Beth stopped paying attention to Joel, smiled at all three of the boys, especially Matt, and took a seat at the opposite end of the ice cream parlor. She pulled a book from her purse while she waited for her order.
“I feel like I struck out,” Joel complained, “before I even made it to bat.”
“What do you expect?” For the first time, Billy’s usually calm demeanor slipped. He stared at Joel, an unwavering expression that said talk, confess, convince.
“I expected—” Joel carefully chose his words because his nephews, staring at him all big eyed and tense, didn’t need to hear the family’s dirty laundry “—I expected to be able to say I was sorry and for all to be forgiven.”
“That may take a bit of time.”
“I was eighteen, an adult. Granted, I didn’t leave in the most sensible manner. But I didn’t expect for the whole town to treat me like a pariah.”
To Joel’s surprise, Billy didn’t rush to assure him that everything was all right and his friends would come around. Instead, his stepfather’s lips pursed together and a definite look of disappointment came over his expression.
“What?” Joel asked. “I chose the rodeo over the farm. It wasn’t big enough for the two of us, anyway, and it was Jared’s dream, not mine. Still, I should be able to come home for—”
“You boys stay put,” Billy ordered. “Matt, finish your ice cream. Ryan, clean Caleb’s face.” He stood, motioning for Joel to follow him outside.
Joel stood too quickly, and then had to wait for his balance to return. All three boys looked at him like he was in trouble.
Beth still had her nose in her book.
The late-September sun still hovered high in the sky. A few cars were traveling down Main. Billy’d already made it to a distant picnic table. He sat with a rigid demeanor, his lips still pursed.
Joel waited, but Billy looked as if he expected Joel to do the talking.
The sunlight shimmered on the black-topped street in front of the Ice Cream Shack. Across from it was the barbershop where Joel had first climbed in a chair, sat on a padded seat with a cape over him and felt grown-up. Next door was the grocery store, not nearly as big as what the city boasted, but with a candy aisle that lived up to a preschooler’s dreams. Everything looked the same; it was the feel of the place that had changed.
Fine. Joel would start. “Out with it, Billy,” he ordered, carefully sitting across from his stepfather. “What’s going on? I expected Jared to be mad, but to turn me away when I’m truly down on my luck? And people I waved to on the street this afternoon, they either waved back at me like I was a ghost or they didn’t wave at all. At the school, I ran into people I grew up with, parents now, and they looked at me like I’m not real. Then Mrs. Armstrong practically tells me to never step foot in the elementary school again.”
“You really don’t know?” Billy asked.
“I. Really. Don’t. Know.”
“Maybe that knock on the head did permanent damage?” The words may have been in jest, but the look on Billy’s face was serious.
“I really don’t know what’s going on,” Joel repeated.
Billy looked at the sky, ran a hand over mostly nonexistent hair and sighed.
“It’s one thing,” Billy said, “to hurt people by taking what belongs to you.”
Joel opened his mouth. He’d been stifled on the farm, had always felt out of his element, and on top of everything else, Jared didn’t want to share, especially after he’d married, brought his wife to Solitaire Farm to live and had a baby.
But Billy wasn’t done. “It’s quite another thing to hurt people by taking what doesn’t belong to you.”
The words hung in the air, an invisible yet tangible barrier between Joel and the stepfather he so admired. It hadn’t been an easy decision, asking for his share of the inheritance, in dollars, instead of pitching in and staying on the family farm. But the will had stated that at eighteen Joel could sell his share. Because of the economy, it was a lot less than he’d expected. Still, Joel taking what was his hadn’t caused the sale of Solitaire Farm; it had only caused a bigger mortgage.
“What? Are you saying the money you gave me didn’t belong to me, because as I see it, having Jared buy me out was the best solution to—”
“I’m not talking about your half of the farm,” Billy sputtered. “I’m talking about the Rodeo Club Fund.”
Joel leaned forward, perplexed. “What about the RC money?”
Billy’s expression took on a hard edge. “The money that I put in my office after the festival the night you left.”
Joel growled, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What about the RC money? I remember attending the Fall Festival because it was my last night in town, but—”
“I put it in my office,” Billy said. “The treasurer said he figured we’d made double the usual. I was about to unlock the safe when my cell phone rang. One of the kids had gotten kicked by a horse. I didn’t think twice. I took off.”
That was Billy. He was a hands-on principal, and kids were his top priority.
“I took off,” Billy continued. “About an hour later, I went back to the office. I’d never forgotten that I needed to lock that money away.”
A bad feeling started prickling in Joel’s stomach. This wasn’t some proverbial story that Billy was telling to make a point.
“The money was gone,” Billy said, “and so were you.”
Joel had been sucker punched more than once in his twenty-six years, but never before had he realized that words had more impact than fists.
“You knew where I kept the key to my office, you knew I’d put the money in there, and you took it.”
“I—” Joel opened his mouth in indignation, but finishing the conversation was not to be. They were no longer alone. Beth stood behind the three boys, her hand on Matt’s shoulder.
“Matt’s got a stomachache,” she explained, her gaze going from Joel to Billy and back to Joel. To prove it, Matt held his stomach and doubled over a bit, moaning.
Beth shifted uncomfortably. “Is everything all right? Do you want me to run the boys home?”
“Everything’s fine. Or, at least, it’s going to be,” Billy rushed to assure. His eyes never left Joel’s face. Disappointment battled with anger.
Nothing was all right, not in Joel’s life and apparently not in Matt’s life, either.
Billy looked at Joel for a long moment before saying to the boys, “Let’s head home before your father sends out the hunting dogs.”
“We don’t have any hunting dogs,” Caleb complained.
“Shut up,” Ryan said. He quickly and
