The Bridge (21 page)

Nolan played basketball with his heart, mind, and soul. The ball was an extension of his hand, and every move, every step was as natural for him as breathing. Watching him, Ellie felt her eyes dry, felt herself marveling at the gift he’d been given, the way she celebrated it every time she had the privilege of seeing him play. Nolan’s dream was as simple as it was impossible.

He wanted to play in the NBA. It was something he prayed about and worked toward every day. Every hour of every day. From the A’s and B’s he struggled to earn in class to the hours he put in here every day and
night. If Nolan didn’t wind up playing professional basketball, it wouldn’t be for lack of trying. Not for lack of believing.

He hit five shots from every spot along the arch of the three-point line, then he gulped down more water and finally tucked the ball under his arm and walked back to her. He used his shirt to wipe the sweat off his face. “Could it be more humid?”

“Yeah.” She smiled a little and looked at the open back door. “Not much of a breeze.”

“No.” He led the way. “Come on. We’ll go to my house first. I’ll shower, and then we can go to the park.”

That’s all Ellie wanted, a few hours alone with Nolan at Gordonston Park. The place with their favorite oak tree and enough soft grass for them to lay on their backs and watch shooting stars on more summer nights than she could count. She didn’t say anything, not yet. They walked silently out the back door, which Nolan closed and locked. Nolan’s dad was the coach, and he had given him a key a year ago. Too much trouble to open the gym every time Nolan wanted to shoot baskets.

They rode their bikes down Pennsylvania Avenue and then took the shortcut down Kinzie Avenue to
Edgewood. Nolan’s house was only half a mile from Ellie’s, but they might as well have been in separate worlds for how different they were. Nolan’s neighborhood had fireflies and front lawns that stretched on forever. Ellie’s had chain link fences and stray dogs, with low-slung, single-story houses the size of Nolan’s garage.

The sort of house Ellie and her parents lived in.

Ellie sat with Nolan’s mother in the kitchen while he showered. Her eyes were dry still, so she didn’t have to explain herself. Instead, the conversation was light, with Nolan’s mom telling her about the new Bible study she’d joined, and how much she was learning about the Old Testament.

Ellie wanted to care, wanted to feel as connected to God as Nolan and his parents. But if God loved her, why was her life falling apart? Maybe He only loved some people. Good folks like the Cook family. A few minutes later Nolan came down in clean shorts and a T-shirt. He grabbed two chocolate chip cookies from a plate on the kitchen counter and kissed his mother’s cheek.

Suddenly Nolan looked different, more grown up. She was with him every day, so she didn’t always stop
and notice, but here, in his kitchen, she could see it. He wasn’t a kid anymore. Neither of them were. They’d been friends since second grade, and they’d walked home together since the first day of middle school. She still felt like a kid, but somewhere along the journey of time they’d both done something they hadn’t seen coming.

They’d gotten older. They’d grown up.

Nolan was just over six feet already, tanned from his morning runs, his short blond hair cut close to his head the way it was every summer. He’d been lifting weights for basketball, so maybe that was why he looked different: the way his shoulders and biceps filled out the pale green T-shirt as he grabbed the cookies.

Ellie felt her cheeks grow hot and she looked away. Mrs. Cook smiled at her, and Ellie was grateful the woman hadn’t caught her looking at Nolan. “Come by any time, Ellie. The door’s always open. You know that.”

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you.” And with that they were out the door. There was no need to talk about where they were going. It was the same place every time. Beneath the biggest oak tree in the park—maybe the
biggest oak tree in the city. The one dripping with Spanish moss, with the gnarled tree roots jutting out of the soft Southern ground high enough to make a place for them to sit. The grassy patch was just a few feet away, beneath a break in the branches overhead.

The place where Ellie and Nolan had come to talk about life since the summer before sixth grade. Their place. Back then they played hide-and-seek among the trees, with the enormous old oak serving as home base. During the school year, when it was warm enough, they’d do their homework out here. And on nights like this, they would do what came easiest for them.

They would simply sit down, open their hearts, and share whatever came pouring out.

“Okay. Tell me.” Nolan took the spot closest to the massive tree trunk. He leaned back, studying her. “What happened?”

Ellie had been thinking about this moment since she walked through the door of the high school gym. She had to tell him the truth, because she told him everything. But she didn’t have to tell him this very minute, right? He was waiting for an answer. Her
throat was dry, so her words took longer to form. “My mom . . . she was late again.”

He waited, and after a few seconds he blinked. Twice. “That’s it?”

“Yeah.” She didn’t like postponing the truth, but she couldn’t tell him yet. “My dad was really mad.”

“Oh. I was worried it was something really bad.” He leaned back against the tree. “It’ll be okay, Ellie. It will.”

“Right.” She moved to the spot beside him and pressed her back lightly against the tree trunk. Their shoulders were touching, a reminder of everything good and right in her life.

“One day when we’re old and married we’ll come back to this very spot and remember tonight.”

“How do you know?”

He looked at her. “That we’ll remember?”

“No.” She grinned. “That I’ll marry you.”

“That’s easy.” He faced her fully, shrugged, and folded his arms. “You’ll never find anyone who loves you like I do.”

It wasn’t the first time he’d said this. And always he kept his tone light, so she couldn’t accuse him of being too serious or trying to change their friendship
to something more. Not yet, anyway. Always she would laugh and shake her head, as if he’d suggested something crazy like the two of them running off and joining the circus.

But this time she didn’t laugh or joke or push the subject. She only lifted her eyes to the distant trees and the fireflies still dancing among them. Good thing she hadn’t told him about her mother, about how she’d slept with another man and gotten pregnant. Because that would change everything. Nolan would feel sorry for her, and there would be no more teasing about marriage. Not when her parents had made such a mess of theirs.

Ellie exhaled, content. The news could wait.

Because right now she wanted nothing more than to sit here beside Nolan Cook under the big oak tree at the edge of the park on a summer night that was theirs alone and believe . . . believe for one more moment the one thing Ellie wanted more than her next breath.

That they might stay this way forever.

USA Today
and
New York Times
bestselling author
KAREN KINGSBURY
is America’s #1 inspirational novelist. There are more than 20 million copies of her award-winning books in print, including several million copies sold in the past year. Karen has written more than fifty novels, ten of which have hit #1 on national lists. Karen lives in Tennessee with her husband, Don, and their five sons, three of whom are adopted from Haiti. Her daughter and son-in-law, her sisters, and her mother help out in Karen’s office, making her Life-Changing Fiction™ a family affair.

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kingsbury, Karen.

The bridge : a novel / Karen Kingsbury.

p. cm.

I. Title.

PS3561.I4873B75 2012

813′.54—dc23

2012002866

ISBN 978-1-4516-4701-3 (print)

ISBN 978-1-4516-4702-0 (eBook)

Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version® (NIV®). Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica US, Inc.®. Used by permission.

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