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“How about we think about a solo vacation next time?”
Ali ran her finger over the display. “Where do you want to go?”
Cornell shrugged. “Don’t care as long as it includes you in a bikini and a piña colada and a bedroom not in your parents’ house.” He was relieved when Ali smiled because the part about Bobbi and John was a joke. Cornell couldn’t have asked for a better family to walk into.
“This one seems appropriate.” Ali held up a Ferris wheel.
“For the record, you won’t get me on one of those again.”
“We’re going to hop on some rides. Do you want to come?” Tara asked.
“Nope,” Cornell quickly answered.
Ali opened her wallet to pay for the magnet. “We’ll get a drink and meet you guys at the house.”
They walked through the crowd toward the water, stopping at a bar. Ali ordered two beers and Cornell reached for a bowl of nuts the bartender had placed in front of them. “Your bag is blowing up,” he told Ali as her phone incessantly beeped from inside her bag. “Your mom? She might be ready to evict Mowgli.”
Ali looked at her phone and groaned. “Bill Jones.”
Cornell’s eye twitched. “Graham’s dad.”
She silenced her phone. “If it’s not one Jones, it’s the other,” she sighed. “Bill wants to make sure Graham’s classes are a cakewalk. I told him Graham is a good—”
“Don’t,” Cornell interrupted. “Don’t say Graham is good at anything.”
Ali rolled her eyes. “He’s your quarterback.”
“Not by choice.”
There had been months of discussion with his boss, Evan, about whether or not to offer Graham a spot—a second chance on a silver platter—at Hopperville. As hard as Cornell put his foot down, it wasn’t hard enough.
Wiping the condensation on the wooden bar with a napkin, Ali shook her head. “He’s here,” she said, referring to the community college where they both worked. “He deserves another chance.”
“The hell he does.”
“Cornell—”
“Ali he assaulted a girl.” Cornell’s tone was sharp, serious, even though he was downplaying it. But he hated the other word—the way it burned as it left his mouth, the way it sounded from someone else’s, like nails on a chalkboard. It was the only word Cornell could think of that had the power to permeate his skin and litter his insides with malaise, an audible injection of poison.
Tonguing his cheek, Cornell raised his eyes slowly. “You’re telling me you want him around?”
Ali sighed in frustration. “It’s not about what I want. I just make sure whoever is there understands the rules and what they have to do to get out, that’s all.”
“And I love you for that.”
It was, in fact, the foundation of his adoration for her. That tiny heart filled with what seemed to be eternal optimism and unwavering belief in every single kid who stepped into her office, but most especially, the most difficult ones—and there were many.
“But there has to be a line. If there isn’t, we might as well pop in the prison on our way home to see if any big guys will be on parole by the first game. I still need a second-string center, you know.”
Ali rubbed her forehead. “I get you’re kind of new. I hate to be the one to tell you Hopperville has had students with criminal records. And ones with pending charges.”
“How many of them were rapists?”
“He’s never been charged with anything, Cornell.”
Cornell’s eyes widened. Graham hadn’t been charged, only kicked out of a top Division-I school, where he was known as “The Texas Gunslinger,” the future of the football program, a potential candidate for a Heisman. So if Ali wanted to bring up the idea of innocent until guilty, Cornell would happily remind her there was no smoke without fire, but Ali continued.
“Years ago we had a player facing felony charges for armed robbery. Everyone was in an uproar, even me. But you know what? Those charges were dropped. He went back to Division-I and graduated with honors. You might think the problems that land kids at Juco are the biggest issue. But they’re not,” Ali said emphatically. “The biggest problem is when they slip through the cracks right back into the issues that landed them there in the first place. I try to make sure the cracks are sealed, Cornell. For everyone.”
