by Shirley Jump
“What are you talking about?” Trent balanced the ball in one hand. “I’ve lived here for twenty years, ever since I started college.”
“But you’ve never been…grounded. Even in school, you were always gone, riding some trail or climbing some mountain. Taking advantage of a sunny day to kayak. Or a windy day to sail. There was always another place to be, and almost always you were at that place alone.” A trace of bitterness lingered on the edge of her words. Their relationship had been as hard to pin down as Trent. Just when she’d thought she could count on him, he’d been gone again.
“I was in school a lot more than you think. You saw me, in Mr. Lipman’s American Lit class every single week.”
Clearly they had different perceptions of the past, because she was the one who had never missed a class or an assignment. “Trent, you missed so many, Mr. Lipman drew a smiley face on a piece of cardboard and sat it on your desk.”
“Okay, I might have missed one or two classes.”
“Try seven.” Not that she’d been paying attention and counting or anything like that. Once she’d noticed Trent MacMillan, it was all she could do not to keep noticing him. “You’re lucky he gave you a passing grade.”
“That’s because you helped me write my essays. And study for the tests.” He grinned. “I bought a lot of those sandwiches to thank you. I tried to take you out on the water before the end of the semester too to give you a little break.”
“Someone had to stay in her dorm room and study, instead of embarking on another adventure.” There had been weekends when she’d been stuck doing research or working on papers, and had resented him a little for having fun in the sun. He’d asked her to come with him a dozen times, but instead of finding a middle ground when she’d said no, Trent had gone on his own. More and more, she’d begun to resent him and to wonder if they were meant to be together, until they weren’t, the abrupt ending expected but painful.
Trent curved his wrist and pressed the ball to his chest. “All study and no adventures makes for a very boring college life.”
“I was there on scholarship, Trent.” She let out a long breath. How did he not understand that things had been harder for her? That her parents hadn’t been there like his had been, and that she couldn’t just abandon her responsibilities? Not then, and not now. “I couldn’t afford to take days off, and risk my grades dropping. You…you had a different life.”
“We’re not so different. Like…” he pointed at her, his finger wagging as he thought back, “we both did that, uh, environmental thing. The protest.”
“The fundraiser for the sea turtles? Yeah, we did that, but not together, because you were gone before we finished setting up the table.” Again, their versions of history differed. Maybe it was because Kate paid attention to details, logged the long hours. The responsible one who stayed put and, yes, rescued dogs and cats and turtles.
“No, I wasn’t,” Trent said. Two lanes away, someone got a strike, and the whole group cheered. “I remember helping you.”
She put a hand on her hip. “Then tell me one fact about the turtles we were trying to save. Do you even know what kind they were?”
“Uh…” He thought for a second. “Snappers? Who have shells?”
Kate rolled her eyes. “For a guy who spends so much time outside, you’d think this would be something you would pay attention to. Olive Ridley sea turtles. They’re at risk of being endangered, and every single nest matters so they can have their babies and live a happy life in the ocean. That’s why I got involved in it with you. I thought…”
“Thought what?”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter.” The thunder of balls rolling down the lanes, punctuated by the crash of the falling pins and clunking of the machinery was a steady beat under a peppy Taylor Swift song on the sound system.
“Yeah, it does,” he said.
“It was a long time ago.” Why had she brought this up? Opening a door to the painful parts Kate liked to ignore wasn’t getting her any closer to finishing this book. Neither was standing here bowling with Trent, or getting dinner with him, or debating American Lit class again. She needed to get back on track and maybe put some mental bumpers around all this reminiscing.
At that same moment, Elizabeth and her grandmother walked over to Trent and Kate. Elizabeth had a pair of light-up sneakers on, and her bowling shoes dangled from one hand. “It’s my bedtime.” Elizabeth pouted. “I gotta go, Kate.”
“Thank you for being so sweet to her,” her grandmother said. “Elizabeth can be a bit…effusive. Like a bottle of champagne that’s been shaken a little before you open it.”
Trent laughed. “I was like that as a kid. Kept my parents running.”
“Well, you look like you’ve done well for yourself.” The elderly woman gave them a smile. She had light blue eyes, a paler shade of Elizabeth’s. “You two make a lovely couple. Do you have kids of your own?”
Kate flushed. “Oh, we’re not, we aren’t….”
“Well, you should.” The woman wagged a finger at Trent, even though she was a good twelve inches shorter than him. Elizabeth stood there, watching the whole encounter with wide eyes. “If you’re a smart man, you’ll scoop up this treasure before some smarter man beats you to it.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Trent said.
“I was married for fifty-two years, God rest my husband’s soul. We had our ups and downs, like everyone does, but we made it work. I know you didn’t ask for it, but I’m going to give you my advice anyway. If the two of you want to make this last, just remember that arguing about the little things is a waste of the time you have together. You have to learn to let go more often than you hold tight.”
“That’s good advice,” Kate said. “My own grandmother would undoubtedly say the same.”
