A Time To Come Home

“Not in the field you’re planning to study, you don’t. I’ll show you the ropes, teach you some things about running an office. Think of it as on-the-job training.” He named a figure on par with what she expected to earn as a waitress. Then he threw in better benefits.

She had to admit the job sounded like a godsend, but the allure of the position warred with panic at the thought of being back in Bentonsville. “I couldn’t work nine to five, because my classes are in the mornings.”

“Then work one to nine. Nine o’clock is when the community center closes. We’re open seven days a week, but you can have two days off. Say, Sunday and Thursday.”

“That would mean driving back to Gaithersburg every night on the dark, country roads.”

“Don’t live in Gaithersburg. Live in Bentonsville. You could even stay with your mother.” He must have picked up on her tension, because he added. “Or rent an apartment. Housing costs in Bentonsville are relatively cheap. I might even know of a place.”

She fidgeted with her coffee cup. The people who remembered her would recall that she’d been pregnant and unmarried when she left home, subjecting Jaye to unwanted curiosity once the child moved in with her. But while Diana’s mind rejected Chris’s suggestion that she live in Bentonsville, she didn’t entirely dismiss the idea of working in town. It might be awkward for her, but she’d faced a lot worse than awkward the last few months and survived.

“I’m tempted,” she said, thinking aloud.

“Wait ’til you see the center. There’s not much going on today because of the holiday weekend. But come with me, have a look around first.”

“You sure you have the time to give me a tour?”

“For you, Tag-Along, I’ll make the time.” Chris stood up, extending his hand to her. “So what do you say?”

The safe thing would be to refuse on the spot, but instead she placed her hand in his. What could it hurt to look?

DIANA INSERTED a chicken marsala frozen dinner in the compact microwave, set the controls on high for five minutes, then flopped down on her hotel bed.

A rerun of the pilot episode of Everybody Loves Raymond played on the television set across from the bed. As she watched the hectic beginning scenes, she vaguely remembered the plot. Ray’s wife’s birthday was approaching, and she wanted peace and quiet away from ringing phones, demanding kids and friends and family dropping by unannounced.

Three shrill beeps signaled her food was ready. Diana grabbed the remote and flicked off the TV before getting up from the bed.

Spending a quiet birthday wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. She should know. She’d had one last month. It had been only slightly more bearable than the lonesome Labor Day weekend that was finally coming to an end. But she had only herself to blame for that. If she were really through being a coward, she’d have accepted Connor’s invitation to spend the holiday with him. And Jaye.

Setting the packaged dinner down on the desk, she removed a cola from the small refrigerator and sat down. Through the walls, she could hear a young girl’s high-pitched giggle and the deeper voices of a man and a woman.

She glanced at the streamlined phone by the bedside, longing to pick it up and make a connection with her own daughter. But the reason she’d given Connor for not being in touch with Jaye still stood.

She was like a leaf swirling in the wind, without a place to touch down. How could she even think about having Jaye with her until she’d landed?

She cut off a piece of chicken with her plastic knife, put it in her mouth and chewed. The taste didn’t compare to the chicken marsala served by the Scarlet Pimpernel, which is what she could be eating tomorrow night after she’d attended her first day of classes and started her new job.

But the position the restaurant manager in Nashville had lined up for her no longer seemed as attractive. Supposedly the Scarlet Pimpernel had prospective waitresses lining up at the door, but Diana kept thinking about the Bentonsville Community Center.

She’d make about as much money as she would at the restaurant, which would still enable her to afford a nice-sized unit in the apartment complex she’d chosen. But not only would she have more scheduling flexibility, she’d have better health coverage for Jaye.

She heard a door opening, then closing, and the voices of the family that had been in the next room growing softer as they moved down the hall toward the elevator. Then the quiet was so pronounced, she could hear herself chew.

When she and Chris stopped by the community center on Saturday, the place had been, to use one of Chris’s words, hopping in spite of the holiday weekend. Small children and their parents had gyrated to the music in one of the all-purpose rooms hosting a Mom & Me exercise class. Senior citizens had congregated in the great room for their weekly Saturday afternoon bingo game. And a raucous basketball game had been going on at an outside court.

