Page 113 of Over & Out

CHRIS: Tell me what you see.

HOPPER: The sky is the color of your cheeks when I kiss you.

CHRIS: Cornball.

HOPPER: It’s true. The sunset’s almost as beautiful as you.

“It’s back on,” Lana says, squeezing my hand.

I pocket my phone, my wet eyes back on the screen.

“So this is the moment,” Rob says dramatically, “where Hopper claims we may love him less. But in an interview like this, you only get one side of the story. So we thought we’d do something different. This time, we’re going to bring in someone with another perspective. A person who’s known Hopper his entire life and might have different views on the memories Hopper’s shared.”

My stomach plummets. They’re going to bring out his dad. They’ve done this before. Had a surprise guestwho contradicts what the main guest says. Who creates drama in the studio. Everyone eats it up.

“No,” I say, my heart clenching.

Hopper’s face is pale. He wasn’t told about the guest. No one ever is.

I remind myself we were just texting, that he survived this interview, and I will too.

But when the second guest walks out, it’s not Hopper’s father. It’s Mabel.

Mabel, who Hopper fired and probably has an axe to grind with. Mabel, who sabotaged Hopper’s happiness—even when she thought she was doing the right thing.

I close my eyes, unable to watch, but knowing my ears will stay open.

And what happens next is a revelation. Mabel introduces herself and says she’s a former member of Hopper’s team. But more than that, she thinks of Hopper as her son.

“And like any mother,” she says, “I made some grave mistakes.”

It’s Mabel who tells the story of what happened that day with the so-called thugs. “Hopper was young and in pain. His mother had received a diagnosis that limited their time together to an uncertain period—months or years, they weren’t sure. And in the meantime, his father was harassing him. Worse, he was harassing her. Constantly. Relentlessly. Hopper saw him trying to put his beloved mother in an early grave.”

As Mabel tells it, Hopper hired a group of bodyguards for her only. He gave them explicit instructions—there are records—to do whatever it takes to keep her safe.

It was his error in wording, surely, but Mabel says she’ll swear to all authorities that it was with the intention of protecting his mother. Not going after his dad. She tells about the night it happened, saying his father violated a restraining order and, drunk, broke into his mother’s home. He refused to leave, and one of the men had to forcibly remove him. Still, he came back.

“The men took their jobs seriously,” Mabel says. “They put him in the hospital. Nearly killed him, truth be told, though Hopper doesn’t know that part. And I made the decision not to tell anyone how bad it was. Not his mother, not the authorities, no one. I told Hopper,” Mabel says with a grimace, “to pay his father off.”

“Mabel, you realize you’re speaking on national television,” Rob says, sounding very serious. “You’re not under oath, but we’re pretty damn close here.”

“I understand that,” Mabel says. “My sole purpose in being here is to tell the world the truth. To relieve the burden from this man’s shoulders. Who, you should all know, is not the bad-tempered man the world knows him to be. But the kindest, biggest-hearted man I’ve had the pleasure of knowing. While I may have brought him shame, I know his mother would have been beyond proud of who he’s become despite what I’ve done.”

There’s more. Lots more. Hopper talks about meeting me and the accident at the dirt track, though he calls it a vehicular accident, which I know is to protect my identity. Mabel says she also covered that up. Lied about the extent of my injuries. Wouldn’t let him visit the hospitalon his own. Had all but a few of the flowers he sent every day diverted so the sheer volume of them wouldn’t alarm the staff.

Hopper says he fell in love with me before he ever saw my face. He doesn’t say it, but it’s clear he never wished his father harm, at least not in the way that it happened. He wanted to protect who he loved. He wanted to love me.

Rob moves on to lighter things toward the end, asking about the Muffin Man incident and then later showing a photo someone snapped of him reading the latest Duke book just the other day in the airport.

“Is that a casual airport read? Or are the rumors of you reprising your Duke role true?”

Screams abound.

“No comment on the movie,” Hopper says when they calm down. “But I didn’t buy that book at the airport. I bought it at this great little store in Redbeard Cove, BC, where I’m filming right now. It’s calledPink Cheeks, and they take online orders of all your favorite romance books.”

Lana screams.

“That’s you!” Shelby yells at Lana, startling Jess on her lap enough that she starts to cry.

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