Sam had spent the past decade avoiding anything to do with Aubrey. He figured if she ever made it big, he’d have to listen to people talk about how smart she had been to move from Maplesville and pursue her dream. But she hadn’t made it; he could count on one hand the number of times he’d heard about her these past ten years.
But now she was back, and if he wanted to prove he was a bigger man who could rise above what she’d done to him, maybe he shouldn’t act like an ass.
Or, maybe he could accept that he wasn’t a bigger man.
Just the thought of taking the high road and accepting her apology made Sam want to curse up a storm. She didn’t deserve it, dammit!
He made sure he had everything he needed to bring to Ian’s garage before leaving the school auditorium. His parents’ home was halfway between the school and Ian’s, so Sam decided to stop in to check on his mom. But just as he pulled up next to his dad’s old pickup in the driveway, he remembered that she and his aunt, Elizabeth, had made plans to go to the movies.
Sam sat behind the wheel of his idling truck and stared at the pitched roof of his dad’s workshop in the backyard, visible beyond the flat roof of the detached garage. It would be a hell of a lot less work to build the set for the play in his dad’s workshop instead of at Ian’s. His best friend worked on motorcycles. Ian didn’t have all the equipment Sam needed. He could unload the things in his truck bed, then go over to Ian’s and bring in the other props.
Sam’s hand moved toward the ignition. But instead of turning off the truck, he put it in reverse and headed for his condo.
He wasn’t ready.
After a shower and leftover spaghetti that he probably should have thrown out two days ago, Sam grabbed a can of iced espresso from the fridge and brought it into his home office. He didn’t have much in the way of furniture, except when it came to this room. He sat before his computer setup, which Ian had long ago dubbed the Starship Enterprise. There were four LED monitors, including a 34-inch curved ultrathin mounted to the wall above the desk. He also had two laptops mounted on either side of the monitors, along with at least a dozen other peripherals. Some were necessary for him to do his job; others were there strictly for the coolness factor.
Sam saved copies of the project he’d been working on to three separate cloud drives before taking a third laptop back into the living room. He clicked on ESPN and settled on the sofa. In addition to building the set for the play, he was currently juggling three separate work projects: developing an inventory database for Hawk Transpo, a helicopter shuttle service out of Belle Chase, and two payroll databases for a couple of local small businesses.
For most people this would be biting off more than they could chew, but he could do this in his sleep. When it came to the software projects he’d been working on lately, the only hazard Sam faced was getting bored with the work. Despite the great pay, he just couldn’t seem to summon the enthusiasm he used to. He needed to shake things up, do something different.
He leaned back and put his feet up on the milk crates that served as his coffee table. He’d brought them from his parents’ house when he moved into this newly built condo complex a couple of years ago, expecting the crates to only be a temporary fix until he could get some furniture in here.
But then he’d gotten that call from Noah.
Sam had met Noah Bankston at Tulane, back when they were both overworked freshman hustling to maintain their scholarships to the oppressively expensive university. He and Noah had remained friends throughout their four years at Tulane, but after graduation, Noah accepted an internship on the West Coast and never looked back.
Two years ago, Noah left his well-paying job with a Silicon Valley tech giant and ventured out on his own, starting a business that developed apps for mobile phones. He tried to get Sam to come out there with him, but at the time Sam didn’t even want to see the state of California on a map. The fact that Aubrey lived there was enough to keep him away from the entire West Coast. But as his intense animosity toward Aubrey lessened with the passage of time, Sam decided that California was big enough for the both of them.
But then Charlie’s doctor had called with word that his dad’s inability to hold onto his wood chisel wasn’t caused by run-of-the-mill muscle weakness. Once the ALS diagnosis came down, everything changed.
Sam kneaded the bridge of his nose.
Things were different now. He no longer had his dad’s illness to keep him here. He could accept Noah’s long-standing invitation to join his start-up, which had proven to be more lucrative than even Noah had anticipated.
But it wasn’t that simple either. Sam still had his mom to consider. She’d just suffered through the agony of watching ALS slowly steal her husband’s life. He couldn’t just leave her. Could he?
Although, these days whenever Sam went to visit his mom she was always running out the door, either with his aunt Elizabeth, or her book club, or those ladies from her church. His mom had more of a social life than he did.
He shifted his foot and knocked over one of the milk crates.
Shit. He needed to get some real furniture in here.
Yet, every time Sam attempted to go furniture shopping, something stopped him. What would it say about him if he finally bought real furniture? Would that mean he was here for life? Did he call Noah and tell him to stop with the emails and Facebook messages, because he would never leave Maplesville?
Of course, now that Aubrey was back, it was the perfect time for him to leave. He wouldn’t have to deal with seeing her.
Sam threw his head back and ran both hands down his face. It was bad enough she’d sent him scurrying from The Corral. Would he allow her to run him from Maplesville too?
He cursed as he thought about the hurt that flashed across her face earlier today. He’d been such a dick. But those memories she’d brought back with her singing had hit him like a tidal wave, reminding him of how things used to be and how she’d ruined it.
“That was ten years ago,” Sam said aloud. “Get over it.”
