Free Until There Was You by J.J. Bamber Page B

buoyant and light.
    Bailey looked impressed with himself and then suddenly tired again, like his energy had been zapped in his pursuit of premature adulthood. He yawned a big yawn and snuggled his face against the seat. "I'm tired, so I am going to go to sleep… But there better not be any bad language from you, or I will hear it! You know I always hear it," he mumbled, putting his thumb in his mouth.
    "Okay," Nate whispered as he watched Bailey drift back to sleep. After a short time, he turned to face the windshield and noticed that the rain had stopped pouring and the black clouds up ahead were moving away, like they were being swept off so that the sky could illuminate the way. "I actually got a sign…" Nate mumbled as he typed a new address into the GPS—an address that he had never imagined he would ever type into any GPS—and turned the key in the ignition.

You Can't Go Home
    "Hey, Mom," Nate said into his cell as he messed around with the gas pump. There was silence on the other side of the phone, the only sound a slight crackle of bad reception. He looked around at the quiet gas station and inhaled the metallic smell of the fuel. He allowed himself to take a moment's solace in the isolation. Nobody would tell him what to do, or look at him sympathetically, or have opinions on how he should be thinking and feeling. Still rainwater rested in deep bumps and grooves in the ground, their surfaces slick and still—a strange mix of grim and serene, of raggedness and beauty.
    "This is Ava… Who is this?" Nate's mom's voice boomed through the earpiece. Nate was taken aback by the intensity of her voice even though he had spent his whole childhood listening to her boisterous phone manner. He suddenly remembered all of the times that he had been embarrassed by the animated way that his mother had spoken to her friends on the phone.
    "It's Nate. You know, the only person in the whole world who would call you mom." The sarcasm in his voice was partly at such a ridiculous question and partly because it was a bit of armor, a defense against something he hadn't faced in years. He could feel his resolve failing a little, and he could hear the frightened young teenager who had fled town in the dead of night.
    "Oh, Nathaniel! How did you get this number?"
    "Well, you've had the same one my whole life, so I thought I would take a risk." He smoothed a non-existent wrinkle on his sweater, reminding himself to be calm and collected. Surely he could get through the first conversation with his mother in ten years without biting her head off.
    "Of course, that's us, never changing. I guess I was just surprised to hear your voice. You sound so different, like you've grown—like you're a grown up man now," she said, suspicion now easing into something that sounded like quiet heartache. Nate was listening to her voice as closely as possible, trying to grasp how his mother was thinking and feeling.
    "That's me, I'm all grown up—well, that's what I like to think. I can drive now and I have a bank account and everything..." Nate laughed a little. He looked through the passenger window and saw Bailey making his usual bored face, his little cheeks blown up so that they looked fat and round. Bailey rolled his eyes at Nate, trying to signal that it was time to go, that he couldn't stand sitting in the idle car any longer.
    "I can't even imagine you driving! Oh, Nathaniel... My book club is reading one of your books next month. I still can't even believe that you have books… And all of the ladies have already read it! And they love it so much that they want to read it all over again. That never happens. Well, except with The Da Vinci Code … But I hated that one. You know, all that luminati stuff, it's too hard for me to get my head around. I told them when we were reading it. I like a good romantic comedy, plain and simple. Is your book a romantic comedy? Not that I wouldn't read it if it weren't." Her voice had turned excited, her words