Evergreen

by Susan May Warren

  John stared at the kid, now removing his helmet to take a knee and listen to the coach. Long blond hair caught in the wind. “Well, he’s my wife’s sister’s kid, but . . . for now, I guess so.”

  “He’s catching on fast. It’s a little late in the season, but he’s still eligible, so if he keeps digging in, he might see some playing time.”

  “Is he playing end?”

  “Yeah, strong side.”

  “He’s not holding his ground. He’s got to learn to turn the runner inside. Let the outside linebacker pick him off.”

  “He could use some backyard coaching, for sure. But he’s got heart.”

  On the field, the coach drew the kids in, hands in the middle. They chanted, broke free, and ran to the sidelines.

  Romeo slowed as he saw John. His hair hung in sweaty strings around his head, his practice jersey grimy and sodden. Hard work, focus. He saw it in the kid’s demeanor.

  John lifted his chin in acknowledgment. “I’ll be in the truck.”

  Wandering back through the school, he stopped at the trophy case. Spied his own grinning mug in the state championship photo.

  He pulled his sweatshirt on when he got into the truck, checked his phone, and texted Ingrid that he’d found Romeo.

  Why hadn’t she told him about Romeo going out for football?

  Romeo climbed in beside him, tossing his backpack on the seat. “Sorry I’m late. Practice went over.”

  John glanced at the kid as he reached for his buckle. He’d showered, his hair still wet on his shirt, looking like he’d hurried from the locker room. He was shivering in the cool evening.

  Aw, shoot. “Listen. You gotta get more aggressive. You got a regular six-lane highway out there right now. Stand your ground.”

  Romeo eyed him, and John braced himself.

  Then, “How?”

  How. He hadn’t expected that. But seeing Romeo stare at him, big eyes, John had the crazy urge to get out on the grass with him. Play a little two-handed touch football. He shook away the feeling. “How? You get low and attack the outside shoulder of the defender with your inside shoulder. You’ll push him where you want him and then be free to attack the runner.”

  Romeo nodded, and John turned away, putting the truck into gear.

  Romeo rode in silence. Finally he said, “Thank you, Mr. Christiansen.”

  John reached for the heater, switched it on. “I’m your uncle John. And you’re in luck because I think your aunt is making pot roast for supper.”

  INGRID EASED OPEN THE DOOR and walked into the bedroom.

  “Here’s the deal, Romeo. I’m not just a mom; I’m a sports mom, so I know when an athlete is hiding pain.”

  Romeo sat on the floor in his sweatpants and T-shirt, stretching his legs, his face in a grimace. “I’m a little tight, is all.”

  “Heads up.” She tossed him an ice pack. “Try that on your calf. It will help with the tension and loosen it up.”

  He gave her a half smile. “How’d you know?”

  “You were limping after dinner.”

  He wrapped the pack around his leg. “I’m just sore. I’ll be good for Friday’s game.”

  He didn’t ask her if she’d be attending, but she heard it in the silence. She came closer, pulled the quilt off the bed, and hooked him around one shoulder to help ease him up. “My boys played hockey, not football, but your uncle John used to play.”

  Romeo settled back into the pillows. “For the Minnesota Gophers. I saw his picture in the hallway.”

  She picked up his socks, tossed them into the basket in the closet. “Defensive end. I even caught one of his games.”

  “Only one?”

  “We weren’t dating until after college. But I still wanted to see him play.” Sitting at the end of his bed, she smoothed the quilt. “I had a terrible crush on him for years before he noticed me.” In fact, it sometimes felt as though she’d loved him her entire life. She’d forgotten that feeling lately. But seeing Romeo in his T-shirt, icing his leg, flashed a memory of John on crutches. Wide-shouldered, long hair, he’d looked broken then, as if he needed her, and she loved him even more.

  “He actually injured his knee his freshman year and had to work his way back onto the team. I’ve never seen anyone with as much sheer toughness as your uncle John.”

  “How come your kids didn’t play football?”