“That’s because we have age and wisdom. The wrinkles are proof of it.” Elizabeth’s grandmother smiled. “Good luck to you both.” Then she took Elizabeth’s hand, and the two of them said goodbye. Elizabeth chattered the whole way out the door about bowling balls and pins and the new friends they’d made.
“That was…odd.” Kate shook her head. “I have no idea what gave that lady the impression that we’re together.” Or what would inspire her to give marital advice to two people who weren’t a couple.
“Maybe it’s the bickering about the past.” Trent grinned. “Speaking of which, you didn’t answer my question.”
“I didn’t?” Although she knew full well what Trent was talking about. Maybe if she played dumb, he’d move on, and she could skirt around that painful bump in their history. “You do know you’re supposed to roll the ball, not hold it, when it’s your turn, right?”
“KitKat…” He waited until she looked at him. “What did you think would happen when you and I got involved in that sea turtle thing? Excuse me…the Olive Ridley sea turtle rescue program?”
Kate shifted her weight and glanced away. Darn him for getting the name of the project right this time. Why couldn’t he have been this invested years ago? And if all this was in the past, why did it still sting so much? “I thought…I thought it would be something you and I could do together. Saving the sea turtles was something to do with the outdoors, and something to do with the environment. A middle ground between us, and between the things we were each passionate about. I thought you’d like that. But you were gone, Trent. You were always gone.”
He considered her for a long moment, then set the ball back into the return. Trent took her hand and pulled her down to the bench. They sat across from each other while pins fell and balls rolled and people cheered. “Then tell me now, Kate. Tell me everything I should know about those sea turtles.”
“Trent, you don’t care—”
“I do, Kate. I care, right now.” He touched her hand and met her gaze. As much as she wanted to look away, to leave, Kate was transfixed by his blue eyes
and his touch and his honesty. “Tell me everything I missed. Because I think I missed an awful lot.”
Six
Trent wished he had an excuse for how distracted he had been at dinner and the bowling alley. Lack of sleep, malnutrition, a bout with malaria. Truth be told, it had all been Kate. Something about Kate had captivated him tonight, just as it had that day in American Lit when she’d argued that Scout’s depiction as a tomboy was a rebellion, not just against dresses, but against the societal norms of the time that silenced female voices. Kate’s spirited discussion of Harper Lee’s classic novel had so intrigued Trent, he’d gone back to his dorm and read it that night. He’d made sure to stop Kate in the hall after class so he could meet the girl who had ignited his curiosity in a course he’d intended to skate through. From that day forward, he’d started to pay attention and listen to Kate’s passionate arguments.
That passion had ignited again tonight when she’d sat across from him in the busy bowling alley and told him about the turtles. How the Seattle Aquarium was the only recognized sea turtle rehabilitation facility in the state of Washington. How the shifting ocean currents and the cold water of the Pacific Ocean stranded the turtles, stunning them into immobility with the sudden drop in their body temperature.
“The aquarium rescues the ones that get stranded,” she said, continuing her story as they bowled a few more strings. “They give them medical care, then release them back into the wild. During nesting season, the Olive Ridleys make these deep circles in the sand, lay their eggs and cover them before heading back out to sea. The aquarium has volunteers who patrol the beaches to mark off the turtle nest and protect it from curious people. When the hatchlings are born, volunteers watch to make sure the little guys make it into the water. When you see one of them struggling so hard to get over a divot in the sand, or to battle against an incoming tide, you just…” Kate sighed. “I guess you feel like saving that turtle is the most important thing in the world. The little guy is working so hard just to live, and he deserves that chance.”
“You’ve been there?” He knocked down eight pins, then waited for the pinsetter to reset. “When the babies hatched?”
She grabbed a ball and threw it down the lane. It careened off the bumpers and hit nine pins. “Every single fall. The mamas use the flippers to hollow out a nest in the sand and lay about a hundred eggs. About two months later, the babies hatch, and if we’re very lucky, we are there at just the right time to help them get to where they need to go.”
“That’s amazing.” He watched her take her second run at the pins, seeing Kate with new eyes and a renewed curiosity in this self-proclaimed bookworm, who was also one of the most multi-faceted and interesting women he had ever met. “I never knew that. About you or the turtles.”
She took his hand and opened his fingers, then drew a circle on his palm. “They’re so tiny when they’re born. They can fit right there, in the center of your palm. They are the cutest little things, with big front flippers and a shell that looks like dozens of itty-bitty blue-green bricks. They dig into the sand and push themselves forward, because somehow they know the ocean is where they need to be.” A second later, her cheeks flushed as if she’d just realized she had touched him.
“I imagine that something as small and simple as someone’s discarded soda can or a moat for a sandcastle can spell doom for the little guys?”
“Exactly. The volunteers try to keep the pathway as clear as possible, and we monitor the nests so we can try to predict when the hatchlings will be born, but every once in a while, there’s a nest that hatches when no one is there. So many hatchlings don’t make it.” She released his hand, and a flicker of disappointment ran through Trent. “It’s so sad to see, because you know they tried their hardest.”
Despite the odds and the tragedies and the challenges, Kate kept on volunteering. With that community garden, with the turtles. He liked that about her. Liked it a lot. “But it’s also what makes you come back year after year to patrol the beach and fill in the moats.”
