Once a Good Girl.... Wendy S. Marcus

      He glanced over his shoulder. “She was a stubborn little thing when I started working with her. Reminded me of a girl I used to know.”

      Victoria resisted the urge to scream. Having Kyle Karlinsky around was going to be an exercise in self-control. And secrecy. At least until she decided whether to inform Jake that his father, who she’d promised to help him search for when he turned sixteen, had returned to town eight years ahead of schedule.

      Using the utmost care not to bang her now throbbing foot, Victoria slid onto the cold leather driver’s seat.

      No doubt Jake would be thrilled to finally meet the man whose picture sat on his night table. He deserved a chance to get to know his dad. At some point. Was now, when he was so young and impressionable, the best time? Until she could learn a bit more about Kyle, where he’d been, why he was back, and maybe gauge his reaction to having a son, she would not risk Jake getting hurt.

      Although the drive to school turned out to be a bit more difficult than anticipated, Victoria avoided any major problems. Thank the Lord two pedestrians crossing at Third Street saw her in time to jump out of the way.

      The second she got out of the car and set her right foot on the ground for balance, pain exploded in her ankle, the intensity on a par with labor contractions. She eyed the distance from her parking spot to the door of the cafeteria. It may as well have been the length of a football field rather than the twenty or thirty feet it actually was.

      Eleven minutes late, she couldn’t afford to be any later. Clenching her teeth hard enough to crack a filling, she made a limping dash towards the school. Halfway there Jake exited the building, in the process of pulling on his hat, and without looking at her walked directly to the car.

      The afterschool program teacher—Mrs. Smythe—followed.

      The temperature dropped a few degrees.

      “I had to take care of a choking patient. Then I twisted my ankle rushing to leave,” Victoria explained.

      “If it wasn’t that it would have been something else,” the evil woman replied. “I have a life outside my job, you know.”

      Was it common knowledge that, aside from Jake, Victoria didn’t? “I’m sorry.”

      “Don’t be sorry,” she said as she, too, walked past Victoria without looking at her. “Be on time.”

      She would do better, Victoria decided when she climbed into the car, glimpsed into the back seat and saw the unhappy pout on her son’s precious face. Jake, the most important thing in her world. “I love you,” she said.

      He stared out the window.

      “I’m sorry I’m late.” Victoria started the car and changed the radio to Jake’s favorite station.

      He lunged over the front seat and turned it off.

      Except for the heat blasting from the vents, a tense silence filled the car.

      She looked at him in the rearview mirror. “Put on your seat belt.”

      He didn’t.

      “Jake, I said I was sorry. You understand why Mommy has to work so hard, don’t you?”

      Nothing.

      It was going to be a long night.

      “I’m talking to you, Jake Forley. And we will not leave this parking lot until you answer my question.”

      “Because it’s just the two of us,” he said, still looking out the window. “And you need money to pay bills and send me to a good college.”

      “And so you can play baseball in the spring.”

      He jerked his head, his eyes went wide. “Really?” He scooted to the front edge of his seat. “You’re going to let me play?”

      An impromptu, anything-to-cheer-him-up decision she would likely live to regret but, “Yes. And you’re going to need baseball pants, a bat and glove, and shoes.”

      “Cleats, Mom,” he said with an eye roll and an air of eight-year-old disgust at her ignorance of sports lingo. “Baseball players wear cleats.”

      “After dinner we’ll go online and do some research.” To figure out what cleats were. “Sound good?”

      “Sounds great! Thanks, Mom!” He leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “I love you, too.”

      “I know.” But she’d never tire of hearing him say it.

      The next morning, her purplish, swollen right ankle elevated on an overturned garbage can and propped up on a pile of folded towels, her neck stiff, and her right knee almost twice its normal size, Victoria felt like she’d been selectively beaten by one of the dozens of baseball bats she’d viewed on the Internet the night before. With everything she needed to consider—barrel, taper and grip size, length and weight, as well as material makeup: wood, aluminum, or composite—choosing the correct bat was more complicated than calculating a biochemical equation. On the plus side, she now knew baseball cleats were little more than fancy sneakers with molded rubber studs to increase traction on the field.

      She smiled. After a difficult start, she and Jake had had a super-terrific—his words, not hers—evening together. He was now an officially registered little-leaguer assigned to a team in the Madrin Falls Baseball League, practices to start next week, the season opener three weeks after that.

      It would require creative scheduling, but she’d find a way to squeeze in everything. Work. Jake’s school. Her school. Religious school. And now baseball. Her stress level spiked up a notch just thinking about it.

      “Knock, knock,” a familiar male voice said from her office doorway. “How’s the ankle?”

      Victoria turned her head in that direction, forgetting her neck felt fine as long as she didn’t try to move it. “Go away.” She lifted her hand to the stabbing pain and tried to work out the cramp.

      Kyle walked in, towered over her, filled her tiny office. He set two cups of coffee on the desk, and squeezed into the small space behind her. His body pressed against her back, pushing her ribs into the desk. She couldn’t move. “Wait.”

      As if his fingers had the ability to shoot potent muscle-relaxer beams deep into her screaming elastic tissues, the spasm lessened with the contact of his big, warm hands on her skin. A pleasant tingle danced along her nerve endings, made her wish he’d branch out a bit. Lower.

      Heaven help her, she still loved the feel of his hands on her. Strong. Knowing.

      She forced her eyes open. This had to stop. But it felt so good. She let them drift closed, again. One more minute. Maybe two.

      But, on the cusp of total relaxation, Victoria’s memory kicked in and transported her back in time. Something had her wedged in place. Confined. Squished. She couldn’t expand her chest. Couldn’t breathe. Could not pull air into her lungs. Please. Not again. She needed to get away. Escape this place. She was an adult, refused to be imprisoned. Never again.

      “What’s wrong?” Kyle’s concerned voice sounded far away. His face appeared in front of hers. Kind. Searching.

      She returned to the present standing on both feet, the garbage pail lying on its side. She shifted her weight to relieve the pressure on her right ankle, the move so quick she lost her balance and grabbed on to the desk for support. Her chest constricted, floaters dotted her vision, a wave of dizziness threatened to tip her over.

      “You’re okay.” A strong arm wrapped around her upper arms and basically held her up. “Come on. Breathe. In and out. Move my hand.” Which he’d placed over her diaphragm. “That’s it.”

      “I need …” She tried to push away from him.

      “You need to sit down for a minute.”

      Not again. Not now. It’d been nine years, for heaven’s sake. Why was his voice, his touch,