AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I felt like I belonged here. With him.
Andthatwas terrifying.
ChapterTwenty-Three
COOPER
The days and nights rolled on by. Farrah and I fell into a rhythm. We spentalmostevery night together. Or that was what I told myself.Almostwas where I fudged the truth. It was every freaking night. We just didn’t talk about it. Maybe that made it seem accidental.
We shifted between our places and developed a habit of closing the door at the top of the hallway so Humpty could move between our apartments at his leisure. Every time I wondered if this was getting out of hand, I shoved that question out of the way, kicking it into oblivion in my brain. We were on the same page. She didn’t want more, and neither did I.
The arrangement was perfect—friends with smoking-hotbenefits.
It was getting so comfortable that I didn’t even consider it a problem until my mom came for her planned visit.
I was bringing my mother to show her my apartment, and Rowan’s mother was with us. “This is a cute little building!” my mother exclaimed as we walked up the stairs.
When we turned at the top, and my hand closed over the knob of the door into the upper hallway, I realized my mother would discover I left my door open for Humpty. As did Farrah. Fuck.
Humpty sat on the windowsill at the end of the hallway in his new favorite place. The sunny spot offered a view into the trees out behind the building. He enjoyed watching the birds flit around, or so I imagined.
Humpty turned and eyed us. “Is that your cat?” my mother asked.
I immediately improvised. “That’s him. He’s figured out how to open the door.” I shrugged.
Walking ahead, I stopped in front of Farrah’s door. Fortunately, it was only open a sliver. I gestured toward my door. My mother ignored me and walked past me to greet Humpty.
Rowan’s mother glanced to the other side of the hallway. I knew she noticed that Farrah’s door was cracked open. I said nothing. They walked into my place a moment later, and I quickly closed Farrah’s door behind me.
You are getting way too comfortable with Farrah, my skeptical mind pointed out.
I ignored it. After my very brief apartment tour, I made sure Humpty was firmly put in my apartment. I took them over to Firehouse Café. Rowan met us there, and Janet even sat down with us for a few minutes.
She smiled at my mother. “We love having Cooper here in town. I’m sure you miss him, though.”
My mother smiled up at me. “Of course I do, but I’m glad he likes it here. For now,” she added.
After getting a list of things to do from Janet, Rowan’s mother went to the bathroom. Rowan stepped away from the table to take a phone call. My mother looked over at me. “I hope you’re not planning to stay here long term. This is just temporary, right?”
“Mom, I don’t know my plans. You’ve been traveling a lot, and the house is for sale,” I pointed out.
My mother took a swallow of her tea, twisting her lips to the side. “Be that as it may, I still think you need closure with Cindy.”
I resisted the urge to grit my teeth and swear. I understood that, for my mother, my breakup with Cindy had shattered her dream. The dream where I settled down in town with my high school sweetheart and the daughter of one of her closest friends. We would all be one big happy family. That wasn’t going to happen.
Not for the first time, I wished my father were still here. Maybe he would know how to help my mother accept this reality. He would’ve had a much stronger reaction to what Cindy did. While my mother had initially experienced her own sense of betrayal at the situation, I suppose in her grief around my father, she just wanted something to stay the same. It was too much of a change for her.
“Mom, the closure has happened. For me. Maybe not for Cindy, and maybe not for her mom. But it has for me. It is what it is. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future. Right now, I have no plans to move back to Stolen Hearts Valley.”
My mother’s fingers tightened around the handle of her mug. “I just wish…”
When her words trailed off, I cocked my head to the side, eyeing her warmly. “I know you wish things were different. They’re not. Things started with Cindy and Dan before Dad died. I guess they just really heated up after that. I would’ve found out one way or another. Stolen Hearts Valley is too small for a secret like that to stay hidden forever. I’m just grateful I found out before Cindy and I got married.”
My mother blinked, her mouth curling down at one side. My heart felt cold for a beat when I saw the grief passing through her eyes. She and my father had had the kind of love many people envied. Life hadn’t been perfect for them, just as it never was for anyone, but they really had always been there for each other. Maybe,bigmaybe, I could’ve gotten over Cindy cheating on me, but not with one of my friends and not with the excuse that I hadn’t been emotionally available enough after my dad died. Because when life got bumpy was when you were supposed to be there for each other. That was what I believed.
My mother straightened in her chair, lifting her chin. “I’m selling the house. I don’t know what I’m planning to do. But with you gone and your dad gone—”
I felt compelled to clarify. “Mom, I’m notgonethe way Dad is.”
