want to say the truth; that no, Walter said he would be hiring someone. He doesn’t know anything about doing something like that. My middle ground white lie answer sounds better. It’s odd that I find myself defending Walter to my dad. “Let’s go.”

He needs to get out of here before I start second-guessing all my positive thoughts about him. He doesn’t get to think badly of Walter or make assumptions about him. Yes, I realize I did the same thing, but I didn’t cheat on my mom and break her heart either. Well, I may have hurt her some with my reactions and behaviors. Either way, I’m not the bad guy when Dad is involved. He wins that title.

Remembering what he did has me on edge as we drive to Elsie’s. Dad didn’t want to drive out of town, just to come back for the courts and to take me home.

“I can’t believe your mother would move to the backwoods country,” he complains as we walk into Elsie’s.

I want to snap back that I can’t believe my father would cheat on my mother, but I don’t. Mrs. Elsie appears with a smile and leads us to a booth.

“How are you doing, Haley?” she asks.

“Good. How about you? Been feeling pretty well?”

Mrs. Elsie rolls her eyes. “Don’t turn into my husband, who has been on my rear making sure I feel fine.” She faces my dad to end the conversation. “What would you like to drink?”

“Tea, please.”

She walks away, still looking light on her feet, so I figure she must be back to normal and feeling well. I don’t glance over the menu because I know what I want.

“Don’t need to look?” I ask Dad. He clasps his hands together on top of the menu and brings his eyes to mine after looking around the room.

“No.” He clears his throat. “I want to talk to you about something.”

My stomach sinks. My gut is screaming, yelling, and throwing a tantrum that this will be
bad
. I swallow hard as he reaches into his back pocket. He pulls a folded card-stock type paper from his wallet. He hands it to me and I reluctantly take it, opening it. Somehow, I manage to withhold my gasp. All I can focus on is the wedding bells at the top of the page.

He’s marrying her?

He’s inviting me to their wedding?

“I’d love to have you there, Haley. I know I haven’t been the best father since your mother and I split, and I’m sorry. I didn’t know how to face you, to tell you.” My hands are shaking, so I drop the invitation on the table, keeping my head down while lowering my hands into my lap. “Tonya makes me happier than I’ve ever been.”
Happier than when we were a family?
“I want you to come to our wedding. I think you would really like Tonya and Carly, too. Will you come?”

When I lift my head, there’s so much hope shining in his eyes. This doesn’t make sense to me. He went from not being around me to inviting me their wedding? In one month? Am I the last to be invited because weren’t these things supposed to go out like months ago?

“Will you?” he repeats.

“Yes, of course. I’d love to,” I lie. Maybe it’s not a lie. I don’t know. The most abundant emotion is shock. I’ll have to sort through the rest later.

A grin pops onto his face, which makes me feel slightly better about my decision. To go. To his wedding. With the woman he cheated on my mother with. Will there be a moment where I can feel sick? How am I supposed to tell my mom what I just agreed to?

“Well, I need to clear it with Mom first,” I hastily add. Based on the date and time, she probably won’t want me to drive home that late.

“She shouldn’t have a problem with it. If she does, let me know, and I’ll talk to her.” That’s the last thing I want to happen.

But I nod and tell Mrs. Elsie my order when she returns to our table. For the rest of the time, spent as Dad tells me all about his new family. Apparently, Tonya is a saint and Carly is an angel. Tonya does volunteer work, helps with any activities Carly is involved in, which is a lot, and somehow manages to be the perfect housewife while working a full-time job. It seems like Dad obviously cares about them and admires them. I just wonder if he speaks the same way to them about me.

By the end of lunch, he’s in high spirits, and I’m still all over the place. I’m beyond ready for us to play tennis. Dad’s phone beeps as we walk to his car. Inside, I get that bad feeling again while he texts whoever it is.

“Sorry, Haley. I need to get back. Rain check on the game?”

“Yeah, sure. Can you drop me off at the courts anyway?”

“Of course.”

Mrs. Elsie’s isn’t too far from the courts, big surprise. Dad drops me off and leaves with a promise to come back soon for our match. I plop onto a bench after he drives off; I pull out the invitation he made sure I kept. A freaking wedding. I fold it up, drop it into my tennis bag, and pull out my racquet as well as a few balls. Then, I text Keelan.

Me: Ever play tennis?

Keelan: A few times with Jess and Cameron. She killed us.

Me: Haha! Want to play with me?

Keelan: Yeah. Give me a few and I’ll meet you there. Or do you need me to pick you up?

Me: Already here.

I begin rallying with the wall. Ten minutes later when Keelan arrives, I’m no closer to figuring out how I feel. We begin an easy-flow rally and I’m impressed with Keelan’s skill. He can at least hit the ball back to me.

