Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 55153 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 276(@200wpm)___ 221(@250wpm)___ 184(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55153 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 276(@200wpm)___ 221(@250wpm)___ 184(@300wpm)
“Hey,” I say softly, looking at the bright-white pillowcase. “This is still where I feel you. I keep waiting for your burial spot to become that place, but…not yet.”
I open a bag of peanuts and eat a few, irrational guilt keeping me from saying what I want to.
“I went out with someone,” I finally manage. “I mean, it wasn’t a real date, but…I guess you know that.” I smile. “If I’m assuming you can hear me, I also need to assume you have a bird’s-eye view up there, right?”
When Eric was a patient here, and for all the years he was at the nursing home in Kansas City, I talked to him. No one knew whether he could hear or understand, but I didn’t care. I even told him when the machines were going to be turned off, assuring him I’d be with him every second. And since he’s been gone, I haven’t been able to break myself of the habit of talking to him. He wasn’t just my husband, but my best friend.
“I guess I’m just lonely,” I say, sitting back in the chair. “I didn’t think I was, but when Pax held my hand the other night…none of it was real, but I still felt something. I felt…alive, I guess. Like part of my heart had been dormant for a long time and it woke up when he looked at me like that, and when he said I was beautiful.”
My throat tightens with emotion. This thing with Pax isn’t even real, and it still has me feeling all kinds of emotions. What will I do when a man takes me out and expects me to be thinking of him and not feeling guilty because of Eric?
“Maybe I shouldn’t even worry about it,” I say, my voice barely audible. “I have my hands full with Jasmine and work. I mean, I haven’t even unpacked all the boxes from when we moved yet. As you know. And I don’t think we’d even have clean clothes sometimes without my mom helping with everything. Dating takes time…and energy.”
I finish my peanuts in silence and put the empty plastic wrapper in my snack bag, then drink some water.
“Enough about me,” I say. “How is it up there? I hope it’s like Jasmine thinks, and you get to hop from cloud to cloud watching over us. I hope you’re free again, and you can walk and talk and do all the things you loved.” I glance at my watch. “I guess I’ll get back to work. I think they’re moving someone new into this room tomorrow, so it may be a while until I can come back.” I smile. “But you know how to reach me, so…come visit me in my dreams and give me the answers to all of life’s big questions. And the winning lottery numbers, if you’re in on that stuff.”
With a final glance at the pillow, I pick up my things and leave the room.
Chapter Seven
Pax
* * *
“I’ll get right to the point,” Coach Bear says when I close the door after walking into his office for the post-practice meeting, which he summoned me to right after practice ended. “Is it true you’re dating Pike’s sister?”
I sit down in the chair across from his desk, the armrests squeezing my hips because it’s too small for me. Though I don’t make a habit of lying to my coaches, in this case, I have to.
“Yeah, Coach. Her name’s Kylie.”
Coach pinches the bridge of his nose, weighing his words before speaking.
“You know me, Pax—I like harmony in my locker room. And if things don’t work out between you and a teammate’s sister…”
I nod, wishing I could tell him there won’t be a breakup in this case because there’s no relationship. I’m a levelheaded, reliable player who doesn’t cause my coaches strife.
“This isn’t something I just jumped into,” I assure him, the lie coming easily. “I’ve had my eye on Kylie for a long time now, but I wanted to respect that she was technically still married.”
“How long has it been since her husband passed?” Coach asks me.
“Around three months.”
He nods. “And what about her daughter?”
“Jasmine? She’s…ten, I think? She’s a good kid, from what I know.”
Coach leans back in his leather chair, fixing his most skeptical glare at me over the rim of his glasses. “I’ve known you for what, just over a year now? And I’ve heard you make comments about not wanting kids, Pax. When we’re on the road, I know damn well which of my players are tucked into their beds by midnight and which ones creep into their rooms at four in the morning after spending the night with a woman. And I know damn well that you fall somewhere right in the middle. You’re not a choirboy, and you’re going to end up costing me my goalie when the two of you get into a fight over his sister. You see my dilemma?”