Breathe (32 page)

the condiments, stopped off for a basket to carry their load, and headed to the aisle

where he"d left Lincoln. He rounded the corner and almost dropped the basket full

of groceries.

At the other end of the aisle was Emily Shaw, standing motionless, staring up

at Lincoln.

Jay took a shaky step, then another. Lincoln spotted him first. The look on the

man"s face was pure panic. Of course he knew who she was. He"d seen her at the

courthouse for the arraignment and sentencing, neither of which Jay had gone to.

Jay quickened his pace. “Emily?”

She turned to him. “Jay.” There was no anger in her voice. “I tried to catch

you, but you were running in the other direction. I figured I"d wait with your…” She

gestured to Lincoln but didn"t look at him. “I didn"t know the two of you were

friends.”

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The basket slipped from Jay"s hand and fell to the floor, tipping over, the

ketchup bottle smashing the buns, the chips crunching underneath.

Emily held out a hand to Lincoln. “Emily Shaw.”

Lincoln looked at her hand but didn"t move. He raised his gaze to Jay, his eyes

asking for something. For help? For permission?

Jay nodded, and Lincoln shook her hand.

“Lincoln McCaw.”

The name hung in the air, like a new melody for an old song. Jay didn"t want

to hear the hatred and disgust of the original. Not any longer. That was written for

a man who didn"t exist.

Emily watched Lincoln. Her eyes moved rapidly, scanning his face. Jay wanted

to demand she stop. She"d never find what she looked for, not in Lincoln.

The silence continued on. Oddly, Jay couldn"t break it. Finally, she faced him.

Without speaking, he pleaded his case, pleaded for her understanding. She broke

her stare and glimpsed the items in the basket at his feet.

“You"re off to have lunch. I won"t keep you. It was nice to see you, Jay.” She

stared at Lincoln again, and her mouth curved up at the corners. Jay had never

seen her smile like that. Her smiles were usually poised, perfect, contrived. This one

was sad, with a hint of something else. Confusion? Resignation?

She dropped her head and rounded the corner for the next aisle.

“She knew.” Lincoln slumped and sat on the edge of the beer cooler.

“Yeah. Before you said your name, I think. After, for sure.”

“I recognized her right off. She just walked up to me after you left.”

“What did she say?”

“Nothing. Until you got here.” Lincoln glanced at the stack of beers inside the

cooler beside him. “I expected… I don"t know. More.”

“Me too.” Jay didn"t want to think on what that meant or what Emily had

thought about seeing him and Lincoln together. The time for truths was long

overdue.

How could he explain to everyone what he wanted? How was he supposed to

convince his mom to leave Lincoln alone? How could he tell her he had no intention

of keeping their deal?

* * *

“Yeah?”

Adam stood in the hallway between the living room and the kitchen. “Can I

ask you a question?”

Lincoln tossed the newspaper he"d been reading onto the coffee table. “Of

course.”

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165

“When did you know you were gay?”

So much for reading the sports section. Lincoln gathered the rest of the paper

from the couch and tossed it onto the table. “About your age.” Talking to the kids

about sex wasn"t something he wanted to do, but he wouldn"t lie to them. There was

too much important shit for them to know. If they wouldn"t ask Nancy, then he"d

give them the facts. He just wished he had more knowledge on the sex-with-women

thing. Then again, Adam wasn"t asking him about women, was he?

Adam sat beside Lincoln and said, “Did you get beat up?”

“Once or twice.”

“They must have been big guys.”

Lincoln laughed. “Sometimes it"s not about size. It"s about how many. There

something you want to talk about, kid?”

Adam pulled his cell out of his back pocket, scrolled through a couple of

messages, then flipped it shut and tossed it onto the coffee table. Lincoln had all

day. He"d just wait until Adam could work up the nerve to get out whatever he

wanted to say.

“Yeah, I guess.” Adam crossed his arms over his chest and sank farther into

the couch. “The other day I was arguing with this guy Troy after gym class about

dirt track racing. He said the rules for each series—weight limits, the engine, the

tires—are all the same. And that"s bullshit. They"re all different. Everyone knows

that.” He bit the side of his thumbnail.

“You had it right.”

“I knew it, and he kept arguing with me. Then this scrawny kid I"ve never

talked to before backed me up, said my uncle was a driver, and I"d know what I was

talking about. Troy and his friends got pissed. They pushed the kid down and

kicked at him. Bloodied him up good.”

“Not just because he agreed with you?”

“No.”

“"Cause he"s gay?”

“I don"t know. They called him a fag. Everybody calls him a fag.”

“What"d you do?”

Adam sat taller. “Nothing! Honest!”

“But maybe you should have?”

He was quiet for a minute. “You mean, I should"ve helped him? But then they"d

think I was a…”

“Fag?”

“Sorry.” Adam slouched onto the couch again, his arms folded in a pissed-off

pose Lincoln had used plenty of times. The kid wasn"t pissed at anyone but himself.

He shook his head. “I guess I did the wrong thing.”

“Only you can answer that.”

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“I guess…someone wanted to help me, and when he needed me, all I thought

about was myself.” He threw his arms in the air, and his hands landed on his thighs

with a smack. “I just didn"t want to get suspended again. Mom would"ve killed me.

They might"ve expelled me if I got into another fight.”

“I understand that. But sometimes you have to do what you know is right,

despite the consequences.”

“Yeah, I get it.”

“You never said what that first fight was about.”

He shrugged and sank back to the couch again. “It wasn"t a big deal.”

“Must have been important enough to fight about.”

“Someone just said some shit to me.” He looked away.

Just as Lincoln had guessed. Maybe Adam hadn"t changed all that much after

all. “About me?”

