“Who is this?” Cassie demanded as she sat up.
“Um, me—” the high voice said. The caller cleared his throat. “Matt.”
“Very funny,” Cassie said sarcastically, though she smiled into the phone. “What has you calling so late?”
“I was thinking.”
“That’s always good,” Cassie prompted, her smile widening. “About what?”
“You. Me. Us. What Asher and Austin said at dinner tonight.” The last words tumbled out of Matt’s mouth, as if he’d wanted to hurry and clarify what his first words had meant.
Cassie was glad. Those first words had sent her heart racing and plummeting at the same time. There can be no us. But then Matt had to realize that. He knew she was married. He’d driven her home from visiting Devon tonight, hadn’t he?
“Asher and Austin said a few things at dinner. What were you referring to?” Cassie asked, her own tone cautious.
“Well, definitely not the part about watching PBS.”
“That was sort of funny,” she admitted. “Or it would have been under different circumstances.”
“Yeah, I know,” Matt said. “I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make light of anything with your husband. I’ve been thinking about him, actually, and about Noah and about what my boys said about sharing their dad, sharing me. Then I was thinking about the way you really helped them both by allowing us to be a part of your soccer team.”
“Sounds like a lot of thinking,” Cassie said, still unsure where he was going with all that. She turned sideways on the bed and lay back, allowing her still-damp hair to hang over the side.
“Well—” Matt paused. “The sharing parents thing is a good idea, for both of us, all of us,” he clarified. “We could help each other with our boys, if you want to, that is.” He sounded suddenly unsure, and Cassie felt an emotion she couldn’t quite put a name to as she imagined the expression on his face. He was probably trying to look nonchalant about the whole thing, as he’d attempted when he’d told her that his wife had died. Why did guys always think they had to hide their feelings?
“What I’m trying to say,” Matt continued. “Is that, if it’s all right with you, I’d like to be friends.”
A nugget of warmth stole its way into her heart with his suggestion. That he’d felt the need to formally ask her or to get her approval seemed almost chivalrous. Cassie touched a finger to her lips, as if to contain the tiny bubble of happiness his words had called forth.
“You still there?” Matt asked. “Is that asking too much, the being friends thing, I mean?”
“Not too much at all,” Cassie hurried to assure him as the warmth that had begun in her heart overflowed to the rest of her. “In fact, we already are.”
Matt pushed Asher’s feet aside as he settled on the end of the couch next to his sleeping boys. He’d been carrying both at once when he got home, and it had been easier to deposit them on the sofa than to walk all the way to their bedroom. It didn’t appear they were losing any sleep over it.
He opened his laptop, propped it on his knees, and waited for the internet search bar to appear. As soon as it did, he typed “PVS” and hit “enter.”
Potomac Valley Swim Club appeared at the top of the screen. Nope. PVS Pest Control. Not that either. He continued to scroll down. Passport and Visa services. PVS Specification and Verification. No and no. Matt didn’t know what the latter was about, but it didn’t sound like a medical condition. About three fourths of the way down the page, he found what he was looking for. Persistent Vegetative State. He clicked on the link and began reading.
An hour and a half and nine websites later, he leaned his head back and closed his eyes, feeling drained and stressed simply from reading about patients like Cassie’s husband. He’d learned that they could breathe on their own but received all nourishment— as Cassie had mentioned— through a feeding tube. They had periods when their eyes were opened and others when they were closed, but a PVS patient’s eyes never tracked or followed anything.
Cassie’s husband never looks at her anymore, yet he’s awake, sort of. How freaky that must be. Matt tried but couldn’t quite block the image of Jenna’s lifeless body— but with her eyes open, staring past him— that came unbidden to his mind. At least that was something he hadn’t had to endure. He couldn’t imagine how Cassie coped with that and everything else.
He was shocked to read that there were between one and a half and two million TBI, traumatic brain injury, patients in the United States every year. Most of those were from vehicle accidents, but a few— like Cassie’s husband, Matt suspected— were from gunshot wounds.
