joel im sorry but i cant stay in bentley right now

At the bottom of the article was a faded photo of the full Bentley Bison team and cheer squad, circa 1975. The picture was all orange light and seeping green jerseys. Joel pulled the convertible to the side of the road, pinched his screen to zoom in. He identified Corwin from the names at the bottom of the photo: a very tall boy with a brilliant smile that cut through forty years of deteriorating film stock. Gorgeous. Happy. Just like Dylan. Blond, not brown haired, and taller, sure, but possessing the same persuasive glee, an obvious pleasure with his casual power.

Next to him, arm over Corwin’s shoulder, was a young Coach Parter, hair down to his ears, burly even at eighteen. And smiling from Broadlock’s other side was Mr. Harlan Boone, today’s county attorney, already standing (even as a teenager) with the straighter back of a man deigning to submit to public service. The three boys—Boone and Broadlock and Parter—were clearly tight. They held themselves apart from the rest of the team, a trio of golden boys.

Son of a bitch. Son of a bitch.

Farther down the line of players Joel spotted “former teammate” Grady Mayfield—a man who had told Clark he “hadn’t had dreams like this” since he was in school—giving the camera a thumbs-up. A few players away stood young Keith “I weren’t ever invited in my day either” Grissom, a scowl on his thin lips, already looking mean and permanently disappointed. Among the cheerleaders standing in the photo’s wings, Joel spotted a luminous girl who could have been the Starsha he’d dated ten years ago (if that Starsha had ever bothered with her hair): MARGO DELBARDO, the citation read. Joel marveled at her. What had happened to Clark’s mother to make her the nervous, limpid woman he’d always known growing up?

Joel’s eye fell across a short, scrawny boy with a wispy mustache standing alone at the end of the Bison’s line, so shy he seemed to shrink in front of the camera. TOBY LOTT, the caption read.

Mr. Lott. The friendly cartoon man who had been the sole source of decency to Joel in the wake of the scandal ten years ago. The only man in town who hadn’t flinched at the sight of Joel upon his return. How had Joel never thought to ask Mr. Lott about any of this?

He loaded Google Maps, intending to call the hardware store, but his service had died again. Fuck it. He was only a few miles from Bentley. Joel tapped out another quick message to Clark, dropped his phone between his legs and sped toward town.

KIMBRA

A steady stream of cars passed her in the highway’s other lane, all of them heading for the field as she drove toward South Street. Her Bisonette singlet pinched her tits like it always did but for once Kimbra didn’t mind. It was hard to believe that after three years on the squad (and after misplacing God knew how many uniforms) this was the last time she would ever be seen so spangly and green.