I nodded. “I just need to make a quick stop home to change.”
“Don’t be late.” He shot me a wicked smirk. “You might be harmless, but Bianca is definitely not.”
I forced a smile but my head was spinning and my emotions were churning. Their words kept coming back to me, so at odds with the way I saw myself. What I feared for myself.
I was so lost in my own thoughts that I almost didn’t notice that my mom was home when I walked through the door. She was grabbing her things to head out for another shift. She eyed me. “So you’re going then,” she said as she watched me grab my bag with the lame pants Bianca made us wear for practice.
“Yeah, I can’t miss another one,” I said.
“Good. I’m glad.” She turned away but hesitated before turning back to face me. “Coop, I just wanted to say…”
I arched my brows, shifting the bag from one hand to the other in impatience. “Yeah?”
Mom stared at me. I hated that I snapped so I tried to walk it back. “Sorry, what’s up?”
She cleared her throat and took a deep breath. “I don’t know what happened between you and Eve on the porch the other day…” She trailed off with a little blush as my brows arched in disbelief.
Crap. This was not what I needed right now. I wasn’t exactly looking forward to seeing Eve tonight and I wasn’t sure having a conversation about her with Mom was helping any. Especially not when if I allowed myself to step back, I would realize the truth.
I was desperate to see her.
Just to make sure she was all right.
But I was also scared that if she wasn’t alright, I wouldn’t be either.
But Mom looked so fervent as she stared at me so I brought my thoughts back to the conversation She’d heard me talk to Eve. Right. Focus on processing that. Our house was small. Tiny, even. With the door open the way it had been, it would have been hard not to hear what we’d been saying.
“Okay fine, I didn’t hear all of it,” she amended. “But I heard enough, and I just need you to know…”
I backed up a step in alarm as her normally tired, weary expression shifted to something far more intense and way more...emotional.
Ah crap. I’d had my fill of tears this week, and I couldn’t handle the thought of another female I loved crying over me.
“Hey, Mom, it’s okay,” I said, awkwardly moving toward her to pat her shoulder.
“I know, I just…” She blew out an exasperated breath. “I just want you to know that you’re a good guy, Cooper.”
My face went slack and my hand dropped to my side. What was this? Had someone sent a memo telling the people around me that I needed a pep talk or something?
“I know you’ve struggled since your dad and then Connor and…” She sniffed. “I just need you to know that you’re nothing like them.”
I gave a grunt of sarcastic amusement. “Yeah, right.”
“I mean it.”
“I have Dad’s temper,” I started.
My mom surprised me by letting out a little snort of amusement as well. “You have one of our tempers.” She rolled her eyes. “I hate to break it to you, kid, but everyone in this family has a short fuse.”
I scowled down at her. My mom wasn’t exactly a saint but I didn’t think of her as an angry person, either.
She shrugged. “We’re also generally quick to forgive and have a tendency to feel deeply in a lot of ways. Not just anger.”
I couldn’t stop staring at her, as if maybe by watching her lips I could better understand what she was trying to say.
“But the important thing is, that’s where your similarities to your father and your brother end,” she continued. “Your father…” She shook her head in frustration. “He has a tendency to be selfish. Connor, too. But you’ve never shared that trait. Even as a kid, you always looked out for others. You always put everyone else first.”
My eyes widened in surprise when she clapped her hands on my shoulders like a coach, her expression deathly serious. “I love that about you. I do. But I also think it’s time you stopped worrying so much about taking care of everyone else and started worrying about you.”
I frowned down at her, feeling for the first time in years like she was….well, my mom. And not like I was the one taking care of her.
I shook my head in confusion. “I don’t know what you mean.”
She bit her lip and then sighed. “I mean, it’s time for you to think about what you want. What will make you happy. Because Cooper…” She squeezed my shoulders. “You do deserve to be happy. You know that, right?”
I stared at her, unable to answer.
Did I?
And then everything else she’d said came back to me and hit me like a ton of bricks. She didn’t think I was like my dad. Or my brother.
She wasn’t just waiting for me to stumble off the right path and mess up my life.
The enormity of what she’d said left me feeling shaky, even after she walked out the door to head to work.
I followed right after, my bag in hand as I drove to the academy, my mom’s words kept playing in a loop, along with all those things Ryan and Ethan had said. By the time I reached the academy, there was one phrase my mom had said that wouldn’t leave me alone.
It’s time to think about what you want. What would make you happy….
What would make me happy?
I didn’t have to think about it. I already knew the answer.
Maybe I’d always known.
As I parked my car I saw Eve getting out of Ethan’s car and jogging up the steps.
Eve was what made me happy.
But I’d ruined my chance of happiness with Eve...and there was no way I’d get another shot.
My life was in the crapper and I had no idea how to fish it out.
Chapter 13
Eve
Olivia caught up with me the moment I walked through the front doors of the academy.
“There you are! Just the girl I was hoping to see.” She linked her arm through mine as we headed toward the studio where I’d be dancing with Cooper. Assuming he was man enough to show. A sort of dark cloud hovered over me as I followed alongside her. My heart was pounding and my head ached. I didn’t want to be here. I really didn’t want to be anywhere. But I was tired of Mom asking me if I was okay and giving me a look that she’d perfected over the years. The one that said, I hear what you’re saying, but I don’t believe you.
Olivia looked suspicious as she was focused over my shoulder toward the front door where the football players were starting to stream in. Her grip on my arm was so tight that she started cutting off circulation.
“Olivia…” I gently pulled my arm from hers, desperate to get some feeling to my fingertips. “I’m fine. I promise.”
“Of course she’s fine.” Collette’s voice was just a little too chipper to be believable as she came to my other side and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “She’ll have us there.”
Us, presumably, was her and Ethan. Maybe Bianca and Ryan, too. What she meant was, I’d have friends in my corner.
But right now, I didn’t need friends.