The Homecoming. Робин Карр

      Iris wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She looked out her kitchen window and there he sat on the ground beside the lawn mower like the big dumb ox he was. Well, she was glad it was out. Now Seth knew everything that had pissed her off. Now he could go away because she was over it. Over him.

      She made sure her doors were locked, then she threw herself facedown on her bed and smothered her cries in the pillow. She let all of the emotion out.

      Before too long she heard the mower start up again. It ran for about ten minutes, then stopped and she was enveloped in silence. But the noise inside her head was deafening.

      This was good, right? Getting it all out, all of it. Venting all the hurt and anger and feelings of betrayal. Because he hurt me so much. He’s been such an ignorant fool!

      He’d been seventeen and stupid. And you were seventeen and not much smarter, her thirty-four-year-old self added.

      Well, of course that internal argument was going to happen—she was a social worker, a counselor to young people. Young people who made mistakes every day, some that were hard to recover from, very hard to move on from.

      Iris didn’t turn on the TV or her stereo. She cleaned house, literally. She cleaned out cupboards, closets, washed clothes, scoured the bathroom and the kitchen, threw away stuff in the refrigerator, filled bags and boxes with things she’d been meaning to get rid of for a long time. Clothes for donation were bagged, kitchen items that had been around since she was a teenager were boxed up—some to donate and some to pitch. She folded her underwear into little squares, rolled her towels and put them in an attractive wicker basket, changed the sheets, washed the rugs that fit into the washing machine. When the sun came out and the afternoon grew warm, she opened the windows to air out the house.

      On Saturday night she had a glass of wine with her light dinner and put on an old movie—one of her favorite old chick flicks that always made her cry. She’d learned a long time ago that if there was a good cry growing in your chest and throat, a nice tearjerker could get it out of you without forcing you to dwell on the real issues.

      What if she’d gotten pregnant from that spontaneous drunk coupling? she wondered. What would they have done? Would they have talked about it? Gotten married or something? Gotten married and given up their educations? Gotten married and maybe missed that fast car that had ended a prestigious football career? Gotten married because they had to and divorced later because Seth hadn’t been ready to be a husband and father, only a famous football player?

      As it had happened, her period had started right away and she’d devoted herself to avoiding Seth. About a week after his reconciliation with Sassy, Seth had approached her. “You have any plans to go to the prom?” he’d asked.

      She’d looked at him in horror. “You know I don’t, you imbecile. You said you wanted to take me, then you said you couldn’t because you made up with Sassy.”

      “Hey, I would’ve taken you, Iris! I’m sorry, but I didn’t know you’d take that so seriously. I was just pissed.”

      “Good for you,” she had said. “And now I’m just pissed. I hope you have an awful time!”

      “What do you want me to do, Iris? Tell Sassy I can’t take her and take you instead?”

      “I wouldn’t go with you if you were dying and it was part of your Make-a-Wish list!”

      That was so vulgar of her, she thought. She’d been that outraged. It wasn’t like Iris to make cruel remarks like that. Although they hadn’t talked about it, she’d heard he had a miserable time at prom and the homecoming couple broke up again. That made her perversely happy.

      Iris didn’t talk to anyone all weekend. She didn’t leave her now sparkling house until three o’clock on Sunday afternoon when she drove to a donation bin and unloaded her stuffed car into it. Then she filled the Dumpster behind the flower shop with all the trash she’d cleaned out of her little house.

      That night she had a long soak in the tub. She lit candles in the bathroom. She put on soft, clean pajamas, curled up on the couch and got out one of her favorite books of inspirational quotes—something to buoy her spirits and put her back on track. After an hour of skimming she found one that spoke to her. Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies—Nelson Mandela.

      “Enough,” she said aloud. “That’s enough. Moving on now!”

      She closed the book and went to bed. She slept soundly for ten hours.

      * * *

      Seth wasn’t nearly busy enough all week to distract him from thinking about Saturday in Iris’s backyard. There was no way he was ever going to remember the events she described, but he couldn’t help but wonder how closely her description fit some of his dreams. He had dreamed of making love to her in the flower van. It had been clumsy and embarrassing in his dream. From what he gathered, it had been so in reality, as well.

      There had been other dreams about her, but they’d been fantasy dreams that took place in ideal settings—rooms with satin sheets, forest glens covered in silky grass, even on the hoods of sports cars. He had enjoyed those. There might’ve been a dozen starring Iris in as many years but since he’d had lots of dreams about lots of women, he hadn’t thought the ones with Iris had any real significance. In the past seventeen years he’d only had a couple of serious relationships. They hadn’t lasted too long nor had they been very fulfilling. He’d had plenty of dates but the right woman had always eluded him. Probably because she was back in Thunder Point, mad as hell at him.

      He saw Iris twice that week. Once, he’d seen her riding her bike to school on a sunny morning, waving and laughing with the kids. The other time he’d seen her from his office as she went into the diner. He had lacked the courage to follow her in there and try to talk to her. No, he wasn’t going near that until he knew what he was doing. And he didn’t. Not yet.

      The following weekend it was time for him to head to Seattle to visit his friend Oscar Spellman. He was driving up on Friday afternoon, would spend Saturday with Oscar and return to his home in Bandon on Sunday, ready to take on Thunder Point on Monday morning. The timing for a long drive alone in the car couldn’t be better.

      Friday night was clear and the weekend was sunny, not so unusual on the coast of Oregon in October but in Washington it was a treat. All the way up the freeway he’d been thinking. Remorse is a lot of hard work and boy, had he done a lot of hard work.

      He’d been drafted by the Seahawks when he was in his first year of college. He heard they’d been surprised to find him available, but they wanted him before he got hurt because he was fast and strong and there was a very good chance he’d make them money. He got himself an agent to negotiate a good deal. His first pro year, during which he’d played a little bit, he made four hundred thousand dollars, all of which he spent on taxes and a late-model Ferrari sports car. Considering he’d never driven anything but his dad’s old clunker truck, he really thought he was somebody. And one night, right before training camp for the Seahawks started, he took his new car out for a long drive along some Washington back roads. A miserable old Chevy sedan blew through a stoplight in front of Seth and Seth couldn’t stop. He tried to avoid a collision but his car basically T-boned that old Chevy.

      That was Oscar.

      It was determined that Oscar had fallen asleep at the wheel after working a double shift at a manufacturing plant near Seattle. He was a forty-five-year-old machinist with a wife, Flora, and two kids. There had been two witnesses stopped at the same crossroad who could validate it. Oscar had been responsible for the accident. But Seth had been going eighty in a fifty-five zone. Ironically, he had just slowed down around the curve. He’d probably been doing ninety, maybe more. He was cited for speeding.

      Both drivers were rushed to the hospital after being cut out of their cars. Seth hit Oscar’s car on the driver’s side. Seth and Oscar were both gravely injured, but Seth recovered. It took a long time, several surgeries and a lot of determination, but Seth pounded his way through the worst of it. Oscar’s spinal