Closing all but the original page he’d referenced, Matt opened a second window and typed “Officer Webb” into the search bar. Images of several different uniformed men appeared at the top. Matt wondered which, if any, of the men was Cassie’s husband. She’d mentioned his name a few times tonight, but Matt couldn’t remember what it was now.
He started scanning the articles listed below the photos and was further disturbed to find stories about five different officers with the last name Webb who had each been shot in the line of duty. Four had been killed, but the last, Officer Devon Webb of the Sacramento Police Department, had been shot and critically injured a little over six years ago while responding to a domestic violence call. Matt read the entire article and learned that Devon’s partner had been killed during that same call. Another link led to the officer down memorial page for the partner, but Matt couldn’t find any additional information on Devon, though this article had been written about two months after the shooting.
Matt stared at Devon’s picture on the screen. The fallen officer had pages of accolades and memories written about him, while Devon Webb— still living, but not with any kind of quality of life— seemed pretty much forgotten. Matt hoped, for Cassie’s sake, and for Noah’s, that the city or state was providing her with some kind of benefits or compensation, and that her husband had been honored in some way for his sacrifice.
He thought about her little apartment, way out on that lonely road and above a rickety barn. Whatever help she was getting, if any, didn’t appear to be much. Matt reminded himself that he needed to follow through with paying for Noah’s dental bill, and he’d figure out whatever it was that was wrong with her car and get it fixed. He’d do some of the things he should have been doing for Jenna, things he’d done the first few years of their marriage before he’d become caught up in the life of an NBA commentator.
Matt closed his laptop and stretched. He felt tired enough that he might actually be able to sleep tonight. But he was also filled with purpose. Tomorrow wouldn’t just be about getting through another Saturday with the boys. It would be about doing something good for someone, and then having some genuine fun with Austin and Asher. After the soccer game, he’d take them back to Ikeda’s to get that burger he’d promised, then maybe they’d go to a park, and after that, he’d take them to get ice cream again. This time, they’d buy chocolates, too.
“Dad, can you pour me some milk?” Something cold and wet touched Matt’s arm, and he jerked upright a split second before milk sloshed from the open carton onto his arm and the bed.
“Asher!” Matt jumped up, grabbed the carton from Asher’s hand and marched into the kitchen. “Who opened this?” he demanded, staring at the only possible culprit; Austin sat at the table, busily slurping down an overflowing bowl of Cheerios.
“Haven’t I told you not to open the milk yourself?” Matt stared at the mangled top of the carton. It looked like someone had taken a chainsaw to it, with a quarter of the side ripped off. If most of the milk hadn’t already spilled all over his bed, it certainly would have gone bad, sitting in the fridge, unsealed as this one was.
“You said not to wake you up on Saturdays.” Austin jammed the spoon into his mouth again.
“Next time wait for me to get up,” Matt grumbled. He crossed to the table and poured what was left of the milk into Asher’s bowl. So much for not goin
g to the store for another week.
“We were hungry,” Asher said.
“You’re always hungry. That doesn’t mean you have to eat breakfast at six a.m.” As Matt crossed the kitchen to wash the residue milk from his hand and arm, his eyes strayed to the clock propped against the wall on the counter. Nine fifteen? No way.
He pulled up the blinds covering the window over the sink. Sunlight streamed in, over the apartment building next to theirs, confirming how late he’d slept. Serves me right. He let the blinds go and brought a hand up to massage the back of his neck. He supposed this was what he got for staying up, searching the internet half the night. What he’d learned had been important. It— along with his new resolve— came rushing back. Cassie’s husband. Cassie. Her car. The soccer game.
He ran to his room to pull on jeans and a t-shirt. The game was at eleven. If he hurried, there might still be time for him to figure out what was wrong with her car. He called to the boys to finish eating quickly, then rummaged through the pile of clothes on their floor, searching for the soccer jersey Cassie had given Austin. After a good two minutes of pawing through clothes, some clean and others not so much, he gave up and went to the kitchen.
