Chapter 26 #3
“It’s not like I’ve ever been in love, you know, but I remember what it looked like with Mom and Dad.”
Leslie squeezed his shoulder. “Yeah. They were in love. I wish you could have seen them before, you know?”
Sandy finally looked at him. “You’re nothing like he was. You’re not going to be him. I don’t need medical tests to tell me that.”
Leslie blew out a shaky breath. “How? How can you have so much faith in me when I don’t have it in myself?”
Sandy turned to face him. “Because you raised us. You never raised your voice unless we deserved it. You were fair and tough, and you let us know you hated our actions but you loved us. We could never tell with Dad.”
“He loved you the best he was capable of. Anything I did for you and Randy I learned from his example.”
“What did you learn?” Randy asked as he and Agnes approached the car with to-go containers in hand.
“That my brothers are pretty damned smart. Now, let’s get back to Ayre Valley. I have work to do.”
They got back to Greenvale in time for football practice and Leslie let his brothers take the lead.
When it was over, he walked over to Higdon and worked up the courage to go inside and face the music, like the moody stuff he heard coming from inside the common room.
It seemed empty until he stuck his head in the doors.
Joe was alone, in front of the mirrors, dressed in snug black pants and no shirt.
He moved in long lines, reaching at a diagonal and lifting the opposite leg and then he’d switch directions, making his way across the floor in a fluid movement.
Joe’s long limbs seemed to grow impossibly longer as he stretched them out as far as they could go and still be attached to his body.
His feet were bare and his hair was loose and wavy, falling in his face.
Leslie stepped into the room and watched Joe move as if he were liquid, or a flower bending on its stem with the breeze or the weight of a bumble bee.
He did a series of turns and then a leap that sent him rolling on the floor.
He rose slowly, a little unsteady on his feet, and his facial expression was so full of passion, of longing and…
sadness. He reached out with his hands, the muscles on his arms standing out, his fingers spread wide, articulating each bone with each grasp.
He swung his leg in an arc and his toe hit the floor, leading into a lunge.
His arms wheeled over and over until he brushed the floor with his fingertips and then he arched back, bending in half.
He held that pose until the music ended and then he stood upright, his chest heaving as he stood in front of the mirror, glaring at Leslie.
“That was beautiful,” Leslie said, moving forward tentatively. “What’s it for?”
“New choreography for Dance Machine but also to show my beginning dance class.” He tilted his head to the side. “How did the doctor’s go?”
Leslie shoved his hands in his pockets, moving forward two more steps.
“Good, um, the doctor doesn’t see anything on my scans to be concerned about. He wants me to see some specialists about my migraines and for cognitive therapy.” He shrugged. “I’ll do whatever he says,” he added. If it means I have more time.
Joe nodded and chewed at a thumbnail. “That’s good,” he said. He turned back toward the mirror and looked around, finally grabbing his shirt. He slid it on and turned back around, but his body language seemed tense, as if he were looking for an escape route.
“Joe,” Leslie said, holding his hands out. Then he let them fall. “I...I don’t know what to say. I thought about it all day but I—”
“We said we would be honest. We wouldn’t keep things from each other.”
Boom. Joe’s words hit Leslie hard. That was the truth of it. They had made that promise and Joe had done his part. He’d told Leslie about his job situation even though he knew Leslie wanted him to stay in Ayre Valley. He’d been honest. “I know.”
“I kept wondering why you were in such a hurry, besides the fact that we’d waited so long. I didn’t understand why the rush? ”
“Because what if I don’t have the time? What if my TBI becomes CTE?
What if I lose myself?” Leslie blurted the words out.
He laid himself bare before Joe, like the wooden expanse of floor between them.
“My father was about my age the first time he threw a chair through a window in the house because he was pissed at my mom. That was how it started. He’d throw shit.
It quickly descended into a time of terror for my family.
” He really didn’t want to tell Joe the horror stories, hoped he wouldn’t have to, not now.
“I’ll tell you more, I’ll tell you anything, but it was bad, Joe. ”
“Leslie, I know you. I know your heart. Never for a minute—”
“And people said the same about my dad. Well, people who didn’t live with him. He always had a bit of a temper, but he never hurt us, not before…”
Leslie blew out a breath. Their family had tried so hard to keep the details under wraps, but had that been the best plan? Had it allowed for more people to experience what Leslie’s family had?
“I’m sorry for what your family went through, Leslie. I know it forced you into more of a parenting role with your brothers and it was tough on them and your mom. But Leslie Payton is not Rick Payton. I know who you are. And I thought,” he said, messing with his hair, “I thought you knew me.”
Leslie wanted to close the physical distance between them, but it was as if there was an invisible barrier holding him back, or his feet wouldn’t work, so despite everything in him wanting to fix this, he couldn’t move.
“I do know you, Joe. All I can say is I was afraid.”
“Afraid I’d leave. I guess that means the Joe you know is not to be trusted.
You can’t trust me to know the truth about your health, you can’t trust me to take care of you when you’re sick, and you can’t trust me to still work on my career and also be with you, even when you said you would support me always.
” He set his hands on his hips and his chest deflated. “You know me, but you don’t trust me.”
“I trust you in more ways than I’ve ever trusted a living soul,” Leslie said. “I’ve told you things, let you see me at my weakest…I gave my heart to you!”
“But when you needed me most, when it mattered the most, you shut me out. You made me think I was wrong for wanting to keep working when really you didn’t trust me to come back. Well that just fucking hurts, Leslie. After everything we’ve been through—”
“I don’t want you to end up like me.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Joe asked, his voice going up in pitch.
“I hate to see you hurt. I know how much pain you’re in and I don’t want that for you. I know you love dancing, but is it worth it?”
“It’s all I know! It’s all I’m good for.”
“That’s not true—”
“Let me finish. I’d be nothing without this body,” Joe said, gesturing to himself.
“And my fucking talent. And it’s going away.
I have a very small window left before I can’t do it anymore, and you showed me that I had something else to give by bringing me here.
I love coaching, I love teaching, and I love that I can do that here and be close to you, but I’m not a wealthy man.
I have to work, and I have to keep my options open, limited though they may be, in case the college doesn’t hire me back.
I can’t just settle down without a plan. I have to think of the future.”
Leslie felt this conversation slipping away from him like being down twenty-one points in the fourth quarter with the chances of scoring minimal.
“Is it more than that, though? I know you feel like coming here is settling.” Fear was a monster that did ugly things to Leslie. “I guess that means I’m not good enough to settle down with if you think this is settling.”
Joe flinched as if he’d been slapped.
“If that’s what you think, if that’s how little you think of me, then we have nothing else to say.” Joe cranked up the music, turning his back on Leslie and the conversation.
A single tear fell from Leslie’s cheek as he left the room, walking away from love for the second time.