This is a side to Willow I don’t know but I want to learn more about.
And now that the kid has diarrhea of the mouth, I don’t want him to stop.
“Like what?” I ask him.
“Oh, I don’t know off the top of my head.” He chews thoughtfully. “Well, one time, you were playing, and we were watching as usual, and there was nothing on the screen hinting at the fact that you might be breaking a record that night. I hadn’t heard anyone mention it in the pregame. I had no idea.”
He takes a bite, and I cross my arms over my chest, listening.
This isfascinating.
“But Aunt Wills looked kind of nervous. She was pacing and biting her thumbnail, and she wasn’t eating any of the nachos, and I was like, ‘What’s wrong with you?’ And she said, ‘He only has to score two goals to break it.’”
I have chills. Goose bumps all down my arms.
“And I said, ‘Break what?’ and she said, ‘The all-time scoring record. They’re not even talking about it, and he could break it tonight.’ She was so mad that the commentator dudes weren’t talking about it.”
“They didn’t want to jinx it,” I murmur, remembering that night.
Christ, I was nervous. And I never get nervous on game night.
“And then, when you made that second goal,” he continues, finished with his sandwich now and switched back to the bag of chips, “she freakingcried. It scared me because Aunt Wills doesn’t cry. That woman issolid. And she just wept like a baby. I patted her back for a few, and then I was like, ‘I’m going to my room.’”
Fuck me.
“Thanks for telling me that.”
“Sure. She probably wouldn’t like that I told you she cried, so let’s keep that between us.”
With a chuckle, I nod. “Okay. Was there something specific you wanted to ask me before we got off on the Willow tangent?”
“Oh, right. Do you think I’m too old to start playing?”
“I was your age when I started,” I reply. “You’re not too old.”
He scratches his nose. “I don’t know. I kind of want to. But some of the guys at school are assholes, and I don’t want to hang out with them.”
“Beat ’em up on the ice,” I suggest. “That’ll feel damn satisfying.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Come on, let’s finish up. We have a lot left to do.”
Aiden is a hard worker. I can see that he’s beat, since I worked him hard today, but he never complains. I don’t have to ask him to do anything twice, and when he saw that I was struggling with a tree earlier, he jumped in to help me.
He’s going to be an asset to the ranch this summer. This first week went really well.
And I can also see that Willow’s right. He’s a good kid. So why is he acting out and treating her so badly? What in the hell is going on with him?
I’ll ask him over the coming weeks, and we’ll get to the bottom of it because I hate seeing my Willow upset.
We’re sitting on the porch with bottles of water when Willow comes driving up to the house. She climbs out of the car, and Aiden stands and turns to me.
“I guess I’ll see you on Monday,” he says.
“Get some rest tonight,” I reply, and he walks down to where Willow’s standing.
“I figured you’d be hungry,” she says as she approaches, and I hear the hesitation in her voice as she speaks to him. Is she afraid of him? “So there are some burgers and fries in the front seat. I already had mine, so the rest is yours.”