“We’re leaving in two minutes.” Matt took a slice of bread from the bag he’d just bought the previous night. As with the cereal and milk, the loaf had already been pilfered by little hands, and several of the slices were smashed together. “Both of you get your shoes on, and find your soccer shirt, Austin.”
“I’m wearing it, Dad,” Austin threw back at him. “I had a game last night, remember?”
Matt glanced over his shoulder. “Right.” He did a double take. Austin was wearing a lot more than the shirt. Asher’s dinner was still smeared across the front of the jersey, partially covering the white lettering. Matt braced his hands on either side of the sink, leaned his head down and cursed silently. “Come here.”
Austin drug his feet across the linoleum to Matt’s side.
“Hands up,” Matt commanded. Austin obeyed, and Matt pulled the shirt over his head. “Go find something else to wear while I wash this.” Austin slumped off toward his room while Matt turned the shirt right side out and inspected the damage. Both boys had been asleep when they got home last night, so he hadn’t bothered with brushing teeth or getting into pajamas. They hadn’t even slept in their beds, but on the couch where Matt had deposited them, though he had grabbed a couple of blankets and covered them up.
He wasn’t entirely negligent, though he felt a bit hopeless as he stared at the shirt. He took it to the sink and ran it under the water, then squirted some dish soap on it and rubbed it together. Maybe that would do the trick. After a few minutes of brisk scrubbing, he rinsed the whole thing then wrung it out, hoping the stains were gone but not bothering to look. It was what it was at this point, and the jersey would just have to dry on the way.
The clock now said 9:31. An hour and a half until the game. He hoped whatever was wrong with Cassie’s car was something easily fixed. If not, he’d have to pick her up instead of returning her car, up and running, as he’d hoped to.
“Let’s go, let’s go.” He marched the boys in front of him. While they buckled into their booster seats in back, Matt started the truck, rolled the passenger side window down a crack, fitted Austin’s wet shirt in it, then rolled the window up all the way.
“We forgot drinks,” Austin whined.
“Nope. Got that covered,” Matt said, feeling pretty good about his parenting skills at the moment. When they’d had the scrimmage with Cassie and Noah, he’d noticed she kept water bottles in her trunk. He’d bought a case of them himself last night and left them in the truck bed. “We’ve got enough water to last the rest of the season.”
As they drove to Ikeda’s, Noah’s jersey flapping in the breeze, Matt filled the boys in on his plans for the day. He was pleasantly surprised that they both liked the idea of trying to fix Cassie’s car for her. Once he’d pulled his truck close to her Nissan and had both hoods up, Matt let the boys get out, and he showed them the jumper cables and how to attach them.
“It’s like magic,” Asher exclaimed a few minutes later when the Nissan’s engine finally sputtered, then gradually grew stronger.
Matt transferred the boys’ booster seats, the water bottles, and the nearly-dry-but-still-stained jersey to Cassie’s car, then locked his truck before driving the Nissan to the auto parts store. The diagnostic there showed the battery was dead, so Matt purchased another— the top of the line, with the longest life and warranty. He installed it, and by 10:23, they were on their way to Cassie’s barn.
“Who wants to beep the horn?” Matt asked as they pulled up.
“Me!” Austin and Asher answered together, already scrambling from their seats. After both boys had hit the horn no less than three times each, Cassie and Noah appeared at the top of the stairs that were even more noticeably dilapidated in daylight.
Matt stood beside her car, his hands jammed in his pockets, with what he was sure was a goofy smile on his face as he looked up at her. He liked this role, the knight in shining armor— or at least the guy who rescued her car. He really wished he’d tried helping a damsel in distress out much earlier— with his wife.
“My car!” Cassie came bounding down the stairs, her ponytail flopping and Noah right behind her. She stopped just short of Matt. “Is it— fixed?”
“Yep. Just needed a battery.”