But why should he get over it? He was the one who’d been wronged here. He didn’t owe Aubrey anything. If he chose to hate her for the rest of his life, no one who was around ten years ago would blame him.
But what did he have to gain by hating her? After all this time, what had his hate gotten him?
“Not a damn thing.”
She’d extended an olive branch and he’d slapped her across the face with it. He was bigger than that. He was better than that. At least Aubrey was trying. All she’d asked for was peace between them while she was in Maplesville. He could give her that, couldn’t he? It shouldn’t be too hard.
“You can start by not being an asshole,” Sam said as he pushed himself off the sofa. That was always a good first step.
Chapter 3
The applause rang out throughout Greater Saint Peter Baptist Church before the final note of “Blessed Assurance” left her mouth.
“Amen! Girl, it’s good to have you back.”
Aubrey laughed in relief, delighting in the feeling of acceptance she was convinced one could only find in their childhood church.
“It feels good to be back,” she said. “I missed it here.”
She’d arrived for choir practice twenty minutes early, still debating whether she even belonged. As she sat in the pew, soaking in the familiar scent of Murphy’s Oil Soap and studying the brilliantly colored stained-glass windows, she’d considered getting up and walking out. She wasn’t sure the people of her old church would want her here.
She should have known better.
Angela Coleman, who’d been the choir director for as long as Aubrey had been a member of Greater Saint Peter, had been the first to arrive, and her enthusiastic greeting had set the tone for all the others. They’d accepted her back into the fold with open arms—literally—everyone drowning her in warm hugs before they began practice for this coming Sunday’s services.
“You sure you don’t want to sing a solo o
n Sunday?” Angela asked as the two of them returned the song booklets to the rack next to the organ.
Aubrey shook her head. “I’m fine being a regular member of the choir for a while.”
“Don’t think I’m going to let that voice just blend into the chorus for too long,” Angela said. “It’s been a long time since we’ve had a soloist with your kind of skills. I’ve been waiting impatiently for Felicity to turn sixteen so I can snatch her from the youth choir.”
“I promise to sing a solo soon,” Aubrey said with a laugh.
She followed Angela out of the church, and turned to where she’d parked Deanna’s sedan in the graveled parking lot. She stopped short at the sight of Sam leaning against the driver’s side door of a ruby-red pickup truck. He wore faded blue jeans and a simple white T-shirt, but it looked so good on him that it put thoughts in her head that made Aubrey want to go back into the church and pray for her soul.
His jaw had the barest hint of stubble, the darker hair contrasting against his lighter, defined cheekbones. That five o’clock shadow wasn’t there when she’d run into him earlier. It was yet another reminder of the difference between the young, teenage Sam she’d left behind and the very much grown man he’d matured into over these ten years.
“I figured I’d find you here,” he said by way of greeting. “It’s been a while since I’ve been to this church, but I remembered choir rehearsal is held on Wednesday nights.”
“Okay,” Aubrey said as she cautiously moved closer toward him. “What are you doing here, Sam?”
“I don’t know.” He hunched his shoulders as he pushed away from the truck and shoved his hands in his front pockets. “I just…I don’t like the way I left things today. You were trying to make peace and I acted like a dick.” He grimaced and looked over at the sanctuary. “Probably shouldn’t say dick outside of a church.”
Aubrey choked on a laugh, then sobered. “Do you, uh, want to talk?” Her stomach tightened with nerves in the seconds it took him to answer.
“Yeah. I’d like that. How about the playground?”
Behind the hall adjacent to the church, where the fellowship hour and bible study were held, stood several pieces of old playground equipment that should have been condemned even back in those days when she’d played on them as a child.
Aubrey walked over to the jungle gym and leaned against the one spot that wasn’t covered in rust. The silence that stretched between her and Sam was the most uncomfortable thing she’d felt in years. It saddened her. At one time there wasn’t a single person she’d felt closer to.
Sam Stewart had been her world. But so had music. And when it came time to choose, she’d chosen the latter. And he’d never forgiven her for it.
“I’d forgotten how humid it is here, even at night,” Aubrey said to break the silence.
“Why are you here, Aubrey?” Sam asked. Her head jerked back. “In Maplesville,” he clarified. “After all this time, why did you decide to come back?”
She hadn’t expected him to come right out the gate with such a direct question, but she probably should have. Sam had never been one to beat around the bush. Back when they’d first started dating, he hadn’t played the typical games high school guys played. He’d cornered her in the hallway after phys ed, said he liked the way she looked in her short shorts, and told her he wanted to be her boyfriend. If he’d been that direct back in the ninth grade, why would she think he’d be less so now?
“So? Why’d you come back?” he repeated.
For a second she thought about skirting the truth about the real reason she’d returned to her hometown, but if she and Sam were going to have a real conversation, she didn’t want to be anything but honest.
“I’m back because it was my only choice,” she said. “The cost of living in Los Angeles was getting out of hand. Actually, it’s been that way for a while, but I didn’t think I would be welcome back here, so I stayed in L.A. much longer than I should have. It wasn’t until I maxed out my credit cards in order to pay rent and buy groceries that I finally admitted to myself that I could no longer live that way.”