  “I don’t know. Darek started playing hockey when he was about six years old and loved it. We wanted to let our kids choose their own sports, so we dove in. But I think John always wished he’d had a son who played football.” She refused to let her thoughts land there. “Did you play for your last school?”

  He nodded. “It seems to be the only thing I’m good at.”

  She doubted that. “I’ll bet your mom enjoys coming to your games.”

  He shook his head. “She’s never been. Working or something. I don’t know. But maybe someday. Next year . . .” He looked at her then, his eyes finding hers. “Why didn’t we ever . . . ? I mean, how come Mom never talks about you?”

  Butter nudged the door open and padded into the room. Ingrid ran her hand over the dog’s body as she plopped down on the floor next to the bed. “Your mom and Uncle John had a terrible fight right after you were born. She wanted to move here, but . . . well, it was a difficult time for us, and Uncle John thought he was protecting me. So he told her no. She got angry and, despite the letters I sent to her, refused to forgive.”

  “She told me that you said she was a horrible mother.”

  Ingrid frowned and shook her head. “I never said that.”

  He looked away then. “I don’t think she ever really wanted me.”

  “Romeo, that’s not true. She loves you—”

  “No. If you love someone, you don’t act like they annoy you. You like them, and you try to make them think they’re the most important person in the world to you. And you never, ever push them away, make them leave you.”

  She stared at him, his words thickening her throat. She swallowed hard. Softened her voice. “She didn’t have a choice, Romeo. And this is not forever. You’ll be back with your mom by Christmas.”

  He shrugged.

  She got up, fighting the overwhelming urge to kiss him on the forehead. But he didn’t belong to her.

  “Why does Butter come in here every night?” He dropped his hand down, running his fingers through the dog’s fur.

  “Because you’re in Owen’s bed, and she loves Owen the best.”

  “Maybe she loves me the best now.”

  Ingrid smiled at that. “Probably.”

  John was already in bed watching the Food Network when she came in. “Hey,” he said.

  She went to the bathroom, changed into her pajamas, and came out.

  He turned off the television. “Why didn’t you tell me that Romeo went out for football?”

  She smoothed lotion on her face, sitting at the edge of the bed, her back to him. “I didn’t think you cared.”

  “Well . . . I . . . I mean . . . of course I care.”

  “Really? Because you barely talk to Romeo.”

  “I talk to him.”

  She didn’t answer, reaching for more lotion.

  “Ingrid—I talk to him.”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  “Okay. How about this? We’ll go to the game on Friday night.”

  “I think that would be nice.” She climbed under the covers, pulled them up to her chin.

  “He reminds me . . . of me.”

  She didn’t expect that—or the strange tone to his voice. She opened her eyes and found him staring straight ahead. “Oh?”

  “I was just thinking . . . I don’t know. About the boys, I guess. And how none of them played football.”

  “No, they didn’t, did they?”

  “They might have, if I’d tried harder to get them to love it.”

  “I don’t know, John. It feels like either you’re born with it or you aren’t. Our boys love hockey. It’s
sort of like football, except on skates.”

  He frowned at her. “It’s nothing like football.”

  “There’s pads and helmets.”

  “And a puck and sticks . . .” He shook his head. Leaned back against the headboard. “Seb says that he’s good. Tough.”

  She closed her eyes. “Of course he is. With a name like Romeo, he’d have to be.”

  “Yeah, he would. Maybe that’s why your crazy sister named him that. Because she knew he’d never have a dad, and he’d have to be tough.”

  Opening her eyes again, she looked at him. “He could have a dad. At least a sort of dad, if—”

  His quick glance cut her off. “I’m not his dad, Ingrid. I’m his uncle. I have my own sons, and I don’t want any more.”

  She drew in a breath. Of course not.

  “Good night, John,” she said and rolled over.

  Just because he didn’t want to be Romeo’s father—or a father figure—didn’t mean that John didn’t care about the kid. Or want to cheer him on.

  “John, over here!” Nate waved his hand from the middle of the bleachers, where he and Annalise had set up camp. They sat on padded stadium seats, dressed in parkas and blue-and-white Huskies-emblazoned caps, a blanket over their laps. Annalise sported a pom-pom that she raised and shook as the band warmed up with the Deep Haven High fight song.