Her face fell. “You didn’t buy one, did you?”
Uh oh. Matt hadn’t considered that purchasing a battery might be outside the realm of their terms of friendship. “Well, I had the car at the store already, and—”
“Which store? Where?”
“The one between here and my apartment. It’s downtown, by—”
“Those cheats,” Cassie muttered. She kicked the front tire. “This is the third battery I’ve had since January. Nothing they sell is any good.”
“Wait a minute.” Matt held up a hand. “How old was your battery?”
Cassie shrugged. “Two, three months, maybe. It was on a really hot day when it died. The guy at the store said heat can do that sometimes.”
“But he replaced your last new battery for free, right?” Matt asked.
“It was discounted, but not free.” Cassie stood with her hands on her hips as she frowned at her car. Noah had already climbed inside and was talking to Austin and Asher.
“Well, this battery is going to be free,” Matt said. “We’ll take care of that right now. Are you ready to go to the game?”
“Everything is in the trunk,” Cassie said. “I realized that last night after you left with my keys. Let me grab my phone and call my mom really quick. She’s on her way to pick us up, but I’ll tell her just to meet us at the game.”
“Great,” Matt said, wondering what, if anything, Cassie had told her mom about him. “We’ll stop by the store on the way. Do you have the receipt from your last battery?”
“In the glove box. Be right back.” Cassie sprinted up the stairs, and Matt forced himself to look away, watching the boys playing in the car instead of admiring the way she ran. He’d done enough of that at their scrimmage game and felt plenty guilty about it afterward. For a lot of reasons.
I’m sorry, Jenna. He hadn’t even been on his own a year yet, so what did that say about his character to be noticing and admiring another woman? And one that was married, at that. Cassie had basically been alone for over half a decade, and her faithfulness hadn’t wavered. Matt felt like the worst kind of creep for the thoughts that kept stealing through his mind and the undeniable attraction he felt. Helping Cassie wasn’t exactly an altruistic act. He liked being around her, plain and simple.
The only comforting and self-redeeming thought was that his eyes had never strayed when Jenna was alive. He might not have been home enough, and he’d definitely neglected her and the boys, but the only affair he’d ever had was with basketball. And in the end, that had fouled him pretty bad.
When Cassie returned, Matt already had all three boys squished into their seats in the back. He sat in the passenger seat but had left the driver’s side door open for her.
As they drove back to the auto parts store, Matt briefed Cassie on the possible reasons her car might be eating batteries.
“How much is it to replace an alternator?” She pressed her lips together in a worried expression.
“Depends. Every car is a little different. Let me see if I can find a YouTube video for your model. I might be able to do it.”
“Matt.” She looked over at him and gave a slight shake of her head. “I can’t let you do all this stuff for me. It isn’t right.”
He thought he read the underlying meaning of her words. You’re not my husband or even my boyfriend. He was ready with a response.
“What if I came up with a fair trade?”
“Like?”
It seemed a good sign that she hadn’t shut him down right away.
“Austin and Asher go to daycare after school a couple days a week when I work late. They hate it.”
“We hate it,” Austin echoed from the back seat.
Too late, Matt realized this was a discussion he shouldn’t have started in front of the boys.
But Cassie’s face had brightened. “I could pick them up after work. I’m usually done by four, unless the principal has a late meeting.” She glanced in the rearview mirror. “What would you think of that, Noah? Would you like to have Austin and Asher come over a couple times a week to play?”
“Yes. Yes. Yes.” Noah’s head bobbed up and down.
Matt thought he was starting to sound a lot like Asher, or maybe all five-year-olds answered in triplet. He wouldn’t know. He hadn’t been around a whole lot when Austin was five last year.
“I’ll have to pay you, of course,” Matt said. The last thing he wanted to do was to take advantage of her.
Cassie looked over and rolled her eyes. “Friends don’t pay each other for helping out. And we are friends, right?”
Between Heaven and Earth Page 11
