SCARLETT
Cooper pulls both me and Adam by the hands up the pavement toward his school. His excitement is potent as he grins wildly at his friends and waits for Adam to pull open the door before yanking us inside.
“SP! Look, I painted these ones in the mural!” he shouts, pointing to the wall by the entrance made up of painted tiles that all together create a mountain range with high, snow-covered tips and bundles of trees lining the bottom.
“Coop, remember what I told you about having an indoor voice?” Adam chuckles.
Cooper essentially shrugs him off and pulls my hand tighter, bringing me closer to the mural. “You can say that mine are the best. I know they are.”
Arching a brow, I lean toward the two tiles and hum under my breath. “Yeah, Cooper, they’re by far the best.” I gently shove his shoulder with mine.
“That’s not sarcasm, is it?” He narrows his eyes quizzically at me.
“Not this time.” I wink.
A large hand spans the width of my back, and I lean back into its embrace. Looking over my shoulder, I see Adam standing close behind me, watching the two of us with blazing love in his eyes.
I’ve seen that look more times than I can count over the past few months, and I plan on seeing it for a long time to come.
“I can paint you some tiles next time we do that in class, Scar. Maybe I could paint you a gold medal or something,” Cooper offers casually.
My heart squeezes. I smile down at him. “I would love that.”
“Sick. Maybe I can as soon as we’re done with this stupid people unit. I hate drawing people—hold on, is Grandma A still coming?” Cooper rambles, his thoughts scrambled.
Adam bends down, and his words brush the tip of my ear. “She would burst into tears if she knew he had called her that.”
“She’s only been nagging at him to say it since the festival.” I snort.
He kisses the side of my head, laughing. “Yeah, she’ll be here, Coop.”
It’s been a month since we found the right caretaker for my mom, and she’s been handling the change better than I was hoping. She enjoys the company of Bridgett, and they’ve really hit it off. They’re friends, in a way. The relationship they have has helped with the onslaught of guilt and selfishness I felt after telling her I couldn’t take care of her on my own anymore.
That day was hard. It was probably one of the hardest days I’ve ever had. But ultimately, it was the right decision.
Her memory is faltering quicker as the months go on, and with that, her personality is changing, altering. There are some days when I don’t recognize her at all, but somewhere, she’s the same woman who held my hair back when I puked after my first night out drinking and quit her job when I was sixteen because her boss wouldn’t approve her vacation days to take me to a hockey tournament.
It’s been hard, but we’ve survived. She adores Cooper and Adam, and when days are good, they’re so good. We’ve been holding on to those days.
She’s been looking forward to Cooper’s fall art show for weeks now, and he’s thrilled to show off to her. It’ll be good for all of us.
“Yo, Cooper! Come see the pictures I took of my new RC car!”
We all turn to see a group of boys staring at us by the water fountain. The tallest one with a backward baseball cap waves like a madman.
Cooper looks at his father and me and groans. “I don’t care about RC cars.”
Adam ruffles his hair. “Be a good sport. We’ll see you inside the gym.”
“Fine, make sure you wait to look for my table. Don’t do any sneaking around,” he mutters before dragging his feet toward the group of boys.
I stifle a laugh, watching him paint a smile on his face and say hi to his friends. He looks over at us once and sticks his tongue out before turning back and joining the conversation.
“I’m realizing you two have more in common every day,” Adam says.
“Are you trying to say that I’m not a people person?”
“Oh, baby, I know you’re not a people person.”
I roll my eyes at him. “You like it because it gives you a chance to turn on your charm to make up for my lack of conversation.”
“Precisely.” He nips at my ear and uses the hand on my back to steer me in the direction of the open gym doors.
We pass multiple sets of parents, all of whom say hi to Adam and, in turn, me. By the time we actually make it inside the gym, my cheeks are sore from all the smiling.
As we get settled against one of the walls and wait for the official start of the show, Adam turns to face me and grabs my hand, threading our fingers. “I’m proud of you, you know?”
I look at him, and as our eyes meet, butterflies erupt in my stomach. “For what?”
“Everything. Your mom, Cooper, your new job. You’ve come so far since the first time you came into my office.”
Excitement bubbles at the mention of my new job. It’s only been a couple of weeks since I took a coaching position for Willow’s U15 hockey team, but it only took a few days to realize it was the perfect position for me.
After one of her previous coaches decided to drop everything and move to Quebec with her fiancé, they had an opening that needed to be filled urgently, and Willow didn’t hesitate to bring my name up for the position. It was a bit of a shock to get a call from a woman offering me a job I never applied for, but Adam was the one who gave me the push I needed to go for it.
Now, I still train at WIT on days I don’t have practice, but I have something else to give me purpose. Something to push me.
“Now that I think about it, I’ve been really missing our therapy sessions lately,” I admit.
His lips pull into a smirk. “We can always have one when we’re done here.”
“I think that’s probably a good idea. We don’t want all our hard work to be for nothing.” A liquid heat falls between my legs as I stare up at him, my lips parted.
His eyes flare, and as much as I know that a school gym isn’t the right place to be contemplating jumping Adam’s bones, I can’t help it. He does something to me nobody before him has ever done.