  John glanced behind him at Ingrid, who carried a blanket. They’d left their stadium chairs at home. “Want me to run home and get our seats?”

  “Don’t be silly. We have five minutes until kickoff. I’ll be fine.” She smiled past him, toward their friends, and climbed the stairs. John followed, glancing at the field, at the players warming up, running in place, dropping to the grass for push-ups, standing for jumping jacks. Calisthenics designed to intimidate the other team.

  He could admit he missed it, and suddenly the long-dormant desire to see one of his boys on the field filled his chest.

  Darek would have made a fabulous defensive end.

  He scanned the field as he slid into the row behind Ingrid, looking for Romeo. Finally he spotted him running to the bench with the team, fist high.

  “It’s about time you attended a game,” Nate said as the fans took to their feet. “Although I half expected to see you on the field. Feels like yesterday I was sitting up here with the band, watching you blitz the quarterback.”

  John laughed, caught Ingrid smiling up at him, and a strange heat tunneled through him. She looked pretty tonight in her white snowball cap, blue mittens, a Deep Haven High sweatshirt layered over a fleece jacket. The stars winked down at them from a Husky-blue sky, and in the distance, the moon lasered a path across the big lake. “I’ve never noticed the view before,” he said.

  “It’s one of the perks of sitting in the bleachers in thirty-six degrees,” Annalise said. “We started attending when Jason was in the band. Now we’re addicted to small-town football.”

  The announcer introduced the team, and John ignored the strange pinch of disappointment when Romeo’s name wasn’t in the starting lineup. But when he ran out for kickoff, John watched him all the way down the field.

  He got hit hard but stayed on his feet long enough to add to the pile bringing down the returner.

  Ingrid glanced at him. “That was pretty good, right?”

  He lifted a shoulder.

  The Huskies were playing the Barnett Eagles and by halftime were up by six, Romeo on the field for three kickoff returns. John bounced to his feet twice, shouting when the defensive line let a runner score around the outside.

  “You want to go down there?” Ingrid said at halftime, winking.

  “Maybe.”

  “Just a guess, but I don’t think the pads will fit you anymore.” She grinned at him, and again, that almost-unfamiliar heat twined through him.

  She pulled a thermos from her bag and opened the lid. “Cocoa?”

  He’d forgotten about the picnics they used to have in the stands at hockey games—hot cocoa, popcorn, sometimes sandwiches. She’d reverted right back into her sports-mom persona.

  “No thanks,” he said. Maybe this was a bad idea, attending this game, stirring up the sense that they might be a family of sorts. Romeo was just a lodger—and as long as Ingrid remembered that, no one would get hurt.

  “Ingrid, do you need help sewing any costumes for the live Nativity?” Ellie Matthews trekked down to their row. “And Dan wanted to know if you wanted the hospitality committee to organize hot cocoa in the fellowship hall afterwards.”

  “That would be perfect, Ellie, thanks. I found the box of wings, and they need to be repaired. I think if we can get parents to donate sheets, we can create a nice chorus of angels with the children’s Sunday school classes.”

  “I’ll talk to the Sunday school superintendent, see if we can make that happen. Have you decided on a Mary and Joseph yet?”

  “Nope. But don’t worry; I have a few ideas in mind.” Ingrid turned back to the game as Ellie left. “I wonder if Romeo would be willing to help. You know, be a shepherd or something.”

  John looked at her. “Romeo will be gone by Christmas. You know that, right?”

  She didn’t look at him, wrapping her hands around her cup. “Mmm-hmm.”

  “Ingrid—the second his brother arrives in the States, Romeo’s going to live with him. Right?”

  She still didn’t look at him. “Yeah. Of course.” She blew on the cocoa. “You sure you don’t want some of this? It’s homemade.”

  He pursed his lips. “I’m sure.”

  Overhead, a few clouds had moved in, blotting out the stars. A wind picked up, and as the team came out for the second half, the temperature dropped. His gaze went—too often—to Romeo on the sideline, stamping his feet to keep warm.