“What happened with your dad, Hales?” he asks, his voice carrying across the court.

“I thought you might not have remembered.”

“Need more time before you vent to me?”

I grunt as I return the ball a bit too hard and fast for Keelan to hit it back to me. “He’s getting married to her and asked me to come. Something came up, so we only had lunch; we were supposed to play.”

“Did y’all used to play a lot?”

“He’s the one who taught me how to play. Why are you avoiding the fact that he’s marrying her?” He misses another ball, so I serve with the last ball I have in my shorts.

“I don’t know what to say.”

Well, I guess that’s a good answer. We rally for a bit before I miss his out of bounds ball. We take a small break to pick up the balls before starting again.

“Are you going to the wedding? When is it?” Keelan asks.

“Yes. Next month.” I pause, standing upright as an idea hits me. Keelan’s return bounces right past me. “Will you go with me?”

“What? Seriously?”

“I can’t go by myself and it’s not like I can ask my mom to go with me. Please?”

Keelan hesitates. Can’t say I blame him. Who wants to go to a wedding? Not us, obviously.

“How far is it?”

“Two hours give or take,” I reply.

“I’ll ask my mom.”

“Really?” Keelan nods, and I grin. “I knew there was a reason I liked you.”

“A
re you going to tell me what happened with Jess?” This is the first time I’ve had a chance to speak to Cameron since we left him with Jess yesterday. He spent all day with her. Once I got back from playing tennis with Haley and saw he was home, I went straight to his room. He’s lying on his bed playing video games and I take a seat in the chair.

Cam keeps his eyes focused on the TV. “She’s going through some stuff.”

“Stuff that’s not related to what happened with y’all?”

“Yep.” He doesn’t add anything else for a minute or so. “Sorry about blowing up on you. The mess with Jess was stressing me out, and I took it out on you.”

“Didn’t have anything to do with you not knowing where you came from?”

He clenches his jaw. “No.”

“Sure about that?”

“Leave it alone, Keelan.”

He obviously isn’t going to spill his guts to me. We sit in silence for a bit while I watch him play the game. I’m tempted to push the issue some more, but decide against it. I don’t want to create problems with my brother when I don’t have to.

“I’m going to ask Mom and Dad if I can change my last name to Sanderson.”

My head snaps toward him. Change his name?

“Just wanted to let you know,” he adds.

“We can do that?” Changing my last name from Moore to Sanderson never occurred to me before.

“Yeah, I looked it up. Mom and Dad would just have to fill out some forms. That’s pretty much it.”

It sounds so easy. Why didn’t we think of this sooner? I’d love to be a Sanderson, to seal myself into my family even more. “I want to do it too. When are we going to talk to them?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Right now?” I ask, eager to get the process started, even if it’s just by asking our parents.

“Sure.”

We both hop up. I’m not the only one who is excited. We bound down the stairs and into the kitchen where our parents are cooking dinner together.

“We need to talk to y’all about something,” Cameron begins.

“Oh, dear. This can’t be good. Brace yourself, John,” Mom says, making Dad laugh.

He places a lid on whatever’s cooking on the stove and comes to stand next to Mom at the counter, where she’s preparing a salad. “All right. Let’s hear it.”

Cameron looks to me, I nod, and he takes a deep breath. “We want to change our last names to Sanderson.” Their eyes widen with surprise. “If that’s okay with y’all,” he quickly adds.

Dad’s gaze is locked on Cameron. Based on that and his next question, I know that Cam’s outburst had to do with him not knowing where he came from. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” he replies without hesitation.

Mom’s eyes become watery. “We’d love to give you boys our last name. We wanted to when we adopted you, but we didn’t want to confuse you. How long have y’all be thinking about this?”

“Long enough to be sure,” Cameron answers.

She hesitates, but I’m not sure why. Until she speaks. “Let’s wait a month, okay? I just want y’all to be sure. We’d need to look into what we’d have to do because y’all are minors still. It may not seem like a big transition, but it will be. You’ll have to get accustomed to writing a different last name, answering to it, and things like that. If in a month, you’re still absolutely sure, then we’ll start the paperwork.”

“We’re not going to change our minds,” Cam says before I can.

“We want this,” I add.

“So do we,” Mom tells us. “But we’re still going to wait. You both have a lot going on right now, and we don’t want that influencing your decision to do this.”

Cam opens his mouth to argue, but I nudge him with my elbow and say, “Okay. We can do that.” If he keeps arguing with her, he’s going to prove her point and make her think he’s only doing it because of how he’s struggling more with all of his unknowns.

“Yeah, we can,” he agrees.

“Good. Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.” Dad returns to the stove, which smells like spaghetti, and Mom finishes getting the salad ready.