Pushing her half-eaten container of food away from her, Diana got to her feet and picked up her purse from the floor beside the bed. She rummaged through it, finally pulling out a business card.

Not giving herself time to change her mind, she punched in the number on the hotel phone and counted the rings. One. Two. Three.

“Hello,” Chris Coleman said, his voice coming through bright and jovial. Commotion reined in the background, as though the community center had hit a particularly busy spell.

“Hi, Chris. It’s Diana Smith. Is the job you offered me still available?”

TYLER BENTON RUSHED through the Bentonsville Community Center in the direction Valerie, the receptionist, had directed, aware of minutes ticking by that could be spent preparing for trial.

It couldn’t be helped. He needed to take care of this today.

The high-pitched chatter of the children in center-based day care mingled with the rusty voices of seniors playing bridge as he stood at the head of a large room, scanning the crowd.

“Yoo hoo, Tyler.” The greeting came from one of the women at the nearest card table: his sixth-grade teacher, the white hair piled on her head adding inches to her height.

“Hello, Mrs. Piper.” He tamped down his impatience and smiled at her. The other women at the table looked up from their cards. Tyler knew two of them, who he greeted by name. Mrs. Piper introduced him to the third, Mrs. Ruth Grimes, a plump woman with old-fashioned horn-rimmed glasses.

“Tyler here is an assistant state’s attorney,” Mrs. Piper told her, “although we all know he’s destined for even better things.”

Mrs. Grimes peered at him with interest over the top of her glasses. “Oh, really? Then perhaps you’d like to meet my granddaughter. She’s a peach.”

“I’m afraid that adorable Lauren Fairchild got to him first.” Mrs. Piper lowered her voice as though confiding a secret. To Tyler, she said, “I saw you two together at church on Sunday. You make a lovely couple.”

Tyler’s father, who’d invited the omnipresent Lauren to sit with them, had voiced the same sentiment. Tyler let Mrs. Piper’s comment slide, the same way he’d ignored his father’s verbal shove in Lauren’s direction. If he claimed not to be serious about Lauren, he’d find himself on a blind date with Mrs. Grimes’s granddaughter.

“Have any of you seen your director?” he asked. “I’ve got some business with him.”

“I wondered what you were doing here in the middle of the day.” Mrs. Piper craned her neck just as Chris Coleman stood up from a chair he’d pulled up to one of the other tables. “There’s Chris now. He’s such a sweetheart.”

The three other woman nodded, their assessment of Chris unanimous.

“Don’t let me interrupt your bridge game any more than I already have,” Tyler said, his mind on taking care of business and getting back to work. “It was a pleasure to see you ladies.”

He moved toward Chris, who excused himself from the foursome to whom he’d been talking. The charming smile the director had bestowed on the ladies of Bentonsville disappeared.

“Benton,” he said in lieu of a greeting.

“Chris.” Tyler inclined his chin. “I’ve got to talk to you.”

“Now? It couldn’t have waited until tonight?”

Tyler spent some of his very limited free time on the center’s outdoor basketball court, playing ball with the teen boys who congregated there. “I can’t make it tonight. Or any time soon, I’m afraid. I’m about to go to trial.”

“Then what’s so important you’re here now?”

Tyler looked around, encountering a half-dozen sets of interested eyes. He indicated a nearby hallway with a jerk of his head. Receiving his silent message, Chris walked with him until they were out of hearing range of the card players.

“Okay, what’s up?” Chris asked.

The director’s manner was friendly. His eyes were not. Although they’d never run in the same social circles, Tyler had graduated from high school the same year as Chris. The animosity he sensed rolling off the director hadn’t appeared until recently. Lately, it seemed as though Chris plain didn’t like him. Well, Tyler didn’t like what Chris had done.

Tyler carefully kept his next statement non-accusatory. “Jim Jeffries told me you backed out of buying his pool tables.”