Page 47 of Coach Sully

I sniffle, the tears coming down my cheeks in full force. He doesn’t deserve it. Fuck, this is a disaster. I have no idea how to get out of this mess with both of us intact.

“I will. I’ll tell him.”

Raleigh takes a deep breath. “Okay… Now, tell me about you. How’s the nausea been?”

I sniffle again. “I’m home sick today.”

“Okay, I’m going to stop by later with some of those spice cakes from Sugar and Ice. You said they helped, right?”

“You don’t have to do that.” I don’t want to see her. It will only make me feel worse. I’m ashamed of not telling her it was Sully, and even more ashamed that she found out before Sully.

“I’ll be there around three. Get some sleep, babe.”

I roll my lips together to keep from crying. “Mm-hm.”

I disconnect the call and scream into my pillow.

My dumpster fire of a life is no longer contained. It’s spreading to everything I touch. Sully. My career. My friends.How can I be a parent if I can’t even take care of my own problems?

I’m afraid there’s only one way out of this. I have to tell him.

Kendra is gone for the second day in a row. It’s got me worried. It’s not like her to miss work. I’m supposed to be focusing on my newest date, Becca, but all I can do is speculate on where my producer is. I know I pissed her off with that interview, but she rarely ever misses a day. Today’s shoot feels different without her buzzing around, delegating and juggling a million tasks.

I push some of the broccolini around on my plate, wondering if she’s home sick or if something happened. What if she was in a car accident yesterday? No, somebody would have said something. Shit, what if that interview shit got her fired? She said something about it, but I didn’t take her seriously. Fuck… Rachel doesn’t seem concerned, and she would say something, right? People would be talking about it.

“Do you like to travel? Is there anywhere you want to visit you haven’t been yet?” Becca asks, taking a sip of wine. I’ve been avoiding my glass. I’m not in the mood.

“Yeah, I love traveling. Somewhere I haven’t been?” I do my best to give her my focus. “I’d really like to visit Vietnam someday. What about you?”

“What?” She looks at me funny. Maybe she didn’t hear what I said.

“Vietnam.”

“Oh, I thought we were talking about traveling.”

Am I having a stroke?

“We are? Vietnam is where I’d like to visit. What about you?”

She tilts her head to the side and furrows her brow. “Vietnam was a war, it’s not a country.”

I almost choke on my bite of salmon. “Pardon?”

“It was a war. It’s not a place you can go. Unless you plan on time traveling, but even then, why would you want to visit a war zone?”

Wait. She doesn’t think… No way. She’s got me speechless. My eyes find the film crew. Several are staring at the interaction wide-eyed. One of the audio assistants has his back turned, his ears are red and shoulders shaking like he can’t keep it together. I can’t believe Kendra is missing this. How do I respond to her without making her look like an enormous idiot in front of everyone? I ignore her comment and continue the conversation.

“Where do you want to travel?” I ask.

“Somewhere tropical. I love the Caribbean, but I’d like to go to Hawaii or Alaska.”

One of the crew coughs to cover their laugh.

“You mean somewhere tropical like Hawaii…orAlaska, which is not tropical, right?”

I don’t mean to offend her, but after the Vietnam thing, I have to check.

“Huh?” She drops her fork on her plate. “No. Both are tropical… they’re right next to each other on the map.

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