Chapter Twenty-Five
Ulysses
As I sat at the basketball game, I kept my eye on everyone.
Most especially Finn.
He wouldn’t look at me. I sat in the bleachers, across where he was coaching—and he wouldn’t make eye contact.
Three days. He’d worked two of them, had a day off, and was now here. And yet he’d made no move to contact me. And my three texts had gone unanswered. Just one a day. See? I can be reasonable. I’m not obsessive. I’m not obsessed.
Or so I keep telling myself.
Over and over, I replayed that night in my mind.
Should I have said something different? Would it’ve given me a different outcome?
Or had the die been cast when I chose not to tell him about my writing?
I didn’t have a ready answer for that. If Finn wasn’t a writer himself—a poet no less—would the omission have cut so deep?
Again, I couldn’t say. I’d kept my mouth shut—as I had for the last almost fifteen years—and had never considered sharing.
H.R. wasn’t part of my day-to-day life. I fit writing and publishing around my day job as a reporter and now, as editor of a small-town paper.
If I’d thought the pace of life would slow once I moved to the boondocks, I was sorely mistaken on that count. Mission City kept me hopping.
Michael scored a three-pointer, and the crowd erupted in cheers. No one louder than Finn. He embraced everything in life with enthusiasm. Did he ever reach out to Giancarlo?
I’d tried. And been rebuffed. I’d explained the story was coming out in just a day and I was offering him an opportunity to set the record straight.
He’d slammed the door in my face and ignored my repeated emails.
Not that I’d believed he had a record to set straight.
Probably his lawyer warned him about speaking to the media—or anyone else—about his situation.
He was unlikely to make the situation better—but he could make it a whole lot worse if he wasn’t careful.
So I’d backed off, and the story had run as front-page news today.
The paper would be distributed throughout the day and, as of yet, I hadn’t had anyone approach me about my plea for more information, complete with a promise of anonymity.
I doubted the people at the game had yet seen the paper—but with the way word traveled around here, someone was bound to hear something.
Plus, time was ticking on Thelma’s adoption. I might have to break that part of the story before I had all the pieces. I absolutely didn’t want to do that.
“Mr. MacDonald.” A deep voice caught my attention.
“Mr. Clayton.” I rose and extended my hand to the principal.
He shook it. “Please, it’s Gage.”
“Then I insist on Ulysses.”
The little crow’s feet around his eyes crinkled when he smiled. “That’s fair. Do you have a moment?”
“Certainly.” Mission City had the game well in hand.
Finn didn’t appear the least bit interested.
My mind kept wandering anyway.
So I followed the tall, imposing man into the hallway.
“How are you finding things in Mission City?” He gestured toward the long hallway.
“I’m adapting.”
He chuckled. “I’ve been here twenty years, and I still say that.”
“You’re not from here?”
“No. I grew up closer to Vancouver. I graduated from teacher’s college and got a job in Mission City. My girlfriend became my wife, and we started a life here. Life proved interesting as I eventually became principal at this school and she was a guidance counselor. But we made it work.”
I cocked my head. “I thought your wife was a lawyer.”
“Ah. Rielle’s my second wife. Cara, my first wife, died suddenly a number of years ago. I’d sort of given up on love—and then fate threw Rielle in my path, and I had no chance to swerve and avoid the collision.”
“Sounds painful.”
Gage chuckled. “Best kind of collision. Meeting of the mind, body, and spirit. I used to think love was a once-in-a-lifetime thing. I’d only ever loved Cara.
Now, I see that simply isn’t true. That a really lucky person, if they lose one love of their life, might find happiness with a second person. I don’t know how to describe it.”
“I think you just did.” I smiled. “And now you have two young children.”
“Yes. Fatherhood at over forty caught me off guard. No regrets—but it’s a demanding thing.”
“I can imagine.” The man had gray threaded through his dark hair. “I don’t know how you do it. I look at parents and see the awesome responsibility.”
He gestured up and down the hallway. “I have a lot of responsibility—here and at home. I’m lucky I have a strong partner.”
“Sounds like it.” I eyed him. “Why are we having this conversation? Not that I mind talking—”
He chuckled. “I figured you’d want me to get straight to the point.” He sighed. “I read the article about the firefighter and drugs. You know we just lost a student to drugs.”
I nodded.
“I’m wondering if there’s a connection.”
I stilled. “Isn’t that a question for the police? The RCMP are in a much better position to comment.”
“And yet they won’t.”
“Ah.” Things crystalized. “I can’t tie the two events together. But I’m seeing a pattern. I can’t go public until I have confirmation.”
“Can you share with me?” His dark eyes held hope.