“What can I say? I’m a softie for turtles.” She glanced at her watch. “It’s late, Trent,” Kate said as she grabbed her shoes from under the bench. “I really need to get home and start working on the book.”
Trent wanted to stay longer, but knew his phone was already blowing up with emails and texts about doing something to get good publicity and better buy-in before the public offering. With the IPO a few months away, Jeremy was panicking and telling Trent he needed to somehow boost spring and summer orders even more, to offset the losses from last quarter.
Yes, they’d had a misstep last season, one no one could have predicted, but there was no sense dwelling on it. Just like when he hiked, Trent believed that looking forward was the only option. Looking back would mean a stumble, maybe even a fall.
Which was why he should focus on the book, not the fascinating details about Kate he had yet to uncover. She was part of his past, not his future, and all this stuff about bowling and sea turtles was pulling him off that path he should be following. “Do you have enough material to write the chapters?”
She laughed. “No. But I can work with what I have, then fill in that outline some more, so you’ll know what other areas we need to expand upon. I’ll email the updated outline to you so you know what I’ll have questions about for the next time we meet.”
“Sounds like a plan.” They exchanged their bowling shoes for street shoes and headed out of the bowling alley. The skies had opened up while they had been inside, and a steady rain was falling. Trent and Kate hovered under the building’s overhang for a while. As much as he knew he should leave her to her work, and he should return to his own, a reluctance to leave kept him rooted to the spot. “I just realized we never decided who won.”
“We tied, one game each. I guess we call that a draw.” Kate looked out at the storm and made a face. “I really have to start remembering my raincoat.”
“Here.” Trent shrugged out of his fleece jacket and draped it over Kate’s shoulders. The thick jacket swam on her, but the pale green material made her eyes seem even darker and richer.
“Won’t you need it?”
Trent grinned. “I know where I can get another one.”
“Well, thank you.” She pointed a couple of lanes up in the parking lot. “My car’s over there. I can run and get it and drive you to yours.”
“KitKat, let me be the gentleman tonight.” He shifted the jacket to cover her head, then drew it closed. “Maybe it’ll make up a little for all the sea turtles I haven’t saved yet.”
She gave him a smile that was almost…bittersweet. “Maybe.” Then Kate darted across the parking lot toward her car. A second later, she was gone. Trent walked out to his Jeep with the rain pelting on his head and shoulders, not caring about the storm whirling around him.
The next morning dawned with a speck of sunshine and a whole lot of regrets for Trent. If there was ever a time GOA needed his undivided attention, it was right now. Every element of the company needed to be ready to launch the next level of success. He had employees to worry about, customers to take care of, and investors to soothe. Even as he brainstormed ideas, Trent’s mind kept skipping back to the night before and the conversations with Kate.
Just a few days ago, he’d been here, in this same conference room, with Kate. She’d walked back into his life, and already he couldn’t imagine her walking out again. When all this was done, maybe there was a way they could at least remain friends.
Friends? Was that what he wanted? Or was it all he was capable of right now?
He cleared his throat and drew his attention back to the people in front of him, refocused on things he could control. “So, about the IPO. How are things looking? What’s the mood from the investors?”
Jeremy smiled. “So much better than a week ago. Sarah’s PR push on the book, and the rapid boost in orders, will definitely ease the inves
tors’ fears. That buyback idea you had in the middle of the night was great. Sarah dashed off a press release, and we’ve already got traction. CNBC did a short segment on it this morning.”
“That’s the kind of PR you can’t pay for,” Sarah said. “Everyone loves the idea of the unsold inventory going to needy people.”
“Glad to hear it.” The overstock of last quarter’s inventory had made his customers wary of investing in new orders. Understandable. On the way home from the bowling alley, with the conversation about the sea turtles still lingering in his mind, Trent had had the idea for the buyback. He’d called Jeremy—waking the poor man up—and had him send an email right then and there. Jeremy had called Sarah and, together, they’d gotten the word out before the sun rose. Already, a dozen customers had taken advantage of the program, then increased their spring orders to restock. “And the plans for the book launch party?”
Sarah slid a sheet across the glass table. “Caterer is booked, and the hall ordered tablecloths in the company colors. We hired a video production company to create a montage of GOA’s history, from the germ of your initial idea to its amazing expansion in the years since. I won’t get into all the A/V details, but it should be pretty impressive. We’ll set up for a podium for a speech from you at the beginning of the night—”
“No. No speech from me.” In the early days, Trent had run GOA solely on instinct. When he’d had to make a decision to turn right or left, he’d gone outside, spent some time in the stillness of the world, and waited for his gut to whisper an answer. It had been a long time since that had happened. Until last night, when he’d shed the corporate mantle for a few hours and let his brain clear the clutter. “Instead, I want to bring in some of the customers who have bought our products and celebrate their journeys. Without them, I wouldn’t be here.”
Sarah leaned forward, her eyes bright. “I like it, I like it. It’s different, engaging, and memorable. There are so many who have tagged us on social media after completing their first marathon or finishing a family hike.”
