“So you survived.”
Casey shook her head and swung her leg over her bike, ready to head back to The Nesting Place, since rehearsal was over. “Barely. And you didn’t help.”
“Me?” Eric placed his hands over his chest, his eyes wide with innocence. “What did I do?”
Casey gave him a light punch to the shoulder. “Telling Holly she was beginning to get the hang of it was hardly beneficial.”
He grinned. “What? You suggest I give her criticism? You think she would listen?”
“No. I guess not.”
“Besides, Thomas would kill me.”
“He’s that protective?”
“Of his position as director. Not of Holly.”
Casey looked back toward the theater, not wanting to be overheard. “You sure about that? He was looking at her pretty possessively. Although I did notice he was wearing a wedding ring.”
Eric snorted. “Like that matters to him.”
Casey crossed her arms over her chest, her feet flat on the ground, balancing the bike under her. “Okay. Spill. You have to tell me what the deal is with you and Thomas.”
“Oh. I have to, do I?”
A quick glance showed Casey he wasn’t angry. But he suddenly looked tired.
“Come on,” she said. “I’ll walk you back to your car.”
“Eric!” Leila came skipping out of the theater. “You said we could go out for a drink, remember?”
“Not tonight, Leila, okay? Another time.”
Leila looked at Casey, her feelings evident on her face. “Fine. Another time.”
With a huff she swung her hair off of her shoulders and stomped to the green VW Bug across the street. Eric didn’t say anything as she snatched her keys from the driver’s seat, revved the engine, and screeched away, her taillights shining brightly in the night.
“Well…” Casey said.
“Come on,” Eric said. “Let’s go.”
He began walking and Casey followed on the opposite side of the bike.
Eric held up a hand, then dropped it. “Like I said, Thomas’ family and mine go way back. Our fathers went to school together.”
“Here in Clymer?”
“No. I wasn’t from here, originally. I moved here when I was eight, when my father got a job. Thomas and his family came shortly after, for the same reason.”
“Jobs with HomeMaker?”
“Yes. Anyway, Thomas was just a year ahead of me in school. I know he looks older, but I think it’s the beard. He cultivated that to appear more sophisticated.”
Casey gave a short laugh, and Eric grinned. “I know. I didn’t say it worked. But he does his best.”
They walked for a few more paces in silence.
“Were you friends?” Casey finally asked.
“No.” It came out as an exclamation. “We never were. I’m not sure why, exactly. Our dads were together all the time, and our moms… But he always seemed to think we were in some competition. Girls, grades, basketball. You name it, we were against each other. I didn’t even like basketball.”
“Or girls?”
He laughed. “Oh, I liked them fine. At least, after about seventh grade. But they always seemed to like Thomas better.”
Casey glanced at him. “Seriously?”
“Sure. He had that brooding, artistic thing going.”
“What? And you don’t? You’ve got more artistic sense than he’ll ever have.”
He smiled. “Well, thanks. But that took a while to come about. I had no interest in theater at all during school. My mother forced me to sing in the choir, but that was as far as my artistic endeavors went. Back then, I was just…all I tried to do was fade into the background.”
“How come?”
He shrugged. “Different reasons. The main one being I was probably the shyest kid in town.”
“No.”
“Time changes things.”
“I guess. And was it just time that changed you?”
He kicked a stone from the sidewalk and shoved his hands into his pockets. “Maybe partly. But it was also Charles Dickens.”
“Dickens?”
“Well. Sort of.” He gave a chuckle. “The musical version.”
“You mean Oliver?”
“You got it. The high school English teacher, who directed the plays, for some unknown reason decided it was the show to do for the spring musical my junior year.”
“And you tried out?”
“No way. I wasn’t about to go anywhere near that thing. The closest I would get would be if my mother bought tickets and forced me to go see it. I left the leading man thing to Thomas. He was much better suited to it, being the handsome extrovert.”
“So what happened?”
He made a face. “I wasn’t exactly large in high school.”
“You mean like now, at your hulking five ten?”
“Hey, I can act taller.” He stopped, puffing out his chest and raising his shoulders.
Casey rolled her eyes and continued walking.
“Anyway,” Eric said, catching up to her, “I was small, blond, and sang in the choir. Good enough for the director. She began a campaign on my mother to get me to do the show.”
“Not your dad?”
“No way. My dad would never have agreed to it. It was my mom that had to be convinced. And she was, eventually.”
“Your dad didn’t stop it?”
Eric pinched his lips together. “My dad didn’t have anything to say about it by that time.”
“How come?”
“Because he and my mom got divorced when I was twelve. He really didn’t have much to do with my day-to-day life after that.”
“I’m sorry.”
He kicked another stone. “That’s the way it was. And my mom couldn’t resist the director. She was convinced I secretly longed for the stage, and dragged me to rehearsal. And that was that. I took one step on the stage and never wanted to leave.” He pointed down an alley a block before Home Sweet Home, and Casey turned her bike with him. “It was like I’d found my true calling. My mother was right.”
Casey followed him around the back of the buildings to the few parking spaces behind the soup kitchen. “Yes, she was. It’s obvious.”
He stopped at his Camry. “To make a long story short—although it’s been plenty long already—Thomas wasn’t exactly thrilled I broke into his domain. It’s been a battle ever since.”
“But you didn’t stay here in Clymer.”
“No.”
“Did Thomas?”
“He didn’t, either.”
“And you both went to Louisville? Actors’ Theater, maybe?”
He glanced at her sharply. “How did you know—”
“Todd. He said you’d been there.”
“Oh. Sure. Those were…interesting times.”
“And you both came back.”
He opened his door and stepped into the lighted triangle between it and the car. “We did.”
“Why?”
He picked his keys up from the driver’s seat and studied them, singling out the fat one that would start the car. “Different things. It was just…time.” He slid into the driver’s seat. “See you at dinner tomorrow?”
“Sure. Four-o’clock?”
“Around there. We’ll probably be having pizza. I’m making a trip to the Pizzeria in the next town tomorrow afternoon. They save their mistakes for us and freeze them until they have enough for a meal.”
“That’s nice.”
“Want to come along? Except you can’t drill me with questions the whole time.”
Casey thought about the day, and how it would stretch out in front of her, with the constant temptation of her cell phone, Ricky being only a call away, and the library, where she could log onto the Internet and the Pegasus web site. “Sure. What time?”
“You promise? Only friendly conversation?”
She smiled. “I promise.”
“Your fingers aren’t crossed?”
She held them out in front of her, fingers splayed open. “I promise.”
“Okay, then. I’ll pick you up at The Nesting Place at two-thirty.”
“Great. I’ll be ready.”
He shut his door, turned on the car, and reversed out of the parking space. Casey backed up to get out of his way, and bumped into Death.
“I don’t know,” Death said. “You’re spending a lot of time with him.”
“So?”
Death smirked. “Like I said before, he’s awfully cute.”
“Yeah? Well, you’re not.”
Death gave a shocked gasp. “Now that was unnecessary.”
“But true.”
“You do realize, love, that you can’t hurt my feelings?”
Casey sighed. “I know. But it won’t kill me to try.”
Death cocked an eyebrow.
“Will it?” Casey asked hopefully.
“Nah,” Death said.
“Yeah,” Casey said. “That’s what I thought.”