Who Do You Love(56)
Author: Jennifer Weiner

“My little man,” Lori had said in the car at the airport, the morning he’d left for Oregon. “I can’t believe you’re so grown-up.” In the early-morning light in jeans and the Oregon sweatshirt he’d bought her, she looked so young, with her smooth skin and her long hair, now colored a more natural shade of blond, artfully highlighted and curled into soft waves. She was only thirty-six, years younger than most of the other boys’ moms. Maybe now that he was gone she’d have a boyfriend. If she met a nice guy he’d be fine with it. He worried, picturing Lori coming home from work, smelling like bleach and perm chemicals, to find the kitchen cold and dark, the couch empty.

He’d climbed out of the car, pulled out his duffel bag, one of a dozen donated to the team by a sneaker company, and tightened the laces of his shoes, which had been donated by another. His days of hand-me-down coats were over—between his paper route and the bowling alley and the giveaway T-shirts and warm-ups he got, he had plenty to wear.

“I’ll miss you,” said his mom, and swiped almost angrily under her eyes with the sides of her thumbs. “I should’ve done better.”

Surprised, he’d asked, “What do you mean?”

She’d brushed away more tears. “I should have encouraged you more. I should have come to more of your meets.” She’d sniffled, then said, “I should have bought you that goddamned coat in fifth grade.”

“Oh, Mom.” He pulled her into his arms, surprised at her smallness. When he’d been little he thought she was as tall as a giantess, big and scary, but now he could see her clearly, a petite, still-pretty woman who’d tried her best for him. Maybe she hadn’t done everything right, telling him that they were a team, that it was the two of them against the world and that they could never let anyone else in . . . but she’d worked hard to support them. She’d never had a boyfriend, never once, in all their years together, brought a man home, the way most of his friends’ single mothers would do. If she hadn’t given him everything he’d wanted, at least he wasn’t spoiled, and he’d learned, on his own, how to push himself hard, how to work for the things that he wanted.

“Go on,” she said. “Can’t miss your plane.” Carefully, she used the pads of her thumbs to pat concealer beneath her eyes. Her nails were long, shaped into ovals, perfectly painted, as always.

“Mom,” he’d said again, and she’d waved him away, a brief, dismissive gesture, turning her face so that he couldn’t see if she was still crying.

“I know,” she’d said. “I know.”

He’d picked up his bag, put his backpack on his shoulders, and walked through the airport’s automatic doors, to the gate, and to college, the next step in the future he’d mapped out for himself years ago. Oregon was the best place in the country for college runners. He’d train and race and impress the coaches with his skills and speed and, most of all, his attitude, his capacity to work hard, to push through the pain, to take whatever they gave him and keep coming back for more. He’d win the NCAAs and the Nationals and the Olympics; he’d get paid to endorse things, to give speeches and lead clinics and coach; he’d buy Lori a house someplace warm, so that she could relax, enjoy herself, not have to wait on other people all day long. He wondered how she’d look when he gave her a gold medal, or the keys to a house that he’d bought; how it would be to have his mom completely happy, entirely approving, glad that he was her son. Work hard—he heard Coach Maxwell’s voice in his head. Do your training, run your laps, and maybe someday you’ll find out.

•••

The Beaumont campus looked like a small village; a rich little village made of old brick and marble buildings crawling with ivy, of plush green lawns and weathered wood benches, wide stone walkways, and students who looked like they could all be Abercrombie & Fitch models. Rachel had lived in the dorms for her first year. Sophomores were allowed to live off-campus, or in their fraternities or sororities, and that was where she had moved. “Here we go,” she said, leading Andy down a street lined with stately mansions, all with Greek letters hanging over their doors and wide, carefully tended lawns, and tall trees that had been planted to shade the paths to the front doors. The Gammas were housed in a three-story white building with marble steps that looked like a smaller version of Scarlett O’Hara’s plantation house in Gone with the Wind, with its pillars and its deep front porch. Inside, it was cool and smelled like furniture polish and roasting chicken. Rachel’s room was on the third floor, and the first thing Andy noticed was that it wasn’t just one room but a suite of rooms, a bedroom and a sitting room with a desk and a couch and a little refrigerator and a fireplace, an actual, working, wood-burning fireplace, with a neat stack of logs in a round iron holder beside it.