Page 83 of Her Coach

“I should leave you to your devices more often, to be honest,” she muttered. “Maybe you’ll try pursuing your professorship career if I do.”

I just shook my head and rolled my eyes. “Hah. Hah. Hah.”

“What!? I leave you be for a few busy weeks, and you go and get a boyfriend and lose the big V?”

“It’s not that big of a deal, Dani.”

“It really is, Bry.” But then, she paused. “How does your mother feel about you dating the coach, though?”

I felt my heart drop into my stomach. “She’s not necessarily a fan of how old Colton is.”

Dani paused. “Yooooou… gonna fill me in on that answer or something so I’ve got context?”

“He’s 40.”

“Oh.”

“Oh?”

Dani snickered. “I don’t know, just pictured Santa Claus with a walker or some shit.”

“Dani!”

She giggled. “Forty isn’t that bad. I mean, that’s, what? A fourteen-year difference? That’s pretty typical in this day and age.”

I sighed with relief. “I’m glad you think so, because Mom would have you believe that I’d just throw my life away and set that shit on fire.”

“I mean, I can’t blame her, after losing your father the way she did at such a young age.”

I paused. “What do you mean?”

“What do you mean, what do I mean?”

“I mean, what do you mean about losing my father? What does that have to do with Colton?”

She paused for a while before she spoke. “Don’t tell me you’re that dense.”

I blinked. “I’d be offended, but you just sound confused.”

“You mean to tell me you moved back home to take care of your mother after college and you don’t even know what powers her brain and her faculties most of the time?”

I took the last pathetic sip of my watered-down Dr. Pepper. “Love you, but get to the point.”

“You sure? Because I’m not sure you’re going to like it.”

I sighed heavily. I still had yet to apologize to my mother for the blowup before my date with Colton a couple of days ago. But if there was one thing I loved Dani for, it was giving me the hard truths that sometimes I simply didn’t see. I swear to hell on high, sometimes she knew people better than she knew books.

Some days, I wonder if she missed her call to be a profiler for the FBI, or some shit.

“I want to hear it,” I said softly. “If it’s about Mom, and it will help with this situation⁠—”

“You’ve already fought about it once?”

I nodded slowly. “And I may have said some things that I regret.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I shook my head. “No. I just want to know what you have to say. Maybe it’ll help.”