“You’re going to end up getting your ass spanked as soon as I get you home and into my bed,” he rasps, squeezing my hand.
My pulse starts to race. “Haven’t I told you before not to threaten me with a good time?”
I gasp when he slips his hand between my back and the wall and inconspicuously grabs my ass, kneading it in his palm. “Remember that you brought this on yourself, sweetheart.”
“I don’t think that will be a problem,” I whisper, pushing back into his hand. He groans quietly, and I smile wickedly. “Are you sure you can contain yourself for the next couple hours? I wouldn’t want you to be . . . uncomfortable.” My eyes fall to the bulge in his jeans.
He bends down, and his lips caress my forehead. “Fuck, I love you.”
Tilting my head, I capture his lips in a quick kiss. “I love you too.”
“I love you both. I mean, look at you. In love and not afraid to show it,” I hear my mom sigh. Adam’s hand falls to his side as we both turn to greet her.
“Hey, Mom.”
“You look beautiful this evening, Amelia,” Adam compliments her. He always does this, and she always turns to putty. It’s adorable, really.
Mom blushes a bright pink as I turn to the onyx-haired woman beside her. “Thank you for coming, Bridgett.”
Bridgett smiles kindly. “Of course. Amelia couldn’t stop talking about it all afternoon.”
“Now, where’s my little guy? I’m feeling antsy to see the little Picasso’s work,” Mom huffs.
Adam answers for me. “He should be out any minute. Why don’t you and I go see if we can find something to drink while we wait? I think Cooper mentioned there would be lemonade.”
“I would love that. You know how much I adore my lemonade.”
With a lingering kiss on my cheek, Adam tells me he’ll be right back before placing his hand on my mom’s back and steering her past all the art tables and up toward the front of the gym.
I don’t know which table is Cooper’s, but I wouldn’t dare disobey his orders. Not when he’s been so excited to show everything off.
Speaking of, I spot the curly-haired boy heading right for me. He grins when he notices me looking at him. I wave.
“Hey, SP. Where’s Dad? We’re ready to start.”
I nod to the drink stand, where Adam is nodding along to something my mom is drawling on about with a full glass of lemonade in her hand. He laughs, and I swear, even from this far away, I can feel the joy in it.
“Oh well. I’ll show you my table first, and then they can find us after.” He grabs my hand and, for the second time tonight, drags me behind him. “I wanted to see your reaction before anyone else, anyway. Before Dad steals your attention and I lose my moment. You know?”
Nerves spark beneath my skin. “That sounds pretty ominous.”
“What does that mean? I don’t think I’ve heard that word before.”
“You’re talking vaguely. It’s kind of scary, nerve-racking.”
“Ah, okay. Yeah, I know I am.”
“Can you maybe be a bit less ominous?”
“No,” he says bluntly.
I choke on a laugh. “Okay then.”
“It will be worth it, I promise.”
“Well, if you’re promising, then I’ll believe you.”
“That’s the right move. Thanks.”
We pass by two art tables and a pair of crying parents before coming to a stop in front of one with a blue covering and Cooper’s name written on a white banner pinned to the front.
“Okay,” Cooper starts, dropping my hand and twirling to block my view of something on the table. “I made this for you, but if you think it’s bad or ugly or something, we can make it disappear.”
Emotion swells in my chest at those words alone. I nod excitedly, too afraid to speak, not knowing if I’ll make any sense when I do.
“Here it goes,” he mumbles before stepping out of the way and shoving his hands in the pocket of his hoodie.
The painting in front of me blurs as my eyes fill with tears. I blink profusely to try and clear my vision but only make the moisture slip down my face instead.
A turquoise-coloured lake rests behind three people. Three people who look way too similar to Adam, Cooper, and me. I flick my watery gaze to Cooper and find him watching me nervously, his eyes wide.
“Oh boy, I made you cry. Should I get my dad? Yeah, I’ll go get him,” he rambles, looking like a dear in headlights.
“No!” I rush out. “No, it’s okay. Is that us?”
He nods once. “Yeah. I told you I hated painting people, and I do, but Mrs. Johnson insisted that maybe I wouldn’t hate it as much if I drew people that I loved.”
I cover my mouth with the back of my hand and swallow back a sob. Between him and his father, they’re going to kill me. “You can’t just blurt out to people that you love them. You need to give them some warning,” I croak.
Cooper smiles apologetically. “Oops.”
“I didn’t know you loved me.”
Curiosity crosses his features. “Why wouldn’t I?”
“You’ve only known me for a few months.”
“I think that’s long enough. I like having you in our family. You complete it, I think.”
A watery whimper-like sound escapes me. This kid . . . this kid is something special. I rush toward him and pull him into a tight hug, mumbling, “I love you too, Cooper. I’ll be here as long as you guys want me to be.”
“So always,” Adam says, joining us. I look at him and notice how his eyes shine as he watches me hug his son.
“Pretty much,” Cooper agrees.
Adam wraps the both of us up in his embrace, and I close my eyes, content and at peace.
I kiss the top of Cooper’s head. “Always sounds perfect to me.”
