Crap. I cast a quick glance in his direction before I could stop myself. Look away! But I didn’t have to, because...he wasn’t there anymore.
I scowled at the empty seat at the card table. He must have slipped out at some point while I was very determinedly not looking his way.
I set the tray down with a thud as disappointment washed over me. The urge to cry was real.
Which was stupid because I should be glad he was gone. I should be happy that he’d gotten the hint and left. I sniffed and swiped at my eyes before picking up the tray again with a weary sigh.
Yup. Happy. That was me.
I forced a smile when Nora and Rosalie stopped me on my way out of the room. “You’re not leaving, are you?” Nora asked.
I glanced at the clock. I had ten minutes left until my shift was over. “Not yet.”
“You should stick around,” Rosalie said, slipping her arm through mine as Nora did the same on my left. “We have a surprisingly fun night planned.”
“Oh, that sounds…nice.” My enthusiasm was feigned and it sounded lame to my own ears, but I was more distracted by the not-so-subtle warning looks Nora was shooting Rosalie, not seeming to care that I was in the middle.
“Um, well, I’d better finish cleaning up,” I said, as I gently slipped out of their grip.
“Oh, but you can’t,” Rosalie started.
She was interrupted by Olivia’s sudden arrival. My friend rushed through the door, out of breath and smiling like a lunatic.
“Olivia?” My brow was creased in confusion. “What are you doing here?”
She ignored my question, turning her beaming grin on Nora and Rosalie. “I’ve got it from here, ladies,” she said with a wink.
“What the…” Before I could finish, she’d grabbed my arm and tugged, pulling me along behind her toward the restroom.
“What are you doing? Why are you here? Where is—”
“I think it’s probably best to just hold all questions for now,” she said when the door clicked shut behind us.
“But why—”
“I got it!” Collette rushed through the door behind me, nearly knocking me over. She was always taller than me but she seemed to tower over me now as she gave me a quick hug. She was wearing heels. And… I pulled away to stare at her in shock. A formal dress, with a garment bag slung over her arm.
I glanced over at Olivia, my mouth still open to ask another question, but then she shucked off her winter coat and I blinked, mostly because I was shocked to see her wearing a cocktail dress, but also because the flashy sequins of her dress temporarily blinded me.
“Like it?” she asked as she struck a pose. “I got it last minute at a vintage shop.”
“I-wha-where—?” I couldn’t complete a sentence, let alone a thought. I looked from her to Collette with my mouth hanging open. “What is going on here?”
They laughed.
“Collette, seriously, what are you doing here?” I asked. My shock was fading and that weary, hollow exhaustion I’d been feeling for days returned. I was tired. I was sick—well, I was heartsick. Was that a thing? Whatever. What mattered was that I was in no mood for surprises and I definitely didn’t feel like getting dressed up.
Collette opened the garment bag and shoved a dress in my direction. No, not just any dress. My dress. The dress I’d worn to the dance the other week.
“Why…?” I started.
Collette grinned down at me. “Just call me your fairy godmother.”
“Fairy—”
But before I could finish, Olivia was coming at me with an open tube of lipstick.
When she pulled back and ordered me to blot my lips on a tissue, I heard giggling on the other side of the door as if a herd of teenage girls were stampeding past the bathroom door. “What is that? What’s going on?”
Olivia sighed with exasperation. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you? Don’t look a grand gesture in the mouth.”
Collette shook her head. “That is so not a saying.”
“It is now,” Olivia said.
“It doesn’t even make sense.”
It didn’t make sense. None of this made sense. But it was clear these two weren’t giving me any answers. A little while later I was no closer to understanding what was going on, but I was looking better than I had in days. They’d even managed to get rid of the shadows under my eyes so a casual observer might not know at a glance that I was wallowing in misery.
“I think we’re ready,” Olivia said when she took a step back to assess her handiwork.
“Ready for what?” I asked.
I should have known better than to expect an answer. What I got was an escort. Like Nora and Rosalie had done ten minutes before, they each took an arm, leading me out of the bathroom like I was their shared date.
Or, more accurately, a hostage.
Music was coming from the open doors of the rec room—the same old-timey swing dancing music that had been playing my first day here. But that was where the similarities ended. Because this time when I entered the large open room, I didn’t see card tables and senior citizens watching TV.
I found a dance.
Like, a high school dance, complete with the guys from the football team and my friends from the academy. Even Holly and her friends were there, swaying in time to the music, giggling amongst themselves, and staring...at me.
Everyone was staring at me, but I was too busy taking in Nora and Rosalie and the other Hazelcrest patients who were coming toward me in a weird sort of procession, each holding a rose.
Nora was the first in line and she handed me the rose. In a ridiculous stage whisper she said, “The rose ceremony was my idea. I saw it on The Bachelor.”
All I could manage was an open-mouthed stare in response. Rose ceremony? Fairy godmothers?
What was going on here?
One by one, the senior citizens handed me roses until I was holding a small bouquet, but I’d stopped paying attention because I’d spotted him.
Cooper.
How could I not? He towered over all of the elderly patients lined up in front of him but he patiently waited his turn, his gaze locked on mine.
My heart was beating so loudly it drowned out the music. Cooper’s gaze was so intense, so filled with emotion, that the rest of this scene faded away.
When Cooper finally reached me, I couldn’t take it anymore. “What is going on?” I meant for it to come out as an angry demand, but it ended up as a whisper. Emotions were choking me as heartache warred with something far more terrifying—hope.
“Eve, I—” He stopped to take a deep breath and wet his lips.
He was nervous. The cool, calm, irritatingly unflappable Cooper Jenkins was nervous.
“Eve, I want a second chance.” His brows came down in a fierce scowl and he shifted even closer so he was towering over me, blocking out the rest of the crowd, his voice so low that he couldn’t be overheard. “I know I messed up. I know I don’t deserve it, but—”
“Wait.” I shook my head, my lungs threatening to burst out of my chest as I tried to get enough air to make my head stop spinning. “Wait,” I said again, holding up a hand to stop him from saying anymore.
The music was messing with my head. The stares of my friends were distracting me. His words were….well, his words were killing me. Because I wanted to believe that this was real, but it all felt so strange. This whole scene was like something out of a fairytale and the words coming out of his mouth were coming straight out of my dreams.