Had she actually just admitted that to him?
After all these years, why did her first conversation with Sam have to be about how she hadn’t been able to cut it living on her own? She wanted the earth to swallow her up this very minute.
“It’s not that I haven’t been working,” Aubrey said in an attempt to salvage her pride. “I’ve had steady work since I moved there.”
It wasn’t always the best paying jobs, but she’d always worked.
“Yeah, I remember someone mentioning that you sang backup on a few albums,” Sam said.
“There’s nothing wrong with singing backup.”
“I never said there was,” Sam replied.
He might not have said it, but she was sure she’d detected a note of judgment in his voice. Or maybe her defensiveness was working overtime, as it was prone to do when she talked about her career.
Or lack thereof.
She’d left Maplesville with the declaration that she would soon be the kind of megastar that became a household name. It had been all but promised to her. When it didn’t happen, Aubrey thought she would die of shame. But she didn’t. She’d picked herself up, dusted herself off, and forged ahead.
“I’m proud of the work I did,” she said. “Even though I mostly sang backup for B-list artists—the kind who opened acts for the A-listers—it was still legitimate work. When I couldn’t get those gigs, I’d pick up shifts at Disneyland.”
“Disneyland?” Sam asked.
A small smile tracked across her lips. “I was Princess Jasmine in the Aladdin show.”
“Seriously?” Sam chuckled.
“The pay was surprisingly good, not to mention the health insurance. A nasty case of appendicitis about five years ago taught me how important it is to have good insurance. Those four days in the hospital would have wiped me out financially.”
He stood up straight. “You were hospitalized?” he asked, his voice showing more concern than Aubrey would have expected from him.
It was the first glimpse of the old Sam she’d seen since she’d returned to Maplesville. This was the Sam she remembered, the one who ditched his friends so that he could tend to her when she had the flu back in the eleventh grade. The one who convinced the principal to allow him to miss school so he could hold her hand at the dentist when she had her wisdom teeth pulled.
She nodded in answer, her throat suddenly clogged with too much emotion to speak. She was ashamed to admit just how much it affected her to see this small amount of concern from him, but it did. She could almost pretend he actually cared about her.
“Anyway,” she continued. “A couple of years ago, a friend suggested I start working as a vocal coach. So that’s what I’ve been doing. I’m still pinching myself over one of my former students making it to the final round of America Can Sing.”
His eyes widened in surprise. “The reality TV show?”
“Yes. You hadn’t heard about that?”
Sam shook his head. “No. I…uh…I have to admit that I haven’t really kept up with what you’ve been doing.”
Aubrey wasn’t prepared for the hurt his words caused.
She wasn’t an idiot. She knew Sam had not been her biggest fan after she left Maplesville, and for good reason. That’s why she’d given him space. For years she’d avoided reaching out to him, even after it became easier to do so with social media. But even though Sam had shown no interest in reconnecting in even the smallest way, she’d thought—hoped—that he’d at least kept up with her life the way she had with his. She hadn’t demanded weekly reports on him, but Deanna and Chandra both let her know when anything significant happened in his life.
Apparently, he didn’t care enough to learn anything about her over these last ten years.
Aubrey tried to quell the ache that came from coming to terms with the reality of Sam’s indifference.
“I guess y
ou’re a good teacher if one of your students made it onto the actual show,” Sam said.
Aubrey nodded. “It was a pretty big deal. She thanked me on national television and everything.”
“It just doesn’t make sense that you’d leave,” he said. “If things were going so well with the coaching, why aren’t you still doing it in L.A.?”
With the way he continued to make an issue of it, it was obvious that her coming back home disturbed him even more than he was letting on.
It made something else obvious. His seeking her out tonight had nothing to do with wanting to mend fences. As far as Aubrey could tell, the only reason he’d tracked her down was to figure out how long she was planning to stay in Maplesville.
“I was over the city life,” she finally said, tossing the lamest excuse possible his way.
“You don’t think you’ll eventually get bored living in a small town again?” Sam asked.
Why do you even care? she wanted to ask him.
But why bother? It was painfully clear that there was zero chance that she and Sam would ever repair this rift between them. They were no longer friends. They never would be. She could just stop trying.
“Maplesville isn’t all that small anymore,” Aubrey answered. She pushed away from the jungle gym. “I should go. I’m driving Deanna’s car until I can find a used one for myself.”
“So, you’ll be here long enough to need a car of your own?” he asked.
She stared at him for several moments, pondering the foolish wish she’d tucked away in the corner of her heart. The hope that she and Sam could somehow put the past behind them and find a measure of friendship.
A foolish wish indeed.
“Don’t worry, Sam. It doesn’t matter how long I’m here. I’ll stay out of your way. In fact, you won’t even know I’m around.”
* * *
Aubrey searched for quarters at the bottom of her purse, cursing underneath her breath for not getting any before she left the house. The Laundromat around the corner from her old place in L.A. had washers and dryers with credit card machines attached to them. She should have known better than to expect the same on the ones here in Maplesville. There was a change machine in the corner, but it only took dollars, no credit or debit cards.
Any Time You Need Me Page 4
