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“You know what nosy boys don’t get?” Quickly unlocking the doors, I haul ass out of the car. I’m inside the apartment, greeted by Pickle’s yowls, by the time August catches up. “Pizza. You feed the boss, I feed you. Deal?”
In all my years of parenting, the one thing that’s never failed me?
Bribery.
“Deal.”
6
CASS
Luna Jackson-Evans ison a mission to give me an aneurysm before breakfast.
No one should be so lively this early in the morning but she could power a generator with the energy flowing from her. Chatting and laughing and gesticulating wildly but that’s not what’s making a headache brew behind my temples.
It’s the woman she’s chatting and laughing and gesticulating at that’s the problem.
I find it hard to ignore Sunday on a regular day. It’s harder during morning practices when she’s one of the few parents lurking, always in a ridiculous bright yellow rain jacket, always sipping coffee, always flipping through a stack of thin notebooks, always gazing at her son. It’s become impossible since, instead of dropping Izzy and running, Luna has taken to joining her.
They’re practically an eyesore. Distracting blots of color in a gloomy, rainy landscape. Huddled together beneath an umbrella, they swap whispers like schoolgirls. Share a thermos of coffee and a box of baked goods. Give the little girls sandwiched between them attention whenever they beg for it—and because Winona and Pippa are their mother’s daughters, that’s often. Only ten months to her sister’s almost ten years, Pippa Jackson-Evans is already skilled in the art of stealing hearts, and when she crawls onto Sunday’s lap and coaxes a sweet smile out of the woman, I have to avert my gaze as my chest does something weird.
Luna is doing this to torture me, I’m sure. Befriending the one person I begged her to leave alone. I all but told her that finding herself a new best friend in Sunday Lane would piss me off, and God knows she loves to do that.
She’s not a mingler. She’s not a ‘sit on the bleachers and make polite small talk’ kind of mom—she’s a ‘sit on the bleachers and cheer obnoxiously loud and talk smack about competitors’ kind of mom. But with Sunday, she’s different. With Sunday, she’s happy to sit and chat and drive me half out of my mind wondering why.
I saw them together at that tournament last week. I watched Luna swoop in and save Sunday from the wrath of a mother scorned. I silently thanked her for it because I’m pretty sure I was one bitchy comment away from stepping in myself—out of coachly obligation, of course. And, purely because I heard what August said and not at all out of lingering resentment, I’m not sure I would’ve been quite as Team Sunday as Luna was.
Although, that wouldn’t have mattered, considering how I acted after.
Doing my best to push the spectators from my mind, I force myself to focus on what I’m actually here to do; coach. Well, assistant coach. In all honesty, I don’t do much but lurk on the sidelines and provide a pretty face. Every day, I’m more and more convinced Ben only asked for my help to get me out of the house, to give me a distraction.
To his credit, it works.
I forget, sometimes, how it felt to play for fun. When overwhelming pressure didn’t eat away at some of the pure joy I feel on the field. I forget, sometimes, how simple it was to just play for fun, and the kids remind me. Watching them makes me wonder how young U12 Select team Cass would feel about his life now. If he’d be happy with it. Most days, I’m confident the answer is yes.
Lately… not so much.
“Someone’s in a mood.”
Calming myself with a deep breath, I side-eye the blonde sneaking up beside me. Luna is all smiles as she extends a pink thermos and a slightly rain-soaked croissant. “If we share our breakfast, will you stop scowling?”
We.Our. Fuck. “What’re you even doing here?”
“Supporting my child, grinch.” Wiggling her brows, she waves the thermos under my nose, filling it with the scent of coffee and cinnamon. “You know you want it.”
It’s definitely my imagination, how double-sided that quip sounds.
Just to shut her up, I relent. I begrudgingly sip some coffee and finish the baked good in two bites, irrationally annoyed at how good the flakey, buttery treat tastes. “Where’d you get these?”
“Sunday made them,” Luna takes too much pleasure in telling me. “Good, huh?”
Unfortunately. “They’re fine.”
Lie-detector that she is, Luna snorts. “You’re ridiculous.”
“You’re ruining my breakfast.”
“Mybreakfast.” She snatches the thermos away with a haughty huff. “Do we need to up your meds or something? That stick up your ass starting to hurt?” Her mouth quirks, sly and provoking. “Or is a different part of your anatomy a little achy?”
