Chapter Two
Sam woke, as he had for the past month, in his childhood bedroom.
It no longer looked anything like when he’d lived at home.
Gone were the Lady Gaga posters and the collage of his favorite actors, their pictures cut from magazines and assembled on black craft paper.
The pinboard displaying inspirational quotes in cursive had been taken down and donated.
Now the walls were lined with shelves holding tubs of fabric and foam stabilizer.
A large cabinet housed rows of miniature plastic storage containers filled with tiny sparkling discs of every color.
In recent years, his mom had gained a not-insignificant following on Etsy, selling sequined purses and totes, and had transformed the room into her own personal craft studio.
In honor of his unexpected return, his parents had unearthed the old rollaway bed from the garage and parked it in the middle of the room.
It creaked as Sam turned over, the metal slats digging through the thin mattress and into his ribs.
He’d refused his mom’s offer to pick out a new bed, something cheap and sturdy from one of the big-box stores, because what was buying furniture if not an admission that he was back for good?
He reached for his phone and checked it instinctively, a habit from another life when he would find his home screen stacked with alerts: emails from work, texts from friends, drunk missed calls he would not be returning.
It stared at him blankly. Sam wasn’t sure if he felt relief or disappointment.
He’d been oscillating between the two ever since his parents had brought him home from the airport.
Escaping Austin had been like removing an iron collar cutting off the air to his lungs.
But coming back to Oakdale meant he was shackled in a different way.
If there was a place that perfectly summed up Sam’s deepest feelings of weakness and inadequacy—a place that, over the years, he’d made unreasonable attempts to avoid—this would be it.
Oakdale was his worst fear realized. After a decade away, chasing one dream after another, he had plummeted back to earth.
He threw on some clothes and headed downstairs for breakfast. His father sat at the dining table while his mother made coffee in the kitchen.
He’d hoped he was late enough to avoid one of his dad’s pep talks, but the man was leisurely flipping through the newspaper, savoring the square of buttered toast in his hand.
“Look who’s up,” his mother said, breezing over and kissing him on the top of his head as he sat down at the table.
“Morning,” Sam mumbled.
“Coffee?”
“Yes, please.” Sam picked up the box of muesli, feeling his father’s eyes on him. “Anything interesting today?”
There was a time when he’d devoured the news, scrolling endlessly through articles and think pieces, fleshing out the world around him.
It had been a point of pride, a great party trick, to always have an opinion about everything.
Sam’s world had grown remarkably smaller in recent weeks, and strangely, he didn’t miss the prized mental real estate he’d expended on thoughts of doomed climate change initiatives and voter fraud.
“Actually, there is.” His father flipped to the back page of the newspaper, revealing several neatly circled listings in the classifieds.
He’d been with the town planning committee since before Sam was born and was one of the council’s longest-standing employees.
He was a practical man, unswayed by the notion that somewhere, somehow, the grass might be greener.
Sam’s mom, on the other hand, had held a plethora of jobs over the years and seemed content flitting between each new thing that drew her interest. He remembered a particularly embarrassing semester at elementary school when she’d served as one of the lunch ladies.
Sam busied himself pouring milk into his bowl. “People still do that?”
“Do what?”
“Advertise jobs in the paper.”
“There’s nothing wrong with advertising in the paper.”
His mom handed Sam a cup of coffee and threw his father a warning look before sitting down across from him at the table.
“You’d be more than qualified for any of these,” his dad continued, unfazed. “Would be nice to get out of the house. And a little extra money couldn’t hurt.”
Sam gritted his teeth. It wasn’t as if he enjoyed sliding aimlessly through his days, watching everyone go about their lives as his ground to a halt.
Within the first week, he’d maxed out his capacity for daytime television—grown women in button-downs and chinos, dancing like kids hopped up on sugar.
Not to mention that his mother’s hovering was getting to him.
She floated around the house and just happened to come across him in whatever room he was in.
He was too afraid to jerk off, sure she’d pick that exact moment to pop her head in the door and ask how he was doing.
It was like being thirteen all over again.
Sam glanced down at the circled jobs. “Kitchen hand?”
“Lots of people get their start in service.”
“I’m not looking for my start.” Not while I’m still paying off my degree.
“This one might be more up your alley.” His dad pointed to a listing for Office Allstar.
Sam swallowed a mouthful of coffee and tried to shake the descending dread. Why is this happening? Why, at the most promising point in my career, did I choke so spectacularly?
“It’s working reception,” he said quietly. He realized his parents probably had no idea what he did. He’d once flown them out to attend a big launch event he’d organized for a client, and afterward, when he asked them what they thought, they’d complimented the catering.
“It’s just an idea, honey,” his mom said.
“Exactly,” his dad said. “A job is a job.”
Sam filled his mouth with muesli so he wouldn’t be tempted to reply.
There was a bench in the middle of Oakdale’s leafy town square that faced a small fountain decorated with half-naked cherubs.
It was a nice enough spot to eat lunch, and Connor found himself there on days when the weather was decent and he wasn’t shoveling a sandwich into his face on the way to his next job.
Sometimes he’d bring the newspaper or an overdue library book he kept forgetting to return and would sit for twenty minutes, taking it all in.
It didn’t take long to soak in the sights of Oakdale.
The town consisted primarily of the redbrick stores that fronted its quaint main street: the post office, Jenny’s Diner, and the “made local” boutique that hawked overpriced tea cozies and tote bags and catered to those passing through on their way to Nebraska’s more interesting cities.
Located a short distance from the main drag was the elementary-middle school that used to be just an elementary school but had been combined a couple of years back because there weren’t enough children to fill it.
The high school was only a few blocks away and home of the Oakdale Panthers, who shared their football field with all manner of local sports teams, including the Hamilton County Lawn Bowling Club.
Connor knew these things because he’d lived here all his life, a sad but resoundingly accurate fact and the reason why, on any given day, several passersby waved at him as he sat on the weathered park bench—customers, former teachers, his parents’ friends.
After spending his youth fighting tooth and nail against his imposed sentence, Connor had raised the white flag and surrendered to his fate.
The town, with its cast of residents and its grid of familiar streets, formed the extent of his world.
And despite the elaborate fantasies he entertained about leaving, that he was still here all these years later was proof of his resignation.
Connor peeled the crust off his ham sandwich and tossed it at a duck waddling past. The poor thing was immediately set upon by a gaggle of larger and more intimidating peers, pecking at the bread in its beak.
Life’s not fair, little dude, Connor mused, watching the spectacle.
“Nice day for it!”
Connor looked up to see Mayor Greenfield walking past with his bespectacled assistant and raised a hand in greeting.
When he was fifteen, he’d been helping his dad out on a job at Greenfield’s house when the mayor had pulled his father aside and informed him of the community’s growing concern about his wayward son.
“It’s a small town; people talk,” Greenfield advised in a lowered voice, though not quietly enough that Connor, standing mere feet away, hadn’t heard the entire exchange.
Oakdale was a small town, and people did talk. Their talk filled in the blanks, fixing Connor in place like a caricature. Who cared if it was true? It was easier to let them talk than to change their minds.