I shook my head. “Too premature. I will say if I had a direct link to the school then I’d be telling you.”
“Finn mentioned he thought he saw a man trying to sell drugs to Michael. Michael denied it, of course.”
“Yeah. It’s not like he’s going to admit to buying drugs—especially to someone he respects as much as Finn.”
“I’d hoped—” He ran his hands through his hair. “Finn’s so good with the kids. I hoped he could help keep them out of trouble.”
“Can anyone do that?”
He chuckled. Ruefully. “Uh, no. They’re teenagers. They’re chaos incarnate. Good point.”
“Yet you love them.”
“I do. I really do. When I lost my wife, I had this place as a reason to keep going. Successes like Finn help a lot in soothing the ache when things don’t go well.”
“Like David.”
“Like David.” He extended his hand.
I shook it. “I promise I’ll let you know.”
“That’s all I can ask. You going back to see the rest of the game?”
I shook my head. “It’s all good. I’ll get the final score to print in the paper. You’ve got a good team.”
“Yes. With a good coach. And Finn helping the kids not strong enough to make that team. We work hard.”
I liked how he included himself in that statement. Like he understood that leadership from the top was as important as lower ranks. That Finn was as important as the other adults in these kids’ lives.
Gage held my gaze. “You ever think about having kids?”
I blinked. Wow. Okay. Holy personal question. “Not in the cards for me. For some guys? Yeah, I can totally see it. I’ll happily watch from the sidelines.”
“Fair enough. Might you consider mentoring some of our kids? Even a single kid? We need good role models…”
His original question now made more sense. My immediate thought was mentoring kids in creative writing—teaching them about the world of publishing.
Gage didn’t mean that, though.
“I’ll see if we can organize something. Spring’s a local graduate, right? She might have some ideas of how to get a student more involved.”
The laughter from Gage was unexpected. The grin was also a contrast to the serious nature of our previous topic.
“Spring Dixon. Oh God.” He rubbed his forehead.
“Kennedy was before my time, but I’ve taught or been principal to every other Dixon sister.
I doubt it’ll come as a surprise when I say Spring was—” He made a rolling gesture with his hand.
I arched an eyebrow.
“Challenging. In a good way. She had to question everything. And I mean everything. She was the editor for the school newspaper, and I never knew what to expect. The teacher responsible for supervision wasn’t great at, uh, supervising.
I survived that year—barely. Autumn was such a treat by comparison. ”
Spring’s younger sister. “And her twin, Summer?”
Another chuckle. “Not as…defiant…as Spring. But still a handful. And I can’t say more.”
“At least I’m now able to identify all of them. I’ve never met seven sisters who so resemble each other.” Most of them had long black hair and pale-blue eyes, like carbon copies of Spring at various ages. Only Kennedy had chestnut-brown hair.
“Yes. I can say the same—except I don’t even think I’ve met seven other sisters at all.”
I laughed. “True that. Okay, I should be going.”
The doors to the gym opened, and people started pouring out.
Finn was near the front of the pack and, when he spotted me, he made a beeline my way. “Hey, Mr. Clayton. Ulysses.” He gave me that look. Clearly, he was still annoyed.
“I need to go speak to the players. Nice to see you, Finnegan.” With that, Gage headed toward the gym.
“Can I talk to you?” Finn gazed around at the milling students.
“Sure.”
He gestured toward the door to the outside.
I followed him.
When we arrived in the parking lot, he stopped. “Why are you here?”
“The basketball game?”
He arched an eyebrow. The streetlamps cast shadows across his face.
“Seriously, Finn.”
“Did you go to the bathroom?”
“What?” I stared at him. Then I laughed. “Uh, no. I didn’t go to the bathroom.”
“This time.” He didn’t appear the least bit appeased.
“Finn—”
“Did you talk to Mr. Clayton? About what’s going on?”
I nodded. “And I’ll tell you what I told him—I don’t have a complete grasp of what’s going on. When I do, I’ll let him know.” I’ll probably go to print first…but I will tell him.
“What about Thelma? She’s being rescued in a couple of days. Look, I’m going to go down to the shelter myself.” He ran his hands through his hair. “Unless you promise me you’re working on it. That you’re going to save her.”
Be careful. “It’s coming together, Finn, I promise.”
He didn’t look convinced. “I have to go.”
A pang of disappointment resonated in my chest. We hadn’t talked about what happened the other night. I still didn’t have a read on his feelings. Well, upset with me for keeping a secret—he’d made that abundantly clear. The rest? I didn’t have a clue. “I’ll see you around though, right?”
“Yeah. Sure.” And then he was gone.