Page 43 of Mile High Coach

Even against the toughest game of the season.

Even when everything else is going wrong.

And it’s at that moment, watching her sit down and reach over for a bite of someone else’s popcorn that I have a terrible, horrible realization.

I am falling in love with Lovie Waters.

Chapter 19

Lovie

“Idon’t know, Lov,” Chrys says, her voice staticky over the phone. “He’s just been…different, since that last hospital trip. Like that light he had before is gone. And I’ve been trying to cheer him up, but it’s like it doesn’t even get through to him.”

I switch the phone to my other ear, glance through the fogged up windows of the grocery store, and try to focus on my sister and shopping at the same time.

“Did you tell him about Shannon’s?” I ask, giving another shopper an apologetic smile as I step around them to grab a bottle of nonalcoholic wine, and two more bottles of the fertility wine Harrison suggested.

Shannon’s is a little diner in Portland that cooks up a whole Thanksgiving feast and delivers it to your door. When we were kids, my mom would call ordering Shannon’s “naughty” cooking.

“I told him,” Chrys says, sounding apologetic. I grab a package of crackers and a block of Havarti, then throw them into my basket. “Maybe he’ll feel differently when it’s here.”

“Maybe,” I agree, swallowing down the lump in my throat at the thought of Shannon’s not even cheering him up. “Hey, sorry Chrys, but I’m about to go through the checkout.”

We say our goodbyes, and I try to put the thoughts of my dad out of my head as I walk a block back home. Snow is already coming down, floating gently through the yellow street lights, and I’m not the only person hurrying home, head down against the wind, clearly buying last-minute Thanksgiving supplies.

Because the weather is supposed to be bad, Harrison thought we should have our Thanksgiving tonight, just in case the power goes out tomorrow. I agreed, and now I walk through the lobby and into the fancy elevator, punching the button for his floor.

Maybe I should stop by my apartment first, freshen up, run a brush through my hair, but I’m to the point where Harrison knows what he’s getting from me. After a week of lying on my back, knees to my chest, eyes on the ceiling while he made me laugh, I hardly need to worry about my bangs being frizzy.

Still, even with that familiarity, I knock when I get to his door.

“Lovie,” he says, something warm and buttery in his voice when he says my name. Then, his eyes dart down to the items in my reusable shopping bag. “I told you not to bring anything.”

He looks flushed, his cheeks tinged the lightest pink, which somehow only makes his blue eyes bluer.

I have the strangest urge to rush forward, throw my arms around him, pull him close to me and breathe in his scent. To feel his hands on my back, to let him hold me. I ignore it and pull the bottle up, shooting him a smile I hope doesn’t give away the feelings lingering from my conversation with Chrys.

“I brought nonalcoholic wine,” I say, turning the label toward him. “So we can get not-sloshed.”

“Sloshed?” he says, raising an eyebrow. “Is that what the kids are saying these days?”

“I’m thirty-three,” I counter, stepping in when he backs up and lets me inside. I kick my shoes up, hand him the bag, and meet his eyes. “So I have no idea what the kids are doing.”

“Until you have your own.”

I know he means it as a joke, but it hangs in the air between us, a reminder of what this is. A deal for sperm. A contract we both signed to spend time together.

Forcing a laugh, I brush past him and toward the kitchen, knowing he’ll want to follow me so I don’t touch anything. He got a firsthand taste of just how bad my cooking skills are last week when I almost set his apartment on fire.

“Hold on a second,” he says, skirting around me, one hand on my hip gently guiding me to the breakfast bar, and I laugh at the obvious redirection, my shoulders relaxing at the relief of the brief awkward moment passing.

More than anything, I want to take a pregnancy test and find two little lines instead of one. But I’d be lying if I said the thought of that—of being done with this thing with Harrison—didn’t also make me a little sad.

“There you go,” Harrison says, opening one of my teas and depositing it next to me on the breakfast bar. Like every other time I’ve come to his apartment, I sit and sip my drink, swinging my feet and watching him cook, but this time it’s the world’s cutest—and totally not sad—Thanksgiving meal for two.

He rubs Cornish game hens with butter and herbs, boils and peels red potatoes, washes asparagus and tosses it in a mix of oils and seasonings. Harrison chats with me as he cooks. We talk about the season, the drama with Greenhill, whether or not we really think he’s left the mother of his children high and dry.

There’s no doubt in my mind—Harrison is still holding out hope that Greenhill turns out to be a decent guy.

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