My eyes moved around the room and I saw a figure standing beside the window. Coop was staring out into the garden and his profile was breathtaking. His sharp features stood out against the moonlight behind him. He turned to me with a smile on his lips that slipped as soon as he registered it was me standing behind him.
“Bailey,” his hoarse voice sounded like a gunshot across the quiet room. He dropped his gorgeous eyes from mine, and my chest thrummed. My heart was putty in his hands and my body began to move towards him almost without conscious thought. When his eyes lifted to mine again, there was a coldness there that stopped me in my tracks.
“You can’t be in here.” He spoke with a firmness bordering on coldness which made my entire body stiffen. I moved towards the bathroom, ignoring him, and he reached out. His hand closing over my arm almost painfully made me stop when a knock at the door sounded.
“Coop, you in there?” Jan’s voice called out, and he dropped his hand from my arm calling out to her as he stepped away from me.
“Yeah, babe. Hold on.” He moved towards the door and I flicked on the bathroom light, closing the door with my foot as Coop’s eyes met mine in the mirror in the cream tiled bathroom. His eyes widened for a second, but the door closed before I could read too much into it.
I started the faucet and glanced at myself in the mirror. Blood was smeared on my cheek and all over the top of my chest. I was a mess. Specks of blood were in my hair and I wasn’t sure how they’d got in there. I grabbed a cream washcloth and dipped it into the water before scrubbing at my chest.
My right hand sat uselessly on the counter, but I ignored it and rubbed at my skin, trying to get the blood off. With each rub of the cloth, my breathing increased until I crumpled to the floor. Everything was going wrong again. Phil destroyed my room and Coop hated me, again. He was probably screwing her right on the other side of the bathroom door at that very moment. My breathing sped again at the thought and my body shook as I sank down to sit on the floor.
A knock sounded at the door and after a second it opened. I didn’t look up to see who’d come in. In all honesty, I didn’t care. I was so tired, and I couldn’t see in the darkness. Warm arms pulled me up onto a lap and the scent of Coop hit my nose. He pressed his lips to my forehead and sat on the floor with me until my breathing mellowed out.
After a few minutes, the panic attack had passed completely, and my body shuddered with exhaustion as I sat on Coop’s knee. He didn’t speak at all and when I glanced up at him, he was staring straight ahead with tears swimming in his eyes.
“Coop?” I asked hoarsely. His eyes dropped to mine and then continued until they landed on the floor.
Tears poured from his eyes and ran down his nose.
“I was jealous,” he muttered and breathed in jaggedly. “I know how much I messed up, but, Bailey, you need to understand I don’t want to feel like this for you. Being in love with you sickens me. I shouldn’t want you the way I do.” His words cut into me like knives and I struggled trying to get out of his arms.
He held fast and spoke again.
“No, you don’t understand what I mean.” My breathing was ragged as I struggled to get away from him. “Bailey, please let me explain.” I shook my head as my tears spilled over.
“No,” I whispered, pain lacing my voice as I spoke, “you’ve said enough. I can’t hear anymore, not today. Please, just leave, Coop.”
His sharp intake of breath and loosening arms told me he heard me.
“I’m sorry, Bailey, you deserve so much better than my half-assed attempt at loving you.” He kissed the top of my head and gently slid me back onto the floor. As he stood my chest burned, but I didn’t say a word to him, and he left closing the door gently.
That was the last time we spoke for almost three weeks. I didn’t need to explain my wrecked room to our parents because while they were at the hospital it was cleaned up and any damages repaired. Knowing it was him, I slipped Coop a note to say thank you and that was the only communication we had. We didn’t even look at each other and if we accidentally touched, it burned, and we snatched our hands back straight away.
I joined the drama club and spent my days with Lish and Selene. We were all in the school Christmas musical together and I joined the choir with them, finding that I loved to sing and dance, almost as much as I loved to read and look at art. If we weren’t at school then we spent our days going to different art museums and looking at paintings. I loved critiquing the art, but Selene was desperate to paint. We spent a lot of afternoons and weekends in the museums and I loved the peace and serenity of exploring art.
She even convinced me to join the art club because she was an incredible artist, but she wasn’t allowed to go to study art at college. Her dad was a lawyer and her mom was a physicist, so they wanted her to do something more academic. We talked about it at length in art club and on our museum trips and she often came with me to see Zane at the hospital.
If Cooper was there with Jan, we’d go to get a coffee or go to the gift shop and get Zane a crazy gift. We’d gone up to the ward and sure enough, Cooper was sitting with Jan by his side. She never left him alone and I tried to be around them as little as possible, so we’d left without going in.
“Why does Cooper always look so sad?”
I was browsing the candy, trying to get Zane a candy bar to eat and I paused, dropping what I was holding as I turned to look at her.
“I’m not sure. He doesn’t speak to me. Why do you think he looks sad?”
She faced me and I could tell she was struggling with what to say since she was worrying her lip between her teeth.
“He just… he always smiles, but his eyes…” She paused for a moment and turned to face me. “He never has any light in his eyes anymore. It’s crazy.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I turned away from her and chose a Snickers, before walking to the magazines.
“Oooh did you see Jennifer Lawrence is supposedly seeing Liam Hemsworth?” I changed the subject to try and ease feeling uncomfortable with our conversation about Coop.
She came over and stood beside me as I scanned the article. We didn’t speak for a few minutes as I read the trashy article claiming they’d been spotted out together.
Selene cleared her throat as I closed the cover and put the magazine back on the shelf, going instead for a book. One Hundred and One Ways to Live Free. I picked it up and was about to turn it over when she spoke again.
“Hey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you…” Her pause didn’t last long as she took the book from my hand. “Why do you always clam up when I ask you about Cooper?” she asked in a quiet thoughtful tone.
I met her hazel eyes and wished I hadn’t because she always seemed to be able to see right through me, so I decided to go with a partial truth.
“We used to be friends and then we fell out. Now he hates me and I don’t know how to act around him now because he doesn’t speak to me at all…”
I paused as she nodded and patted my arm sympathetically.
“I thought you liked him or something?”
My instinct was to turn away and hide my face, but I forced out a laugh and shook my head.
“No. Not at all. Don’t be gross; we’re practically related…”