Adam nodded. “He said since you raced and knew what you were doing, they

should"ve sent you to prison for the rest of your life.” He faced Lincoln. “Which is

bullshit. I looked it up online. Most people don"t serve any time at all. It"s only

"cause you raced.”

“Yeah. But I don"t want you fighting over me, no matter what.”

“Thought you said some things are worth fighting for? Isn"t family one of

them?”

The kid was also smarter than he let most people know. Lincoln nodded and

tapped the kid"s knee with the side of his fist. “Anyone who means something to you

is worth it.”

Adam rose and crossed the room. He stopped beside the couch. “Jay seems

cool.”

Lincoln laughed. “He is.”

“He"s uh, kinda young.”

“Yeah?”

“Uh…duh. He"s closer to my age than yours.”

“Hey!” Lincoln grabbed the sports section off the coffee table and tossed it at

Adam who successfully dodged the newspaper.

“I"m just sayin".” Adam laughed as he headed for the hall again.

“Adam.”

He stopped. “Yeah?”

“It"s good you see your mistake. Mistakes help you figure out what kind of man

you want to be.”

Lincoln almost missed the next words as Adam turned away. “I want to be like

you.”

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Damn, if that didn"t hit him in the heart. He"d never been more thankful he"d

agreed to live there. Maybe Nancy was right. Maybe the kids didn"t need a father.

Maybe Jay had been right too. Maybe Lincoln could be what they needed.

But Adam had said something that hit a nerve too. Lincoln should be more like

the kid. Not vice versa.

Time to face the truth.

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Chapter Twenty-four

Jay sat in the living room of the Shaws" home, Stuart Shaw on the sofa

opposite him. Neither man spoke.

Magazines and newspapers were piled into a large, uneven stack beside the

couch. A sewing basket sat on a table beside a chair. Several blouses were wadded

up next to the basket. The room no longer smelled of lemon furniture polish. It

reeked of dust. And sweat? A binder lay on the coffee table. A football playbook open

to a printed diagram of a play. Maybe Stuart"s entire college team had sweated on

the pages while they huddled around the notebook, memorizing the play for their

next game. Funny how the book was sitting out even though Jay had called ahead

for the visit.

Not funny was what else was sitting out. A framed photo of Katie at her high

school graduation. Jay hadn"t seen that picture in over a year.

“Sorry about the house,” Stuart said. “She"s finally grieving. Really grieving.”

Was that a good turn of events? Jay was doing his best to move on, and Emily

Shaw had decided it was time to lose it. How could Jay explain what she"d seen the

other day?

She entered the room with a tray of coffee cups and gave a slight smile as she

passed one to Jay, but the smile faded with a deep breath as she sat on the couch

beside her husband. They looked battered. Wrinkled. Hard. When had they aged?

Emily had crow"s-feet forming at the corners of her eyes. She wore dress slacks and

a blouse, both wrinkled like she"d worn the same clothes all week. Stuart had fared

worse. His eyes were squinted to slits and deep lines crossed his forehead. There

were also signs of a thinning hairline. How had Jay not noticed the changes in them

before?

Silence filled the room as they drank their coffee. Jay didn"t know what to say,

and the Shaws, it seemed, didn"t either.

But Jay had to speak. For them. For himself. For Lincoln.

“I feel bad I haven"t visited more. By myself.”

“We"re glad you"re here now,” Emily said. “Aren"t we?”

Stuart didn"t answer but gave a slight nod.

“I was surprised to meet your friend at the grocery store,” she added. “I wasn"t

aware you knew him.”

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“I imagine not.” The words left Jay"s mouth harsher than he intended. He

didn"t want to be angry anymore, didn"t want there to be only grief that held them

together. A part of him didn"t want to lose the Shaws in his life. They had given him

Katie. He owed them something.

“Does he know who you are?” Emily asked.

“He does.”

“It seemed… Well, you were touching him. And the way he looked at you… It

seemed you were more than—”

“What?” Stuart"s eyes shot open wide.

She didn"t answer him.

“Emily?”

She swung her gaze to her husband, then back to Jay. “It seemed like you were

intimate. Like lovers.”

“What?” Stuart"s eyes widened as he glared at Jay. “You"re gay?”

Jay opened his mouth to explain, and the other man cut him off.

“What was our daughter to you?”

“I loved her. I"ll always love her.”

“But you"re sleeping with this man?” Stuart teetered on the edge of the sofa,

his body looming large before Jay. Even with Todd"s warning, he hadn"t believed

that Stuart Shaw might actually hit him. Stupid. The man spent his career

slamming into people for money and now trained the next generation to do the

same.

“It"s more than that,” Jay said.

Emily set her cup and saucer on the table. The loud clink of porcelain to wood

didn"t match the graceful movement of her hands. “It looked like it might be.”

Odd how the delicate pink and white fine china hadn"t broken with the force

she"d used to set it down. Even stranger how Jay"s life seemed more fragile than the

china. Was he going to lose everything to be with Lincoln? “I want to keep seeing

him. I want a future with him.”

Her jaw dropped. Stuart stood and strode across the room to the large picture

window. A flock of birds sitting in the bush outside took flight as he drew near. Jay

stared at the man"s tense back. He had expected anger, yelling, disappointment.

Not the silence.

Emily"s calm whisper startled him.

“It"s that serious?”

Jay looked her way. “I"d like it to be.”

“I"m not sure—” She breathed deep and picked up the coffee cup and saucer.

She raised the cup in front of her, but didn"t take a sip. “I"m not sure what to say,

Jay. I want to understand, but—”

Stuart scoffed, his back still to the room.

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Emily set the cup onto the saucer and lowered them to the table, the move

more refined than earlier. She spun the cup until the handle stuck out at a perfect

right angle. The precise gesture combined with the thin layer of dust on the coffee