  The Eagles scored on the kickoff, tying, then leading by one point.

  John couldn’t help but coach in his head as he watched the sophomore defensive end—the starter—get mowed over, again and again.

  Close the gap, turn him to the inside—

  And then it happened. The defensive end came off the line hard, got hit, went down, and another player landed on him.

  As the play cleared, screams echoed off the field, and the stands hushed to a horrified silence.

  Coach Knight ran onto the field as Seb motioned for the ambulance. John gritted his teeth, claws in his gut as he watched them carry the kid off, his leg splinted.

  Ingrid held Annalise’s hand, watching the spectacle with wide eyes. John rested a hand on her shoulder.

  Almost in slow motion, he saw Coach Knight turn, searching, gesturing—and Romeo took the field, strapping on his helmet.

  In a strange way, John took the field with him. He lined up beside him, or behind him, coaching him into the play. Felt the hits, winced when he got flattened, cheered when he swept his defender and blitzed the quarterback. Found his feet when Romeo caused a fumble.

  And watched with an eerie, almost-painful sense of pride as Romeo did everything John had told him to do and shut down the running play on that side of the field.

  The Huskies punched it into the goal one more time for the win, and when the whistle blew, John began to breathe.

  “Good game!” Nate high-fived him. “And if I didn’t know he wasn’t your son, I would guess Romeo is from Christiansen blood.”

  John had nothing for that—and he couldn’t look at Ingrid. Not when she’d been right.

  Shoot, but he liked this kid. And if he didn’t watch himself, Ingrid wouldn’t be the only one getting hurt when Romeo left.

  As they headed out of the stands, the sky began to sift out glistening snowflakes across the lights, landing like fairy dust on the field.

  A LAYER OF CRISPY SNOW coated her yard, concealing the blemishes that remained from the forest fire over a year ago. Ingrid stood at the window a moment, watching the waves against the shore, the bushy pine trees, a golden sun melting away the clouds.

  How quickly the seasons had changed, gr
ace blanketing her world, a dusting of the magic to come.

  “Nana!”

  The voice turned her, and she set down her hot cocoa just in time for Tiger to leap into her arms. “Oh, you’re getting so big!”

  “I made this in church today!” He handed her a turkey, made from the outline of his hand, cut, colored, and glued to a Popsicle stick.

  “Apparently we’re supposed to post it on our fridge for the month as a reminder to be thankful,” Ivy said, setting a towel-wrapped casserole on the counter.

  “I agree,” Ingrid said. “I’m thankful for my family. And especially for nose kisses.” She rubbed her nose against Tiger’s and he giggled. Then he scampered over to Butter, launching himself at the dog, playing with her ears.

  Butter opened an eye, bored, but lifted her head to lick him.

  They’d made the right decision about her surgery, even if it had cost their savings. And the trip to Europe. And perhaps even a smidge of warmth between her and John. Although maybe he’d finally forgiven her.

  At least a little.

  He’d seemed less annoyed with her, perhaps, in the two weeks since they’d attended Romeo’s game. Maybe it had everything to do with Romeo and the fact that he loved football as much as John did.

  Or maybe John simply realized how well Romeo fit into their family. Easily, as if he’d always belonged here. Like when he’d helped Ingrid take Butter to the vet for a checkup, carrying the dog to the car without being asked and then soothing her on the table.

  And Ingrid couldn’t deny the turn of her motherly heart watching him play with a litter of puppies tumbling over one another in a gated area of the foyer. He’d made friends with the runt and returned home with puppy kisses on his chin.

  Yeah, Romeo fit, and today, right now, she intended to soak in the joy of having her family around the table for Sunday dinner, without a football game to interfere.

  Until the 7 p.m. Vikings kickoff against the Lions.

  “What did you bring?” she asked Ivy as she unwrapped the towel.

  “Apple crisp,” Ivy said, pulling out plates. “The lasagna smells amazing.”

  “Hey, Dad,” Darek said, settling down on the sofa and grabbing the sports section.